As promised, pictures of Bedugul

The view from the road into the mountains. Usually you can pick strawberries here,
but there weren't any because it's the rainy season.

Pura Ulun Danu in Bedugul. During the dry season you can walk to it,
but right now it's effectively an island.

Sylvie, Mirah (one of our language teachers) and Frances by Lake Beratan.

A Balinese fisherman by Lake Beratan.

Sanur was good, although mostly uneventful. We befriended a Javanese kid who called himself Roger Michael Steve and may or may not have been lying all the time, since his background story was pretty ridiculous. There were also a few moments of panic when we heard about the tsunami warning, but it turned out to be no big deal (although obviously not in Chile).

Now we're back in Bedulu, returning to the standard class-topeng-hang out with homestay family pattern. I figure it might be good to say a few things about everyday Balinese life, so here goes. Bear with me if I've mentioned some of these things already.

1. Music. Balinese culture is incredibly musical -- it's not uncommon to walk past people practicing gamelan on their front porch, or to hear gamelan accompanying a ceremony until late into the night. The younger people are definitely into current music, especially punk rock, the Cranberries, and Bob Marley (I think I've heard "Buffalo Soldier" about 10 times in the last hour at this internet cafe). They all listen to music on their HP (hand phones, i.e. cell phones), but it's not uncommon for them to switch back and forth between Bob Marley, the Ramones, and traditional gamelan.

2. Originally bizarre-sounding greetings, the first of which is "mau ke mana?" which basically translates to "where are you going?" At first this comes across as an unnecessarily nosy question, but it's really just like saying "what's up?" Also, it's perfectly reasonable to reply "jalan-jalan," which means "just walking around." Another weird greeting is "sudah mandi?" which my host mother asks me all the time. It means "have you already bathed?" which at first seems really rude and made me thing I always smelled terrible. Then I realized it was basically asking if you're feeling refreshed. Balinese people bathe frequently, at least twice a day, almost always with cold water, which is in fact incredibly refreshing.

3. Marriage and babies. Although Balinese young adults are getting married later these days, my host sister-in-law is only 22 and she and her husband have an 8-month-old baby. My ibu frequently asks me if I have a boyfriend in America and teases me about getting married soon. Also, if two people are married but don't have kids, the term is always "belum" (not yet) rather than "tidak" (no) - it's assumed the couple just hasn't been married very long. (This has led to interesting conversations about the marital status of family members, etc.)

4. Ritual: a huge part of everyday life, and I would be remiss if I didn't mention something about it. Offerings are put out basically whenever food is cooked, and of course at other important times. The Balinese calendar involves a 7-day week, a 5-day week, and a 3-day weeks (as well as another system I don't really understand), and when certain days of the weeks overlap, it is a particularly auspicious time and festivals may occur. Also, every 210 days, a given temple will have an odalan, or a temple birthday, which is a big festival.

That's about it for now, but I'll post more as I think of it. Let me know if there are other things I should be talking about!

More adventures

Hi all! Apologies for the long delay in posting. On a day-to-day basis, I've been doing a lot of topeng carving. I'm done with the chiseling component of my mask, which means the face is pretty much blocked out and I've carved out the back. The next time I go, I'll begin working with knives to make the face more detailed; after that, painting begins.

I've started walking home from Mas (where the topeng-maker's workshop is) to Bedulu. It's about a 5km walk (or so I've been told) and it's easier to do that then to try to catch a bemo (public transportation) in the late afternoon. Plus, it's a nice walk -- mostly downhill, and on the back streets of Mas I get to talk to lots of people and see some cool temples and sawah (rice fields). It confuses my host family (and basically everyone else), though. My bapak keeps telling me to call him for a ride home, even when I explain that I enjoy the walk. The people along the street assume I'm lost, which can also make for some entertaining conversations.

Let's see, what else has happened in the last week or so? Last weekend I went with Sylvie (one of the other students on the program) to Klungkung to work on our "archaeological sites" paper, which basically involves going to an important cultural/historical site, exploring it, doing some research, and, of course, writing a paper. We went to Kerta Ghosa (which I may or may not be spelling correctly, apologies), which is part of the old palace in Klungkung.

Sylvie walking up to one of the buildings.

The roofs of some of the buildings are painted in the wayang (shadow puppet) style, and all tell a story. This roof has the descriptions of various punishments in hell, plus I think one of the stories from the Mahabharata (although I may be mixing it up with one of the other buildings).

Interior of a roof at Kerta Ghosa

On Wednesday, we migrated to Denpasar for three days, where we went to Udayana University and met with some of the English students there (and also attended some lectures on Balinese culture). Yesterday, we went with them to Bedugul, which is in the mountains. We went to a temple on a lake and a botanical garden: pictures in the next post when I can upload them to my computer. Now, we're on a free weekend in Sanur, which is one of the touristy/beach towns.

This morning, we went to the University for a large ceremony, since today is Saraswati day and Saraswati is the goddess of knowledge. There were a ton of people there, and a full gamelan orchestra, a dance (I forget the name of it, sorry), and, of course, many offerings and a high priest officiating. We got to take part in the prayers, which involved being sprinkled with and drinking holy water, listening to chants (we didn't know the words so we couldn't really take parts) and making offerings ourselves.

Tomorrow, it's back to Bedulu for the week for more class and topeng making. Next weekend we head to Ary's (the academic director) village for a week, then to the northern part of Bali. Stories to come!