A Weekend of Good Decisions

This weekend I spent almost solely with Ankita. The rest of the Karimun crew went to a spiritual healer while Ankita and I went to party in Kuta. Is it a moment I was proud of? Picking a party over a healer? Yes. Turns out the healer was a scam artist (who saw that one coming?) and they ended up spending the day wading through trash, as Balinese men tried to convince them they could now stop oncoming cars with the power of their minds. Ankita and I had a lovely time for near to free. We went on the beach and then out to a nightclub where we got free drinks. It may not have been so spiritual, but I felt one with myself and my wallet at the end of it. Also a win, I got to try out 'the face'. Now the face is something to be used only in a desperate situation. If you are out dancing, having a good time and a guy comes to talk to you and won't leave you alone even after many attempts to ditch him, you have to give him 'the face'. Now I heard about this from another blog and have only been joking about it with friends but Saturday it came into action. A very intoxicated guy from Java cornered me and proceeded to ask me the only two phrases he knew in English for at least ten minutes. "What's your name?" and "Where you from?" are alright questions at first, but when they have now been asked 20 times each and freedom is nowhere in sight, it was time to put the face to the test. I crossed my eyes and squinched up my nose, I put my head back to create a double chin effect as I opened my mouth and stuck out my tongue a bit. Now I had practiced in the mirror a few times, so I was ready. I suggest if anyone else decides to use this technique, they should also give it a few trial runs. And once in position, I committed! He started to laugh at first, then stuck out his tongue as if we were both in on this joke together, then he started to say "What? Why? Pony? Why?" (Pony is how all Indonesians pronounce my name FYI) I almost gave up half way through, but I persevered and what do you know, he turned to his friend to ask for a cigarette and never turned back. Victory was mine! The night was a total success.

On Sunday Ankita and I were again together but this time we went to Jimbaran for sea food. Now Ankita does not eat sea food, so this was an adventure mainly for me, but when we got there and she saw how fresh it was, even she had to try some. It was amazing! She got Baracuda and spent a long time asking the man to make it look as little like a fish as possible. Mine came out with everything but the eyeballs and hers came out covered in chili and garlic dressing looking like it could have been any type of meat. We both enjoyed thoroughly. It was the most money I've spent on a meal here in Bali, but we decided that a splurge was necessary every once in a while. We watched the sunset together on our beach chairs, drinking bintangs and eating peanuts. Had we held hands and smiled at each other it could have been a commercial for viagra or herpes medication, that's the level of romance we're talking about. It was an almost perfect picture, except for the drunk Russian tourists sitting right in front of me. They had been drinking Bintangs since before we arrived and carried on even after we left. The drunker they got the louder they got, one woman in particular, and we had to continuously move our beach chairs further and further from them to escape their blond shrieks. Nothing was going to keep us down though, the light was beautiful and the beach scenery unmatched. And we were no where as bothered by them as the couple sitting to their left. This couple looked to be having a perfect evening too, but somehow they seemed concerned about everything going on. The sun wasn't just right so they would look at each other and grimace before calling a waiter and trying to sign to him about how they'd like the position of the sun changed. When the Balinese man looked at them confused, their concerned faces grew darker and heavier. Nothing seemed to make this couple happy. They began to take photos of each other, one trying to capture the sunset while the other stared moodily off at it. The picture would be taken and then the result judged with another series of grimaces about how the camera wasn't good enough or the pose wasn't exactly right. They were hysterical to me, and I'm pretty sure they noticed me staring at them, much to their concerned discomfort. There are 3 different locations for seafood in Jimbaran, an expensive, medium and cheap. We went to the middle section first, thinking we would be posh. After looking at about 2 restaurant menus we were reminded all too quickly of our dwindling budgets and headed back to the car for the cheap section at the Southern most part of the beach. It was a good choice too. The food was exactly the same (the menu we ordered from was a carbon copy of the other restaurants, except with the name and prices covered and changed) we were excited about our decision.

After sunset we packed up our beach bags and sadly walked away from the shrieking Russians and concerned lovers and headed to a puppet show in Puputan Square. We didn't really know what we were in for at this event, but a student at ISI was performing, so we were told not to miss it. Puputan Square is one of the few parks I have seen in Bali and is a huge public space where events go on in the evenings and children fly kites and play soccer in the day time. There was a stage set up and a show was already in progress when we arrived. It was an event to encourage people to ride their bikes as opposed to scooters or cars. There were environmental videos shown, and a long period of time where kids rode around in a circle on bikes as the crowd clapped and about a billion photos were snapped of them. Next men with topeng masks came out to entertain the crowd, some legong dancing happened and then a huge fire show which ended in fireworks. The atmosphere of the event was wonderful, kids playing on the field as their parents sat and watched a performance. Vendors walking amongst the crowds selling peanuts, fried goodies and one man with magic mushrooms. This was a pretty chilled out night. We met Johblar, the puppet master and he gave us coffee Bali and some treats and said it was time for him to get ready. We settled ourselves in front of the giant shadow puppet screen and when the performance began, the crowd was immediately entranced. Now I don't really know what went on in the puppet show, nor did I care. It was hysterical. The crowd laughed at every joke and I was right there with them. The child like wonder in me was awakened as I watched the 2 clown puppets beat each other and then cower in fear when the god puppet came. There were flying monkeys and dancing puppets, the 2 clowns later performed a song. The whole show lasted for 2 hours. We couldn't stay for the ending, because we were all exhausted, some people wet from having coconut water poured on them by the healer, so we left early. But as an artist, it is always an amazing experience when you see art bring a community together and be the focus of a good time.