Beautiful cultural Ubud Dec 8th to 11th

Careful how you buy your petrol or what you drink here! Sold in Absolute Vodka bottles!
The Suckling Pig hawker stand and my friend/driver Mus.
Beautiful dancer at Legong Dance show
tFamily kitchen
Bowls and crusher, whatever it was smelled delicious! Spices...
eStove
Bike group (all Europeans, two local boys and me the Canadian)
yVolcano mountain
Fire Dancer
Evil dress swinging monkey

Arrived back in Bali and met a wonderful couple from Italy, Ivano and Lena. We toured the town and did some more cultural things like evening performances. The first being in a nearby pub with the Ubud local reggae band who were amazingly good and then of the real Balinese dances- Kecak Ranayan and Fire Dance one night and then Legong and Barong Dance show another night. Amazing music, costumes, makeup and details, a lot of work goes into these shows.
Decided I needed some exercise and wanted to see more of central Bali so I went on a bike tour to Kintamani Volcano and Lake Batur. The views were amazing and first we went to a coffee plantation and saw how they made coffee from a Luwak's (ferret looking) waste droppings consisting of cherry coffee berries that he ate, fermented in his stomach and once 'disposed' of was gathered by people, cleaned, roasted slowly and then crushed and ground into fine coffee that apparently is sold in department stores in Australia, London and even the States for about $50 a cup! I wonder if the people really know......what some people will do for a 'good' cup of java! They had samples but I tried a sip is all and choose to have lemon grass tea!
We had more coffee at our viewpoint and banana bread with is not like ours at all, it's deep fried (of course) and battered kinda yummy I'm getting used to it.
So full of caffeine we started off on our bike race, I mean ride. Some of the people in our group thought it was more fun to race thru the country side full tilt but I liked to enjoy the sights and take pictures of the local children who just love the tourists and scream at the top of their lungs 'Hallo!' when they see you and run out to the road to slap hands with you as you whiz by. Sort of feels like being on the Tour De France with all the fans! I only got left behind once.....it's a very strange feeling riding out in the middle of a strange countryside all alone! The locals were cute I keep asking and pointing which way? And they pointed me in the direction that the group went and I soon caught up. I would like to think they would have come looking for me.....
We also toured thru a family compound that consisted of different buildings, one for the kitchen, one for sleeping, a temple, an outdoor bed area that was for any special occasion be it a birth, marriage, death and also in the back their garden and a pen for a mother and baby pig. The whole families (grandparents, children and grandchildren and even siblings) live together here and everyone helps out with everything. It's nice to see, so different than our society.
We checked out a chili pepper farm, the famous rice paddy fields, temples as well along the way. Then the rain started....we took a little break and found cover but finally had to continue on and luckily didn't get too soaked, it was rather refreshing actually, not for wussies!
I also toured a few Art Markets that the Ubud area is famous for, if only I had a huge suitcase and someone to carry it, I could have come home with some amazing painting, wood carvings, jewelry, clothing you name it!
Finally I had to see the Monkey Forest Sanctuary, it was beautiful jungle setting with pathways and loads of grey monkeys who loved bananas! The picture of this particular piggish monkey was taken after he was swinging off my dress with both hands! I was trying to feed the smaller monkeys my bunch of bananas cause they were too timid to come too close but once he got so aggressive I just started throwing them at him and he wouldn't leave me alone until I had none left in my hands! Kinda freaky but amusing at the same time.
I read in a travel magazine that you can't leave without sampling the suckling pig and the place to go was called Oka Ibu so I had a 'taxi' motorcycle guy drive me there only to find out it was closed for the evening. I asked where else I could go, not too expensive as there as some $$$$ places here but some equally good less expensive places too. Next thing I know, hanging on tight to the back of his bike we were headed out of town. I kept asking where we were going, he was a nice kid, talkative and friendly and he kept saying don't worry I know a place. Well we ended up in some local village at an outdoor market for the locals, selling new and used items and he walks me to the back where there are little 'hawker stalls' and all the locals ordering their food. Again I am the only bulea around and all eyes are on me! So Mus ever so kindly orders up my food and they serve it up again with their hands (I've stopped cringing at this sight now and not getting sick yet...knock on wood helps!) and I sit down to eat on the plastic stool they showed me. I didn't know what I was eating and would ask Mus after I ate it often, 'What was that?!', he got quite a laugh out of it and not sure if he told me everything. Not quite the way I was envisioning my last dinner out in Ubud but what an experience again! Headed back into town in the rain. It's very hard to hear and chat on a motorbike but I was trying and being half deaf doesn't help either. We were going along thru one village and I thought he said 'Merry Christmas' and I said Yeah, we celebrate and started to explain how I'll miss my family when he pulls over to the side of the road. I said hold on what are you doing? He said - I asked if I could kiss you! Well I slapped his back and said NO and laughed and then he laughed and apologized over and over! I am getting tired some days of not having a real English person to talk to! The accents and lack of english gets exhausting and can be a little risky at times! haha
All in all the Indonesian people are wonderful, friendly, peaceful, happy people. I love it here and will come back one day and hope to see more!
Next stop Thailand! Sounds all good except they suggest to stay away from demonstrations (really I have better things to do!) and Parliament buildings. Not sure when I'll update again, I'll be joining an adventure group and seeing Northern Thailand until the end of December. Wishing all of you the very best for the holidays and much happiness!
Cheers Ali