Today we saw the largest, oldest temple complex in Bali. It's called Pura Besakih, referred to by locals as The Mother Temple. Kadek made the drive from Ubud to drive us to Besakih for the day. Along the way, we saw the usual Balinese sights: Mind-twisting traffic, 2,547 stray dogs, 36.9 million scooters, 27,374 warungs selling Babi Gueling, and, because we were headed up the southeast coast of Bali, a nearly endless parade of dump trucks carrying black sand. Mt. Agung is an active volcano. It last erupted in 1963, destroying the area around it and covering a large area of land under black volcanic rock and sand. That rock and sand is now considered a luxury commodity and builders from all over Bali want to use it when constructing high-end villas. Lemonade from lemons, I guess. Here is a visual guide to driving from our hotel to Pura Besakih: When we arrived at the temple complex, we were assigned to a "free" tour guide, who came with our tickets unfortunately. He was a dour, wizened old man with rheumy eyes who never told us his name. He was supposed to take us through the complex and explain things to us. He sort of did, in the way that a mob enforcer might explain that if you don't pay back the money you borrowed from Vito "Bent Knuckles" Cabrone, you might wind up sleeping with cement slippers on. The temple complex was huge with thousands of stairs. Kerri's back was bothering her quite a bit so she and Kadek hung around near the entrance to the temple while I went off–alone–with the guide, whom I've come to think of as Mario "Two Bucks" Bologna. We passed the throngs of Instagram People crowding certain spirit gate, but completely absent from others and Mario explained that in the eruption of 1963, 80% of this entire complex of 18 temples was destroyed. It has since been rebuilt so much of this ancient looking place is actually from the 60's. About half way through our intimate walk, Mario casually slipped in that I was his only tour for today and, probably his only work that week and that many people, when he takes them for tours, tip him $20 or, sometimes, much, much more. I feel the need to add here that I do tip. I try to be generous, but I hate feeling extorted. And, to put his wild claim if $20 tips into perspective, we had been told, by Balinese people, that a generous tip for A WEEK of work by house staff who cook and clean in Bali is about $10 per person. For a week of work. This guy is telling me he is expecting twice that for an hour of work where he mostly walked ahead of me and smoked. "Ahhh," I said, "My toes curling. That must be great." "Yes," he said. "Especially when it's my only work for the week." "Okay. I'll tip you when we get back down. Don't worry." "It's better here," he said, stopping and holding out his hand. I won't lie. I was mad. I reached into my wallet and peeled off a 50,000 bill and handed it to Mario. He looked at it as if I'd farted in his hand. "This is only two bucks," he complained. First, it wasn't. It was about $3.50. And secondly, that is, by any measure, a very generous tip in Bali. I grumbled and forked over another 100,000 rupias. He eyeballed me again. "That's all I have" I lied and kept walking. Despite my fears that he might have my knees broken, we did make it back to Kerri and Kadek in one piece. Kadek leaned over and whispered that these guys are very poor and that I might consider tipping him. I told him that I had slipped him $150k, which Kadek seemed to deem fair, which made me feel a bit better. I still couldn't lose the feeling that I'd been shaken down. I'm not proud of that, but there it is. Despite the low-level mob vibes, Pura Besikah is stunningly beautiful. I won't try to explain what things are, but the entire complex was incredibly gorgeous. It was not nearly as crowded as we had expected. The misty, foggy day added to the ethereal beauty for me. Hi! Hello. You can wake up now. I'm done sharing 25,000 pictures. For now. I was just totally blown away by how stunning it was there. After the temple, we had lunch at a swanky hotel that was built into the side of a cliff overlooking lush jungle. We once again bought Kadek lunch. We all ordered chicken burgers and Kadek was comically amused that we had all ordered the same thing. He'd never had a chicken burger before and, I suspect, that he never will again. Our plan had been to go from lunch to a scenic overlook, but the clouds scrapped that plan, and from there to go to a turtle conservancy, but it turns out they're closed on Sundays. We decided to head back to the resort. Along the way, we stopped at a strange spot - caves that had been carved into the rock where Balinese people hid during the Japanese occupation during WW2. It was a surreal sort of tourist spot. As I headed into one of the caves to take a photo, Kadek casually mentioned that there were likely a lot of venomous snakes sleeping in there during the day. Kerri broke 15 land speed records sprinting across the parking lot. On our ride back, Kadek taught me the phrase "Omsuasiastu" which is a casual, "Hey, how's it going?" greeting in Balinese.
I practiced it over and over and when we got back to the resort, I used it on the people in the lobby, who lit up and smiled in return. "Suasiastu!" they all said, clasping their hands in front of their faces and bowing slightly. I felt like Kadek had taught us a magic word. It is totally amazing the effect it has. We cleaned up at the hotel and headed out in search of Balinese pizza, which, Kadek said, can be had with chicken and sambal mattah, my new favorite obsession here. It's a fiery, fresh mix of shallots, hot peppers, lemongrass, and salt and it is delicious. As we walked to search for a restaurant, I kept greeting people and getting delighted smiles and returned greetings. We found a restaurant that had wood-fired pizza (none with sambal mattah, alas), but we had a wonderful dinner and delightful evening. The band was two guys who clearly had a lot of fun playing together. The staff was delightful, and the manager, Susie, said she was impressed by my pronouns (my pronunciation, I assume) and wrote down a few more phrases for me to learn. So, we found ourselves eating pizza in Bali while listening to two guys mangle a John Denver tune. As one does. On our way back to the hotel, I greeted two guys who laughed and started talking to me in Balinese. I confessed that I was a fraud who only knew a few phrases. They gave me a new one and said "Say that to the guards at your hotel." All the resorts have guards out front and all cars are stopped and given a cursory check for bombs after a tragic bombing that happened in Bali about 20 years ago. When a couple young guys tell me to say something to guards, I am reminded of my misspent youth. "If I say this, will I get my teeth punched down my throat?" I asked, like the ugly American I obviously am. "No, no, no, "they assured me. "It's good, it's good. It means 'Good evening' in Balinese." When we got to the guard house, I poked my head in the window and tried the greeting. They both looked at me blankly. Oh no. "Was that rude?" I asked. I explained the circumstances as well as I could, but they spoke very little English. One of them got on his radio and talked quietly into it. "We are going to jail," I mumbled to Kerri. "Sorry. At least dinner was tasty." The guards both started laughing. They were asking their supervisor what the phrase meant. Both of the guards were Javanese and neither of them spoke Balinese. It did, indeed, mean "good evening" and Kerri and I were not going to jail. We went back to our room and headed to bed. It had been a long day and we have a boat ride booked for tomorrow morning.
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