Week 13 and Week 14 - Bali, Indonesia Trip!!

Bali, Indonesia

I arrived home from New Zealand on Monday. It was a good trip, but on Sunday the white water rafting was canceled, which was definitely a highlight of the trip. I ended up meeting some Israeli Defense Forces soldiers, and as you all know, I love these guys. lol We talked and went to a local bar and just chilled. I learned some new Hebrew words.

Tuesday it was pouring out so I got a ride to the tavern and met some friends there for drinks.

Wednesday I slept and packed and then left Bond University at 330AM for a flight from Brisbane to Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia.

We landed in Bali and checked into the Hard Rock Hotel. It was snazzy. I liked it alot. Day 1 there we walked around, got food, drank beers at the Centerstage Bar in the Hard Rock Hotel. Got dinner at the restaurant in the hotel. I got Nasi Goreng, which means Fried Rice. It was one of the best meals I have had in a long time. It was also Thanksgiving so it worked out that I got such a good meal. Some people went out after the bar but I was exhausted and decided to go to bed. We woke up early the next morning and rented a car and a driver named Nelson. We drove to a place on the western side of the lower tip of Bali called Uluwatu. It is a famous surf spot. One kid surfed while we tanned on the decks above the rocks there. It was a hott day. The Indian Ocean is a very warm ocean too. Cools you off, sort of...

Then we went to a Monkey Temple on the cliffs. It was huge and hundreds of monkeys were everywhere. They were eating and jumping around and were not intimidated by people at all. The temple was pretty as it overlooked the ocean and pretty cliffs.

The temples do not allow women who are menstruating inside of them. They consider it unclean. It is kind of funny to see posters strewn about saying "Women with periods may not enter." lol.

Then we drove to Jimbaran Bay and saw the beach. It was pretty corroded but there was a whole strip of seafood places. They were kind of expensive so we went to Nusa Dua instead and got food at a Lotus Flower joint. It was delicious. I got Indonesian soup and Balinese chicken spring rolls. The currency of Indonesia is a Rupia. One USD = 12,500 Rupiah. One AUD = 8,000 Rupia. So at first you can get confused when you see "Balinese Springrolls 28000 Rupia" and then you realize.. Oh shit.. thats not even $3 bucks for spring rolls!

After Nusa and dinner we shopped around a bit and then drove around Denpasar. It was about 8 oclock and even though we could technically keep the driver for longer, we decided to go back. We showered and got ready and went to the band playing down at Centerstage. Their name was "X-Cite" they were a full band who played all different types of American songs from Shakira to Billy Joel to whatever. We were singing along at one point lol. Some of the bar staff were so cool: Mustang gave me a rice paddy hat. I wanted to take it home to wear for Halloween but it was just too big to deal with bringing to Fiji and all over the place. Hogi was a manager there he was real nice too. After Centerstage we walked to the club spot in Kutu (which is where we were staying) and went to a club called Bounty. Bounty was huge. 2 floors with over 5 different rooms. The first room had ethnic Balinese music being played live on hand drums and with tambourines. They had a good deal for scorpion bowls: Buy one for 45000 rupiah get one free. That's about 4 dollars for 2 gigantic drinks by the way. We all drank a few too many. Danced. Talked. Laughed. Sang. It was really a good time. We didn't get home until really late.

Saturday in Bali: I woke up and was like whoa I drank way too much. I drank Arak which is clear liquor made from rice. In Bali there are hundreds of rice paddies but the natives are starting to sell their paddy's to construct buildings and other things on because the rice paddies just aren't profitable enough anymore. I slept late then went to the beach and the pool and just chilled. We got lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe. We then shopped around and Jen and I got facials. Everywhere you walk people are like massage? massage? (do not pronounce it like Massage American style say -mah-sah-g, separate syllabus) The facials cost less than 4 bucks American. Colleen and Tom arrived (I might even be getting my times wrong but this all happened maybe not in this order though). And Colleen and I checked into our own room. We went to the pool then went and got food. This time I got Mie Goreng, fried noodles, which was awesome. The food here in Bali truly impressed me. Then we showered and went to the other room. We have some cocktails and headed out to Bounty area again. We partied in Bounty for awhile but knew we had to be up early for Sunday's festivities.. White water rafting and Elephant safaris!!!

