Ruma Oka (at Oka's house)

Just when I think we are on our way home, the children are asleep in the way back seat, the car slows to turn into a lonely road. We’re in the middle of jungle. No one’s said anything to me. It’s just assumed that I’m also planning on spending the rest of the day--with them--at Ruma Oka. In the games I play with my mind to remember strange words: ruma oka is one that sticks. The house of Oka.

On a lumpy, muddy road, we drive slowly,but still bounce up and down, while squeezing between narrow and steep mossy rock walls with the car mirrors tucked in. Up the stairs into the compound. It’s simple, well-worn, and dirt-covered. Past pens of ducks and pigs, chickens scratch the bare ground in front of the house, laundry hangs to dry, and sun flits through the spaces between rambutan and manga trees. Roosters for fighting crow from straw cages. Barefoot kids dart between sunshine and shadow. A lone motor bike guards the small family rice field. Two small buildings are joined by a traditional Indonesian kitchen. No stove, no gas. But a coconut-husk fed fire that has blackened the walls and contents of the kitchen with soot. Anni shows it off – great taste here, not like the gas stove. In the corner fresh, dark blood spills from a board, and pools on the ground. It was probably a chicken.

Oka sits, dressed in white (a stark contrast to the drab surroundings) watching the day, cross-legged on the long covered porch, smiling. He welcomes us and instructs me to sit with him as his wife brings out three plates of fruit and coffee. I try to eat, because I know it’s expected, but I am so full I can hardly stand the tie around my waste anymore (that and the pig incident has left my stomach just a little queezy still). I appease them with sips of strong copi (coffee). Then the coconuts (colapa muda) are brought out. Oka hacks them open and inserts a straw for me to taste it. His wife teaches me to say “rasmana manis” (those are sweet). Then I learn the names of more fruit as Oka’s tiny grand daughter points her brother’s camera at me to take pictures of me making silly faces. The kids run around the yard. Newly wed sister, in a sparkling kabayah, chases them and picks them up, for hugs and kisses against their will. Everyone laughs. The boy who’s picked on the most, but who has the best joking demeanor, finally hides behind the farthest wall of the compound and starts to sing.

Maybe six years old, his soft voice, like tissue paper, sometimes rips and tears on the high notes – it’s sweet, light and beautiful. The other kids join in at parts, he gains confidence then sings at the top of his lungs. The only word I understand: “My darrrrrling! My darling!” Everyone laughs. I join in for reasons of my own: I’m in Bali, sitting cross-legged in the family compound of the descendent of an Indonesian king, sharing new words with his family and children. Three weeks ago, I was working in a coffee shop, in Seattle.

Nothing much happens. Just a series of simple minutes, that drift into hours. A lazy afternoon with a group of strangers-turned-family, like all the others. This is Indonesia, they tell me, as we sit and peel rumbutan and mangiis. Eating, sharing, talking Indonesian. Jokes and smiles and gossip is traded. Kids play. I snap photos as they correct my Indonesian. Then lean back, imagine what it would be like to have grown up here, and let myself whither after long hours in the sun. Oka drives me home, escorts me back to the gate. I thank him many times for honoring me with a visit to his house. He is pleased and wants to take me to new Indonesian places tomorrow or the day after next, or after that? I am so worn out again from so many busy days. I know I need to rest, work, and after being surrounded by a pool of such fabulous people, so constantly: I feel the need for some serious down time. (So American, but it’s what my heart and mind are now yearning for.)

I smile, Ya, ya nanti, nanti… Saya kerja! (Yes, yes, but later, later….I work now!)

Tidak, tidak, tidak: Lampang! (No, no, no, lampang!)

Are we heading home? I ask. Nanti (later) Is the response I get. The children need food.

We drive far away. I laugh at my insistent need to get things done, when I know this is enough. We go for babi guling at a grimy warung. I snap a couple shots (in case there was any doubt just how Indonesian I am eating these days) and watch a busload of tourists unload, and walk by without a glance. The kids hand me things to smell and taste. I like the slightly spicy fried bean crackers called lampang, I’m ok with the flavorless fried pig skin that acts as babi guling spoons, I devour the meat and start in on the nankat (jackfruit?) fruit soup eagerly. The yellow-brown broth is delicious, savory and sweet.

