Waka Namya Ubud

... on you – that's just how it is.
If people don't have much they try to get as much as they can from
foreigners who they know have a lot more money than they do. They
hustle. All you can do is try to educate yourself on how much stuff
costs – negotiate by cutting every price at least by half,
understand you will pay a bit more and go with it. The Balinese as a
whole are lovely people and are giving.


We also ...

... about 60-70 cents to fill up each time. Once we got the motorbike Mike and I got pumped - we felt the sudden rush of being able to travel independently without having to rely on public transport. This excitement got our minds racing with ideas for day trips. We were ready.

Before we could even think about going on a day trip with our motorbike, however, we had to do a little practice as neither of us drove a motorbike before. Michael caught on pretty well along these narrow roads ...

... powiedzial, ze zalatwi nam wejscie za 60tys. Po chwili namyslu zdecydowalismy sie zobaczyc. Zalatwienie wejscia polegalo na tym, ze weszlismy bez biletow. Taniec Barong to kolorowe przedstawienie z Barongiem oraz czarownica Rangda w roli glownej. Symbolizuje walke dobra ze zlem. Przedstawienie nie powala na kolana, byc moze dlatego ze dla bialych jest nie do konca zrozumiale. Czesc osob opuscila przedstawienie w polowie.
Pozniej udalismy sie do fabryki ...

... been walking many hours by the time we were done. It was time to be done with our jalan jalan. After a couple errands, we went home to relax for about an hour before we headed out for dinner in town. Our plan was to have dinner in town, come home and have a couple drinks, and then try to find the bars in Ubud to have a night out on the town in Ubud. We had yet to even try going out in Ubud and did know that there were about two places ...

We had a set schedule of the week from Tuesday to Friday of teaching at our Ubud school, so I could really plan out my days ahead of time and actually make a schedule for myself. I woke up at 5:45 to get a run in and get to school by 7:30. Today, we were teaching Grade 1 and then Grade 3 in the morning at our Ubud School. Grade 3 and Grade 4 would be later in the afternoon at the Sayan school (a village nearby). We began our lessons of the week with Grade 1 and went over the ...

... and urban, where rice paddies co-exist with fine cuisine and comfortable living. I dont know for how long though... it is an irony that just to the right of our bungalow, there is construction going on in full swing to build more bungalows. You can see they are eating into the rice fields, and can imagine that delicate balance getting disturbed permanently in the not-so-distant future. It has not been so rustic all the time in Bali. We ...

... surf spots, the swell was dying off, and the tides were very extreme - so a lot of spots were washed out in the morning. Uluwatu is the Huntington Beach of Bali. There's a cliff full of restaurants, surf shops, and ding repair/massage/lifeguard/photographer/r ookie information stands on the lower level of the cliff. The line-up on a meager day was over 50 people easy. I looked all over for a decent board, and found a pretty nice one but ...

Up to Ubud. I'm expecting a small town in the mountains...a little cooler, with lots of artists...also lots of ex-pats...plus a monkey sanctuary. Well, small it is not. Apparently Ubud has grown and grown and now has more shops than you could ever take in...and in fact, there are lots of artists...but TOO MANY PEOPLE - both locals and foreigners...and it's not cool at all, just as hot as anywhere. My favorite place here is the monkey ...

... getting in your way without getting run voer somehow). Added to the general mayhem of driving here where every motorbike except you pays no attention to any laws (they especially like to roar up one way streets and pretend that your lane is theirs) was the fact that we didn't know where we were going and Balinese street signs lack in signage (although they make up for it in potholes where are everywhere and look like meteorites may have once crashed in to them). Anyways ...

... in Ubud, which is about an hour from Denpasar. I went up on Saturday afternoon and came back on Sunday evening. There are lots of nice shops, and crafts, and restaurants, and batik-making courses, and then there are bird watching tours, and dozens of performances of traditional Balinese dancing every month. Of course I didn't have enough time to see or do that much, so I will have to go again in the future. What I ...