Indonesia Island Life II: The Beautiful Life in Bali

With a little more than a month on the island of Bali under my belt, I can see why some many western expatriates love to call it home.

The weather is beautiful year round; the local Balinese people are generally quite friendly and good-natured; dining out is very good quality and relatively inexpensive; and the yoga and recovery communities here are extensive.

With the exception of all the motorbikes zipping around and the four-wheel vehicles congesting the roads that are barely wide enough to accommodate two-way traffic, there is not much to complain about. The western community here can be a bit haughty, and with the exception of rice and other staples, food in the groceries can be a bit pricey, but that is life pretty much everywhere.

Actually being in Bali, has seemed less like a vacation and more like a brief experience of living abroad. First of all, I have a nice room with a kitchen and a balcony overlooking a lush green neighborhood, in what is called Penenstanen, northwest of Ubud, which is yoga central on the island of Bali.

I spend much of my time hanging out in my room, drinking instant coffee I make on my stove and completing an online course I have enrolled in. Some days, I don’t even make it to Ubud, but hang out exclusively in Penenstanen, practicing yoga just down the lane from where I stay and going to the Bintang Supermarket for bread, peanut butter and yogurt.

But not having a job, I have not been able to establish a good daily routine either.

Yoga for All

I chose to stay in Ubud primarily because of its association with yoga. There are numerous schools throughout the area, but ground zero is a place called the Yoga Barn. I visited there on my first day in Bali, but did not take a class there until about a week later.

At first I did not know why they called it a barn as it is more like a whole farm and none of the buildings remotely resemble what we call barns back in the farm belt of the Midwest. But one Sunday morning, with a crowd of people leaving our kundalini class interspersed with a throng of people making their way into an ecstatic dance, it felt like we were cattle or sheep being herded about.

I’ve primarily been going there just for the kundalini classes as the Yoga Barn is a 45-minute walk from my apartment. I realized that although I got a kundalini yoga teaching certificate, I had no real experience with actual kundalini classes. Having been to classes with three different teachers there and my limited prior experience, I am starting to get the feel for the flow of a real kundalini class although I do not feel entirely qualified to teach it – not that I plan to be a full-time yoga teacher or anything.

Yoga Barn does offer a lot of different yoga styles, however. With nearly a dozen different studios or other facilities on the campus, there are multiple classes per day to choose from. The clientele is largely western although Balinese students, who get a considerable discount on classes, do also attend.

I actually started my yoga experience in Bali at a place called Alchemy Yoga and Meditation Center, which is only about a half kilometer from where I stay. I bought a six-class pass that let me attend one class on each of the five elements and their special Krama sequence. It was a nice place to practice but it felt very much like the yoga that we have back in the United States – more vinyasa flow and less traditional Indian approach interspersed with new age feel good jargon instead of actual yoga philosophy.

So I started going to a place just down the lane from where I stay, probably no more than 200 meters from my gate to the school’s. It is called Nalanda Ubud and has a sister school called Intuitive Flow, which is a little further from here but not nearly as far as Yoga Barn. The thing I enjoy abut these classes (besides being so convenient and half the price) are that they are usually led by Balinese, or Indonesian teachers.

The style is not purely Indian, but is tinged with a unique sort of local flavor. As a note, the Balinese people are primarily Hindu although the form of Hinduism they practice is nothing like it is in India and the temples are dramatically different as well.

I also discovered a uniquely Bali flavor of yoga called Usada yoga taught by Guru Made Sumantra at the Siwa Linggam Temple a couple of kilometers northeast of where I am staying. I was the only yogi to arrive at the temple for the regular morning class when I went for the first time yesterday. So I got a very personal taste of the style with a lot of adjustment and alignment. The practice started with pranayama that was unlike anything I practiced in India and then went into a series of just a few asanas, primarily from the traditional surya namaskar. During this unique sun salutation series, we chanted various vowel sounds associated with specific chakras. By the end of this sequence, which involved a great deal of standing back bends, I actually got quite light-headed and thought I might faint.

We returned to seated poses for the remainder of class and Guru Made Sumantra provided pressure to help stretch my already flexible body even deeper into the poses. There was no svasana at the end of the practice, but I still felt quite blissful after leaving.