As I drink more and more, the broth slowly lowers. Finally I have to lower my head to the cup…allowing me to see the inch long tufts of thick pig whiskers attached to a large bit of pig meat that finally rose to the top of my soup cup. In my fearless mission to try it all for the last couple weeks, it’s the first time I am really, truly floored by nausea. I look again. Yes. Tufts, floating in a pool of green-brown savory broth. The smell of everything—the once delicious soup, the bits of nankat, the spicy meat, even the bland white rice--suddenly seem raw and clammy. I try not to think of the pig, or it's origins. But only think of it more. Snorting and moving...and...If not eating is rude, I imagine throwing up would ruin my “accepted” status with Oka’s children. As the room spins and my stomach churns, I sip on my Coke, I reach for more lampang, I laugh, I eat bits of white rice, I try not to glance at the butcher’s block at the front of the store where a woman hasn't stopped hacking at the steaming hot flesh of another pig.

I ask for more words and the distraction works. Oka’s children are all eager to teach a ton of new words: “Saya mao pergi ker pura”, bulon, bintang (they all laugh when it hits me that bintang, or star--we create little fists for "star"--is also the most popular Indonesian beer--we create circles with our hand and pretend to drink!), engat, lampang, cupu-cupu…and then always "Tidak, tidak, tidak!" (No, no, no!) My brain is on hilarious overload trying to keep them straight. Plus the price for getting it wrong is nerve-wracking! Not understanding the complexities of a new language yet, children are brutal teachers: erupting with laughter at my every hint of a mistake, firmly correctly the slightest miss-pronunciation in a chorus of: “Tidak, tidak: lampang. Lammmmm-pang! Lammmmm-pang!” slowly sounding out each syllable until my slow ears find the right match for my slower tongue.

It's awesome playing with them, learning words from them. Watching them warm up to me. I am their non-stop entertainment. I try to imagine what they must think of me. The puti-pale, tall girl who can just barely form the words they mastered years before. No idea (or care) that I once climbed a corporate ladder, have my own house and pay a mortgage, live by my mad-crazy Microsoft Excel skillz that are just above my mad-crazy mountain bike skillz. They don't care at all, about any of it. Instead, we chomp on fried pig skin and spoon rice, with the fingers on our right "good" hand, to our mouths as they also grow more comfortable with my big camera. Often it captures their laughter. Other times, I’ve seen each pause, for minutes at a time to look into my lense with the most genuine, curious, or serious face I have yet to see.

Saya tidak "turis" (I am not a tourist)

Once again, I'm awake before sunrise. Annie and I drink hot copi, eat sweet wild mangoes, then I tuck a couple plastic wrapped chocolate-rice millet sweet cracker into my purse for later. (Annie laughs that when I say I want to try alllll Indonesian food, I mean the mass-produced, made in Jakarta or Java, cartoon labeled sweets that I throw in our shopping cart. It’s one of the things I like about traveling: reveling in the authentic real food and pop-culture trashy food with equal exuberance!) These ones are called “Better” (and they’re pretty good in a trashy kind of way!.
Two hours late (on Balinese time) our ride appears. We barely all fit into the car. Oka’s newly-wed daughter in a sparkling lace kabayah, son in law, Annie, Oka’s three other sons (out of the 8 total, very blessed is his family, Annie tells me.)

When we arrive, the procession starts as a cavalcade of cars, trucks full of people, and a host of white-shirted men driving colorfully laced women (often balancing offerings, baskets, young children) on motor bikes. On the way to our ceremony, we pass three others. “this is how it is!” they laugh. We hop from the car and run as carefully as my sarong will allow to the plaza under the giant holy banyan tree.

I hear the bamboo and drum gamelon first. Large bamboo poles, wave red and yellow flags. Men in matching red and black sarongs shoulder bamboo litters of flowers, ducks and chickens. Incense burns. The crowd follows: children in tow, offerings piled high, irredescent lace kaballahs sparking. The dragon-beasts come nest. Brown, stringy hair touches to the floor, bits of mirror scattered on its gilded body reflect the sun at all angles. A garish, masked face with bulging eyes. More clanging and drumming and pounding of metallic notes. The priest dons a black crown, wraps himself in orange cloth, and whispers incantations as incense burns. We sit, in the sun, on the ground. Then I hear the golden bell. It rings, now like an old friend, with incessant predictability. A procession of women, with offerings around the plaza. I see Oka’s wife among them. Devout and angelic.

I feel like I recognize it for what it is, or at least means to me right now: chaos. Utter and absolute chaos. And it’s not a bad thing, it’s just chaotic because I don’t know it from before, I am not yet familiar with part of my life yet, but I'm getting there. Like my first Indonesian syllables, the green kaballah and mismatched sarong, the rise and fall of the unpredictable gamelon, the wedding: I learning to trust my own step forward, and let this all swirl around me, loving it for what it simultaneously is and is not. I am becoming part of this. It’s been interesting to witness my own process of exploring, learning, sometimes falling, always growing. It makes me dream more and more about bold new things.

