Holy Temples, Holy Snakes, last days in Bali

I depart tonight, 7 hours to Korea, 14 hours to DC, a 5 hour layover and one hour to Hartford. The heat here really is too much for me, searing in the day, but lovely about 6am and in the evening. I never thought I'd be looking forward to cold weather!

I am in Sanur on a small strip of land connecting the main island to a smaller "drop" sized portion of Bali at the south. It's a very upmarket beach town, but very quiet, its such a place that I can't afford to stay ON the beach, but there is a paved path that I walked on for miles yesterday morning. My hotel is across the road and is lovely, my room has ac but also a nice porch where I read in the afternoons, interesting to be reading "Walden" in such different conditions. This morning I visited a beautiful local temple, also quite early.

The last two days have been taken up with seeing cliff-side temples on "sunset" trips. Unfortunately non-Hindus are not allowed in them, and because they are on a cliff, not even that near them, so you get a good spot for the "photo" op. As much as I would have liked a closer look, I can also see why a huge amount of tourists would not be practical on cliff side temples. The ambiance is fun, I often enjoy just camping out somewhere and enjoying the parade of tourists.

Tannah Lot Temple


Often the strangest things about my trips alone are that there are no photos of me, so I obliged another tourist, just to prove that I really was there!

At Tannah Lot, there was the additional interest of the "Holy Snake" I could not understand what made it holy, but the two men who had the snake looked like pretty serious types, they had a brisk good business also getting people to pay to see the holy snake, which I also obliged.

The Holy Snake

The Holy snake

This morning on my early morning walk I came upon a beautiful local temple with a great deal of rock faces as well as bright polychromed painted images of a wild amount of deities, some recognizably Hindu, others nothing that I could understand, probably the mix of indigenous deities and Hinduism which is what makes a place like Bali so interesting. The temple is supposed to have ancient roots, a lot of parts of temple seem to be being "renovated" I hope too much of the older material is not lost. Unfortunately I had my camera on a setting where I can't upload the images here. Those kind of "finds" not on any tourist map, are often what I like the best, serendipitous finds.

Yesterday on my early morning walk I came upon a temple in the far north part of the Sanur beach, which seemed to be a local fishing community far outside of the tourist area. There in the place where there is an empty "seat" for the god was a taxidermied monkey, quite haunting as there was also a monkey in a cage,

Temple Monkey, not looking very "alive"
it was not the type of place that inspired me to hang around for very long. A bit south of that was a huge abandoned type of tourist or entertainment complex, however the beach in this part of Sanur was better than the "reefed in" beach that formed the main part of the tourist area, making all the more haunted in feeling. Fortunately it was a hazy morning as I had a 4 hour walk, the sun can get hot by 7am and later than that its positively searing.

Ulu Watu Temple, this in on the far south coast of Bali

Ubud

Ubud is charming, the main phrase you here over and over and over again however, is "taxi" or men approach you making hand symbols that are to mean the revving of a motorcycle, a taxi is not needed as its quite a walkable city.

As much as the intense commercial aspect of a tourist city like Ubud can get on my nerves after 6 days, its been very nice. I've eaten in a lot of interesting places, but have returned several times to the Lotus Cafe where the food is excellent, unusual and there are many more things on the menu I'd like to try than days left in Ubud.

I've enjoyed both of my hotels, and particularly my present one, possibly one of the most luxurious I've had. Shopping is what one does here and the prices are geared to the European traveler so not to my tastes, particularly compared with the beautiful thing I regularly find in India, where I'll be in about a month. Outside of the commercial area, which I imagine has grown in all directions in recent years, there are nice walks in the rice paddies. So many of the buildings look new, that it does seem to be recent development.

There are cultural events every night, I've seen two concerts and a free shadow puppet theatre at my hotel that was being put on for another group, I think from what it sounded like, a group of American students. Tonight one can show up at the nicely organized tourist desk in the center of town and catch a free bus to a bamboo gamelan concert in a nearby village.

Its very very very hot, so I am on my usual routine of being up early and then again in the late afternoon and am thankful when its hazy, as I can be out walking earlier in the afternoon. One of the highlights, which you will see some photos of, is the Monkey Forest preserve, some interesting temples and a lot of monkeys and amazing densely tropical water and trees.

