hello everyone,
can’t believe it has been 6 weeks since we arrived! we had 5 great (and sometimes rather surprising) weeks in bali and 1 week in gili air – tiny island 1.5 hours away by speed boat.
so far bali has been pretty good – what a generous place! it’s beautiful and it’s filthy… it’s calm and relaxed and crazy and frustrating at the same time…
magic mushrooms and weed offer on gili air left our dubai kids rather shocked ((-;
on my first day i met 5 people called Kadek. i did find it a bit confusing but.. it’s settling in! in the area where we live (next to ubud) most of the people speak some english which is very helpful. all of us started to learn indonesian – let’s see how that goes! kids like it more than arabic – no wonder, there is no script to learn and generally it’s much easier. so perhaps even i’ll be able talk a bit (-;
couple of insights on daily life:
no need for parfume – constantly drenching myself in citronella to ward off at least some of the Slovak blood thirsty mosquitos..
no need for any hair products (not that i ever use any..) or hairdryer.. or hairdresser. hair is constantly damp. if it by accident happens to be dry it will surely rain in a minute. and we are in dry season now (-; so if you travel here.. you can leave your hairdryer at home (-;
our house is very beautiful although not extremely practical. our room (actually a wooden house) is completely separated from kids rooms/houses – which basically means that one of us sleeps with one kid and the other one with the other kid as kids are scared to sleep alone in their little huts (-; very romantic!!! i think it’s kind of revenge (justice?) for not sleeping long enough in the same room/bed with them when they were babies. need to catch up!
pets – not only we have a lovely and very affectionate cat, koi fish and flock of mosquitos, you can meet preying mantis (of huge proportions!!!), centipedes (last night’s catch was a bit scary) spiders, dragon flies, butterflies, all shapes and sizes of ants, huge wasps, various beautifully coloured bugs (and an odd roach or two) in our garden/open kitchen. 1 snake encounter so far – but our sweet cat killed it. linda was very upset and sorry for the poor snakie.. good news – from 30 snake species in bali only 4 are poisonous. hurray!!!! interesting piece of info from bali guidebook – the geckos always take shit on the same spot – is confirmed every morning on a rag in our bedroom ((-;
for prospective tourists: don’t trust google maps in bali. just don’t trust them. they are not up-to-date if they ever were ((-; talking from experience.
food – i’m in heaven. the best ever fresh healthy organic. yummy. you can also find fried pork skins around. serves everybody’s tastes ((-;
school – probably the main deciding factor in our move here – is great. it’s also very strange. kids really love it so we are happy (-:
we still haven’t worked out how to earn our living here – but we are taking it easy.. for now (-;
our bodies, minds and spirits are slowly adjusting to the new environment, new bugs and germs, uneven surfaces and (real) barefoot walking and running..unbelievable how clumsy a person used to ‘civilisation” can be! to finish on a positive note – so far we have ended up with different degrees and combinations of bali (gili) belly, ear pain, mosquitos bites scratched to the point of disgusting infection, jelly fish and bee stings, toe injuries, suddenly materialised sea sickness.. etc. but nothing to worry about.
hope you are all doing well and maybe i’ll see some of you soon!
lots of love,
jarka&co