Kids race around the plaza. They smile shyly at me. A group of boys take turns shouting “hello lady”. Squealing when I say “hello” back. They say “teri mi kasi” and I bow my head “sama sama”. They squeal louder and whisper to their friends. The little girls on my side join in. Pretty soon we’re all counting to ten, and they’re cheering me on in the early morning sunshine, in a temple of stone carvings. There’s a collective rustle of fabric in the plaza as hundreds of bodies re-arrange to face the rising sun. Panic. What now? Annie whispers to follow what she does. She is Muslim but says she knows how to pray Hindu.

I look at her. Pray Hindu? What?
She shooshes me and motions to follow her lead. As she places a small palm basket of flowers before us and a white-dressed holy man douses us in flicks of cold holy water.

I remember the wedding prayer. I think of Oka’s wife and daughter. Graceful, reflective, beautifully quiet.

We each take a single flower from the basket, place it between our hands, then the bell rings. Slow, steady, reassuring. It rings a meditation. My eyes close. I take slow deep breaths. Feel the sun on my face and the warmth in my heart. I give thanks for all that I have, all that I have beheld, all that I hope to become. The ringing bell speeds faster. Then. Silence.

Open eyes. I am kneeling in a temple in Bali, praying. It is as it should be, I hear over and over in my head. Slowly place the flower my hair. Then reach for a new one. Deep breath, a smile, a single blossom between the fingertips. The bell starts slowly and my eyes close.

I pray in the sunshine. For long, slow, golden minutes. At high noon, sweat trickles down my face and arms. I open my eyes on the bells command. With each prayer it gets easier and easier. I am less nervous. I relax more and more into this new place I have found.

At the bell’s command I open my eyes, smiling. Like seeing the world for the first time, over and over and over. Then I open my eyes, and see the tourists. Sarongs loosely tied, powershots in tow, they stand on the outside, looking and pointing. Then they see me. More pointing and I nod my head and smile. Looking at them, I realize just how lucky I am to be included in this. At the bell’s command I close my eyes and shut them out. I find my prayer for happiness and understanding, kindness and peace, and unstoppable kick-ass wildness. I smile. When the bell insists, I open my eyes and he’s leaning against the pillar, 50 feet away, watching me. Smiling. I wonder if this could be as beautiful to him as the wedding prayer of graceful mother and daughter was to me. I feel beautiful and warm. I feel that it is. I feel sweetly at peace with the world, myself, chaos, fear. All of it. It's just another blossom to bless and put in your hair. The bell rings and I pick a flower, lift it to my head and close my eyes. When I open them again, he’s backed off. Then reappears. Camera in hand this time. Like a western shoot out, I reach for mine and take a picture of him taking a picture of me.

Annie and the others see this and shriek with laughter, patting me on the back.

The holy men come around again, this time, we are doused in holy water. It’s refreshing and cold after a long sit in the hot noon sun. We take bits of rice in our hands and press them to our forehead and temples. There they dry and remain for the rest of the afternoon.

Saya mao tidur secorang (I go to sleep now)

After so many days, overflowing with so many golden hours of stunning amazement and emotion and languages and people, I find I am craving some quiet time.

I get up with the morning light, jalan-jalan (walk) to the market with Anni, we eat delicious, hot noodle soup -- on a hot day -- from her friend's warung (little restaurant) and somehow it's the best thing ever, I practice my Indonesian every chance I get, learning more and more words every day. Impressing Anni and Oka's friends and family with my new fluency (Pintar! or Smart! They point at me.) My words are almost as impressive as my iron-clad stomach, as I keep my vow to try everything put in front of me. And I do. The only thing I don't try is Anni's ayam (chicken) soup with two, whole and cooked to a golden-orange-hue-I-can-see-their-eyes-beaks-and-head-flappy-thingys-in-her-soup-as-I-drink-mine chicken heads floating on top. (Since it was Anni's soup and it wasn't put in front of me so I didn't feel compelled...)

