March 7, 2024.
Today I woke up at a family guesthouse. Read, a guesthouse where you share space with the family. Sons shower in guest’s bathrooms. Children play on the shared garden. Mothers prepare morning offerings next to the room’s patios. Families in Ubud seem like working in company. They cut vegetables, prepare food and make leaf boxes for offerings together.
The daughter invites me to do the morning offerings. On each altar in the family property, in door fronts, in the middle of the garden, she puts tiny portions of rice with coconut on banana leaves cutlets. Next to the rice, she places a small leaf box of flowers and makes a small prayer.
She gives thanks for the life she has. Most Balinese families repeat this ritual every day, multiple times a day. To start each day with gratefulness and a giving mentality.
Every afternoon has rained in Ubud. For three, four, five days straight, rain can be expected, counted on, to split the day and halt any outside plans. But it’s not the typical rain. With each one, time seems to slow down. People seem to stop moving as fast. Raindrops seem to hang a little longer in the air.
“Don’t scream”, she said, “I will drive us back”. She drives a motorcycle every day to work in Jakarta, and she can be a “crazy driver”. Her words. I met her by chance in our accommodation, and again while doing the Campuhan Ridge Walk. After the walk, short and hot, we get back to the accommodation. “Wait one minute”, she said. “Ok, let’s go eat”.
I drive to a Thai restaurant. In total, I may have two weeks experience driving a motorcycle. She notices too, starts to get impatience. “You don’t have to wait for cars to make space”. They will make space. “Pass these cars on the right”, the space between cars and sidewalk, too narrow for my current skills.
Ok, she will show me how she drives in Jakarta. It’s fast, deliberate. I scream, but it’s delight. No helmet, cruising around Ubud getting motorbike lessons.