Sunday: Colleen and I were up real early. We got breakfast at the hotel, which was bomb digs. Really good food! Fresh omelets made to order etc. We then got picked up and driven 1.5 hours away to the river, the Ayung River. On the way we saw more rice paddys, more of the scooters that almost every person in Bali owns, and again, hundreds of dogs. I am telling you, I have never seen so many dogs in my life. But supposedly most of the dogs aren't strays, they live with families but fend for themselves for food and then come back and protect the house, cattle, and other animals that a family owns. There have been 4 cases of rabies recently on the island, although it had been eradicated since the early 1980s. Culling of dogs was authorized by the government in order to reduce the threat of rabies but many home owners are in outrage. How could you tell if one dog is a stray and one dog is owned but just roams free? Well, you can't! Most of the dogs look filthy so you can't tell like that either. We talked to our driver about it and guess what. He eats dogs. You read it correctly, he EATS dogs. He asked me if I do as well and I was like UMM my dog is my best friend!!! Aw KC I miss you.. lol Glad I got to see you on webcam!! hahah Anyways I guess back to white water rafting..

White water rafting was definitely not as intense as the first time I went in Cairnes but it was way more cultural and beautiful. We had a few bumps, one enough for 2 people (including my friend lol) to fall out. It was pretty hilarious. Our guide kept asking if we were okay the whole time and I just wanted to be like DUDE we are fine there aren't any Level III rapids like the brochure says!! But we saw natives bathing and washing clothes and cleaning pots and pans and stuff it was crazy. We saw people filtering out the sand to make pottery and use as like concrete and stuff. We saw amazing hotels and rice paddies and beautiful trees hundreds of feet high with Tarzan-like rope swings and stuff. Heard some monkeys but didn't see any. It was a total of 8KM long. It was definitely fun! After this we went had to walk up hundreds of steps. It was intense and locals were bothering us to buy stuff the whole time. $1 dollar please $1 dollar. I am telling you, some of this stuff was worth WAY more than $1 measely dollar. We would have bought stuff but we left our money in the car to stay dry.. Poor people..

Got to the top and went to hot showers. Two girls were in it.. naked.. It was a trip. Colleen blurts out "I am going to wait until we are home to shower!" so loud. I just went in with my bathing suit on and then she followed suit. I guess Americans just weren't raised to.. um.. be so open.. In New Zealand women were showering naked all over the place in the hott bathes too. Then our driver brought us 45 minutes away to the Elephant Safari!!!

We got to the Elephant park and went inside. There are 27 elephants in this park. They were all rescued from Sumatra, the largest island in Indonesia, and 6th largest island in the world. The elephants here are being slaughtered for their ivory and what not so an American man who married a Balinese woman descieded to do something about it. He rescued them and brought them to a land parcel of land in Bali. There is about to be the first ever birth of an elephant on Bali, ever, from a set of the elephants. There are only 6 male elephants so the women tend to fight over the male companions. It takes 18 months of pregnancy for an elephant, double that of a human! These creatures are actually mammals, as they are completely covered in hair. Their cute heads are full of reddish hair. They are so gentle and sweet and let you pet them, feed, them, they smile on command, and lots more. They can start having children around the age of 20-25 years old and live until they are approximately 75-100 years old. Two other cool elephant facts: Their trunks contain over 50,000 different muscles!!!! Their legs have certain creases they are only their own, no replicas anywhere; just like the human fingerprint!!!

We played with two different elephants for awhile, feeding them coconuts and sitting on their legs and stuff. I felt bad but then realized the men who work there are kind to these elephants; they have dedicated their lives to training them and befriending these guys. The elephants get fed so much food and are safe here in this park. We watched a show where the elephants demonstrated basketball skills, math skills in which I held up a number and they did math 4 + ? = 6 and the elephant took the 2 out of my hand! Smart guy! lol. They did some other tricks. It was cool. The music in the background was so corny though. Then we got on and rode them!

It was pitch black and we got on the elephant, Hamoush, and rode around for about 15 minutes through a nature jungle walk. We saw crazy huge spiders and stuff. Our elephant was misbehaving and it was pretty scary. She was hungry and kept reaching up to the trees for food. When she did this the entire back of her would tip, including the seat Colleen and I were on, and it was close to making us fall off. It made it more exciting though! I always seem to get the hungry animals aye? LOL It was cool. Then we got off at the restaurant and I will tell you, wow was the food great or what! It was bread, brushetta, salad, soup, bread crusted chicken with potatos and vegetables, and then a molten chocolate dessert. MMM MMM. Unfortunately I was having really bad heartburn and couldn't even eat it all. :( I have been getting heartburn lately and I've never had it before. It sucks really bad.. Then our driver drove us back to the hotel. Saw so many dogs in the darkness on the way back. We watched some movies and passed out.