Tonight, as of the initial writing of this, I plan to go to a kundalini gongbath meditation at Yoga Barn if the heavy rains that have been soaking Ubud today keep at bay for the evening.

Awesome AA

I am assuming most of the people reading this blog already know that I am an alcoholic and addict who has found recovery through the 12-Step programs. If not, surprise. I have been clean and sober almost a full decade now and I owe that entirely to the fact that I have remained close to the fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous.

If you are one of those Eleventh Tradition purists who would accuse me of breaking my anonymity of the level of press, radio, film (and the internet), you are probably right, but it’s my anonymity and not yours. Plus, how many people will ever read this, or really care?

So with that out of the way, I will talk a little about the recovery community here in Bali (without breaking anyone else’s anonymity).

Just a few days after arriving in Ubud, I found the local 12-Step hangout at a place called the Wahyu Cafe, right in the heart of Ubud. There are meetings of various 12-step groups two to three times per day, every day of the week, although I have primarily been attending the 9 a.m. AA meetings, which attract a fair number of people – both local expats and visitors to the island, who are just passing through.

There are people with all levels of sobriety from the crusty AA old-timers to the raw newcomers to the people who have slipped up after a few years and are finding their way back into the rooms. I have had the pleasure to make friends with a few of them, including a Ukrainian close to my own age, who plans to open a center for veterans when the conflict in his war-torn homeland ceases; a young American woman, who I had the pleasure of sitting next to at her first meeting and have watched blossom in her first month of sobriety; and a few really kind local expatriates who have been keeping the doors of these meetings open for years.

Unbeknownst to me before coming to Bali, the island is the site of a pretty large Founders Day weekend International Roundup convention, which just happened to coincide with my visit. So while many of my friends in recovery back in Ohio were rolling p to Akron for the big convention that draws ten thousand plus attendees, I was with you in spirit among about five hundred fellow alcoholics from all over the globe.

It was definitely a great way to spend the weekend, listening to international speakers and a panel of locals and their visiting friends speak on a variety of different topics.

As an added bonus, the convention was at a ritzy hotel in the beach town of Sanur and we had a Sunday morning yoga class on the ocean, based on the Eleventh Step, followed by a meditation on the same topic. It was really a great way to spend the weekend.

In addition to that, this past Saturday, five of us loaded up in a Toyota mini and rode about thirty kilometers up the mountain to a place where of our local members hosts a monthly Mountain High gratitude meeting. He feeds all the members a wonderful Balinese buffet lunch afterwards.

When sharing on the topic of gratitude that day, I reflected that I was blessed to have found such a “privileged” group of people who I now include in my ever-growing recovery family.

Fantastic Food

I first started discovering Indonesian dishes on the island of Gili Air, but since then I have tried a lot more of the local cuisine, along with a lot of really high-quality health foods and international dishes on the menus throughout the cafes and warungs of Bali.

I have also started learning Indonesian language, or Bhasa, and can recognize and ask for foods by their local names. Probably some of the most notable words are nasi for rice; mie is noodles; goreng is fried; ayam is chicken; and tidak is no (which has a lot more use than in just ordering food.)

So I can say things like “Saya mau makan nasi goreng dengan tahu dan tempe. Tidak daging, talong.” I think than means “I would like fried rice with tofu and tempe. No meat, please.” At least it seems to get me the dish I want. And another important saying in restaurants is “Makanan ini enak,” which means this food is delicious and always elicits a smile from the waitress or waiter.

Learning Bhasa is not really necessary though as most people working in the service industry in Bali understand and speak pretty decent English.

Just like India, there are a lot of fresh fruits here for really cheap. Among the most notable, and in season, are red dragon fruit, or buah naga, which I had never really tried before coming here. You can just cut one in half and scoop out the juicy insides with a spoon.

I usually budget to spend between $7 and $10 for a meal in a nice restaurant or cafe but you can easily eat at a local warung for $2 to $5 a meal, depending on just how frugal you want to be. There is actually a very good place right up the lane from me called PriMa, where an elderly couple serves a wonderful plate for just 40,000 Rupiah, or slightly less than $3 a meal.

