Mark Jarvis: Ubud and area III

I hope it doesn't seem like we just go to the same places over and over again. I'm not saying that's not partly true but there is a very justified reason for it. Firstly, there's surfing. While you can find surf up either coast of Bali the best is on the Bukit peninsular where the waves and crowds are aplenty. The second reason is that we travel by scooter. So we can go to the same place more than once, even a couple times, rather than moving on and on without end. That may be the case once we leave Bali behind, as we're going to get rid of a couple things starting with the surfboard, but it's too impractical here. The last reason is that it's really nice staying in the same place and making trips. You get the pleasurable feeling of coming home, the realtionship you build with your homestay family and you get to only carry what you need so stopping getting around is much easier. So yeah, we go back to certain areas more than once but each time to see something new. This time we went to Ubud to see Pura Goa Gajah, again we didn't make it, and you'll have to wait as that post is coming up soon. What we did do was stop at a tree, get a massage, and wander the streets of Ubud, oh the life.

The Balinese religion is predominately Hindu with Buddhist and Animist beliefs mixed through, shaken, slightly stirred and served with a fateful yet positive acceptance of the events of life. For instance last time I was here, I got worked over pretty good by a wave and after coming to the surface realized that I had four injuries, and four corresponding dings in my board. When recounting the event later the Balinese man I was speaking with said, "I was lucky". Meaning that no matter what happens, if you're still here to talk about it, you're lucky. It's a good point though tested at times. The point of all this is that the Animist aspect of their religion surfaces in their belief in the spirits of trees and to some degree all things. Yet it's the trees which seem to get the most focus here and the holy are identified by gold or black and white checkered cloth wrapped around them. In this particular tree was a temple guarded along its circumference by statues. It must have been 20+ feet in diameter but there are larger ones in Bali.