My trip to Bali - by Maxwell James Wall Bixby (Myles and Austin's Cousin)

Bali is very fun. I like it there. It’s a nice place. Though there are a few bugs that can give you a little bit too many bug bites. But Bali is a really nice place. It’s fun, and active!

Austin and Myles’s house is awesome! It’s ancient, and there are mosquito nets all over the beds. It has a pool that is huge and very deep. We swam a lot! I liked it when we all played Marco Polo.

From Max visits Bali

We also went to a local market. We wandered off, and I noticed that there’s a guy on every street who tries to sell you something. We bought some things.
We went to Bali Tree Tops and I did 2 courses where I did a zip line through the trees. It was a cool adventure park and even though I was a bit scared, I liked it.

From Max visits Bali

We went snorkeling up north and I saw parrotfish and swordfish and angel fish and every kind of fish you can imagine! I loved it. We went on a boat that had thingy’s that look like flippers that made it stable. That was a great day.

From Max visits Bali

We had lunch at Kadek’s house one day. It was very very very ancient and they were poor there. We had coca cola! The Dadda was a duck farmer so we had duck.

From Max visits Bali

One day we went to Bali Funworld and it had zip lines, too. Then we went to Bali Bird Park and Reptile Park. We saw salt water crocodiles – they were huge! I carried a lizard and some birds sat on my head and my hand.

From Max visits Bali

The food in Bali was gross. The milk tasted funny. The rice was good! And the juices were very good. Mango smoothies were my favourite.

On our last day there, we went to Waterbom. It’s a big waterpark that is all waterslides. We sure had fun, but it was very sad that day because we had to leave afterwards. I was sad to leave Austin and Myles. They are not just my cousins, they are also my best friends.

From Max visits Bali

“Makasi” is thank you in Indonesian.
Maskasi, Austin and Myles and Janet and Pete and Emmet for sharing your adventure with us - I loved it!!!!!!!!

Galungan

This coming week in Bali is the holiday of Galungan. The holiday occurs every 210 days and is celebrated by all Balinese. It's an important holiday here, when the Balinese believe their gods visit the earth. So the kids are off school next week, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. On Friday of this week Myles and Austin's Grade 2 class did a special dance in front of the whole school for Galungan. Here's the video from their performance:



And here's a few pictures from a web album. Click on any picture to go to the web album.

From Galungan

From Galungan

From Galungan

Guest post from Blair

This month, Emmet's Dad Blair came for a visit. Here he is with Emmet and Myles outside the guest house. Under the picture is a guest post from him.

From October in Bali

I just arrived back in Toronto from Bali, but not really. It's almost a week and I still feel like my molecules lay scattered over the Pacific. Yesterday I was in Bali, Indonesia, and the experience was intense, hyperreal. Today I sit jet-lagged in a café in Parkdale, Ontario, and neither place seems altogether real. Such are the perils of international travel.

Peter invited me to write an entry for his blog, to record some of my impressions, being the first visitor to Janet and Peter's Balinese idyll.

Let me begin at the beginning, with Emmet.

I travelled a long way just to be able to ask my son "how was your day at school"?, and I was really pleased (and relieved) to hear the answer. He loves it- he's totally engaged with his classwork, and his teachers adore him. From appearances Emmet's school is easy to love: magnificent open-air bamboo structures overlooking a steep river valley, a bird sanctuary, renewable hydro-powered energy, forests, fields and vegetable gardens. Still, a new school with new schoolmates in a new country, that's a lot for a kid to take on, but he's thriving. In fact, the adults I spoke to about Emmet - teachers, parents, his Balinese acquaintances - all find him charming and disarming. Clearly the boy can work a room, with or without walls.

It turns out Emmet is also a natural traveller. Nothing had prepared me for the spectacle of my son, two months in, chatting effortlessly in Indonesian with friends and total strangers. It's not just his facility with the language, I'm impressed by the way he launches into these exchanges so fearlessly.

