Culture Shock

Well hello there, time for a reality check. We moved up to Ubud today and checked into a traditional Balinese hotel. This one is pushing Loreen beyond her comfort zone for sure. Not sure what she is thinking yet, she hasn't said much - she is just standing in the middle of the room with the most bewildered expression on her face. Like, what the hell have we got ourselves into? She has managed to choke down a warm beer of her own and most of mine, so we know she is not in total shock, she still knows how to self medicate!

I actually think it is pretty neat, an old two story building, it has it's own moat and lily pond, complete with at least one snake. The outside bathroom leads out to the garden and the adjoining rice field, where the ducks are waiting by the flag to be led home. A four poster bed with mosquito netting and a stairwell to the upstairs with naked women carved on it. It has a really nice balcony on two sides with marble floors adjacent to the lily pond.

Well it is 24 hours later, we have walked all of the main streets in Ubud and are back at the hotel pool where Loreen is self medicating again. Actually the hotel is not bad, good pool area, and has a pastoral feeling about it. Peaceful. We do have to use ear plugs at night as the noise from the cicadas and frogs is mind boggling.

Ubud is not quite what we expected. We, for some reason, thought it would be relaxed small village atmosphere. But it is every bit as busy as the party towns of Kuta and Legian, lots of tourists and busy with locals. However if you get off the main drag some of the side streets are pretty peaceful.

We took a stroll through the monkey park and had a lot of fun. These creatures have become habituated to human presence, are quite bold and will pull on your pant leg or dress for food, if you have it, and totally ignore you if you don't have any thing. If you hold a banana up at arms length above your head they will crawl up your side and perch on your shoulder while they eat it. I had one up there by choice and another up on my head because she was a greedy little thing and took all my bananas away - and we spent $5.00 buying bananas for them - mostly for our entertainment!

There are big signs in front of the entrance telling you not to bring any thing that might look like food in with you. We watched a Chinese gentleman lose his snacks out of his shirt pocket and another fellow have one jump on his shoulder, take his closed juice bottle out of his hand, chew a hole in it and drink it.

We went out to eat at a place that sells Babi Guling, or roast suckling pig. They roast a full size oinker every day and that is what we feasted on, skin, sausage and all. One of the reasons Loreen wanted to come to Ubud was to eat Babi Guling.

Today, Boxing Day, we went river rafting on a small river in the mountains. In comparison to Canadian classifications, probably a class 2, no big water, but lots of small rapids and lots of rocks. We got hung up on more rocks than we should have, mostly due to one person, first initial L, who kept pretending she didn't understand the term "paddle forward, or paddle backwards"!!! Who'd a thought.

In one area the guide runs you into the rock wall underneath a 200 foot cold waterfall, well not really cold but cool, it was invigorating and at the very end we went over a four meter vertical slide down the front of a dam. It was a bit of a rush. The Climb out was up 365 steps carved into the side of the canyon wall. No I did not count, but asked one of the guides when we got to the top. All in all a really good day.