Today I braved public transportation to the capitol city of Denpasar, about 40 minutes away, not that its a problem once you are on it, but with so many potential taxi drivers and other types of transport services, actually ending up on a public bus and not on a more expensive "special" bus is a challenge, and not one I always met successfully, but I did get there and back. My impression is that people think you're plain nuts if you are a tourist and want to take a public bus, but for me, it spells liberation from bargaining with taxi drivers, which I must do later this week to get to some of the temples on my list that remain to be seen. Denpasar is not given much credit in my guidebook, but at least in the area around the beautiful museum, large park and main temple, it was gracious, shady and tree-lined and I enjoyed a long walk after I had visited the temple and museum.

I'm getting restless as I usually do, and rather than spending all of my remaining days here, I'll spend the last three at Sanur, described as a quiet beach in an authentic Balinese village on the south penninsula. Its described as a bit sleepy as its mostly populated by retired Brits. That will be fine for me, compared to my other beach experience in Kuta. Plus its near one of the most important temples, on a ridge that sticks out on the far south coast, an area that is not built up for tourism at all. Trying to see that from Ubud would have been quite a drive and probably at quite a price. I think saying good-by to Bali at the beach will be quite appropriate.

monkey forest preserve

Monkey Forest

monkey business in the monkey forest

more monkey business

early morning ceremony in the Monkey Forest temple

Lake Batur

I'm in very hip Ubud now, which is crawling with tourists, for good reason, its a very nice and interesting place to be with a lot to offer, and to have my last days in Bali. After Padangbai which my bad cold might have made seems a more negative experience than it was, (how bad can a beach in Bali be afterall) I had two beautiful days at Lake Batur in the mountains and felt I really recovered, at least I had the energy one day for several continuous walks from 9am to nearly 4.

I found this path near the lake, its a raised area that prevents the lake water from flooding the farmers fields. I'm not sure if was an official path, but it did just fine and nobody told me otherwise. I walked along it quite a long way until it ended, this is a view into the farms

tree shrine and boat from my walk

There was not much if any town, but that was not necessary as there was a spectacular botanical garden and the lake itself and the extremely picturesque Pura Ula Danau temple. The weather seemed to change constantly as you will see from the many photos I took of the temple sitting in the lake. I didn't bring my other card from the camera, but it actually was sunny part of the time and I have some nice shots of a sunset that I'll post later. In the botanical gardens it went from a light rain to a heavy rain (I found a covered temple area to sit it out in luckily) back to a light rain, to a complete white-out fog, to sun and the clearest weather I've seen, all in about 2 hours.

After I left there I walked around a serpentine main road to another path on the side of the lake that was supposed to lead to a "Japanese cave" and then a walk to a very high temple. After some trial and error and about an hour walk on the wrong path, I found the Japanese cave. It looked like something out of Indiana Jones so no way I was going inside of it, but I never did find the path to the temple but had a nice walk anyway. Because it is rainy season, the path might have been overgrown.

Lake Batur, Pura Ulun Danu temple


Lake Batur again

More Lake Batur

Lake Batur at dusk (check back for Sunny Lake Batur!)

SUNNY Lake Batur



Like in Willimantic, the Lake Batur temple has frog guardians, though here they don't have spools to sit on. This frog has a bird guardian on its head.

Ancient Buddhist stupa at the Hindu temple of Lake Batur

Its fun to be here in Ubud, there are three main streets, one called Monkey Forest Road, and they are lined with shops, so there is a lot to poke around and look at, including many temples, palaces and walks out into less populated areas. Tomorrow I'll go to the temples at Monkey Forest sanctuary, though the monkeys themselves are said to be nasty creatures and I have no walking stick like John Craig had in India, to defend myself with, but do have a big umbrella which may suffice, as it rains on an off quite a bit, often in terrifically strong monsoons, so one always has to have an umbrella handy. The one I bought in Yogja is huge, for these kind of very serious but often quite short rains.

Since I came early and my reservation started the 15th I found a nice room in a rambling old stone building, but its rather dank and dark so I'm glad to be moving to the hotel I reserved for my last days here, I stopped by today and its the lap of luxury with a lot of tile, and big airy balcony. I have two writing projects to finish while I'm here so mid days will be spent there writing and early mornings are for walking around. At night there are cultural performances at many venues in and out town, some in villages, but a mini-bus at the very well organized tourist office takes people there for free, there is something going on every night. They have really worked hard in this city to preserve many of the traditional arts. After that, so many nice places to eat with international fare, the other night I had a delicious stone pizza, but mostly I love Indonesian food and a nice cool local beer.