With Emmet in school I was on my own much of the time, which was not a problem. Bali is a small place, and it was pretty easy and incredibly fun to buzz around the island on a scooter (I recommend listening to Phillip Glass's Satyagraha on the ipod). I saw a lot of amazing things on the way to the places I thought I was going to: Sublimely beautiful rice paddies. Comically ugly street dogs. Temples without number. A riot of carved stone.

And offerings, everywhere. Flowers, fruit, incense and cake, offered three times a day to gods and ancestors in a spirit of gratitude and devotion, as I understand it. They pile up, topple over, get trampled. You can't swing a cat in this country without hitting an offering. I think it might be the religio-economic engine of the whole society. And it's bio-degradable, which is another word for.. transient.

Of course it was also very nice just to sit still in the heat of the day and let the world go by. Maybe it's the effect of Bali's reputed spirituality, but this latter activity seemed to have a meditative rather than a hedonistic quality. Now that I'm back in the coldhearted disenchanted city, it's clear to me that I did feel really good there, and at peace most of the time.

I trust I can relate on this blog that I approached my stay with Janet and Peter & co. with a certain trepidation. Will this be.. awkward, I wondered? Well, my anxiety was misplaced- as it usually is. My hosts were warm and welcoming and very generous, and I had a great time hanging out with everyone at their extraordinary thatched villa in Nyuh Kuning. It was especially great to spend time with the sacred monkeys of the house, Myles and Austin. I highly recommend to any readers of this post that if you're invited to come and stay in their bamboo guesthouse, go there. Skype just doesn't do the place justice.

Selamat Tinggal,*
Blair

From October in Bali

Ubud Cremation Ceremony

This past August, the king of one of Ubud's villages - Peliatan - passed away. This week his cremation ceremony was held. There was a series of events in central Ubud, culminating with the cremation march from the Peliatan temple to the graveyard. The king was transported in a 25 metre high tower (he was about 2/3 of the way up), carried by about 200 men. The men carried the tower - well, ran with the tower - for about 100 metres, before stopping and having 200 other men take their place. The tower was preceded in the march by a large Bull, and by a dragon, both also carried by about 100 men. It was very dramatic and exciting. Blair - Emmet's Dad - is here visiting right now, and he and I headed to central Ubud, climbed onto a wall, and watched the spectacle. I shot some video of it... The video is not in fast forward - they are RUNNING!

Up the River

Our latest short film "Up the River" is now online. Watch it here! A gripping drama set in the jungles of Borneo.

A trip to Borneo

This past week the kids had a mid-semester break. Along with some Canadian friends from the Green School, we decided to go to Borneo to see Orangutans. We did some research and found the best place in Indonesia for Orangutans is in Tanjing Puting National Park on the island of Borneo in the Indonesian province of Kalimantan. And... here's the best part - the park is located along a series of small rivers, accessible only by boat. So for three days we hired a boat (or as it's known in Kalimantan a Klotok) with a captain, an assistant captain, a cook, an assistant cook and a guide. It felt a bit like our house! Here's what the boat looks like (although this is not our boat, ours was actually a bit bigger because there was ten of us).

From A trip to Borneo

The trip worked liked this. We spent three days and nights on the river. We arrived around 6:00pm on the first night, a bit later than we hoped, as our flight was delayed. We set sail in the dark, up a large river from the port of Kumai. After about an hour, we turned onto Setonyer river, and sailed another hour or so. It was hard to see anything, but we did pass some amazing trees that were full of fireflies. They looked like Christmas trees (albeit French-Canadian trees as they were blinking). We ate a delicous dinner prepared by the crew. The mattresses and mosquito nets then came out and we slept on the deck. A little hot at first, but great to go to sleep in the middle of nowhere, with only the sounds of the jungle as the soundtrack.

