Bali, Bali, Bali…ohh, how I love you.
Well, first off, if you didn’t already know me and a few of
my fellow Americans went to Bali for our Mid-Semester Break, which back home
would be like our Spring Break. And it
was AWESOMEEEEE, and like no other adventure I have taken yet. It was the perfect break from school and
life, and was definitely exactly what I needed.
Tulamben
This is where we got dive certified! The dive company picked Meredith, Erin, and
me up from the airport about midnight and drove us to the resort (quite an
interesting ride as I constantly let out mini squeals as we nearly hit SO many
dogs). When we arrived to the resort, it
was way better than the place I had imagined we would be staying because it
looked like a ritzy honeymoon spot as it was directly on the beach with a run
off pool that looked like could have gone straight into the ocean if you looked
at it from the right angle. Probably a
little too excited, we looked like little girls who had just entered Barbie Palace (I’m saying that even though I never liked Barbies) as we cheered and
soared across the beds. I could barely
fall asleep that night too!
The next morning, we were greeted with a delicious breakfast of omelets, bacon, sausage, fruit plate, toast and jelly, and fruit juice (which we got EVERY day). Then we were off to the pool where we learned how to
breathe correctly through the regulator and practiced certain skills like
equalizing, clearing our mask, hand signals, etc. It was SO much easier than I
expected, and I felt so comfortable that I could NOT wait to get to the
ocean.
The next two days, we dove in the ocean! The deepest we went was about 18 meters over
an old shipwreck! I touched the steering
wheel, and then we saw sharks (6 or 7 feet LONG), octopus, banner fish, lionfish,
sweet lips, seahorse, barracuda, little Nemo’s and Dori’s, and pretty much
everything else possible to see EXCEPT a sea turtle. Bummer, I know. One scary moment though was
when I had to take my mask completely off and put it back on while underwater
as part of the skills test. I was already
nervous to do this, and of course, as soon as I take my mask off, what do I
do? I breathe in through my NOSE. I inhaled what felt like the entire ocean and
started to panic a little knowing I couldn’t just swim right up to the top
because we were so deep and my lungs could burst. Somehow, I managed to get my breathing
pattern back on track, and my lungs thanked me. Positive note though… I passed my exam, and I
AM OFFICIALLY DIVE CERTIFIED!! YA!! (had
to say that for Courtney and our moms.)
When we weren’t diving, we hung out by the pool, ate
delicious Indonesian food (my favorite was crab and corn soup), got FULL body
massages (when I say FULL body, I mean FULL body), and chilled on the beach. My
first black sand/rock beach that is. At
night, we listened to locals playing acoustic American songs and Balinese songs
when we asked them. I tried so hard to
find someone that knew “Collide” by Howie Day, but NO one did. So… my second choice was Sweet Home
Alabama! Even though Alabama isn’t my
home sweet home, it’s my favorite movie and is almost the same thing. :D
Another luxury we had was our own motorbike! I’m pretty sure they didn’t give it to us for
“joy” riding, but we did it anyways. We
took it down and around the streets of Tulamben, which was such a cool
town. One pit stop we made was at a
restaurant that served octopus and ONLY octopus. Those that know me well won’t believe this,
but… I ate my ENTIRE serving of grilled octopus, and it was SO good. (What is happening to me?!) Or…was I just THAT hungry again. Hahh.
One thing that happened that wasn’t funny at the time, but
is now, occurred just as we were about to leave the dive place. I spotted a HUGE gecko, and knowing how much
Meredith likes lizardy things told her to come look at it. Not sure where her brain was at the moment,
she went to pick up this gecko, and it bit her all the way to the bone on her
knuckle and had to be pried off with a knife.
Luckily, the dive people had alcohol and band-aids and the wound healed
nicely. Isn’t he cute??? NOT.
Ubud
After a beautiful scenic taxi drive (I could NOT stop taking
pictures), we arrived to Ubud where we were supposed to meet Clara and Marlee
at the “Secret Garden”, but it stood true to it’s name of being secret because
we could not find it to save our lives.
After searching and searching and finding every other secret garden
except for the one they were at, Meredith started to not feel well so we just
found a homestay to sleep at for the night.
