Labuan Bajo

My boat leaves in an hour so I have time for one little post from Labuanbajo, the small and quaint fishing village on the edge of the Flores Sea. These islands are a few hundred miles from Bali but a century apart. The main attractions here are Komodo Dragons, huge carnivorous lizards, and the diving. There is also the now famous cave called Flores where the possible new dwarf subspecies of genus homo was discovered a few years ago dating to the Pleistocene and earlier. The local people have lore about little people roaming the forest, but little is known beyond that. We do know that Indonesia was home to many early species of of homo (think Java-man).

The bay is idyllic and serene with great sunsets. I have only been here two days, but its kind of charming. The biggest town, Labuanbajo has a few thousand people and tourists are just discovering its charm. Yesterday I rode a motorcycle into the interior on disintegrating roads and trough mountains full of switchback curves. Last night I could hardly move from the ride; my body was beat. I saw some lovely little towns and lots of rice fields, as well a cacao groves, smiling people and tons of little kids who all greeted me with enthusiasm. Anyway, before getting on the boat here's a few pictures.







Hey, it's a boat called the KMP! Must be mine.













View from the hotel of the serene little bay






Mountains, and more.








Small kitten sleeping in my shoe at the local "bar" as it is. They have a good soundtrack and fabulous homemade ginger ale (fresh ginger, mint, lime, and mineral water.














My main form of transport and torture. Comes with helmet.







Small farming villages in the interior of Flores..... It's dry here, but they bring water from the mountains in complex hand dug canals. This looks like very hard work.


















A typical warung in this seaside town.

OK, heading for the boat. More when I get back next week....

Location:Indian Ocean

Bali Days

Ok, I'm remiss on posting to my blog, despite best intentions. It's been a long but exciting last 10 of so days. Bali is a paradise, but it comes with a cost, for sure, that affects both the people and the place. There's a clash between rampant development and traditional people and a clear impact on the local ecology. There are 240 million people in Indonesia, close to the population of the US, and there are 17,OOO islands. 120 million of those people live on the Island of Java in three huge cities, the largest being Jakarta. There are some other big cities, but nothing compares to Java. Just as a measure of the growth in wealth here, Indonesia is currently importing 800,000 motorbikes a month. That's almost 10 million a year. Asia is ascendant, but its not all good.

Bali has 2.5 million people, but many a clustered in a few cities near the coast, and the interior is made up mostly of smaller villages where people are closely related and farming, religion, and landscapes are intertwined. Each house has a temple where people daily make offerings to their ancestors. The temples are always in the NW corner of the compound and are large and elaborate with several shrines and altars. Each rice field, owned by a family also has a temple in the field. Each village has a much larger temple complex, also spatially located to the north (if you are on the southern side of the island, the import point is that it must be towards the mountain). These are used for community and larger ceremonies which are frequent (more than one a month). There are also much larger temple complexes located at prominent points like at the base of the mountains and by the sea. These are more pilgrimage destinations for events, or just when people can get to them. All these different layers are intertwined and have related meanings. For examples, the organization of water management, allocation and labor to keep the rice-production system in place intimately tied to the religious order and hierarchy. There's a good book by Stephen Lansing called "Priests and Programmers: Technologies of Power in the Engineered Landscape of Bali" that goes into much more detail.

Anyway, heres some pictures from my visits to friends houses in Bali, some household temples, and some larger ones. At the end are a couple pictures from my few days by the beach, surfing. Bali has some of the best waves in the world, so this was not to be missed. Next, I'll post on my trip to Komodo and Flores, wonderful islands to the east of Bali and centuries away. As I write I'm sitting in a rustic cafe in Labuanbajo, a small funks fishing village overlooking a stunning bay. It's hot and noisy and full of strange smells.




Sign at the entrance to Pura Tirta Empul temple complex. Don't go there if you are mad.




Temple in the lake



Preparing food for Kunidan, a large festival held every six months. All the food is for offerings at the community temple.












Young performer from the Barong Dance.




Rice fields on Bali, with mountains to the north.




More rice, this time by Kendran the little village where I rented a house.







Cave shrine to Ganesh, with traditional Balinese offerings





Perfect surf, Kuta, Bali (tourist hell with great waves)

My new home

After four nights in small guesthouses in Ubud I was able to move into a small house in a village called Kenderan about 15 min to the north of the bustle. The house is located just outside the village in the rice fields. I comes complete with pool, staff of two during the week, and sweeping views of the paddies. The staff does come on weekends too so that they can leave offerings to appease the spirits that inhabit the land. This has to be done everyday.


The house is pretty cute from both the inside and outside. It's spartan by US standards, but perfect for the tropics. I have rented a small motorbike to commute between here and Ubud, where there is yoga, food, people, and internet. So far, I have ridden the bike about 300 km exploring the countryside and meeting Balinese, who are always friendly and willing to talk to a stranger, even if we can't always speak the same language. I would guess that about 1 in 5 people can speak a little English.

Location:Kenderan, Bali

A Bali Welcome

After a long flight (27 hours from San Francisco) I arrived in Bali via Seoul and Singapore pretty exhausted from doing nohing but sitting on a plane. Singapore Air, the Cadillac of airlines, but despite the three "gourmet" vegetarian meals it was still airplane food and there really was not enough room on the plane to do any serious yoga without elbowing passengers in the nose. I mostly slept. The airport in Singapore is pretty swanky though, and I enjoyed the surprising range of options available at 3:00 AM feeling rather rested after my 17 hour nap, as it was. Around 5:00 AM I realized that my ticket did allow me access to the Premier Club so I got a hot shower with ample products and a fairly good Asian breakfast, but passed on the wide of complimentary international cocktails other passengers were enjoying. The three hour flight to Bali involved another two meals and we landed at noon, sated indeed. Bali is the destination of choice for Australians, Chinese, Germans, and others whose economies are not in the crapper and there were about 200 people going through the two open customs lines. A large sign read "BRINGING DRUGS INTO INDONESIA IS PUNISHABLE BY THE DEATH PENALTY." They don't fool around. Simple caning is simply for the arrogant. It seems that most of the pasty visitors are going to the exquisite beach resorts on the southeast coast. I plan to avoid that plan.










My driver, kindly recommended by a friend, met me at the end of the customs line for the drive to Ubud, the heart of Balinese culture and agriculture 35 km from the coast. Made (pron. MA-dey) is a 30 something tourguide with a heart of gold and my first introduction to what is truly a remarkable people, generous, accepting, spiritual, and cautiously integrated into the modern. I think Bali is a place apart from the rest of Indonesia, but more on that later.



Made took me around to look for a house and thankfully discouraged me from some of the ones I looked at on the internet that as it turns out were more like hotels in the heart of Ubad's hustling tourist center. But, this is no Cancun. You can still get a one hour great massage for about $10USD and unlike India there are few touts or unionized beggars. We spent the better part of the afternoon looking and finally I decided to take it easy and check into a guest house and search tomorrow for a rental in the countryside which is what I want. The house, in the middle of Ubud is a family compound that is at least several centuries old and houses the traditional shrine building, outdoor kitchen, and a two ornate guest bungalows. Like everywhere in Bali the family spends a couple hours each day leaving offerings of flowers, incense, and food at dozens of altars across the compound.