Bali Day 1: Katut, Temples and the Midnight Pigs
As with all my important plans, trips, work endeavors and personal outings, I cut it right down to the wire getting to Bali. The excitement kept building, but so did my worry about making it on time.
Meeting Katut
Katut is an authentic, gregarious man: 56 years old, about 130 pounds, and his most prominent feature is his smile. He told me he lost his son, just 19 years old, in May of last year. He's obviously still grieving, so I didn't ask anything that would make him dig back through those memories. He was clearly very proud of his daughter, though, who works at a local water sports rental company.
Home Cooking in a Family Compound
Katut's wife made me two dinners and breakfasts in her own kitchen, something I hadn't had yet on this trip. His house is really a compound he shares with his brothers, complete with its own temple, as most families in Bali have. Dogs and chickens run wild, and sanitary standards are far below what we're used to in the first world. The house backs up to a literal jungle: thick, green and infested with mosquitoes.
Ubud: The Fantastic and the Filthy
Ubud is truly a dichotomy of the fantastic and the filthy. The smaller personal temples can get very ornate, and it seems like people are competing with each other to have the most elaborate one. Much of the hand carving of stone has given way to concrete casts and other obviously repetitive techniques, but every so often you come across a spectacular piece carved by hand.
The streets are full of color; a painted god is never more than a stone's throw away. Sadly, neither is a carbon copy of the shop you're standing in.
The dirty side of Ubud is both a literal and a figurative reality. The sidewalks are riddled with broken and missing segments that force you to concentrate on every step. Some segments are gone entirely, exposing the sewer beneath. The smell of sewage is never more than a couple of breaths away.
Ubud doesn't feel like a tough town, but it definitely has a seedy underbelly. With so many poor people, it's inevitable that there's an underclass struggling to make ends meet. There are also plenty of neglected pets running the streets.
Tourists, Taxis and Millions of Rupiah
Chinese and European tourists flood the streets, even on a Tuesday. The heat, coupled with the humidity, is to be respected. And a taxi here means hanging on to the back of a motorcycle with no help while the driver goes the wrong way down a street that only runs one way.
Money runs into the millions of rupiah. I bought a $200 statue for over 2 million rupiah!
Monkeys by Day, Pigs by Night
In the northern part of town, monkeys roam the streets and aren't the least bit shy about taking anything they want.
And then there are the pigs. Their grunt starts slow with a deep rumble, then peaks in a shrill gurgle, like something being strangled. I know this because as I try to fall asleep, their grunting blusters in over the Balinese midnight insect orchestra, which is none too quiet on its own.