And I would be remiss not to mention coffee, as I drink two to three cups a day. Coffee is widely grown on the mountains of Bali and the other Indonesian islands and the beverage, known as kopi locally, is served everywhere, unlike India, where finding good coffee was rare. You can get everything from a local Bali coffee, which is like a Turkish press with the grounds in the bottom of the cup, to espresso-based Americanos or cappuccinos and even Nescafe-based instant drinks, which I admit I drink too many of in my apartment.

Other Activities

In addition to yoga and dining out, I have taken time to experience some of the unique Balinese cultural and artistic activities, including a visit to the kecak dance and a local museum of modern art.

The kecak, which is a relatively new form of dance developed in the 1930s, is much like the kathakali dance I watched in Fort Kochin, Kerala, back in March.

As a Hindu culture, the Balinese mythology includes the tale of the Ramayana, and a kecak dance typically includes a scene from the Indian epic. On the night I went, the story culminated in the epic battle between Ravaan’s giant brother Kumbakharna and the full host of the Ramayana’s primary protagonists – Ram, Lakshman, Hanuman and Sugriva.

The hourlong artform concluded with a fire dance, in which a wildly gyrating Balinese dancer whirled about through a smoldering pile of red hot coconut ashes, kicking the embers out toward the audience.

It was definitely worth the $7 entry fee to see the spectacle.

I also visited the nearby museum of modern art, where the art features the not entirely grotesque demons that are a common motif in Balinese art, along with flowing feminine designs and other colorful scenes of Indonesian life.

While the paintings in the museum were nice, I was much more fascinated with the intricate wood carving work I saw on display. It amazed me the way the sculptors could release these delicate images from a piece of wood.

Wood carvings are also among the primary staples of the Balinese vendor market scene. It’s a little disconcerting though to see a nicely carved Buddha figure side-by-side with a large wooden penis, which is actually a common item among the goods sold in the vendor stalls.

Just like back in Ohio, I’ve been getting tons of steps here, many of which come on long walks through the rice paddies that surround the Penestanen community. My friend Jim, a Britsh expat who I met on the Annapuran Circuit Trek in Nepal, and who helped get me this lovely apartment, has shown me around on several really pleasant walks and I have found a few on my own devices. It’s definitely been one of the more relaxing diversions, especially since not even motorbikes can access some of the remote rice field trails.

Cisco Kid

While I do love yoga, walking and eating food, this doesn’t keep me busy around the clock. During my last couple months in India, I realized that if I wanted to keep my CCNA (Cisco Certified Network Associate) – the primary networking certification for my job as a network engineer – I had to start the process of recertiyng before July 1.

I was able to earn half the continuing education credits I needed to renew my certificate while in Rishikesh in March, but Cisco did not offer another free course until late May, just as I was arriving in Indonesia. I was able to complete that, gaining a bit of knowledge into the growing field of network automation and associated techonologies.

I also got free access to some other trainings and have started studying for the Service Provider Core exam, which is the basis of the next step up from the CCNA. So I’ve been spending a lot of my down time doing that.

I have actually come to realize that while my job in the computer industry can be difficult and stressful at times, I do find fulfillment in finding solutions to the challenges it poses.

Moving On

Some people I have met on this yearlong journey have expressed displeasure with their professional life before traveling abroad, but that isn’t really the case for me. I actually enjoy my work and did not enroll in a Yoga Teacher Training Course to become a full-time yoga teacher.

Instead, I did it to deepen my own practice. While I would like to share some of the experience and wisdom I have gained by studying with these amazing yogis of the eastern hemisphere and have recently been contemplating a 12-step based recovery yoga series, I don’t intend to make this my source of income.

I occasionally joke that “I am still trying to decide what I want to be when I grow up,” but what I’ve really learned on this adventure is that the answer to that question is right here in front of me no matter where I am in this world of ours – whether that be Bali or Belli(fon-taine) – I am always at home where I am and doing just what I am supposed to be doing at this point in time.

So in that vein, I have decided to end my travels at the end of July and return to my little corner of Ohio.

But in the meantime, expect at least one more installment in this blog as I spend the final leg of my Indonesia island adventure on a boat ride out to the Komodo islands, where I hope to come face to face with the dragons that fascinated my childhood fantasies.