At dinner, we each leave a little left on our plates at dinner, claim to be full, and one by one drop bites (sometimes plates) of food in front of bony & threadbare Anjing - the wild dog who's slowly getting less fearful of our voices and sudden movements. Sometimes she even sits at my feet as I work. (Yes, I work in Bali...but I don't mind at all. I'm pretty happy to have a job that lets me do this. I can't believe it actually. And I like the "break". It feels good to use my head, crunch numbers and think logically. It's a great balance to the Indonesian immersion lifestyle I've found myself suddenly living). I greet passing neighbors and strangers in Indonesian. I read books I've been trying for years to finish, I sit on the teracotta balcony railing, feel the sun and watch the ducks, the fireflys, the trees, the world doing it's thing. I stay up well past bed-time, writing. Madly typing out the memories of the day in fear I'll forget the magic, if I put it off any longer. I think and I dream, a lot. It's a quiet and magical time. Something about being here, getting here after all the struggle to make it happen, the last minute altercations, the doubt that it might not be good, that I might be making a mistake, but knowing it just had to do this...it makes me realize how valuable it is to push through difficult situations, past comfort zones and doubt -- into brave, new, colorful worlds.

I read a colleague turned friend's post on fear and hope. How often we react(and live life reacting to) only our imagined fears in the mind's quest for certainty. It's much easier than admitting to the presence of real doubt, uncertainty and fear--and willfully staring into these things and pushing through it....the childish fear of the bogey man in the closet, until we will ourselves to open that door and stand still while we see what's there--only to find nothing, or something else entirely. Reading his words echo somethings I think I'm starting to realize now, in my heart and head and life. I want to embrace my doubts more, know what they are, so instead of running from them, I can ease into them slowly, gently like a yoga pose or deep breath. Until I am walking forward and I am letting go of fears. I think that's why I've been writing, posting, flinging open various doors and windows in my life the last few months. I fear putting so much out there -- the good, great....and the most vulnerably human part of myself when I'm falling down -- but at the same time, I just want to try living my life, exploring who I am and this world and how I connect with other people, in a more open, honest way. See what those in my life do with this. What I do with this! And somehow, I think this is a start to something...

Days and nights merge lazily into others. I sleep to the sound of talking frogs, who constantly gurgle in the muddy depths, outside my window like little slimy madmen.

And, then the internet breaks. It's my Balinese lifeline -- without it I can't work. Fear. Frustration. I don't know what happened, just woke up one morning and it was gone. Again and again, I try all I can think of, still no internet. Calling an Indonesian help desk is not going to be fun. So I go another route, I set out a cup of Coca Cola and one of my "Better" chocolate crackers on the table. I say a quick prayer to the internet gods. Anni laughs, and I cross my fingers. Four hours later the internet is back. I work from the dinning room table, as Balinese breezes blow through the open kitchen. For the most part, it feels like a dream. And I hear myself wonder: what next...

Pendeta (The Priestess)

When I feel like I’ve had enough (it’s been hours – sitting, eating, listening in the hot sun--since the priestess arrived) still, the rituals continue. The gamelon plays. The bell rings. The people talk and laugh. I have no familiar context, no familiar words, no familiar ritual, no familiar taste, no familiar sound, no familiar face, nothing. Two and a half intense days, lost in time and another world. It’s been immensely beautiful, but also immensely challenging for reasons I never expected. I love how it all makes me start to think new things and feel new things. And yet, when I stop and sit, it feels like chaos, swirling around me. I watch Siwa blow through the palm fronds, I feel the warmth of matahari (the sun) touch my skin through my thin kaballah. Then I look up.

The priestess sits high above me, on her gilded pedestal, hand mechanically ringing the bell, her brown eyes hooked on one thing: me. There’s no one behind me, no one around me, nothing to distract her from me. When I look up to meet her gaze, instead of turning away, something in her eyes holds me there. Looking up at her. Instinctively, I smile. I want it to be gracious and effortless. But I’m tired and worn. My cheeks hurt from trying so hard all day. It feels fake. I feel fake.

Frustration. My smile comes crashing down. Sitting there, I can’t hide. I can’t hide my real confusion or honest pain, my intense desire these days to push myself in new ways, to be better than I was before – not just to myself but to those who find their way in my life. But how does one do this? How does one live, love, dream in this way? I stare at those feelings. I stare at my fear that I might fail in my trying. I might fail over and over. I have already failed, trying, many times already. But I realize that's part of this life. Part of living, it is trying. Learning, growing. Then trying again. Because, now, I can’t run away either. I’m tired of running. From myself, from others. I'm tired of hiding. From myself, from others.