Monday- The next morning we got breakfast and then went to the pool for alittle bit. We then got 90 minute FULL body massages, and I mean FULL body massages, with body scrub, yogurt scrub remover, and then a flower bath. It was intense. It felt best when she was rubbing my shoulders. It was my first ever 'professional' massage. Then we went shopping around the city. We got a ton of stuff. Cheap too. Then we got our hair braided on the beach. Not only was this a bad idea because the lady did a crappy job on my hair, but because we were literally attacked by heaps of Balinese women trying to sell us junk. I ended up buying 3 necklaces, 3 singlets, my nails were done almost without my permission, and I got a sarong. So intense. They made you feel so awful if you didn't support them at all. It was quite the experience. Suprisingly enough though they had licenses to do what they were doing! We got into a coversation with a surf 'instructor' on the beach and he was talking about Obama and how he was excited for change. He was excited Obama said that we aren't Muslim, black, white, Asian, or Christian, we are all Americans. He was like you guys don't like me because I am Muslim but I hope one day you will realize I am a good person too. It was an interesting talk.

This was certainly not the first person to bring up Obama. Almost 100% of the time when asked "where are you from" and I would respond America, they would instantaneously say OBAMA! you have a new president! He studied in Jakarta (the capital of Indonesia) for years! We love Obama! Do you like Obama?? OBAMA OBAMA OBAMA.. lol it was annoying by the end but it was great that the people are keeping up to date with the international community and its politics. I was reading the Jakarta Post and liked many of the articles alot. Good opinion peaces and stuff.

That night we got a buffet dinner which was good and then headed up with our friends to Bounty, Paddy's and a few other places along the night club strip. We didn't get too drunk because we were getting picked up at 8:20 AM the next day, but it was alot of fun.

Tuesday- We were picked up by 2 guys for a full day tour. We picked up another couple, grandparents lol, from England. They were nice though. We went to so many different spots through the day I am going to just list them:
Silver making shop: People were hand crafting silver jewelry and other items.
Tapestry making shop: People (including 8 year old kids) were making hand woven tapestries and hand painted tapestries. They were very pretty and unique.
Barong Dance Show: A traditional Balinese dance performance. It was veryyy strange but a good experience. They had a good god and a bad god and the people rallied behind the good god to kill the bad one. There was a huge dragon-like creature at the begining, called the Barong I think, who danced around and stuff. It was pretty and these people must get 1. so hott in these intricate and thick costumes and 2. bored of doing the same exact show every single day.
Coffee Plantation: We saw coffee bean plants and coffee being roasted. Cacao beans for chocolate. Passion fruit (So delicious). Pineapples (really cool to see growing out of the ground). And some weird fruits as well. Giganormous spiders too. I tried some of the local hot chocolate it was good. Saw some of the hottest peppers on earth. It was cool.
Painting Village: Went to a local painting shop and saw people hand drawing and painting. WOW! It was really impressive. They were so sweet and so talented for real. I ended up buying 2 small paintings for less than $50 American. I don't have any money left but these people need the business.

After the Bali Bombings in 2002 and 2005 the economy of Bali has suffered tremendously. People were scared to go to Bali thinking more terrorist attacks would occur. I never felt unsafe in Bali at any time. There are security guards everywhere. If you enter a nightclub or a hotel you are searched and your car is searched (not like everything but enough to know if you are a terrorist or not ya know?) and even the underneath of your car is looked at from a mirror device. People should not be afraid to go to Bali at all. The people are some of the nicest people I have ever met in my life and we should not allow Islamic terrorists such as Jemaah Islamiyah stop us from traveling to a place that is so beautiful and friendly. The Balinese people literally depend on tourism to live. I once read 93% of the Balinese economy is based on tourism. That's the whole economy! Bali's population is about 90% Hindu and 10% Muslim.

Another thing we did: Ate lunch while looking at an ACTIVE volcano! It wasn't spewing lava or anything but it is indeed an active volcano. It blew up in 1998 and killed 1000 people its path of lava and molten hot destruction. Our guide said we were lucky because we were so high up and usually it rains but this day we could see all of the volcano although clouds and what not were roaming through it at times. It was a magnificent site and the pictures just don't show how amazing it really was. We then went home got room service and watched movies in the hotel room for the rest of the night. The next day we checked out and laid by the pool most of the day. I finished reading a book and swam and relaxed. We got lunch at Pizza Hut lol. It is a very popular spot in Bali! Oh and I saw my first Dunkin' Donuts since being away! I got a cafe latte!! For dinner we ate at a cheap local spot. My last Balinese meal! Then we got a $4 dollar taxi to the airport and ended up taking a very many shots (some free from the Duty Free shop, 12 year old whiskies and stuff! wow) with some other Bond Uni kids and got on the plane. The security to get through was very intense. They searched every person's carry on luggage. They threw away my suntan lotion that I forgot to put in my checked baggage. :( Colleen has all of the elephant photos so I will try to get them from her and post them as soon as possible. I am also working on the previous weeks entries as you finish this. I just think this was the coolest and it is the freshest in my mind. Thanks. Full photo album addresses:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2232014&l=4822c&id=1812695

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2232014&l=4822c&id=1812695

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2232015&l=58ed4&id=1812695