After getting a little too close to nature, we decided it was time to upgrade for a little bit. All this time on vacation, and I think I am paler now than when I arrived. The weather has been nice, but overcast and temperamental. I needed a pool.
We find Hotel Beji, a 5-minute taxi ride from the center of Ubud, the "cultural capital" of Bali. Ubud is in central Bali, with no access to the beach but is home to many artisans and craftsmen, and has a number of cultural performances.
For USD 150 a night, we have a two-bedroom "villa," two bedrooms connected by a common outdoor living room. The hotel grounds are gorgeous... Full of green, beautiful landscaping, 5 INFINITY POOLS. Timeka sees the place and she's DONE. She pretty much has parked herself in front of the pool and has read book after book since she arrived.
Down the block from the hotel is a popular barbecue joint that has a grill in front of the place cooking up Balinese-inflected American fare: hamburgers, steak, chicken, satay, and...pork ribs. For some reason, even in this hindu/muslim country, some people really appreciate a pork rib here, Timeka is beyond excited, and I discover the first dish I order this whole trip I don't like: nasi goreng. I had heard that this was THE Balinese comfort food, so I was excited to order it. It's fried rice, people. Simple, boring, fried rice. My fried rice is better than this, but then again, I make a mean fried rice for a Jew.
I've had a massage every day. I found a place with a young girl I like that has a $7 an hour massage. I've had one every day. Because, waking up, having breakfast, going into the pool... This is hard work and sometimes you need a massage to unwind from all that.
Lisa needs something a little more high-brow... I think her massage was $15 an hour. Lisa is fancy. She is so fancy that she makes me go to this place Clear that is vegan/raw/macro/organic and has fancy juices made with cashew milk and spirulina and kombucha and all that stuff I generally won't touch. I keep an open mind, mostly because I'm not hungry at the time, the place is gorgeous, and they have good wifi. They make you take your shoes off at the door. I had some summer rolls that were little more than seasoned vegetables in rice paper, but tasty. At about $3-4 a plate, and about $3 for a fresh juice blend or smoothie, you can't complain no matter what. If this place were in manhattan, it wold cost about 3 times the price, and be three times as smug. It was lovely in there. I had a peanut butter/banana/cashew mylk (yeah, they spelled it that way) smoothie, and I discover that (a) cashew mylk does not upset my stomach at all and (b) the banana smoothies I make at home are severely lacking in peanut butter.
Lisa also can't sit still... She is running all over the place, pretty much from the moment breakfast is over until the town closes down at 10 pm. Sometimes I go with her, sometimes I don't. I'm impressed that she puts me to shame in that department. Timeka likes to lounge, Lisa likes to see everything, and I'm somewhere in the middle. I'm impressed as to how well we're negotiating our individual travel style and needs.
Lisa and I make plans to walk around central market and see a show. We see some batik sarongs, traditional Balinese ornate fabric. I figure I can pick a few up as gifts and for my African dance class. After some intense negotiation, involving me, Lisa, the woman, and the shopkeeper at the next stall whose English was a bit better, I think I have knocked her down to about $1.50 a sarong. SUCCESS! Oh no, off by a power of 10 AGAIN. She was initially asking for USD 25 a sarong, and settled on USD 15. What a mess. I bow out, pretty sure I can get a piece of imported batik fabric cheaper in the garment district 10 blocks from my apartment.
No matter what is happening, at least one of us is completely fucking up how many zeros to chop off the price. It's really embarrassing. I think it's because it's so easy to convert from rupiah to dollars, we haven't started trying to "think" in the local currency. So instead of thinking "oh, 35000 rupiah is reasonable for that dish," we're translating to dollars, and poorly at that. I can't do math in the summer, clearly. Even if it involves just moving a decimal point.
Lisa and I go to the water palace to see a traditional gamelan and Balinese dance performance... Spectacular. The gamelan is a large metallic percussion ensemble, and the accompanying dancers have impossibly expressive eyes that dart back and forth to each beat and their very long fingers are double-jointed and stretch back in a way that is almost uncomfortable to watch. My mouth was agape the whole time.
The weather is cool and comfortable, and we start getting the feeling that a week and a half in Bali isn't going to be nearly enough to experience anything.
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