So I sit there. I let my eyes fill. A bit of hard-earned salt-water drips slowly from my eyes as she watches. My worn-out senses can only trace it’s warm path down my cheek. I feel it slowly evaporated by a golden sun. Honest pain dissentigrates in the warmth of the day. A deep breath. I look down then. At my hands, at the carved stone, at the bits of magenta and gold flowers on the dirty cement. I close my eyes. I sit in a courtyard in Bali, I feel all these new things closing in around me. The gamelon crashes and falls and crashes and falls so loudly now, people talk with more passion, my sarong is damp with sweat, smoky incense bites my nose and throat, and the high-pitched golden bell vibrates through the air, faster and faster and faster. I feel her staring at me, still. I’m not sure if it’s her eyes I feel, or the honesty of my own eyes staring into new, previously unknown depths of my soul that I feel I’m discovering as I take one new, brave step--directly into the path of my fear—after another: I just know deep down there are parts of me that are scared, nervous, I am not sure any of these things I dream of will work out, I am not sure what is for sure, I am not sure what to trust, I am not sure what to be, I am not sure where to go, I am not sure what to feel. I'm not sure how I'll translate this moment to words. My head aches with new and old words, new and old emotions. Fire, water, wind. Brahman, Wisnu, Si…

Even as the ceremony spins around, the bell stops. I stop. My tired senses and over-worked emotions can take no more. And that is when it stops. I lift my head and open my eyes, to the gaze of a high-caste Balinese priestess, who hums incantations I can’t understand. Red crown, white dress, ringing bell, but something has changed. When I look up to her brown eyes, still staring into me, I see a new depth. A kindness, a gentleness, an understanding – not of my happiness – but of my confusion, my pain, my honesty and my own internal chaos. My humanity. It is this that binds me to the people around me. It is not for me to change, it is only for me to experience, on a never-ending path to learning, loving, living, and understanding. Life--it’s never just done, it always unfolds and continues, up the next mountain, around the next corner. A deep breath as I let go. I see it clearly. Her lifetime intersecting with mine, for just that moment. My mistakes and my falls that create chaos ARE the things I need to celebrate! It’s through realizations from these powerful things, where I am truly finding new depths to my heart and new strengths to my mind, and in the process new honesty, openness and connection with those people around me – long time friends and utter strangers. It’s through these things I begin to uncover my strength. I smile again. It feels real and true. Let there be chaos! Let there be great unknowns! Let there be huge risks! Just let me have the honest strength and kind wisdom to try and experience these fully, to the best of my ability, however, wherever they find me! Let me fail miserably in the trying and always get back up to try again: stronger, lovelier, kinder than before. It’s my own anthem, repeated in my own words, with its own song, in my head.

Holy water is flung from palm fronds to those in the ceremony. They drink it fervently and feverishly. They touch it to their face and wipe it through their hair. They reach for more as I quietly watch, wondering if I'll try to post about this moment. If this will be understood or tossed aside, even though it doesn't matter to me. I know I'll try to post something. It's part of the process. Then the procession starts through the compound. A sea of gold and rainbows against the dirt-gray walls. Through all halls they go, chanting, proclaiming, smiling. It ends where it began, in the center. And it’s over.

The gamelon still plays, the puppet show mimes a holy tale, people continue to talk and laugh and eat. Some people leave. More people arrive. They will continue to arrive into the night and the days to come. More food will be made. More coffee will be served in teacups. The bell stops ringing. Without a word, to anyone, the priestess packs up her things and leaves with her followers.

A quiet, tired, long drive home. I thank Oka and Annie over and over. I head upstairs light a candle, and prepare a room-temperature bath. I close my eyes and lay on my back with my ears underwater, until there is no other sound but that of my own breath, until the dark night of another day finds me.

Nanti, nanti (Waiting for later...)

1pm arrives. Then 2pm. 2:30pm. Nanti, nanti (later, later), people whisper but are not alarmed. The ceremony might not start until 4. I struggle to stay awake and smiling. But finally, the priest comes, except the priest is female. Gray-white hair, soft face, serious brown eyes. She neither smiles or frowns. But takes her position on the ceremonial table, wraps herself in beads and gold bands. After incense, soft murmurs of incantations, she begins ringing a gold bell. Over and over. It “tings” to its own consistent beat. As the gamelon crashes and plays to its own consistent beat. Then the sacred puppeteer adds his own small melody and voice. And still, the older women from the morning ceremony sing into a microphone their own songs and chants. Joined at times by a man who, in an off key that hits my ears in an uncomfortable way like hitting your funny bone, talk-sings. Meanwhile, people come and go, talk and laugh, move through the 20 square feet of the compound where this is all assembled.