I have shockingly fast email here that loads the photos in moments, this is not in any way normal, its only because the card reader on the other computers would not work, so I'm using the internet managers own mac and its pouring rain outside now anyway, so I'm taking good advantage of the chance to load a lot of photos

fog after the rains, Bali botanical gardens Lake Batur

huge Banyan tree, Bali Botanical gardens

Snake (naga) shrine,a temple in the Bali Botanical gardens

after the rains, from the main road, if you look carefully, you can see the edge of Bali, that's what finally made me realize that Bali is probably smaller in size than the state of Connecticut

Snake Guardian at a temple

cat guardian at a temple, his funny square hat is a little "offering" from the way he looks, I'd be quick to appease him too. The real temple guardian however was a very large barking dog that I decided to take no chances with, as much as I was dying to see the shrine that was under the large tree in the back, but didn't want to content with a displeased god (dog)

If not for the temple dog, I would have gotten a closer look at the shrine under the very old looking tree

temple ceremony, these go on all the time, often stopping traffic, but wonderful to observe. Men wear long colorful patterned sarongs and a white "Nehru" collar shirt and turban

these kind of little "offerings" are everywhere, made of simple palm and flowers, offerings to the gods, sometimes there are crackers, for the hungry gods

Bali temples and scenery

On my 4th day in Bali, I finally feel like I'm in Bali. I came to Padangbai (which is bay or small port, so I think of it as Padang Bay) as a base to see some temples and in a town named Klungkung the remains of a palace nearly destroyed by the Dutch aside from two open pavilions covered on the inside with paintings. Padangbai is kind of a dumpy little place with no real beach as its a port,with the usual hawkers and predators of tourists, but with a strip of nice places to eat, featuring the fresh catch of the day. (and perhaps the slowest internet, its taking ages to upload each photo) On my last day in Yogyakarta I came down with a bad cold as I always seem to when I'm in India, and then had to fly the next day which I'm sure didn't help. When I got here I was feeling pretty lousy, but had a nice driver from the airport who I hired for today, giving myself a 2 day rest. I ended up seeing all in one day what I had planned for two, though things are so close together it was fine in a day, and cheaper than hiring a car and driver for two days.

Although I did find this very pleasant cafe with computers on an breezy open upper level porch covered with a thatch roof, I'm not great at "hanging out" and on my first day my hotel was very unpleasant (found on the internet where it looked swell) the "Zen hotel" run by a big Irishman named Liam, the cafe was charming, but my room had a huge rat and cockroach in the enclosed outdoor sitting room, and the hotel was not only not on the water, but behind the bus station. I found a much nicer place the next morning, very clean and pleasant, in traditional styled buildings raised up from the ground with thatch roofs, a balcony on the first and lower levels, if only they had the hot water they promised but did not produce, it would be perfect, I hate cold water showers in the morning, even in this hot sticky climate where you never feel dry.

The scenery and temples I saw today were wonderful, it was overcast which my driver felt bad about, but I was grateful for as it saved me from the intense sun. The first was a temple known as the "Bat Temple" because its a cave full of bats, fortunately I don't have a bat phobia it would have been interesting to visit at dusk to see them in action.

The next and one of the most magnificent temples in Bali is Pura Beksakih, in the mountains, a series of temples on a hill, only worshipers can go inside, but much could be seen from a nice walking path around the temple walls. The most striking thing about Balinese temples is the tower, the meru, for the mythological Hindu Mt. Meru, like the "axis-mundi" connecting the early and divine realms. Some are quite tall and made out of black coconut fiber. The numerous silhouettes of the towers is one of the most striking things about them. One annoying thing about this major tourist site were the aggressive "guides" set up at the entrance to the long walk up to the compound where one was told that a guide was required to see the temples, for a high fee, this is after paying a high entrance fee. Fortunately both of my guidebooks had warned about this so I knew, aside from renting a sarong which is required, that I could walk around myself. I'd rather have a contemplative experience and see sites as I wish, than having someone guiding my visit, particularly as I inform myself by reading before I go. Further along more "guides" approach, and even as you explain that you don't want a guide, one tries to come anyway, saying "he is not a guide" but would want to be paid. (this is too typical of many sites in India) It takes some persistence and patience to finally free yourself and to not hold onto the irritation but to get back into the mood to experience to what you are really there for.

From there I visited a few more temples in various small towns in the vicinity, one extremely old with stones covered with lichen, and an enormous banyan tree one of the most interesting features was what looked like a large pig face at the base of one of the shrines.