We were pretty desperate to just take what we could find, which ended up
being a sweet young man’s OWN room that he offered to us since all of his three
person rooms were booked. It felt a
little strange to say the least to be sleeping in his king sized bed on his
sheets beside his bedside table with his personal belongings and using his
bathroom with his personal hygiene items (I saw bleaching body cream…:O). There was also no air conditioning, but I
learned the hard way (mostly because it was the only choice) that cold showers
before bed are the key to staying cool at night. The next morning, we were given fresh
watermelon and French toast for breakfast, which was a nice change from having
rice, rice, and more rice in Malaysia.
After finally finding Clara and Marlee and THE Secret Garden (the bedroom was gorgeous), we explored the town
of Ubud. We shopped, ate some sushi and
eggplant, watched the Balinese women do offerings and carry things on their heads, gazed at rice fields, toured
the monkey forest, listened to live bands, people watched, and just enjoyed the
most relaxing, stress-free, and laid back atmosphere I had ever been in. The people there seemed so happy, healthy,
and naturally beautiful. Wanna know
their secret?? Yoga!! There was a yoga
place on almost every corner of every street, and I have decided if I don’t
become a veterinarian, my back up plan is to move to Bali and become a yoga
instructor. ;) We also went to a really
cool trance dance where there were really cool costumes, chanting, and dancing.
Uluwatu
This was our next destination in Bali where there was
supposedly surfing for “beginners”. As
soon as we arrived, we we headed to the beach but were humorly surprised to see
that the waves were about 12 feet HIGH, and the beach consisted of maybe 30
yards of beach and then all cliff and rocks.
It wasn’t too hard to decide that that wasn’t the place to learn how to
surf, so we just sat on top of the cliff and watched the experienced surfers
surf while drinking banana milkshakes.
While walking in the sand, one of my flip flops broke and
while I was fixing it, I looked down and noticed my other flip flop was
gone! I laughed at myself…out loud, not
knowing how I managed to do that. Since
there were sharp rocks and glass pieces in the sand, I decided to just wear one
flip flop so at least one foot wouldn’t get cut. However, as I was walking back up the stairs
to the top of the cliff, I looked down and found a single black flip flop that I could wear on my other foot!
I’m not sure what looked funnier, walking around with one shoe or
walking in one white flip flop and one black flop (didn't get a picture of that!).
Not too long after, it started to rain so we sat outside one
of the shops hoping it would pass by. As
we were sitting, a girl named Jessyca (she was an Eskimo from Canada!) came up
to me and looking at my shoes, said, “Hey, did you lose a black flip
flop?! I saw that exact one in the
sand!” I laughed and said, “Well, I
actually lost a white one, but I just happened to find this black one on the
steps.” Raining too hard to go back to
look for the other black one, and too hard to head back to our place, the flip
flop conversation turned into being invited to join Jessyca and some other
people (2 Canadians and 1 Aussie) she had met to hang out with until the rain
stopped. However, it continued to rain
and rain some more, so we spent the rest of the evening playing cards and
singing songs as our new Aussie friend, Sid, played guitar. What else better is there to do on a rainy
day?
After planning to stay in Uluwatu only for a few nights,
Meredith and I were enjoying ourselves and new “fam” (what we called our new
group) so much, we stayed there for the rest of the time we were in Bali. There was a pool party one night at the
resort down the street where we met some cool English boys (one told us a story
about getting “Bali Belly” and my abs were sore the next day from laughing so
much), a guy from Morocco, another guy from Australia, and some German guys
(both could have been models) as we all just sat in the pool enjoying meeting
new people and listened to a live band. They were also ALL surfers by the way... Hehee. We also spent some time at Padang
Padang Beach where we enjoyed the sun, watched some fishermen, and even paddle
boarded a little once the tide went down and the waves got smaller. One morning I woke up to go watch Sid surf! He was so good! We also visited the Monkey temple where they were
extremely touchy and I carried a stick to shoo them away. For our last evening together, we all had a
sunset dinner and then danced and listened to another live band, and ended the
night gazing at stars by the pool. I saw
TWO shooting stars…we’ll see if my wishes come true. The next day, the fam and I had our last
breakfast of banana pancakes (I ate them EVERY day, they were so good) and headed
to Kuta Beach.
Kuta Beach
This is where the fam had our final lunch
together, swam in a pool, and then chilled on the beach until it was time to
head to the airport in the evening. In the end, I’ve
never been so happy to have lost something as it lead to meeting some great
people that we made some great memories with.