I sit at the steps of the wedding building, watching and feeling my tired brain kick into overdrive again (and not having the energy to stop it, I let it go and watch): I feel it trying to make sense of these disparate pieces. Strange rituals, smells, music and people. Laughing because I’m starting to realize -- only now after three days of Indonesian immersion with maybe just one English-speaking interaction -- what it wants: to again find something it recognizes, some certainty, something it can know--instead of drowning in the totally unfamiliar, the chaos of utterly new, coming at me from all angles. It seeks to find it in a wedding ceremony it knows from its past: it seeks one with a distinct itinerary, start and end, quiet decorum, one where a preacher talks and everyone knows listens, one where the musicians sing and everyone sways, one where a man says I do and everyone smiles, one where a woman says I do and everyone gets a little misty-eyed, one where a man kisses the woman and everyone applauds. One where I feel my heart inspired to reach for another. Then the celebration. Then, done.

Instead, I watch as five different things take place at one. All clashing and crashing, in a mismatch of colors, music, and activity, tones and words. The wedding ceremony of Oka’s daughter is combined with the tooth filing ceremony for the other three. Standing before their family, then sitting before the priestess, they are guided through a complex series of rituals and prayers. Flat rocks placed on palms, kicking an egg, tiny strings placed behind ears, tying of green rice leaves around the head, symbolic crushing of rice, then the eating of rice, the drinking of a potent liquid that leaves one girl almost gagging, the passing of sacred things behind and in front of the body. (Doing it over when it’s not done correctly). The elder women, the mothers of those in the ceremony, hover around their children; helping, guiding, instructing, encouraging with touches and silent but approving looks.

More hours pass, people come and go, talk and laugh, eat and drink non-alcoholic beverages. I am ever-fading from the long hot day and wander through Indonesian traditions and conversations. The party stands up to walk to the family temple.
A man with a mini-camcorder positions me in front of the kneeling, golden women. Behind them, the other women line up. Then they pray. Each woman picks a holy flower from the palm tray in front of them, holds the beautiful thing lightly, between gentle fingers. Around them the party continues, the gamelon plays. But kneeling there on the ground, every eye is closed with reverent beauty. The bell rings for a slow minute or two. The bell rings faster and faster, then stops. Silence.

Eyes open, they place the flower in their hair, behind their ears, mothers and daughters reach for a new flower. Again the bell rings slow then fast. Then stops. The flower is placed with the others. Simple and beautiful, it continues. Until they return to the priestess. There are never any words of love, instruction for living a life together, or what it will require of them. Instead, silent rituals are passed from one to the other. Looking around at the people gathered, I realize it’s this community that will help them find their way through this new life they are starting.

Wedding? Belum... (The Wedding? Not yet...)

It’s a long drive back to the compound. Already a full day, I realize it’s only about to begin, at 1 with the wedding which I am told will be very, very long. Tired but excited, I am now greeted with familiar waves and warm smiles—-I laugh, the jolly green giant from America has returned! The kids tug at my hands to show me the beautiful gamelon, now playing. As I take photos of men intently playing, the boys try to pile in my picture, everyone laughs, even the players. Oka teaches me the three main gods: Brahama (fire), Wishnu (water), Siwa--Oka pauses and a gust of wind blows through the compound, we laugh (wind!)!

I repeat the Hindu gods and their English attributes. To everyone’s amusement, when I get to Siwa (wind!) I pause to look at the sky expectantly. Then mocked frustration. I can’t seem to make the wind blow with Siwa’s name, as Oka did. Everyone laughs.

Rounds of copi (coffee) alternates with rounds of air (water) and soda pop. I unwrap a gelatinous cone of brown-red rice from palm strips. I untie little packets of sweet white rice with bits of fruity nankat (yak fruit? They tell me it’s called in America, though I’ve never had anything like it). Both are homemade treats from Oka's wife. I eat orange-colored potato chips from the long potato. I am careful to monitor my smiles and exclamations--as they only seem to result in people bringing me more snacks. And this, Annie warns me, is only appetizer. Noon passes and I am fed two more plates of piled with savory, rich, delicious food (more curries, satays, babi, naci puti, ayam goreng, vegetables...) by various people eager to watch me eat and savor this taste of Bali.

