Bali
INDONESIA
Bali
Relaxing on the beautiful Bali beaches, watching the striking sunsets, tasting the Luwak kopi, trying local restaurants, swimming in picturesque pools in the rain, visiting tall waterfalls, sightseeing rice terraces, wild monkeys, statues and temples, learning to ride a moped, tasting ‘Tempe’, learning the local language from local friends and snorkelling in the crystal clear Bali waters, finding local beaches hidden from tourists etc. I’d say we were lucky to stay in a beautiful hostel and experience a little bit of everything that Bali had to offer.
Luckily, all the scholars travelling in SE Asia were able to meet up in Bali for a barbeque, surf lessons and a good catch up so we could hear all about everyone’s travels so far. I thoroughly enjoyed the surf lessons as it was a new experience for everyone. Luckily our local friend was a surf instructor so he gave us all a discount. Yes, it was difficult….we fell off the board many times but it was so worth it because we all had so much fun together! (Tip- I learned the hard way that day: keep TOPPING UP your sun cream)!! Catherine and I ended up in the sea for over 3 hours and lost track of time. Let’s just say we had a crazy dark tan afterwards and mild sunstroke accompanied by extreme pain and BOTTLES of aloe vera, aftersun and watermelon juice!)
We tried some really tasty foods in Bali. A local favourite is a traditional South-East Asian soy bean product (soybeans in cake form) originating from Indonesia- called ‘Tempe’. This was my favourite snack and I tried to eat it whenever I could because I knew I would miss it after our 2 week holiday in Bali.
Our Indonesian friend Andre showed us all the best cheap local restaurants to eat at and our favourite dish was fried noodles and vegetables called ‘Mie Goreng’. Catherine and I took full advantage of the cheap prices and treated ourselves to a proper fresh fruit smoothie with our meals everyday as we can hardly find such delicious fruit like this in China. (Everything is priced in thousands so buying a smoothie for 12000 IDR gave us a bit of a shock at first)!
Another pretty cool delicacy originating in Indonesia is the ‘Luwak Kopi’. Luwak is a little ferret looking animal which has the ability to find really special, delicious, good quality coffee beans. Once found, the animal digests it and then excretes it. The Indonesians then discovered that finding and cleaning the droppings would make a tasty coffee. As disgusting as it sounds, it’s actually pretty 好 喝 (delicious to drink). All the scholars went on a road trip with our new Indonesian pals and they took us to a Luwak coffee tasting session to try many flavours of this awesome kind of original coffee. This is a must when visiting Indonesia!
Bali is full of culture. For example, one very popular cultural ritual that I noticed Balinese people doing each morning was placing a little basket (often made from leaves) with pieces of food inside, at doorways or on paths which I think was put there to show their offerings to their gods. (We found this one at a temple by the sea):
Bali was indeed a pretty cool place!
Some more photos from our adventures in Bali:
