Our trip to Bali, Indonesia was wonderful! The weather was extremely similar to what we get in Malaysia--sunny and hot with interspersed rain. We snorkeled one day and our guide was really fun and would swim down and bring back up interesting sea life from the bottom of the ocean. We saw a good-sized eel and that was cool. One day we took an island tour and the first place our tour guide took us was to the Barong and Kris Dance. It was really entertaining, although the language was Indonesian so we could only follow with the actions and the brochure we were given when we arrived. Supposedly the Barong play represents an eternal fight between good and evil spirits. The costumes were elaborate and they "over-acted" so it wasn't too hard to figure out the gist. Next we went to a Batik factory and got to see them actually doing the work on the fabric, along with hand weaving. The Mas Village wood carving center was after that and we absolutely loved watching those guys holding the wood with their feet and carving it. Needless to say, we bought several souvenirs here:) For lunch we went to Mt. Batur, an active volcano located at the northwest of Mt. Agung. The first recorded eruption of Batur was in 1804, and it has been frequently active since then, last eruption 2004. It was CONSIDERABLY colder up that high and it felt great, but started to rain and we weren't really dressed for that weather (obviously in the picture).
There are many, many temples on Bali and we went to Puna Gunung Kawi Sebatu, commonly called Spring Temple because of the natural spring water flowing throughout. We were asked to wear sarongs, of course, and it was a series of smaller springs of water and some beautiful fish in each of them, surrounded by various statues.
The hotel we stayed out on the east coast of Bali, Ayodya, had a Balinese Theatre featuring the Ramayana Ballet. We went one evening and had a wonderful buffet followed by an entertaining "show". There were no words spoken, just a group of men (the orchestra?) by the side playing various drums and chimes to the movements. It was not what you would think of as a traditional ballet, but the movements told a story of (you got it) good triumphing over evil. Many of the statues on the island are draped in black and white check "aprons" and we were told that this symbolizes the good/evil relationship. I actually just thought they looked kind of cute!
One day we took a taxi into Kuta, the busy, heavily populated west coast of Bali. There were a lot of hawkers and tons of shops all selling the same thing. The beach on this side of the island has many surfers due to bigger waves and that was fun to watch.
The one thing that did surprise us was the number of scooters on the island. After living in Malaysia the past few years, I am pretty used to having many scooters on the road and have them surround your car while waiting at a stoplight. In Bali there were MANY, MANY more scooters--they just dominate the road and they carry EVERYTHING on them besides people (which we saw large numbers of those on a single scooter, also). I'm just not sure how people survive on the roads with that many weaving in and out while the vans, cars and buses honk ALL the time! I did a lot of praying:)