The scenery was spectacular, my driver often stopped to let me capture some views,not always possible with the very narrow roads. Tomorrow I leave for the mountains, Lake Batur, the location of an important temple on an island on the lake, the cooler air will be a welcome relief if only for 2 days.

I decided to skip the northern beach town of Lovina, and head directly to Ubud, particularly as my driver said it was a lot like Padangbai and there is only one significant temple there. I'm wanting more "culture" which I'll find in Ubud, concerts, dance, theatre and as its central, most places can be visited from it on a day trip.

Padangbai

Goa Lawah temple, the bat temple

Pura Besakih

worshipers at Pura Besakih

Pura Besakih towers

Pura Kehen

sculpture at Pura Kehen

\Gorgeous scenery

Prambayan

The Prambayan temples were in a wonderful park setting with shady tree-lined streets. Unlike Borabadur where pop music was playing over the loud speakers (and it seemed to be the same song over and over) here there was gamaelon bell music which provided for a perfect atmosphere. The site of the Hindu temple profile on the horizon is always impressive. I was disappointed that one could not walk around let alone inside of them, that's usually such a treat, to test my ability to identify various deities and of course with "living" temples to see how they are used, anointed with red kumkum powder, flowers, burning incense ect. that whiff of unexpected incense on a street corner like an immediate passage, even in the midst of traffic, into a "divine" realm.

I never did get any photos of the more traditional buildings, the sudden onset of a cold ended my time a bit early, but I've seen and experienced quite a bit of Yogyakarta and surrounding areas in my time here where 7 days in a beautiful hotel where the young staff redefine the word "sweet and helpful" for $150.00.
I have many things to see in my 3 1/2 days in Padang bai, its a beach town that I'll use as a base to see what I want to there, one major temple complex, an "authentic" village, a palace and a few other minor temples, but first, I need to recover from this cold so will take it easy to the best of my ability, until its over. Prambayan temples

Borabadur Dawn

January 4

I did master the local transport and enjoyed a windy bumpy bus ride out to Borabadur, it cost just 15 cents, a $24.85 savings on what a taxi would have cost and I had a much time as I wanted, where with the taxi I would have had only 4 hours, including getting there and coming back and its over an hour each way. I started at 5:30 and including a very long rickshaw ride to the bus station I made it by 7:30. Fortunately it was overcast until about noon. My transport

Unfortunately I didn't make it ahead of hoards of what I think were high-schoolers, they looked and acted about the right age, a universally obnoxious age in any country and Java it turns out is no exception. The noise level at the "divine" level plus the feeling that I was at a mall rather than a sacred site was somewhat distracting to say the least, if one wanted a contemplative moment, so I headed down to have a look at the wall reliefs on the other 9 layers. At one point I heard the strange sound of silence, so ran back up and caught some peaceful time until another hoard or two of schools came. The teachers seem to just let the students run wild, and the guards seem to pay no mind, but I did give a stern response to a young woman who seemed to feel that the louder she screamed "excuse me" at me,the more likely I was to respond. Being a gray haired old lady does have its rewards, as I walked through the girl gang a bit later they parted in silence like the red sea. I have a few photos of the top before and after crowds and some interesting carving and other miscellaneous imagery.
Borabadur with high-schoolers

Borabadur without high-schoolers

Borabadur about to rain or maybe not, but it makes for a nice backdrop

I've also included a few pictures of the carvings.


I'm not sure what's up with the man and bird, but it doesn't look particularly good!

This is quite curious as well

One of my favorite new signs, interesting at both Borabadur and Prambayan there was a "foreigners bathroom" I guess because we pay a lot more to get in, we get our own special facility.

More photos posted tomorrow, I'm off to eat, I've gotten quite attached to the local beer, good thing I'm waking and sweating a lot each day.

Sublime New Year

After a very brief day at one of the most overdeveloped beach towns in Bali, the much hyped (I can't figure out why) Kuta, I flew an hour to Yogyakarta (pronounced Jogja) in Java to a charming hotel with rooms and a sitting area around a courtyard full of palm trees and traditional pavilion seating areas. That beach town was only "charming" for the time between when I realized I was no longer in a New England January until shortly after when I started complaining about the heat. It's frightfully hot, and at it is the rainy season (which surprised me as its the dry season in India, which is not that far away, but perhaps being in the southern hemisphere has an effect) but it blessedly rains every afternoon. Aimed with a very very large umbrella I head out when it clouds over. I am woken by the call to prayer at 5am and get up shortly after to walk around as it gets very hot by 9 or 10 with no shadows left to walk in.

