Indonesian Adventure - Balinese immersion

Monday, August 7th

This morning’s breakfast is again more than we can comfortably eat. In addition to Balinese coffee and the expected and colorful fruit plates, Wayane, our gummy, cheerful cook has also prepared a plate of small sticky rice tapas, each topped with shredded sweet coconut and palm sugar and cradled within a folded banana leaf boat. She serves these almost as an afterthought, accompanying two plates of Banana crepes and toast.

Sticky rice tapas, banana pancakes and toast

Courtyard garden breakfast

We are on a schedule today and following breakfast, rush to leave our guest house paradise to make the short walk to Tabra’s and from there, stroll down the still sleepy street of Penestanan. We have a cooking class scheduled in a nearby village and will be picked up at the Vespa Cafe at 9:00 A.M. A Balinese couple teaches this class and the wife picks us up and drives us to her compound stopping first at a viewpoint overlooking fields of rice paddies. The flooded fields are a shimmer of silver in the overcast morning light.

Ubud rice terraces

Their family compound is lush with flowering plants and the herbs that they use for cooking.  Ginger, turmeric, wild fern, lemongrass etc. grows in her garden and she picks bits to show us. We taste and smell each carefully and take notes of the medicinal properties and culinary uses. She explains that traditionally 30% of each Balinese family compound is designated for living space, 10% for the family shrine and 60% for the garden. Several generations live together in this compound and we see children coming and going and a few ‘aunts’ and ‘uncles’ in background.

Inside the compound

Floral arrangement and dog

Sleeping pavilion

The family compound chicken

We move from the garden to her outdoor kitchen where cutting blocks and bowls of herbs await us. She patiently instructs us in how to make corn fritters, tuna in coconut milk, Tum Tehu, (steamed tofu in banana leaf), Sweet Tempe and Jukut Urev, mixed vegetables with raw grated coconut. We spend the next 2 ½ hours chopping equal amounts of garlic and shallots and a variety of red peppers. We then take these spices and with mortar and pestle grind into a thick paste. With my hands, I squeeze fresh coconut mixed with water to make coconut milk and Alisha kneads rice flower into fresh corn and the spicy paste we have made. Tabra mashes and mixes the tofu with a different combination of a spice paste and our instructor shows us how to make banana leaf pockets into which we stuff the tofu mixture.

Alisha at the mortar and pestle

Hand washing station

Spices

Mixing ingredients by hand

Tabra and Marty prepping tempe

Marty squeezing coconut milk

Our cooking assistant overseeing the stove

Delicious!

A young woman, the assistant to our cooking instructor tends the wood burning stove and takes our formed balls of corn fritter dough and deep fries them in bubbling coconut oil. She steams the banana leaf wrapped tofu over a contraption of boiling water. Without our teacher to choreograph the process and someone manning the stove, these 5 complicated dishes would take a full day to prep and cook.  Eventually we sit down to a most delicious meal.

Photo of the 'chefs.'

Our meal finished, our instructor rises to take us on a behind the scenes tour of her family compound. Simultaneously a dozen tourists enter through the front gate. We are surprised and learn that this group is from one of the resorts and have arranged for a walking tour of the village and to eat a home cooked meal in a  traditional Balinese home. They have certainly chosen well because the dishes we just made were mouthwatering and although they will not be cooking theirs, I presume that their meals will be equally delicious.

Waiting for compost scraps

Songbird

We walk through the back garden area, pass three stalls housing two pigs and a cow, a caged rabbit and lines where fresh laundry hangs to dry. She takes us out the back entrance of her compound and walks with us along the street of her village, unspoiled by tourist guest bungalows, yoga and meditation centers or restaurants. We cross over and enter the gates of another family compound where a master artist is instructing a 20 year old man in the art of miniature paintings. Three teen age students are working on detailed pen and ink drawings and a young boy practices on a bamboo xylophone. I notice that two long tables in the back garden are set with a dozen water bottles each and I surmise that the group of tourists now enjoying lunch will later be brought here to admire (and purchase) this artists miniature paintings. This is the beginning of the swell of the tourism tsunami that will sweep through this village over the next few years. The miniatures he paints are exquisite and I buy an intricate painting of exotic Balinese gods.

Student artists

Practicing the xylophone

Village woman with flower offerings

A peaceful village outside of Ubud

It is after 2:00 P.M. when we return to Penestanan and our guest house. We have two delicious hours to enjoy the ambience of our private courtyard garden. The day is hot and humid and Alisha takes a dip in the small, jewel of an infinity pool.

Our guest house pool

Alisha enjoying our guest house pool

Our private cabana

Roof detail

 At 4:30 we walk to Tabra’s work compound, settle finances with her business accountant Made, and from there walk to Lala Lili’s for a disappointing dinner. Ten years ago, Art, John and I stayed in a secluded villa behind the gates of the Lala Lili restaurant. At that time, Lala Lili’s was a tiny cafe and rice paddies stretched as far as one could see in all directions. Today, the restaurant has expanded, most of the rice paddies are gone and in their place are wellness spas, mindful retreat centers, guest houses and restaurants. I know that as a traveler, I am part of the problem but the changes are awful. Balinese culture is based on a form of Hinduism and I find the ’New Age’ explosion in Ubud, distasteful.

Tuesday, August 8th.

