New Years in Ubud

I know I’m WAY behind on this Blog, but good things are worth waiting for, so just hold on.

Cassandra Johnson

Leaving the Resort

I spent Christmas by a Hilton Conrad pool in Nusa Dua in Bali, with Vinisha, Ali. For New Years we made the journey to Ubud, Bali. It’s a deceivingly short 45 kilometers between the two cities. Don’t let the distance fool you. It takes damn near all day to get there.

I’m sure Bali was a peaceful, tourist-free oasis until the last decade or so. It probably didn’t have a very big population until recently. As a result, there are no wide-laned highways crossing the island. Most roadways are narrow and limited to two lanes, with local business and dense foliage edging up against skinny shoulders. For those wanting to travel more than a few kilometers in Bali, be prepared to be stuck in traffic to get there.

We made the best of it. Slow going offers an opportunity for sightseeing stops along the way that break up the monotony. And for car naps that one of us is always prepared for.

Temples on the Ocean

First up – Tanah Lot temple in Tabanan, in West Bali. This temple is known for its unique location, set among an outcrop of rocks, jettisoning out into the ocean among the crashing waves.

I found it….Eh. Okay. Tanah Lot known for its sunsets. Ali, Vinish and I explored the temple in the late morning which could have contributed to the feeling of lackluster. Or it could be that the stairs were roped off due to the weather. Or the throngs of tourists. Maybe it was the gray sky and the misty wind in our face.

Or…maybe it was just small and underwhelming.

We walked through the site and relatively quickly walked back to the van before our driver had the chance to park and show us around. It’s quite possible that we missed something important. But I don’t think so.

Also I don’t think I care. You can’t see everything all the time. Sometimes you’d rather be in a warm van instead of experiencing the cold ocean blowing in your face.

Monkeys in a Forest

Next adventure – The Monkey Forest. I really enjoyed this stop. I love monkeys. And it’s real funny seeing how clueless tourists act around fast moving, non-domesticated animals that steal things. We had a good time.

The Monkey Forest is also really beautiful. It’s basically a big Indonesian jungle park with hundreds of monkey families and monkey babies running around causing shenanigans.

I took SO many pictures. After leaving, I had to immediately go back through my phone and delete half of them as completely unnecessary. What was I going to do with two hundred pictures of Balinese monkeys? But how could I not take at least that many snaps…I believe that I had immense self-restraint.

After the Monkey Forest we were supposed to make another stop at a coffee plantation. But the three of us felt tired. Six hours had passed into our 45 kilometer drive. It was game over. Nothing could top the monkeys anyway. We skipped it and were done touristing for the day.

We used the energy we had left to take a few Insta-necessary Bali swings over a rice paddy field after lunch.

We also stopped for dessert to try this mango cheesecake shaved ice cream thing. Beautiful. Delicious.

Bike Rides Through Rice Paddies

Our next Ubud excursion was a bike tour through a lot of rice paddies. This is a thing to do here.

Shout out to Ali and Vinisha for planning this entire Ubud-ian excursion. For once, I had nothing to do with booking any transportation, tours, or accommodations during our time in Ubud. They took care of everything and I just injected myself into their plans. It worked out great (for me).

The biking tour was not the most strenuous bike tour I’ve ever been on. It was quite the leisurely opposite. The bike tour was several hours, and the route was on a seemingly impossibly downward angle almost the entire way with one (very) steep exception that lasted about a half a kilometer. It’s here that the three of us, and every member of the American family with us on this tour had to dismount and walk our bikes up the hill. In terms of physical fitness, we did not represent the red white and blue very well.

The bike tour included a few stops, one at the house of a local Balinese family. Our tour guide also pulled over on the side of the road to show of a giant spider that he found. We also stopped to practice our manual labor skills and harvest rice. All in all, it was a standard touristy experience. But that’s exactly the experience that we wanted.

This was the end of my time traveling through Bali with Ali and Vinisha.  After our biking tour, and a night of dinner and drinks in downtown Ubud, they left for Singapore and I stayed behind. These ladies were great travel companions. Our time together was a nice mix of slow and relaxing with just the right amount of touristing. After jumping from one country to the next, hiking mountains and sleeping in caves, this was just what I needed for a few days.

