More trips

we finished up the week attending the ceremony in Manngu again to see dancing and more performances as well as woodcarving on friday.

today we went to the Tirta Empul Holy Spring in Tampaksiring and then had lunch in Kintamani, near Mt. Batur/overlooking Batur Lake. Hands down, the most beautiful view I have ever seen in my life. im trying to decide if Yosemite was comparable...i dont know, el cap, or volcano and crater lake? hmmm.

Tirta Empul: "Legend has it that the sacred spring was created by the god Indra. His forces had been poisoned by Mayadanawa, so he pierced the earth to create a fountain of immortality to revive them. An inscription dates the founding of a temple at the site to 926 AD. Ever since - for more than a thousand years - the Balinese have come to bathe in the sacred waters for healing and spiritual merit."

also, the government palace overlooks the holy spring. it was built int he 50's and is where SBY stays when he visits Bali.

Now we have begun our week...dancing and gamelon. and we have discovered a gym next door to our hotel...sinu, astrid adn i went to check out the aerobics dance class tonight. AWESOME. an hour of dancing and jumping around with about 40 indonesian women of all ages.

Weekend Excursions

this weekend we went to a 3 month old baby ceremony. i do not know much about the ceremony, i watched it, but am not entirely clear what the greater meaning behind it is. the baby was blessed several times, and what i gathered from others, was that many of the rituals performed were order to keep away bad spirits. it was very neat, adn they offered us lunch afterwards, which was the spiciest food ever! the dessert was unripe mango, something quite delicious! as well as a bali orange, which is an exact perfect combination of a grapefruit adn an orange.

following the ceremony, which took place about an hour north in sangeh (near Ubud), we drove to the monkey forest near by. this pretty much speaaks for itself, it is a plot of land reserved for about 600+ monkeys and tourists can go and feed them etc. it was nice, except that i got peed on. not so nice.

this week we attended another hindu ceremony, called karya ngenteg linggih. again, i am not sure of the greater significance, and when asking indos why they are celebrating they just say, "because it is an important village ceremony". anyays, the whole village takes part (in this case, Bapak Nika's village, Manngu) and walks fromt he temple through the village streets for a few hours, singing adn playing a mobile gamelan set. VERY SWEET.

in terms of classes, painting/sketching is going well adn we have begun woodcarving. this may take some time to perfect...

also the 17th as independence day. (merdeka atau mati!!)

a tattoo artist in our midst...

More classesdancing is getting

a bit harder....

our dance teacher is 70 and is a "legend" in indonesia. she is an amazing dancer. Below is a photo of her before she sped off on her motorbike...

More news: Apparently Selwyn is also a tattoo artist. I only discovered this as I happened to pass him and Ili after class today...behold Ili getting his first tattoo...

Today is Noy's (Loas) Birthday and I believe we are headed to the beach for a suprise visit from Jed and Monica (Mama and Papa Bear from the Foreign Ministry)...

Classes Begin...

So Saturday we went to different museums in Denpasar.

One had cultural artifacts...sarongs, religious instruments, etc. very interesting.

The other musuem was more of like a monument, and inside, like all national monuments in Indonesia, are dioramas displaying indonesian history. indos really love dioramas!

then we took a walk to sanur beach, just to check out the local beach on the east side. this involved some bargaining with a "bemo" bus (a type of old vw-looking bus with benches along the inside.) i believe we fit all 12 of us in one.

the beach was nice. apparently theres a nice little cafe on sanur beach that plays live reggae every mon, wed and fri.

our director told us that there would be a "modern" concert at the arts center adn we should go check it out. tickets were only 30,000 rupiah (~3 USD) and so we went...interestingly enough, the "modern" concert was a rock concert with bands called "andre adn the back done or something like that and superman is dead, "SID". hilarious. they dont sell alcohol anywhere near the concert, but give away free cigs. only in indo. also, there was a small mosh pit in front, but for the most part, everyone else in attendance, sat adn stared...no singing, no dancing. we were the only ones going crazy, and got a lot of strange looks for it.

On sunday we went to seminyak (in another bemo) on the west coast. a bit more croweded, tons of bule bule (all european-i have yet to meet an american), and lots of huge waves. i think im going to attempt surfing...thoughts?

then we went to pura tanah lot...beautiful temple in the ocean during high tide.

Today we started classes...dancing and gamelan. Gamelan is SWEEET. very hard to get used to at first, but very very fun.

This is me in my dancing sarong adn corset. not fun to wear, but keeps your back straight and makes you skinny.

and concentrating very hard playing the gamelon. the difficult part is following every hit with your other hand to mute the tone.

Below are photos from the arts center. this is where my classes will be during the week. My school looks like paradise. If only BU had been this beautiful...

I am a very happy camper. a bit hot and sweaty. but very relaxed in this serene learning environment.

In Bali....finally got to add some photos with a real internet connection at the "Italian and Japanese Cafe" next door to our hotel.The first night we went to kuta beach which is where the sunset photo was taken.

the second night we went to the art

center director's house and watched a gamelan orchestra as well as balinese dancing. (both of which i will have learned by the end of the trip).

it is absolutely beautiful here. the weather is fantastic and the ocean breeze is energizing. so energizing in fact that today i saw signs for the Bali 10K. I immediately bargained with a cab driver and had him take me to the registration. Below is my number, t-shirt, and offering to the gods of speed.

So at 6am on Sunday I will be running through the streets of Denpasar...

Oh, took a photo of dinner the other night. The snakeskin looking item is a new fruit called SALAk. very delicious and strange...also tried mangostine the other day. even better.

but there is great satay, and fried eel...everything with rice. amazing food. (Allie, i dont know how much you like spicy food, but if so, this is heaven).

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