Its a huge sprawling city of mostly modern buildings, each seeming to vie for each other in ugliness (photos coming soon) but within the walled area of the Kraton or palace precinct, and on blocks off the main roads, there are lovely tile roofed buildings and here and there a traditional building with a very tall peaked roof and folding doors which seem to make the whole building able to be opened up for air. I do enjoy the ac in my hotel room for sleeping.
Did buildings like this "ever" look good on some architect's drawing board? The one on the left is a luxury hotel, it looks like its made out of the type of plastic material you cover patios with.

January 2, 2010

I made it to the palace by 10 one of my first days here (I've lost track of days) despite the labyrinth quality of the old walled city, was in a hurry to get to a concert in time, and passed many shops of the beautiful batik fabric and clothing Java and Bali are known for, if I can only find those shops again. Gamelon is the tyye of music Indonesia is known for and the Javanese is supposed to be different than the Balinese in that the Javanese is more serene. It was in an open air pavilion and was the most mesmerizing music I've heard with an interesting slightly off pitch sound, with metal instruments hit by hammers, bells, gongs, some stringed instruments and some vocals. I've heard nothing like it in my life and may become a bit "gamelon" obsessed and as I'll have a lot of time in Ubud in Bali, the cultural and artistic center of Indonesia, I'll have much more opportunity. Tonight is a Ramayana performance-dance, the classic Hindu epic, that I've seen performed many times in India. It normally goes no all night and there are all night performances one can attend, but I'll opt for the 2 hour version.

Unlike India where English is spoken by everyone, there is not much English spoken here, though people are very friendly. It does leave cause for some confusion however. As I often like to figure out public transportation, I asked a tour agency on my block how to catch a local bus to the main bus station station that is not far away, though distances here seem much farther than on my map, and there is that scorching sun. I did as I was told and stood on the street, caught a bus going in the right direction, and asked for "terminus" I was on a street called Parangritis. The money collector said "terminus Perangritis?" I said yes and was charged much more at 10R than what the guide book said I would be, though the guide book also said as a tourist I'd be overcharged on buses. No need to get upset, as 9R is a dollar. Instead of the terminus, I indeed went to the "Terminus" as I realized the very straight road ended 28klm away at a southern beach town called Perangritis" Since I had no place to be and no schedule to keep, once I realized this (and thus the higher price) I enjoyed the breezy bumpy bus and the views as the shopping area gave way to paddy fields. It did make me realize that I should not fool around trying to take buses to the two main monuments I came to see, the Hindu temples of Prambayan and the largest Buddhist monument in the world, Borabadur. Hiring a car and driver are not quite the "deal" they are in India, but as I want to leave at dawn, its best to pay up and know I'll get where I need to be.

Though there are countless nice places to eat and have a tasty local beer in this mid-range tourist area, I had an early night New Years eve, in bed by 10pm as I was catching a 6am bus for an all day tour. It was nice as there were only three of us, a young couple from Tokyo who work in insurance and me. As the old lady, I nicely had the honor of the front seat. It was a spectacular drive up terraced ride paddys to a plateau, The Deing Plateau, where many old Hindu temples are spread around. The landscape reminded me in some ways of Himachal Pradesh in India, although this high landscape had palm trees. It also did not have the unique Indian combination of beauty and terror as the roads were actually two lanes with a white stripe down the middle and guardrails and drivers seemed relatively calm.

On the way down it became quite foggy and rainy and by the time we reached Borabadur for sunset (I'd wanted to just go to Deing as I'm going to Borabadur after the holidays are over so its quieter, on Monday) it was part of this package. It rained like a monsoon, flooding the roads as we got to Borabadur. We sat in a little restaurant and suddenly the rain stopped and for the first time that day the sun came out.

There were immense crowds, but as most people ran to the top of the immense 3-D mandala, and I did the proper circumnambulation of the 6 levels, starting from earthly to divine pleasures, I had most of the sublime carvings to myself, bathed in exquisite sunset light. I found myself being a tad judgmental about the behavior of the crowds, picking up a piece of tossed garbage here and there, feeling more like a Disneyland experience than a holy monument, I realized that the hundreds of seated Buddha's had a serene "it doesn't matter" expression on their faces. I only made it to the third level in my 2 hours, so I've left the "divine" layers until dawn on Monday. It was a wonderful way to spend New Years Day 2010!

Hindu temples at the Dieng plateau

Borabadur

Borabadur Serene Buddhas

Borabadur carvings

Borabadur crowds, heading straight to the "Divine" realm!