The next morning we woke and sailed about 3 hours to Camp Leakey, a research station founded by a Canadian woman in the 1970's. She is the Diane Fossey/Jane Goodall of orangutans. She works here only occasionly now, but is well-regarded for her work on orangutans. There are about 5000 orangutans in the park, about 300 of those are rehabilitated from zoos and pets. They still offer daily feedings to make sure they don't starve. At the camp, we hiked about 25 minutes into the feeding station and watched in amazement as about a dozen orangutans came swinging out of the forest to eat the provided bananas. Here's a few pictures:

From A trip to Borneo

From A trip to Borneo

From A trip to Borneo

The cycle then repeated itself. We visited three camps in all, sailing about 2 hours between each of them. We spent a few hours at each camp, looking at the orangutans. We saw over 40 orangutans in total. We also saw 5 wild orangutans off the side of the boat as we sailed on the river. The rest of the time we read, played cards, swam a little (though we had to be careful as there are crocodiles in the river) and shot our latest short film... oh yes, we've shot another one. This one is called "Up the River" and will be done soon and posted here.

After three days we were sad to leave. Life on the boat was great.

Click on the photo below to go to a slide show of about 50 pictures with captions from our trip.

A trip to Borneo

Janet goes to a local medicine man...

This is a post by Janet:

I went to see a Bali healer, twice.
I went out of curiosity.
I went because I am interested in all healing modalities.
But mostly I went to see if he could heal my summer/fall, ten year old, nocturnal neck and arm heat rash. Those of you that know me well have heard me complain bitterly that for four 4 months of the year I am up a night icing my arms and neck for pain relief.

From October in Bali

First, a bit about Balians, which is what they are called.
The guiding principle behind this magico-medical practice comes from a
traditional Balinese saying: Desa, kala, patra; which translates as
place, time, and circumstance. In other words knowledge, action,
health or life happenings need to be contextualized in place, time
and circumstance. With this in mind treatments are particular, not
general. By ‘particular’ I mean that they believe that illness comes
from either karma or others using poison or black magic on you.

Every village has at least four Balians. There are said to be more
than 8000 in Bali, and with a population of 4 million, they are
plentiful. There are four streams of Balians, I went to see the most
common kind, an Usada, who studies sacred Balinese texts that contain
information on illnesses and how to diagnose and cure them. Many
healers do not see foreigners as they feel that the cultural barrier
is just too vast. Not surprisingly since Eat, Pray, Love numerous
healers are cashing in on the interest by tourists to visit them,
often pulling in $30.00 to $60.00 dollars a client). Our friend and
driver Agus has taken many tourists to see Elizabeth Gilbert’s healer
(though now over 90 and as of August is in the hospital). He told that
me that he heard him say the exact same thing to all the women, a few
positive general comments with a strong emphasis that they are great
in bed.

Visits to the healer are done in public with often a combination of
locals and foreigners watching and listening. Treatments generally
hurt, a lot. I screamed and howled, a lot. The pain was similar to
labour. Sharp and nasty.

From October in Bali

On my first visit I started with a 60 second explanation of my hot arm
which he didn’t seem terribly interested in. He sat me down on the mat
in front of him and pressed all sorts of points on my head and in my
ears with his hands. This was the beginning of the magical torture
session. Next he lay me down on my back and and with his small wooden
mallet he pressed my vital organs as represented on the tips of my
toes (lungs, liver, spleen, kidneys.....). They all hurt. I screamed.

From October in Bali

He then drew some patterns over my body, said a few things, and then
pressed the points again. No change. Repeat. Some change. Repeat with
a few mudras and then finally NO PAIN. That’s right. When he pressed
that nasty wooden instrument into my toes the pain was gone. He then
proceeded to take a tiny glass jar, no larger than my thumb, and with
the opening down he placed it on the base of my big toe. He pressed
hard, I screamed (I had let my guard down thinking the pain was over),
he continued for what felt like 6 months, and within 2 minutes he was
done. NO PAIN. He was taking out the toxins I was told. It took a
while to get them out he offered as an explanation for the finale.