I try to follow the Indonesian talk, to pick out a few words, and add a few of my own. We laugh and talk and eat. I am quietly greeted by Indonesian women my own age, with children and husbands for the last ten of my years. (Aside from Oka and the bridegroom and the small children, none of the men talk to me, or approach me--though they all smile when I level my camera to their faces. Conversation seems left to the women) Far from the travelers hub of Ubud or the touristy havens of Kuta and Denpasar, being alone as a woman is much less common. They have many questions. I can't understand or answer all of them. So I let Annie talk for me. I can see they are in quiet awe that I can travel alone, and do. Annie tells them I work for the internet, have a little house with two adopted kittens (Annie loves animals) in America (it's never the United States, always America). I take photos and write. I am smart and I learn Indonesian very, very quickly. I rent villa. (which I think comes with some implied status, being able to rent the villa--single-handedly--and stay in Bali. When I hear my story told, I try to smile kindly, make a joke, kneel to photograph something simple or play with a child--anything to appear just "everyday" in their eyes, perhaps someone they could relate to. Because, sometimes I feel my American tourist status, accidental villa accomodations, and bank card elevate me to something more than I want to be to them. For this time, I want to be accepted, as one of them, as much as possible.) Annie then proudly brags that I always eat with her the real Indonesian food from any of her favorite roadside warung (restaurant) and never sick. Not like the other tourists, sick the next day. It's this that really impresses people at the wedding. More plates of food are brought out (I say a little prayer of thanks that my ongoing Seattle "taco-truck-or-any-food-from-a-truck-or-hole-in-the-wall" love affair seems to have slowly strengthened my little stomach, to be in perfect Balinese shape! I seriously have just been eating EVERYTHING, ANYWHERE. With no regrets. I am always saying, "Yes!" and am always suprised just how extra-awesome my iron-stomach has become! To get Balinese props at a wedding because of it, even better!)

It is my story, in Indonesian, I hear repeated over and over.

At the same time that they are curiously impressed, the women wonder aloud why I am alone, not married. (It's like taking on 15 or 20 of gentle mothers or grandmas, at one time--they all want to know) I laugh off their honest curiousity. Shake my head and reply: Belum ("not yet" because it is always rude to say no). I am not ready yet. I needed to come to Bali first. Then maybe... They love that I am enjoying Bali and that I can mash together rough replies in Indonesian.

I haven’t told anyone about my photo project. I don’t want to lie about my intent, but at the same time, I feel the best photos will be authentic and unposed. I want those around me to trust me and feel comfortable showing me their less guarded sides. Not self-conscious about (what may likely never actually see the light of) my little altruistic photography show idea. The hiding of this idea is also a little for myself: when I think of putting my photos to the public scrutiny of others, my hands grow stiff and my eye gets nervously cold, focusing on the end result and not the content in front of my lense. When I let myself forget, I am back to taking photos as I like to do it: capturing the many depths and shades of beauty, as I see it so I can better connect with what’s before me. As they day goes by, as I am part of the "ceremony" of simply, patiently waiting (a ritual, I think, is not really known in my country...) they grow more and more comfortable to my clicking shutter, even inviting it, and I discover it gradually easier to move through the day; capturing more natural, beautiful moments of a wedding day unfolding.

As I drift in and out of a jet-lagged lull, I get to do my most favorite of all my activities: watch the world. The intimate goings on of an Indonesian community. The offerings that are replenished, the personal rituals repeated, the greeting of old friends and respected elders, the mischief of children, the laughter of adults, the worry of a mother, the anxious look of a young daughter, the fixing of hair, the whispered talk of family and friends sitting in outdoor hallways of a traditional Indonesian kitchen, in front of enourmous baskets of all kinds of food, chopping, cutting, preparing, soaking, frying, cooking. Stoking the fire with dried coconut husks, to add extra flavor and warmth to food I already know will be amazing.

This afternoon, it’s the women who seem to shine in front of me. The women in the morning's ceremonies reappear - all gold and flowers. I can hardly believe the site of them floating through the crowds and sunshine. Like gilded angels. They eat nothing, to keep to the fasting until after the ceremony, and sit in the shade. Resting, waiting, watching. A smile is never far from their red lips, but it's also doled out carefully to those deserving. I see more solemnity from the young women. One of the girls seems to hurt beyond belief. Tears well in her eyes as she sits, and the others comfort her.

My favorite is Oka’s daughter, naturally beautiful in the early morning, she is now resplendent in a towering, flowering, gilded headdress and burgundy-gold wrap. Wherever she steps, she reflects the light of the sun, matahari. Whatever she does, it’s with light, graceful movements. There is gentleness mixed with playfulness. I see both holds the hand of an elderly woman or tickles the cheek of her friend's child. Whomever she greets, seem to momentarily shine in her presence. When she smiles, it seems there's no one who can't help themselves but to return the gift.