Bon Voyage ladies.

Ubud: City of Yoga

After Vinisha and Ali left, I spent a few days alone in Ubud. These days weren’t all that exciting. I spent most of my time walking around town, shopping for gifts to bring home for friends and family and aimlessly exploring.

The most active thing that I did in these few days was to take several Yoga classes at the Yoga Barn. That was an expeirence.  Yoga Barn is this huge HUGE thing in Ubud. It’s not just a studio. It’s a whole compound. Multiple yoga studios with a spa center, on-site restaurant, accommodations, smoothie bar, and weekly events and retreats.

At first glance and in full disclosure, this place is everything I hate about yoga.  Hippy Dippy 25-year olds with dreadlocks, standing in front of the studio entrance and hugging each other for way too long.  Drinking spinach smoothies and talking about the benefits of going vegan. 

Ugh.  Too much. 

But. Also. It wasn’t so bad. Maybe even…..really…nice.

It took me a minute to adjust to the sheer magnitude, but Yoga Barn has a very strong sense of community. The few yoga classes I took here were crowded, but I was surprised by how much I enjoyed them. It wasn’t a DC corporate yoga class, cramming dozens of poses into 50 minutes, with just enough meditation to keep you from a pending nervous breakdown from your high stress job, and just enough movement to burn as many calories as possible before happy hour. It felt a lot more genuine, and in that way also more challenging.

I tried a few classes, notably a vinyasa flow class and a pranayama class. One class to focus on movement, and the other on breath control techniques. We did an exercise in pranayama called the lions roar.  The way it works is, you breath in normally, and exhale in a quick, robust, almost roar from your gut.  It’s fast and forceful.  And audible. Everyone in class is expected to give out a vocal and loud roar.

There was a judgmental part of me that was rolling my eyes at the whole process. And also a part that was buying in.  The exercise is supposed to help you let go of your inhibitions…of your anger, and your tension.  I’ll be dammed, it kind of does all those things.  Being surrounded by 50 strangers letting out a breathy roar felt weirdly bonding.  Even if it was just for a few seconds. I was kinda into it.

2018 Reflections

Feeling inspired by roaring my way through yoga class, I decided to end the year on a healthy note. I spent the last day of 2018 getting dinner solo at a vegan restaurant. I retired to my guest house around 10pm with no alcohol in my system, and watched fireworks from my balcony.

What a year.  Last year I had a predictable life.  Work routines, and friend routines, with some family visits and weekend trips thrown in to boot. 

And the start of 2019?  In Bali.  Happily unemployed. Running low(er) on savings.  A dozen countries and countless life experiences later and absolutely no idea what I want to do with my career when I get home.

I felt happily uncertain. I have no idea what’s going to happen in 2019. And that’s the absolute best part of my life right now. I’m looking forward to ending the year in a different place from where it began. This sounds more appealing to me than knowing I’ll end this next year stuck in the same exact same place.

I’m not normally one for resolutions, but I made one this year.

Stop avoiding decisions.

For too long I sat in an office, or in some other life situation, knowing I wasn’t happy but being afraid to take the first step to change it. Because even though I knew I didn’t like where I was, the uncertainty of changing it felt scarier. So I avoided changing it. I stayed too long in the same routine. And unsurprisingly, things didn’t magically fix themselves and get better.

This year I learned I’d rather live with mistakes than regrets. Life gives you impossible decisions.  I’m doing the best I can. I’d much rather be an active participant than a person waiting for something to happen.  

Leaving Bali

Bali overall has been…well it’s been ok.  It’s no eat pray love, let me tell you. It’s a lot more touristy than I expected.  And yes, also incredibly beautiful.  The scenery and the Hindu and Buddhist art is really fantastic.  I definitely connected with aspects of the island, but in the end I think it may just be a bit too full of tourists to make my favorites list. If I came here five or ten years ago I might feel differently, but I may have just missed my window.

So it goes. Regardless, I’m glad I came.