March Update

Selamat tahun baru Bali tahun çaka 1937! 

Last weekend was ogoh-ogoh and nyepi the balinese new year, Friday was ogoh-ogoh: Ogoh-ogoh is always a day before nyepi and it is a big celebration. People create huge statues (kind of like parade floats) which depict religious stories or just show different gods and monsters (caluluk) and carry them around the city in a big parade. This is supposed to draw out all of the ghosts from peoples homes and the will follow the statues to the graveyards where people burn or destroy the statues. 

The biggest ogoh-ogoh statue in my area

some people like to work popular culture into their statues, this demon is using a selfie stick

 The actual parade and events start at night time, and Bali turns into possibly the most crowded place I've ever been since about 80 percent of the island is trying to get to the city center at the same time. 

In the city center there was music, traditional dance and food stalls and at the end of the night the parade turned around and all the statues went to different graveyards where they were burned or destroyed. The next day was Nyepi, the balinese new year. On Nyepi you are supposed to meditate and start the year a new person. To help with this no one in Bali is allowed to leave their homes or use any lights and businesses are shut down only emergency services are left open even the airport is shut down. There are even groups of people who walk around in groups called pecalang who make sure everyone else is inside and keeping their lights off so Bali is essentially shut down for a day. I couldn't see what the city looked like first hand because I wasn't allowed to leave the house but my brothers told be at night time since all lights are turned off the start are amazing so after dark we climbed to the top of their roof

Overall Nyepi and Ogoh-Ogoh were really interesting and I'm glad I got to experience them.

Christmas/New Years update

Merry Christmas and Happy New Years everyone, I've been on a break from school so I've been enjoying the festivals and the ceremonies. I also switched families so now I live closer to the center of Denpasar. In Bali since the majority of people are Hindu, Christmas isn't really a big event here. Instead they celebrate Galungan and Kuningan, those are two days where everyone goes and visits their family back in their villages and prays, and when I say everyone I mean everyone. During Galungan when my family left the house to go to their village the streets were almost completely empty. Meanwhile at some temples there are 2 hour lines to get in to the prayer area.

Local temple in my fathers village

Holy Man

One box of offerings that my mother prepared (there were 3 more in the house)

The first of two waiting lines to get into the temple we went to for kuningan 

One of three parking  areas around the temple 

My brothers and I at the very scenic Uluwatu temple for Guningan 

The prayer area in Uluwatu

That's about everything important, I've been mostly getting to know my new family and hanging out with them. I also went to another monkey sanctuary with some of my friends from school and of course more beaches. 

My new monkey friend and I (It wouldn't be a proper blog post without monkey pictures) 

We saw this monkey who had apparently found and was nurturing a kitten instead of a baby monkey

More standard beach pictures 

Balangan Beach

That it for this post I will have another one up as soon as I can. 

Winter update

So recently I got to climb on of the volcanic mountains in Bali call Mt Batur with some of my friends. We started early in the morning so that we could be at the top for the sunrise. It was a fairly easy hike but it was extremely beautiful. At the top there are still volcanic craters that emit hot steam so there is a small shop at the top of the mountain where you can buy banana sandwiches and hard boiled eggs that have been boiled in the mountains steam craters.

My friend Rasta and I at the top of Batur

  Also on top of the mountain were large groups of monkeys who, depending on the mood of the hikers, were being fed copious amounts of junk food, sleeping in the steam cracks and just living a good life as far as monkeys are concerned.

Pastry Monkey

Ramen noodle monkey

It felt cruel to be eating a banana sandwich and not give at least some the the monkeys

Chip crumb monkey (my personal favorite)

Along with the mountain I also got to visit a village where they still stick to the ancient Balinese custom of not burying or cremating their dead. They kind of just leave them out in a certain area and cover them in a little bamboo tent. While a little bit more gruesome then the monkeys and hard boiled eggs of Mt. Batur it was still very interesting.

Entrance to the "burial" area  

Skulls of the villagers ancestors 

Newer bodies under the bamboo tents with all their offerings

As for school, right now we are learning traditional balinese dance, the dance is called "Narii Baris" and we are practicing in large groups and performing for the culture teacher soon. Its pretty simple dance but it is mean to be do in a large group which makes it look more impressive. The teacher hasn't really told us much of the origins or the history but what I do know is the guys get to use big spear things during the performance so i'm excited for that.

Practice in the auditorium 

Well thats all for now, I'm going to be moving host families soon so my next update will be from a new location, closer to the center of Denpasar.

Ok so its been a really long time since I made an update because of a mixture of being very busy and the internet here being terrible so this will be super long. So I just got back from the inbound orientation in Malang which is on Java. I got to meet all of the other exchange students, go to some museums and visit the Batu Zoo. All the other exchange students are amazing and I think it's incredible how in just three days we all got so close.

 

In Malang they also took us to a local village for a sacrificial ceremony where they did pencak silat (Indonesian martial arts), tests of strength (things like hitting each other with spiked branches, breaking bricks on their stomaches and cutting each other with knives) as well as other crazy things like breathing fire and whipping people.

Back in Bali, My family has been taking me EVERYWHERE, I recently saw some of Bali's traditional dances: Kercak dance and Barong dance. Kercak dance is kind of like balinese version of a choir, a group of men sit in a circle and chant while another group tells a story through dance. Barong dance is basically kercak dance with instruments. They both usually tell the story of a princess who gets kidnapped and has to be saved so you know, standard stuff. 

 My family also took me to a monkey sanctuary in Ubud and that was amazing, the monkeys were just roaming around the temples and you could go and touch them or give them bananas. It was probably the coolest yet unsanitary place ive ever been.

My family also took me to a traditional balinese wedding, Balinese weddings are very different than a western wedding or even the weddings in Java. In bali weddings are a couple days long but everyone gets together for a very short time, most people come just to eat. The majority of a balinese wedding is blessings from a priest and praying. 

As for school, I'm having a great time. I'm slowly learning more about cooking. Today I learned how to make vegetable decorations and a couple days ago I learned all the different ways to cut vegetables and fruit. 

I think I will start learning actually recipes soon so I'm very excited, Ive also been learning how to set and wait tables. 

That's all for now, I will update again as soon as I can.