Over the course of the treatment he told me:
-I was allergic to stress
-To look in the mirror and tell myself I was beautiful
-To swallow my smile and not smile for other people but for myself
-To do ashtanga yoga
-To meditate every day and smile while I do so
-To take his oil and put it on my neck and arms
-That my lymph nodes where all blocked
-The my sushumna energy line was blocked and to open those chakras

My rash disappeared. Yup. 100% all gone by days end. I had my first
night’s sleep without a trip to the freezer since July 3rd. 10 full
days of relief. But then.....it returned.

From October in Bali

So I returned for visit two.
Second visit was a little less magical. I was sure he would remember
me. No. I was sure he would do a follow up inquiry into my smiling
meditation. No. I was sure he would look at my arms and a small light
of recognition would go off as to who I was. No. He seemed distracted
and bored. He poked me with that darn stick and I screamed. He didn’t
seem so interested in healing me or connecting with me.
He told me not to eat fish or eggs as I was shuffling back to the car.
It was all over in 3 minutes.

And that was my trip to the healer.

Emmet goes to the hospital (and does an interview)

This weekend Emmet was playing at a friend's house and he got hit in the head with a miniature surfboard. It cut him open just above his right eye. He went to the hospital and got seven stiches. He's doing great (it doesn't hurt anymore), but he can't swim for a week. So he's bummed about that. Here are two pictures.

From October in Bali

From October in Bali

Before the accident I did an interview with him about his thoughts on life in Bali. Here it is:

Question: Okay so here I am with Emmet. Emmet, what do you think of Bali so far?

Emmet: It’s very interesting.. It’s more bio-diverse than Canada. There’s a lot of interesting plants, palm trees. You never see those in Canada.

Question: So that’s the thing you notice the most so far?

Emmet: No that’s not the thing I notice the most. Well the motor bikes, they take up the streets, it’s really geared towards motorbikes. I notice that. I notice a lot of things. And I’m getting used to the monkeys in the parking lot near the monkey forest. Which is weird… I shouldn’t be getting used to that. I’m Canadian.

Question: But what’s your favourite thing so far about being in Bali?

Emmet: The school. Meeting new people.…I like the teachers. It’s pretty multicultural. It’s probably not what they dreamed, which is people from every single nation, or every single big nation. But I have friends from all over now. It’s good I can talk to them on facebook when I leave, email, stay in touch. Yeah maybe the school is what I like the most.

Question: What is something else that you like about Bali?

Emmet: Our house. I like our house. And the people. They’re nice. Learning the language which is fun. I’m getting there. Still at the basics, but the language is really easy.

Question: What about the food? What do you think of the food so far?

Emmet: I like the rice you know. I really like the fried rice. There is four different kinds of rice. I went to a rice field today with my school. They were just growing one type of rice, the new hybrid one. Rice is on every street, everywhere here. But that was the first time I’ve been right up to it.

Question: Okay the so the food is okay would you say?

Emmet: No, the food is pretty good. And there is still western food so it’s not like I’m going to be eating total Indonesian food for a year. Most big restaurants have western food.

Question: And what about the beaches in Bali? Have you been to any beaches? What are your thoughts about the beaches here?

Emmet: We came to Bali and we weren’t obviously like ‘let’s go to Bali for the beaches!’ it was more like let’s go to Bali for the experience. So we are somewhat in the middle of Bali, there’s no beaches. But it’s nice to get to the beaches every weekend or every other weekend.

Question: What’s something you don’t like about Bali?

Emmet: Youtube is really slow here!

Peter in Padang

On September 30th last year, a major earthquake hit the west coast of Sumatra here in Indonesia. Over a thousand people were killed, mostly around the city of Padang. I've spent the past four days in Padang working for UNICEF on a video showcasing their work here since the disaster.

