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Home Exchange Blog: Bali by member Jessica Rohm - October, 23 2009

The blog below is written by Exclusive Exchanges member Jessica Rohm.

Forgive the delay in writing, as promised, but it took us a couple of days to obtain Internet service to our hidden Villa in Bali (http://www.villaasmara.com).  We departed New York on Monday night, October 19th, aboard a Singapore Airlines Airbus 300.  The first leg of the flight was 19 hours.  Eberhard slept for 15 hours and I for seven, using the remainder of the time to work on my novel with time off to finally watch Taking of Pelham 123 - fun!  We switched planes in Singapore's Changi Airport, which could easily beat Fifth Avenue as the location of the most designer boutiques in one place, for our 3 hour flight to Bali.

It's 12 hours later here, and we crossed the International Dateline somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, so we arrived in Bali on Wednesday, October 21st at noon (midnight October 20 in New York).

Now some of you know that Eberhard and I celebrated our 25th anniversary on September 22nd.  But all of you know that it takes a lot less than that to get us on an airplane in pursuit of a new adventures.

We found Villa Asmara through Exclusive Exchanges (http://www.exclusiveexchanges.com) and have been communicating with owner Troy Robertson for some months.  The Villa is magnificent and comes with a full staff - cook, laundress, housekeeper, etc.  The house manager, Sri, is a beautiful woman, about 30, who lives in a small village nearby.  She has two small children, speaks five languages, and had a career in the hotel industry before Indonesia's tourism trade was destroyed by recent terrorist attacks.  The locals are very sad about that.  Living in the Villa affords us not only comfort and luxury, but a glimpse into The Other Side of Paradise.

While the Villa is a self-contained luxury palace with views of the sea, private pool and many examples of local fauna and flora, the surrounding villages are similar to many we have seen in third world countries.  Large families live in corrugated tin shacks, undernourished feral dogs roam the streets, young people double up on their scooters to get to and fro.  Everywhere there are terraced rice paddies and many people, including Sri's mother, make their livings nurturing and harvesting rice, dirty and backbreaking work.  The other major industry seems to be craft and furniture making.  I will never read a Made in Indonesia label again without thinking of Bali.

Our first afternoon we sat by the pool to rest.  Bali is near the equator and the weather is perfect, although we understand it rains a lot between December and April.

We dined on red snapper and rocket.  Then had excellent massages at the Villa for US$13 each.  Our 19 year old daughter, Olivia, quipped: "Maybe we should move to Bali until the recession is over."

Although Indonesia has the highest population of Muslims in the world, Bali is 90 percent Hindu.  There are thousands of Hindu shrines and temples.  The arts are dedicated to Hindu images and folk-lore.  Bali could be called Buddapest, based on the sheer ubiquity of the form, but I suspect the Hungarians would sue for trademark infringement. The tradition is to offer sacrifices to the many Hindu gods several times a day, so in every shop, rice paddy, even the dashboard of our driver's car, offerings of spices, flowers and food  abound.  There are small shelters at the entrance to each home where the "house gods" reside.  Many yards have cows, sacred here as throughout Hindu regions elsewhere.  If you were wondering where the expression Holy Cow comes from...well, you're right! The people are very gentle and friendly; they clasp their hands in a small prayer each time they greet you.

I woke up at 1 AM, thanks to jet-lag, and worked some more on my novel.

The cook made us breakfast at 8 - an open-faced omelet with fresh tomatoes and leeks.  The Balinese coffee is so fragrant and rich that if the real estate business doesn't pick up soon, I'm thinking of importing it.

Our driver, Wayan, came by at 10 and took us to Nusa Dua, a water sports center, our first stop.  It was strictly for tourists so we left within minutes.  I checked the list of suggestions Troy had made and we redirected Wayan to Karma Beach.  The private club/hotel and restaurant is built on a steep cliff overlooking the sea.  We took a funicular, which ran on tracks built into the cliffs at a nearly 90 degree angle, to a small beach restaurant.  We swam, sunbathed and ate a divine lunch of chicken satay and lamb.  Eberhard had chocolate mousse and, I, uncharacteristically, abstained.  Both of us gave up alcohol around Labor Day, which sharpens ones view of life as if a veil has been lifted.

I'm slogging my way through The Angel's Game, which disappoints after the masterful Shadows of the Wind.  Picked up several new novels by favorite authors at the Singapore airport, which I hope will provide the much needed carrot to finish Faulkner's Sound and the Fury.  Sound and the Fury may be the only book I've ever read that needs sub-titles.

Wayan (by the way - he charges only $47 per day including car and gas so we hired him for our entire stay) picked us up at five and took us to Uluwatu, an amazing temple on a cliff.  Its inhabitants, in addition to the requisite gods of course, are thousands of monkeys, so tame they jump on your shoulders, which they did twice to Eberhard.  I was amazed at how coolly he received them - must be from living with a monkey like me for so long.

At sunset, we watched a traditional Balinese Fire Dance based

Our 25th wedding gift to each other was an identical digital camera.  We took a course on Photoshop at Purchase College last Saturday but haven't had time to practice our newly learned editing skills.  So enjoy the photos attached, alas, still in amateur mode.

We got back to the Villa at 9 PM, gobbled a power bar from home and indulged in another $13 massage.

And, here I am, awake again at 3 AM, blogging...

Stay tuned for Day 2.