Slow minutes pass in the Balinese sunshine as we wait. Belum, belum, belum...

Matahari & Air (Sun & Holy Water)

Oka is waiting at the car to take us to another temple, the temple of holy water. This water you can drink, Annie tells me, or swim. But it is very cold. More highway close calls, and we descend to another temple. We navigate stairs and turns, past koi ponds and gardens and vendors. (Annie points out how they attach themselves to the other tourists, but not to me because I wear traditional Indonesian dress). We stop at the long square pools of blue-hued water (In Indonesian, water is called “air”: pronounced “ire” and don’t forget to roll that “r” like it’s Spanish--my favorite part).

Above mossy black-green headstones, carved spouts shoot icy water onto the men and women, young and very old, submerging themselves, and their prayers, in its cleansing stream. It’s beautiful to watch. They place their smoldering incense and palm and flower offerings on a headstone, the price for entry, then slowly wade through the icy blue. They clasp hands under the stream, heads bowed. I try to imagine what they pray for, what cold holy water feels like, what they see when they submerge themselves. Some hold their breath and wait, others pop up quickly with surprise. All are dripping. Dry clothes that had once billowed on entry, now trace all each body’s most intimate shapes and curves. He holds his head under the spout, in prayer, letting the water stream down his head (the most holy) for minutes at a time. A old woman in an eggplant-colored kaballah, fill a white bottle with water to be used later or left on some shrine someplace else. My curious eye or camera shutter never distract their fervent devotion.

The sound of the camera shutter, or a strange woman peering over the brick wall, does distract the men next door. A few feet over is group of 50 or more men standing in a smaller, higher—thus more holy--fenced off pool. There is shouting and
yelling, scratching of heads, and speculating. Talking over the rusted iron fence, one of them invites me to watch as they hoist a massive, tarp covered stone pagoda onto a giant bamboo gurney (the bamboo poles appear almost a six inches in diameter -- are large beyond belief, but still seem like they'll snap under the weight), then lift it, over their heads, to a high pedestal in the pool. One man shouts orders from the pedestal, the masses grunt, heave, argue and eventually laugh.

I revel with how many men it's going to take to lift this one small stone. I think of Annie’s one holy man with big powers, carving out the stone temples and hoisting rocks 100 times the size of this. It’s much more magical to envision one man doing amazing things, alone. But it’s much more interesting watching this large group of men—all focused on the same goal, all practicing the same religion, all wearing similar style clothing. Yet all so different, the angle of a jawbone, the jutting of a lip, the lines of a face, the silhouette of a nose as the sun hits it. It’s the perfect time for watching, and for photos, since they’re too busy struggling to hide or pose.

As I snap my camera, Annie laughs that it’s always something with me. Always something happening. I see nothing else like it. You show up in Bali you go to big ceremony, you find kaballah, you go to wedding, you show up at stone temple, it is yours alone. You come here, there is this. Always something. We stand in the Indonesian sun. I am laughing. I shrug my shoulders. I don’t know, Annie, guess I just got to Bali at just the right time. (There is no Indonesian translation for what’s been happening lately.)

Even when there is nothing – with you it is something…always see something else.she pauses...I think it is good.

I think I know what she means and I think it's good too. I’ve kneeled to grab a shot of the sun hitting an empty, upturned, silver offering pan. I have to squint to look up at her. Hmmm, I don’t know. But I like it. I am glad you like it.

Then, in the corner of my eye, I see her look around and then down to actually see me. What you taking picture of? She laughs, exasperated.

The sun, Annie! It’s the sun—what is the Indonesian word for sun?

Matahari.

Eye of the day. I repeat it over and over. Annie teaches me bulon (moon) and bintang (star…which is also the name of the Indonesian equivalent to Rainier Beer back home.)

As I snap more shots of the men and make up my mind to leave after this one last try (we’ve been here for hours), I mouth matahari over and over--trying to familiarize my tongue to its form, as I stand in its light.

The stone pagoda is lowered, and pushed back up. Lowered and pushed back up. As matahari shines, the human machine continues to exhale and lifting.

Then they try again. Thin muscles strain even more, men leap from side to side, splashing in holy water, pushing and holding. The bamboo poles never break, only bend, under the enormous weight. Then finally, in a slow and back-breaking push, they make it to the top. One massive stone rests on the other, where it will stay for its single lifetime, and hundreds, perhaps thousands of ours. All the while, in the midst of the chaos, the steady stream of quiet worshipers continue to wade through the pools, past floating bits of magenta and orange flowers, and offer prayers to their gods.