From Peter in Padang

I got the job through some parents at the Green School who are freelancers. This week I've been traveling with one of them, Josh the photographer (that's his picture above), as well as with a writer from Jakarta and a media person from UNICEF. Because Josh was shooting stills, I didn't bring my still camera. So the only pictures I have from this week are the ones Josh took, both from a year ago when the quake happened, and from this week. Click on any of pics here go to a small gallery.

From Peter in Padang

Padang is half-way up Sumatra on the west coat. It takes about an hour and a half to from there from Jakarta (Bali is another hour and a half flight from Jakarta). Padang is known throughout Indonesia for it's food. It's spicy, and piled in bowls, usually in the window of the restaurant. You go in, they put the food on the table, and you only pay for what you eat. Very smart. We had some good seafood while here, at a restaurant right next to the beach.

Anyway it was great to see another part of this vast country (remember 18 000 islands!). So much more to see...

From Peter in Padang

A trip North

Bali is a small island... a tiny dot compared to it's Western neighbour Java. It's 90km by 140km long. About the size of PEI (isn't everything?). But for such a small place, it's incredibly diverse. There are, of course, beaches and rice paddies... but also forests, lakes, and mountains. And the mountains, well they're volcanoes. Seven of them. The last eruption was 1963... so here's hoping one doesn't blow while we're here! This past weekend we drove North from Ubud past some of these volcanoes. It was a bit cloudy so we didn't always have great views, but it was nice to feel the mountain air. We were only planning to go for one night... but we ended up driving right on through to the North coast, and spent a day and a night at the beach over there.
Here's a slideshow from the weekend.

A trip to the beach

Bali has some nice beaches, but it isn't like the Caribbean where every beach looks like a post card. You have to know where you're going...

This weekend we went to the beach near Padang Bai with a few families from the Green School. It took about an hour to get there from Ubud, heading East. Along the way we stopped at an important Balinese temple - which happens to be next to a huge cave full of thousands (millions?) of bats. After getting slightly lost, we finally found the lovely hidden beach. We had to trek down a steep path to get to the white sand... which meant the beach wasn't crowded. The waves were a little rough as it was windy on Sunday, but the water was warm and the sand was white.

Here's a slide show from the day.

Green School

As it's the start of the school year in Canada, I thought I would do a short post today about where Emmet, Myles and Austin are going to school: the "Green School."

It's a school that was started three years ago by John and Cynthia Hardy, a Canadian and American expat couple who have been in Bali for over 25 years. They made a fortune in the jewelery business here, and then sold their company about 12 years ago. When their daughter was getting older, they weren't satisfied with any of the international schooling options on the island, and so they decided to open their own school. The emphasis was, of course, on being green and sustainable, but they also brought in people with experience in Waldorf/Steiner schools, and so there is some of that too. And then they also decided they needed to be solid academically, so the the school follows the Cambridge International Examination curriculum. A little bit of everything...

But what makes the school so unique is the setting and the architecture. It's set on a large plot of land next to a river... essentially in the middle of a small forest (jungle?). And as John Hardy is a big proponent of building with Bamboo, they built the entire school out of bamboo. It's really quite amazing. Here are a few pictures from what they call the "Heart of the School," the main building of Green School.






Emmet loves the school. He told me today he likes it better than his last school, Ossington Old Orchard, which is remarkable because he really liked OOOPs. He's got a great teacher who has been teaching in Bangkok for the last few years, and who Emmet likes a lot. I think he likes the school because he gets to be outside a lot, but also feels like he's learning. And as the school is very international, everyone is from somewhere else, there's lots of different accents, and that, I think, is cool.

Myles and Austin were a little lukewarm at first about school... but are now into it. Although Austin especially misses Toronto and their last teacher Mr. D. But, they did tell me today they like their class and their teacher. They are doing work in the garden outside their classroom once a week, and are enjoying that. Today they had soccer practice at lunch, and then phys ed right after... and what could be better than that.

And that's all for Green School for now... I've put together a short photo essay on a day in the life at Green School for the boys. Click on the arrows to watch it on this page, or click on the pictures to open up the web album (larger pictures).



Bye for now,

Peter

Digging

Our much awaited film, Digging... is now finished.
Enjoy.

Elephant Ride

Elephants aren't native to Bali, but they are
found in Sumatra and Borneo.
Yesterday we went on a one hour ride
at a park here in Bali.
It was pretty wild.

Here's a link to some pictures:

Elephant Ride

Thoughts on Ubud and a photo essay

We live 3 km from the centre of the town of Ubud in Central Bali.

Yesterday I shot a photo essay about how to get from our house to central Ubud. Click on the picture of the monkey to open a new page which will take you to the essay. The pictures are in order so the slideshow feature is recommended. For advanced users I've also mapped the photos on google maps ... you'll see a map on the right. (If you're wondering why the picture is of a monkey...you'll have to click on the monkey to see!).

From our house to the centre of Ubud

Here’s what Wikipedia says about Ubud:

“Ubud is located amongst rice paddies and steep ravines in the central foothills of Bali. One of Bali's major arts and culture centres, it has developed a large tourism industry. Ubud has a population of about 8,000 people, but it is becoming difficult to distinguish the town itself from the villages that surround it.”

All true.
Ubud is beautiful and there is lots going on.

But it’s also a total tourist trap... especially since part of the book (and the movie) Eat, Pray, Love is set here.
For us that is good and bad.

First the good:
*Lots of good food choices at decent prices. Most restaurants have a kids menu that offers western food, so Janet and I can eat more exotic fare while the kids have spaghetti (like last night).
*The two grocery stores are pretty good and have cereal, pasta, parmesan, even pesto!
*Most people speak a bit of English… which is good as our Bahasa Indonesia is not great yet, but slowly improving (especially Emmet).
*It’s very pretty. Lots of great views, especially in the ravines and heading North.
*Lots of yoga for Janet.
*Friends for the kids: lots of kids from their school live in the area.
*We are in the foothills so the weather is not as hot as the coast. It’s mostly been about 28 or 29, which has been nice. We sleep with light blankets on at night.
*Ubud is very central. The mountains are North, the beaches South-West and South-East. A good place to be based to explore Bali.

And now the bad:
*Traffic is bad, especially now in August. This is high season for tourism and the main roads are very busy.
*Walking with the kids is not possible. The roads are too busy and narrow. If we go out, we have to call a driver.
*There’s lots of tourists… though not around our house, mostly in central Ubud.
*It’s a fairly long drive to the beach. About 45 minutes when the traffic is good, can be an hour or more if the traffic is bad.
*There are snakes. No one is bothered by this, except me (Peter). I don’t like snakes. I’ve only seen one so far… and it was small. Oh well. Apparently they don’t bother people.

And that’s it.
Mostly good, some bad.

Come and visit and see for yourself!
The next post will be about where the kids go to school… the Green School.
(Unless I finish the “Digging” film first).

Bye for now,

Peter

A week in Beijing.

Okay… so as I mentioned… we hit China on the way to Bali.

From A week in Beijing

Here's Janet with some thoughts about our time there.

...

Our Novotel hotel was near Wangfujing (Beijings ‘ramblas’), so we headed over on our fist night to stretch our legs after our long flight from Vancouver. There were large billboards written in English reminding locals that filling out the census was of great importance in order to run the country. The wording was intense, reminded me of Cuba. 1.4 Billion people can’t be wrong Mr. Harper.

From A week in Beijing

We pushed our way through a very crowded shopping street revealing this country for what it is, a capitalist dictatorship.

