Peter's parents visit Bali

From Audrey and George visit

Here is a guest post from Peter's mom. Audrey and George were here in Bali from December 30th - January 23rd.

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We arrived in Bali and were struck first by the heat and humidity, which continued throughout our three and a half week stay. We stayed with Peter and Janet in their beautiful bamboo guest cottage, and were thrilled to be able to use their house as our base as we travelled around the island. We saw a good part of it, and had an absolutely amazing time.

Of course the highlight of our visit was spending so much quality time with our 3 grandchildren. Of our 649 pictures, it's likely 500 feature Austin, Myles or Emmet. When we were ïn residence, we loved having Myles and Austie climb into our huge canopy bed with us at 6am each morning.

From Audrey and George visit

We travelled all over the island- to the east, to Padang Bai where we went snorkelling on a boat, and swimming on a lovely white sand beach, and to Candidasa, where we went down a tiny steep slope to a surprise white sand beach, complete with warungs (food stalls), showers and beach chairs and umbrellas. We went to the north with Peter to the edge of the volcano, and down into the crater where we swam in hot springs amongst natives...(Peter loves to be the only bule). We went to the north east, to more mountains beside a huge park, where we stayed in an enchanting villa complete with an outdoor shower that was so much fun. We hiked to a waterfall en route to the north, and stopped at a coffee plantation for lunch. We went to the south- twice- to Legian beach, where the big waves are, and many surfers spend their days just playing their hearts out. We went to the south west, to the most photographed place in Bali, Tanah Lot- a historic temple situated in the sea. And we went over to Lombok by ferry with Peter, Myles and Austin, and spent 4 glorious days there, 2 on a remote island called Gili Nangu, where we slept right beside the waves, and 2 at the southern tip of Lombok at a beautiful unspoiled beach with a great Novetel hotel on it. We spent some lovely days in Ubud, in the heart of Bali, and hiked some gorgeous trails (we went up the Sari Organic path a record 3 times, we liked it so much). We did some great shopping and had fun bargaining, we had some terrific meals at very unusual restaurants, we wandered through the Monkey forest, we travelled on the back of Peter and Janet's scooters (or at least I did), and we had two lovely days at a very beautiful 5 star hotel in Ubud.

We had 4 different drivers in Bali: of course Peter and Janet were our favorites, but Agus and Eka were a terrific source of information, and as they took us around different parts of Bali, we learned a great deal about the customs and the ways of the Balinese. We saw ceremonies everywhere- lots of funerals, special temple activities, cremations, and many people making offerings everywhere- even around Peter and Janet's home. We loved walking over flower petals to get into the house! And on our last evening there, we had a special birthday party for Janet's Dad, complete with musicians, dancers, and many more flower petals spread around the house. Amazing

We loved the Indonesian food; George and Janet took a cooking class together, and as I write this, he is making his favorite Nasi Goreng.

From Audrey and George visit

And of course we loved the heat. The rainy season lived up to it's name, and we had rain most days, sometimes accompanied with very violent thunder storms, but the rain didn't interfere with our plans most of the time, and no sooner did it stop than the sun came out. It was very hot and humid throughout our visit.

The surprise for us was how populated the tiny island of Bali was, and how commercial it was- with stalls selling just about everything all along the roads. The roads are narrow, and the traffic is intense, so getting from one place to another was sometimes challenging, but it was all part of the atmosphere, and great fun to soak it up. We found we sought out places that were less travelled, and more rural, and when we viewed our slide show last night, it would appear we accomplished that, as our pictures show us on beautiful beaches and magnificent green rice paddies-virtually by ourselves!

Finally, we enjoyed visiting the Green School, which has to be seen to be believed. George, Janet and I spent a great morning in Grade 2, where we taught the students in Myles and Austin's class all about Canada. It was a red and white day for everyone.

Makasi to Peter, Janet, Emmet, Austin and Myles who were so hospitable, and with whom we had such fun. It was a trip we will never forget, and we are so glad you invited us to come and visit.

Vietnam

Happy New Year everyone!

I realize we've been a bit slow with the blog lately... and for you die hard readers out there, I apologize.

We've been on the road a lot over the last 3 weeks, and life is just now getting back to normal (as normal as it can be while living in a place where you have rats in your kitchen and the occasional monkey in the yard).

Anyway, Peter, Janet, Myles and Austin went to Vietnam from December 16^th -30^th (Emmet went home to Canada, maybe you saw him?) We started in the North of Vietnam, in Hanoi, and worked our way down to Saigon. We traveled by plane, train, bus, boat, and scooter... you name it! Below is a quick take on each of the places we hit, and a few photos (if you want to go to a album of our photos from Vietnam click on any of the photos and it will take you there).

Here's a video from our time there:

From Christmas in Vietnam

Hanoi: beautiful but cold and busy. Was 12 degrees (celsuis) when we arrived, which after 6 months in Bali, is cold! We bought some new clothing, Christmas shopped, and headed out of town to...

Sapa: Probably our favourite place. The Vietnamese alps. Big mountains, great views, and yes, cold air. Got down to zero at night while we were there. We dressed for it (no bad weather just bad clothes) but were definitely not expecting it to be so beautiful! Amazing place. Interesting hill tribes, some nice hikes, and a fun way to get there: by overnight train. The way home, not as fun: Austin puked off the top bunk onto our luggage below (luckily not onto anyone).

From Christmas in Vietnam

Halong Bay: We did an overnight on a Vietnamese junk in Halong Bay. Lovely. Met some nice Aussies and Spanish folks, and enjoyed the beautiful rock formations. As Myles said: “Look, another rock island!”

From Christmas in Vietnam

Hue: Met up with our friends from Bali (from Vancouver) in Hue. Stayed at a gorgeous French colonial hotel 100 years old. Town was a bit ho-hum. Had Christmas morning in hotel and a bizarre massive buffet for Christmas eve. Boys were happy to see their friends and got cool Vietnamese lego from Santa.

Hoi An: Another favourite place: Beautiful ancient town known for it's many (many) fine tailors who make clothes to measure. We got some clothes made and had some good croissants (the French left the recipe when they went home). Twins played soccer in street with locals.

From Christmas in Vietnam

Saigon: Peter and twins there for just a night, but Janet stayed and waited a few days before going to Hong Kong to pick up Emmet. She liked it. Especially liked the bike trip she did in the Mekong delta.

And that's it! Vietnam in a page! Stay tuned for news from George and Audrey's visit (Peter's parents) as they arrived in Bali on the 30^th of December... we went to Lombok. Amazing place.

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.