Category — Indonesia

Many people consider Bali to be paradise.  We found the place to be more complex, with many things to love – and an equal number to drive you crazy.  Our report on Bali is posted here.

On our last night in Bali we had dinner on the beach in the town of Jimbaran – and were treated to a sunset seranede. Seems like Kid Rock’s not the only one channeling Lynryd Skynrd these days.

This is one of those weird, out-of-context musical moments, and surely the last thing I expected to hear on the beach in Bali.

And when the song was done, we enjoyed dinner on the beach and one of the sunsets for which Bali is rightfully famous.

Be sure to check out the Beach Band’s encore performance of “Let It Be.”

They sell bananas for you to feed the monkeys in Ubud’s Scared Monkey Forest, but truth be told, if you are carrying food you don’t make it too far from the front entrance before the monkeys have you surrounded.

The monkeys know what’s what.  If you are carrying yellow, better give it up.  Quickly. Or they will take it from you.

Signs warn visitors not to tease the monkeys, and to protect their belongings.  Turns out the monkeys are accomplished pickpockets.

And cute too.  After an hour of observing the these little thieves, we marveled at their human qualities.

We arrived in Bali, Indonesia without much of a plan.

We hoped to find a nice (cheap) place with workable wifi where we could settle in for a week and continue to make progress on the kids’ schoolwork.  Which is the short version of how we found ourselves at the Swastika Bungalows in Sanur.

No, we had not wandered in to a Neo-Nazi cell in Indonesia.

Turns out, the swastika has existed as an ornament and symbol since the Neolithic period.  It remains widely used in eastern religions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.

In Sanskrit, swastika refers to 1) any lucky or auspicious object, and 2) a mark made on a person or things to denote good luck.

Regardless of the original meaning, in Western societies the rise of Hitler and World War II forever stigmatized and effectively ended the use of the symbol.

So it was a bit disconcerting checking into the Swastika Bungalows, regardless of how comfortable and affordable they were.  Particularly with snatches of German and other Eastern European languages being spoken around the pool.

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