Advertisement
Published: March 7th 2008
Edit Blog Post
London, New Delhi, Mumbai, Hong Kong, Melbourne, Darwin, Sydney, Phnom Penh, Hanoi, Kunming, Macau, Kota Kinabalu, and now Ubud - that's the list of places I've been to twice since I began my travels, though only a handful were because of actually wanting to return rather than having unavoidable admin motives. Ubud required revisiting in order to meet up with LA Woman, whose itinerary for 2008 was otherwise rarely going to be coinciding with mine.
Ubud in rainy season was a rather different prospect to when we had visited last September. An oppressive heat and humidity weighed on the town, discouraging activity and permitting only sweaty forays out for lunch and dinner. Regular monsoonal downpours created cataracts down the stone stairs of the guesthouse's gardens - at least their coming brought with them a blessed breeze and the temporary notion that maybe the temperature had dipped grudgingly below 30 degrees. We'd chosen our guesthouse partly because of its swimming pool, but sadly there seemed to be many families staying as fellow-guests and I'm a firm believer in the theory that Swimming Pool + Children = Public Urinal, so we made little use of it.
I was dismayed to find
that I too had changed since our last visit. Then, nearly 2 years of flitting through countries that generally fell at the hotter end of the spectrum had given me a tan that reeked of an outdoor life. This time, I was again a pasty whitey - weeks in the fringes of the Chinese, Mongolian, and Russian winters, plus a UK Christmas, had robbed me of all colour. The biscuit orgies of December had also restored a certain plumpness that was hardly becoming. I think I'd been aware of this but had mentally decided to ignore it, however it was painfully obvious to LA Woman who had last seen me a good few shades darker and pounds lighter. Fortunately the weight problem was solved by my usual loss of appetite in hot climes, and the Ubud sun spread a pink smear across my face in order to point out my English roots.
Distressingly, some of our favourite friends from last time had not exactly thrived over the last 4 months. Delicat had completely disappeared. We didn't see Glamourpuss until 3 weeks had elapsed, and even then had merely 2 sightings. Library Cat 1 had scratched herself raw due to
a flea infestation and her coat was patchy and lacking in shine. Even Library Cat 2 was showing signs of flea damage. A few kitten sightings held the promise of replacements to our feline circle, but there was no regularity to the locations in which we found them.
Our routine had one goal only - relaxation - so I have little to write, even after a month. I think I read more books in those 30 days than any similar period in my life. One discovery from this was an explanation why there are so many people in Bali with apparently the same name, e.g. Wayan, Kadek, etc. This is because these names mean 1st, 2nd, etc, referring to the order in which the children in a family popped out of their mother. The main English language newspaper here also appears rather informal when naming people who appear in its articles, with their first name often being the only one given, e.g. in a piece about the earthquake in Aceh province: "Head of the Aceh disaster mitigation task force, Bobby, said his office was still trying to determine the exact number of casualties ..." It's interesting that such practices
exist in a country with the world's fourth largest population, where name ambiguity in general might be thought of as more widespread than in, say, Tuvalu.
The month passed all too quickly and an unhappy farewell to LA Woman marked the beginning of my journey to the Americas. We'll see each other again this year, but both date and location are currently unknown. There's a moronic cliche about travel broadening the mind (which I would not necessarily agree with), but not as much said about it saddening the heart.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.06s; Tpl: 0.015s; cc: 9; qc: 23; dbt: 0.0358s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb