Remember This

After the blessing, the Balinese healer prescribed that within three days I go to the beach and stand in the water at 9am, dip my face three times then submerge myself. And so, two days after a blessing of holy water and flower petals at the shrine of the God of the Sun near Ubud, and after a restful night spent in the east coast town of Sanur, I strolled down to the beach. A cluster of Balinese men knelt chest-deep in the water, chanting. I waded past them, giving thanks, said a prayer, dipped three times and dove into the Indian Ocean.

Perhaps it was the heat and humidity that felt like Florida, or the beautiful smiles and open sincere hearts of the Balinese people. Maybe it was the rooster wake-up at 4am each morning, the cold water shower beneath a handheld hose, the journal writing, unplugged from the internet, quiet walks through rice paddies, or the dozens of curious children, so eager to learn. Whatever the reasons, I felt at ease in Bali, and the world seemed bounteous again.

Things got off to a rocky start. Garuda Air informed me that my luggage had been left in Sydney and would arrive the next day. Plus, I had been told that I could pay for a visa with plastic upon landing, but that turned out to be as far-fetched as it sounded. And so I talked my way past the visa checkpoint, pulled 500,000 rupiah ($50USD) from an ATM, left my contact info with a Garuda representative, and then stepped out into the warm embrace of Denpasar.

First-born children in Bali are named Wayan. The second child is Made, the third Kadek. The Balinese often have many names, depending on your relationship, but these are the names they usually go by. Our driver, Wayan Sudirga, met me at the airport holding a hand-printed sign with my name on it, and drove me an hour and a half north to Ubud, past enormous statues of gods, along narrow traffic-filled but neatly kept roads. Wayan’s sister, Kadek, was one of our liaisons. Their father, Darsa, I learned, was a village healer.

Marianna had set us up in rooms at Santra Putra, a quiet place with outdoor bathtubs and mosquito netting, surrounded by rice paddies in the lush district of Penestanan, away from the tourist hustle but close enough to town. Ever since the popularity of Eat Pray Love, Ubud has swarmed with tourists seeking yoga, art, romance and enlightenment. We went out that night to see BALAM, a New York-based group that specializes in Balinese dance. Performed in what seemed to be one of many outdoor temples, as soon as the gamelon orchestra hit its first notes, the rain began falling and masked dancers representing earth-bound gods and demons strutted out and did their thing. Afterward, we met Carlos Fittante, the artistic director of BALAM, who agreed to come to one of our schools in Bangli District to lead an afternoon dance workshop.

Some miles north of Ubud, far away from tourists, the small village of Nyanlang lay smack in the heart of Bangli District. We stayed at the family compound of 27-year-old Puja Astawa, or, as we knew him, Made. Family is cherished in Bali, and each family has their own compound filled with grandparents, children, uncles, aunts, moms and dads. And though officially banned, cock fighting still flourishes in Bali: like the disturbing ritual in Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery, perhaps its darkness helps balance out the light. Sometimes, the roosters crowed at impossible hours, 1 or 2am; night rain usually kept them quiet, but by 4am it was a cock-a-doodle symphony. I would get up before dawn, use a handheld hose to take a cold water shower, then sit on the family platform area and write in my journal until 5:30 or so when Made’s mother would make coffee and then a dish of fried banana or boiled yucca roots in the open air kitchen. The compound’s courtyard bloomed with orchids. Chickens scratched past. Butterflies lingered. Sometimes, a lost duck showed up. While the others woke, I would walk through the village out to the rice fields, sometimes with Made, sometimes alone. Each morning, perched atop a temple wall, a white dog sat waiting the arrival of a man on a motorcycle. One morning, I met a guy with an air rifle who told me he was keeping monkeys out of the rice paddy.

When we asked our students how they were doing, they replied, “I am happy.” After breakfast and the day’s workshop planning, Marianna, Jeanette and I would hop on the backs of Made, Bento and Spiderman’s motorcycles. As we snaked the hills and villages, children waved and even the toughest looking characters would break into radiant smiles. The students in Bali wear uniforms, a different one for each school day. Each morning at SMAN1 Nigri High, we were obliged to say hello to the head master, who welcomed us through an interpreter, and let us know that he was hip to the changing world, the global community, and the need for English literacy. Willie and Nyoman, two English teachers, helped us translate. In similar workshops in Tanzania, our students volunteered long lists of discontents, including poverty, forced marriages, corruption, HIV/AIDS, orphans and female circumcision. Bali, however, seems freed from its colonial past, unbroken by war, disease and famine. The Balinese children practice music; flowers bloom on school grounds, their windows are not broken.

After a break for lunch, we would speed over to SMPN 1 Tembuku junior high, where we held a similar workshop which led up to a school-wide performance at the end of our visit. Later in the afternoon, a group of small children, seven and eight years old, would come running at the sound of our motorcycles and crowd Made’s family’s gate. I would sit with the kids on the family platform, and read to them grammar books, Where the Wild Things Are, and Anansi and the Talking Melon. After a dinner of rice, chicken and vegetables, I would help Made with his thesis paper, a daunting project which dealt with the use of conjunctions as found in an English-written Ubud tourist guide. Giant spotted geckos peeked out from beneath a painting on the wall, calling “Gecko! Gecko!” Frogs croaked. Rain fell.

One afternoon when my reading group failed to appear, Made asked if I would like to see his family’s rice field. In the golden afternoon light, we walked through the village, out to terraced fields. His family kept two cows in a small shed there, and Made explained to me that the cows were money in the bank, there for financial emergencies. Beside us, a coffee bush grew wild, perhaps leftover from another family’s farm. Made asked if I would like to see a “holy place,” and I told him to lead the way. Along a small canal, where farmers and children bathed, and then down slippery wet steps, we made our way to a small valley where three waterfalls converged. Made showed me three pipes jutting out from the hillside, spouting water. He said that I could drink and wash my face in the water, and I did. We then sat on steps and meditated, surrounded by splashing, tumbling water, a wet mist, the smell of ferns and damp earth. I told him I wanted to bathe in the water, and he said that’s what people do. While Made meditated, I took off my clothes and bathed in the water, then joined him again in silent meditation.

Because community is so important in Bali, it is unusual for anyone to ask children to express their thoughts. Our students performed with open hearts; they danced like skittish gods. They recited poems written about their dance workshop with Carlos, they sang thanks for the things they cherish, confessed their fears and expressed their dreams. Like students everywhere, they glowed in the halo of applause, and after hugs and gifts and handshakes, we packed our things and returned for one last night in Ubud.

Darja picked me up on his motorcycle. We rode out of town, past the terraced rice fields, the river bathers and kite flyers, down an unpaved road to a cluster of immaculate temples. We sat on a platform and drank afternoon tea. Darja smoked cigarettes and gazed into the distance. A shirtless man picked pebbles from the manicured lawn. “I am not a holy man,” volunteered Darja. “That man. He is holy.” A quiet descended. “Soon,” he told me, “I will lead you into the temple. There will be a shrine. You will sit in the chair opposite. I will be with you, in case anything happens.” In the still air of the darkening temple, I gave thanks for the people in my life, the places I’ve been, the opportunities I’ve been given. I made wishes for loved ones; I asked for courage, wisdom and guidance. The next morning, I boarded a bus to Sanur.

You find offerings everywhere in Bali: palm leaves woven around bits of food, left at the roadside or placed upon stones; flower petals arranged in patterns on sidewalks, bound sticks wedged above doorways, incense burning at the base of trees. Gamelon music and chants haunt the fragrant night air. Some days, entire villages wear their ceremonial headwear and sarongs. Wedding and cremation ceremonies spill onto highways and back up traffic for miles. It seems that each moment is marked by ritual; nothing goes unobserved. Rice crops take three months from planting to harvest. Individual sprigs are planted by hand, cared for daily, then pulled and shaken and set out on burlap or banana leaves in the sun to dry. On our way to way to the holy waterfalls, I asked Made why people are still willing to do such backbreaking work. Surely there must be easier ways? “It is our obligation,” he explained. “If we don’t do it, nobody else will.”

In some ways, the Balinese cremation ceremony resembles a county fair. Bodies that have been in the ground for as long as five years are dug up, sometimes dozens at a time, wrapped in cloth, and paraded through town. Families and friends of the dead build giant papier-mâché figures and people from the village gather. Vendors hawk cotton candy. Music plays, fires are lit, and the spirits of the dead are liberated to reincarnate into higher beings. My last night in Sanur, I lay in an air-conditioned bungalow, watching the movie Ghost Town on TV. It’s about a man who dies, but at first does not realize he’s dead. He soon discovers that the whole city is teeming with dead folk, waiting round for a bit of unfinished business to get resolved...

This is a poem written by one of our high school students, Dewi, after Carlos’ dance workshop:

Dance
You are like the morning dew on the surface of my skin
There is a new opening of my eyes.
I want you to keep this morning dew all my days
Though I know you will not be here
Come and dampen my self
Every morning.

Thank you, Bali, for helping me to remember.