Rising most mornings at 2:00 a.m. we visited the top sites for as long as the kids could manage. The Great Wall (we went to Mutianyu), The Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, Tiantan park (where the kids played a racquet sport with a local), Yashow Market, the Temple of Heaven, The Pearl Market. We also saw an acrobat show at the Chaoyang Theatre, visited the Lama Temple, The Drum Tower, The Silk Market and The Olympic pool (The Cube)......we journeyed through a Hutong by bike and had fantastic food massages. We ate roasted duck at Da Dong (NY Times best rated restaurant in Beijing) in under 30 minutes, shared a mongolian hot pot, hit up a western style cafe called Caribou where the kids ate bowl after bowl of penne and I drank my first latte in days, we chowed down on fantastic food at both Jin Ding Xuan (cantonese) and Din Tai Fung (dumplings).
By weeks end our lungs were thick with smog (they call it Grey-jing) and we were all hacking and had sore throats. We were tired of the traffic, fatigued by the harassment in the markets, done with Myles and Austin posing for photos and ready to see something green (I scouted for a bird the whole week and never saw one).

But we’re glad we went… China is unlike any other place. And that’s cool.

It was also good because it made the kids eager to see some green after all the grey.

Bring on Bali! We chanted...

And best of all for Peter, it allowed him to finish his film, Digging, which will be up here in a few days.

Click on the photo below to go to an album of photos (with captions) from China:

A week in Beijing

All for now...

Janet (and Peter)

The first post!

Alright.
So we are here... been in Bali one week.

And finally getting the blog started.

I'm going to start where we are today, and then
work backwards a bit, to cover the last two weeks.
Starting with China, and then with our arrival here last Friday.

Many of you have asked about our film we shot in China...
"Digging." It will soon be out. Hope to have a link to
it in the next post... maybe by Monday or Tuesday.
Might be our best film yet (certainly the longest)...

But let's start with today.
I'm sitting in our amazing house just outside of Ubud, in
South Central Bali. The internet connection is a bit
wonky, hoping to upgrade soon, but not bad.
Here's a google maps link to where we live.
The blue dot is our yard.


Here's what the house looks like.

Our house in Bali.

Click on the picture to go to a Web Album with more pictures.

The house belongs to Lawrence Blair, who has
lived in Bali for about 35 years. Here's a link to him. Very interesting guy.


The good:
the house is beautiful, all made of wood, which
is unusual here. The wood is 150 years old and was brought
from Java about 15 years ago... it was a rice granary.
Anyways, there's lots of space,
there is a huge yard, an amazing pool,
super comfortable beds, a nice kitchen...
basically the kids couldn't believe their luck
when we arrived. We couldn't either.
It's also right next to about 2 km's of never
ending rice paddies which are fun to walk in.
Right out the back door.

The strange:
We have staff. A lot of staff.
There's Nyoman, who, well, you pretty much have to call a maid.
She's worked here since the house was built 15 years ago, and knows it inside out.
There's a head gardener and an assistant. Both called Wayan.
One of them comes everyday.
There is a pool guy - Agun Alit - who comes and cleans the pool every morning.
And... there are two guys from Java who built the house
and also did the renovations the past year to get the house
ready for us... Johnny and Tukur, and they right now are living
in the small staff quarters in a corner of the property. Crazy.

(We're trying to figure out what to do about driving...
looks like we'll have a plan soon, but the driving is another
entry in and of itself and we'll get to that soon).

The not so good:
Rats. They come at night.
Janet's seen a few in the kitchen.
Everyone has them in Bali.
We make sure we put all
our food away... they are a bit
smaller than the sewer rats you
might come across in Canada. We
try to think of them as large mice.
Oh well.

The traffic... challenging to get around
Ubud right now because it's high season
for tourism. So lots of traffic. We are told it
will calm down in September. Looking
forward to that.

Okay so that's enough for now...
upcoming entries will cover:
Our one week stop in Beijing (and a film we finished there).
A film we made on Savary Island, BC.
The kids school here (pretty cool)
Our new dog Bene.
Driving in Bali.

If you find any of these topics uninteresting,
let me know and I won't write about them.

All for now.

P