Musings from Ubud…

Heleconias grow along every footpath and in every garden... Along with Poinsettias and the large Proton shrubs, they make a bright splash amongst the lush green foliage...

Narrow pathways hug the steep slopes and wind between the houses built on them...

On the morning Patti left for the Caribbean, we took her dog Sadie for a walk in the immediate vicinity of where she lived, to give me an idea of the layout of the area.

I was shown where I could get my laundry done; where the three closest restaurants or “warungs” as they are known locally, were located; where I could get grocery shopping done; and everything else I needed to know to make my stay in Ubud as comfortable as possible…

Back home, I sat watching Patti pack, or rather, throw things randomly into a large suitcase in a manner which made me wonder if she had any idea what she was taking with her and what she was leaving behind…!!

At one point I found myself wanting to leap out of my chair and take charge of the “ordeal”, but refrained, believing that rummaging amongst her toiletries and other “delicates” might be construed as inappropriate at this early stage of our relationship…!!

My lodgings are more than comfortable as you can see...!!

In hindsight, despite the fact that we barely knew each other, yet were very comfortable in each others company, Patti probably would have welcomed the assistance…!!

Barely 48 hours after we had met, I found myself lugging her suitcase down the path to where her taxi waited to take her to the airport… I saw the taxi driver, whom Patti knew fairly well, raise an inquiring eyebrow as he watched me hug her tightly to my chest and kiss her goodbye…

I stared into her big green eyes for what felt like the longest time, trying to read behind them, wondering what was going through her mind… Was she feeling as confused at what was building between us as I was…?

Ornate decorated shrines such as this one at Made's Warung next door, can be found outside every dwelling or place of business...

I watched the taxi ride up into the village of Penestanan with mixed feelings; sad to see her leave so soon, but also a bit relieved to be alone with the crazy thoughts and feelings that swirled around in my head…

With Sadie in tow, I retraced my steps back to Patti’s villa and set about arranging a “work station” for my laptop and hard drives, as well as my maps and other bits of information I tend to gather to help me remember where I have been and what I did in the places I visited…

My website was seriously out of date, and in the week and a half that Patti would be away, I was determined to bring the story of my journey thus far up to date…

Then there was Sadie to take care of, which proved to be a task for the infinitely patient…!!Every time I took her off her leash, she disappeared into the wild green yonder and would not come back despite my urgent calls or whistles…

Although she was a very friendly and lovable dog, she had a mind of her own and boundless energy to go with it…!! At first I thought she was just one of those dogs of indeterminate ancestry, but quickly discovered that she was actually a distinct breed of Balinese dog, closely related to the Dingo of Australia… Genetically anyway…!!

Australia was once linked to the chain of islands that make up New Guinea and the Indonesian Islands, and when the continents finally settled into where they lie today, Dingos that had lived in the northernmost reaches of the landmass, found themselves separated from their Australian ancestors…

In many ways, Sadie exhibited a certain “wildness” about her, or maybe she was just hard of hearing…!! It took me a while to figure out that it was large doses of both…!!

Our early morning and late evening walks became a daily ritual...

Sadie gets her first bone... This was my attempt to get her to stay at home long enough for me to stop stressing about her frequent disappearances...!!

I had grown up with dogs, and can hardly remember a time in my life when there wasn’t a dog or two that had formed a part of it… My father bred German Shepherds when I was a kid and but for very short periods in my life, I have always “owned” a dog, or been “owned” by one, depending on whose perspective you choose to see things from…!!

I have always had an affinity with animals, and Sadie and I became firm friends in a short space of time… It did however take a few days to establish the pecking order at the villa… She soon discovered that disobedience and the withholding of rewards went hand in hand, and grudgingly settled into her new routine without too much fuss…

We took long walks twice a day, and while I sat writing up my blogs, she either lay between my feet or went off to play with the many other dogs that frequent the immediate vicinity… After her first late afternoon sortie into the muddy rice paddies that surround the villas in our area, she returned in a state that made me decide that it was high time she began spending her nights outside on the porch rather than have me mopping up after her…

Oddballs abound in Ubud, and the owner of this house no doubt falls into that category...!!

There are many forms of accommodation available in Ubud... From upmarket hotels to guest houses and home-stays, Ubud has it all...!!

Our walks took us along the narrow, winding paths between the houses, dodging scooters that are the only vehicles which have access to this part of the village…

Sadie chased the fat brown skinks that lay sunning themselves on the pathways, and took huge pleasure out of chasing the chickens that pecked about in the undergrowth of open lots between the houses and rice paddies…

With Sadie on her leash beside me, I befriended many of the locals, who live and work here, exchanging greetings with everybody we passed and engaging in conversations that usually began with questions about where I was staying and how long I planned to be here…

“I am staying at Made Warung’s with Ibo Patricia…” usually got shy glances and smiles from the local girls and “Ah… The American girl…!!” and a quick wink from the men…!!

Keeping Sadie clean was a mission impossible...!! I think she has a bit of Otter in her family line...