I wake shortly after 6:00 A.M. to the crowing of roosters and bird calls. Our courtyard garden is dripping with dew and I am relishing a peaceful hour writing in our misty garden. The milk in our refrigerator has not been replenished and I  make coffee without milk. (All this bounty and I’m complaining about coffee without milk?) Alisha peeks her head from our room and comes to sit with me in the humid cool of the morning. Precisely at 7:30 A.M. Wayane, our toothy and delightful cook opens our courtyard gate and within minutes she has served us strong coffee with milk and sugar and the most beautiful and exotic fruit plates imaginable. Before us are thick purplish red slices of dragon fruit, checkerboard cut mangos, halved mangostiens, papaya and sliced bananas.

Dragon fruit and mangosteen

Sticky rice tapas for breakfast

This alone would have been sufficient but it is followed by a variety of 8 sticky rice tapas arranged in banana boat leaves and topped with shredded coconut with drizzles of palm syrup. Not enough? Before we can stop her she has made nasi-goring topped with a fried egg. Not wanting to hurt her feelings, I waddle away from the table and hand a premeditated tip to her for her welcoming and her over the top service. I tell her it is our last day here and her eyes well with tears and she turns away. I am confused and my first thought is that I have not tipped her adequately. With quivering lips she hugs us both and apologizes for her emotions.

We make our rice paddy walk to Tabra’s house and onto her work compound. As in previous mornings, we see an older Balinese woman carrying flower and incense offerings and watch respectfully as she places the folded banana leaf and flower packets in front of doorways and shrines. With a graceful gesture of her hand she motions the wafting incense towards each intentional spot and we catch the scent of the sweet essence in the clean morning air. At Tabra’s studio, we greet Dekti, sidestep the quiet warning snarls of Tabra’s dog Pumpkin and wait for Dekti’s  father to arrive to drive us into town.

Tabra and her dog Pumpkin. 

At 10:00 A.M.the traffic is already bad and he takes a detour which still takes us over 30 minutes to drive a few short kilometers. Our plan for the day is to start walking up the Monkey Forest road beginning at the entrance to the Sacred Monkey Forest. This is our last day in Bali and Alisha is looking for a few inexpensive souvenirs to bring home to her family. The day is hot and we cross over to the sunny side of the street to shop and to exchange money. I glance over at Alisha and she is pale, sweaty and clammy. I take her heavy back pack so that she can sit down in the tiny claustrophobic Tabac shop while I finish our money exchange. I am suddenly afraid that she might be coming down with a serious tummy bug or flu and we fly to Flores tomorrow. I steer her up the road and into an open air restaurant where she can sit under the rotating fan. After some time in the restroom she returns, sips at her ginger ale and rests her head on the table. I am seriously worried.

45 minutes later with plans to make it back to our hotel directly so Alisha can rest, we walk up the street towards Tabra’s gallery where we will find a taxi to drive us back to Penestanan. On the way, a clothing boutique catches Alisha’s eye and I ask if she wants to look inside? It is cool inside and she looks tentatively through a rack of clothing. I can see she has stopped sweating and her color is coming back and I am hopeful that the episode was caused by the heat, heavy back pack and the claustrophobic space of the Tabac store. Alisha is trying on a scrappy eyelet lace cut dress dress when a group of rude women shoppers enter. The boutique is tiny and I am appalled at their lack of manners. One woman casually flips clutch purses over and unfurls carefully folded merchandise with complete disregard of the mindful display. Her 4 large and loud friends shuffle though the racks of clothing demanding other sizes and although, I can’t identify their language, I am relieved that they are not American. Alisha buys the strappy eyelet lace cut dress and we exit into the heat of the street. Miraculously, she continues to improve and as suddenly as the faintness and nausea came upon her, it is gone. We drop the weighty back pack off at Tabra’s shop and make short forays out from there while Tabra takes care of shop business. Alisha revisits a boutique she stopped in two days ago and tries on several outfits, spinning in a short dress with a beaded tank bra underneath. She is runway perfect and the prices is very reasonable by U.S.A. standards. I don’t discourage her from indulging.

Ubud is a wonderful destination for many travelers, but lest you imagine it as paradise, Ubud is highly congested and there are sidewalks under repair. Motorcycles need gasoline and everyone smokes.

Sidewalk gasstation for motorcycles

Sidewalks under endless repair

Smokers warnings on cigarette packs

Indonesian graffiti 

Alisha is snared by one more boutique and exits with a wonderful wrap around skirt, secured by heavy bronze snaps and the waistband edged with suede leather. The skirt and two butterfly wing cut out shirts later, we exit. With blinders on, we walk the many blocks up to the main artery street in Ubud and left in the direction of the staircase up to Penenstana. We decide to have an early dinner at Café Artist, on a side street, this side of the bridge. We cool down with lemon squashes and Alisha and I order fish and Tabra a vegetarian entree. Although not memorable, dinner is good and a bit subdued since this is our last night with Tabra in Bali. Before catching a taxi home, we stop at the mask shop by the bridge and I buy the wonderful Hanamum (monkey god) mask that I saw several days ago. It is intricately carved and the wood beautifully painted with gilded accents. The salesman packages it carefully in layers of bubble wrap and although not unreasonable in price, because of the size and difficulty in transporting it home, it will be my major purchase for the trip. Back at our guest house, we pack and shower. 3:30 A.M. will come all too early.