Basket weaving is an important source of income for many Balinese... Wonderful examples of this craft can be found in any of the local markets...

At the bottom of the Campuhan Steps, I spent an hour almost every day, chatting to the drivers of the small taxi rank situated there… I became such a regular member of the group, that on occasion passing tourists took to asking me for a taxi ride into town or for a price to take them to the airport…

The drivers are a close-knit, happy bunch of guys, and shared my mischievous sense of humour, taking the Mickey out of each other at every opportunity… They teased me about exchanging a girl for a dog, while I explained that I was just fattening her up so that we could have “Satay Sadie” in a few weeks time… This was taken in good humour by some, and rather seriously by others, as dog often finds its way onto dining tables in this part of the world…!!

One driver in particular took to prodding Sadie’s flanks whenever he saw us, and told me that I was not feeding her enough, and she in turn would not be enough to feed more than two or three people…!!

Back home we'd ask this guy if he did roofs and walls... Artists are known as "Painters" in Bali...!!

At Bintang, the local supermarket, I always tied Sadie up to the same pole in the parking area outside the main entrance, so she could get used to waiting for me in a spot that she was accustomed to… There she met a whole new group of friends, and I would often come out to find either the security guard or the same taxi driver scratching behind her ears or patting her in a proprietary manner…

Ubud has always been a town steeped in art and culture, well known for its talented dancers and musicians, it’s prolific volume of artists and craftsmen… Tourists flock to the area, clogging the pavements that run down the main streets of town, and traffic is usually backed up at any time of the day.

I intuitively avoided this place at first, but knew that Patti would be changing all that once she returned...!!

The streets are narrow and if you get caught behind a bus or a delivery truck, you better have a large bottle of patience pills handy…!! On the few occasions I took the Big Fella out for a spin, I spent as much time with my feet planted on the ground as I did with them up on the pegs… Not much fun on a big bike…!!

The villages of Campuhan and Penestanan, between which Patti’s villa is situated, are home to many expatriate painters and artists, who have settled here over the years and opened galleries in which to exhibit their art…

I have seen and met a number of the strangest people, who in any other environment who be seen as downright weird, but here, they seem to blend in, accepted as part of the community and adding to the kaleidoscope of colour that life in Ubud brings out…

Sadie's friends visited on a regular basis...

Some have decorated their homes in the most outlandish colours, while others have decorated the pathways surrounding their villas with statues and shrines, sculptures of their work and any other bric-a-brac that has spiritual meaning to them…

Some of the stuff I’ve seen has led me to believe that a lot of mountain tobacco went into the design and layout of their gardens and homes…!!

In the ten days that Patti was away, apart from my daily walks with Sadie, I did not see too much of the town, preferring to hang around the villa, writing, planning the next leg of my ride to East Timor where the Asian leg of my journey would end, and making sure Sadie did not do a permanent disappearing act…!! When she was gone for long periods at a time, I had visions of having to explain to Patti that the simple task of looking after her puppy had ended with the little complication of her no longer being around to look after…!!

Where would I be without my two-minute noodles...!!

Patti’s housekeeper, Agung, came in for a few hours each day, mostly to mop the floors free of Sadie’s muddy footprints and find shoes and other objects that Sadie had run off with…

Agung noticed that I had been eating mostly noodles for lunch and dinner, and offered to cook for me whenever I felt the need for something a little more nourishing… This with my particular eating habits, was not too often…!!

Patti and I remained in touch via Skype and the odd text message, when the weak signal here allowed us to, and from these brief connections, I realized that she was missing me as much as I was missing her… I had spent a lot of time thinking about her and the feelings that our very short time together had unlocked in me… Clearly she was wrestling with similar thoughts…

I could not stop myself from smiling broadly when I thought of her, which was often…!! I must have looked like the happiest guy in Bali to people who came into contact with me during this time…!!

But then the doubts that often beset the human psyche, would settle over me too… I tried to tell myself that we were just two restless souls that had come together at a certain time in their lives when both needed to feel the effects of that heady drug that intimacy brings… We had made a delicate and spontaneous connection that might now just as easily have been broken by the days we had spent apart…

Agung prepares a healthy lunch for me, mindful of Patti's instructions not to let me eat any junk food...!! Have you ever seen so many veggies on one plate before...??

It had me wondering if this was just another unforeseen, and unplanned for part of my overall journey, like so many other strange occurences I had encountered and dealt with along the way, or if this was something I had been searching for all along…

Long bouts of introspection over the past eighteen months had given me a better idea of who I was and what I now wanted out of life… I had shunned the complications of entering into a relationship that I would not be able to feed and nourish, knowing that I still had a long and probably arduous road ahead of me, one that would require all my attention and focus if I was to complete it…

Would I ride off into another early morning sunrise in few days time and chalk this up to just another wonderful experience I had had along the way…??

A quiet but very persistent voice in my head said that this would not be the case…

It's all good in Ubud...!!

 ©GBWT 2011