WTF??‏- Sat 10/04/08

Dear Folks,

A few days ago on the way to work with my host, we stopped off at the compound belonging to her Indonesian mother. I thought about describing the compound I'm staying at as palatial but decided that was a little too exaggerated. I have no reservations using that word to describe this one. This compound is about 4 acres large. It is walled in, as they all are, with a dozen buildings built in the style of an ancient Hindu temple. Squat stone structures, every surface heavily carved and crenelated, with mysterious purposes that are impossible to make out but hide all the amenities of a modern dwelling. It is kind of the same idea as rooms in a western house but instead they build a separate building for each function, all positioned in careful relation to the family shrine. You could only do that here where the building costs are so low. The mother of my hosts was very sweet and even suggested that I live in one of her spare pagoda-like buildings. This is tempting, but I'm leaning towards finding my own place closer to Ubud. I kind of want to avoid the scrutiny of the elderly.

In stark contrast to the religious calm of the compound and the orchids swaying gently in the breeze, is a bizarre acre of land in the back of the property where Gusky's brother Guscuk rears chickens. He's got regular old chickens, chicks, and, last but not least, a whole field of roosters born, bred and trained for cockfighting. Strangely, he also designs and sells his own jewelry, and is married to a Balinese model. Nice guy too. He told us he "just loves chickens"...I guess that's why he trains them to kill each other.

The interesting people I'm meeting in Bali are really the theme of this e-mail. That, and the shit they say and do that makes no sense (I have a theory about this that I'm still developing for a later e-mail).

Later in the day, after spending time wandering the streets of Ubud and absorbing its quaint touristy charm, I met up with my host and we went for dinner at another one of her restaurants. She knows everybody in town and during dinner she was constantly either getting up to say 'hello' to someone or we were being approached. I must have met half of the expats in town over the course of two hours. Most of them, grizzled veterans of the jewelry or hospitality business.

After dinner, we ended up joining two expats she is friendly with for drinks. An older woman Carolyn (who reminds me of a pychotic, nymphomaniac nurse I used to know), and her younger half-Balinese companion Karim. With a drink or two in her, Carolyn began telling the most ridiculous stories. She recounted their trip to Burning Man, hanging out naked with 7,000 other tripping hippies in the desert. Then she followed that up with the time she went cruising naked down highway 1 with the top down in her '84 Cadillac convertible. Continuing the theme, we learned of her idea to start a website called ShaghighwayUSA.com, or somthing along those lines. The premise being that if you plug in the itinerary for your road trip, the service will let you know the best spots along the way to pull over and have sex.

At this point in the conversation, a friend of Karim's pulled up to say 'hi'. Somehow it came to light that he was in Bali studying to be a psychedelic marine biologist...or perhaps it was a marine psychopharmacologist. Whatever it was, he was studying with various shamans and medicine people and his research sounded like it involved licking sea cucumbers and chewing on the peneal glands of male starfish. That seems like far too much dedication for a habitual hallucinator.

After he took off, Carolyn segued into stories about ghosts and the paranormal. Bali is filled with gods, ghosts and spirits. The capstone story was about her mom who had apparently committed suicide rather than suffer through terminal cancer. Out of concern for the state of her soul, Carolyn had consulted a local magician/healer who said that her mother was fine and would be reincarnated as an asian boy. Some time later, she had purchased a dog and when the dog began to behave just like her mother used to, she returned to the healer to ask him about it. He informed her that the mothers spirit was telling the dog what to do.

My host then took the opportunity to share her own ghost story. As luck would have it, the spirit in question resides at her compound. This ghost manifests itself as an old lady and is most often seen by people staying in the same bedroom that I have been sleeping in for about two weeks. These sightings culminated in one of her daughters friends getting the shit scared out of him. He was staying over one night and went downstairs to pee. He was only able to open the glass door to the bathroom an inch before he was stopped by something on the inside. Apparently, as he tried harder to get the door open, a pale white face had pressed itself up against the glass and stared right at him. After screeching loudly enough to wake everyone up, he bolted back upstairs and remained awake and trembling for the rest of the night.

There was a purification ceremony planned for the following morning at the house and in a slightly sheepish tone of voice my host let me know that it was partially to cleanse the house of this bad mojo.

Even for a skeptic like me, her revelation was a little unnerving and I was slightly annoyed that she had neglected to tell me about my spiritual roommate. We left to return home and though uneasy about going to sleep, I was also quite excited to be a part of the ceremony the next day. It certainly promised to be a insider view of Balinese culture that I would be unable to witness if I were simply visiting Bali on my own.

I climbed into bed and, as I drifted off to sleep, you bet your ass I said a very polite good night to the old lady spirit .

Hugs all 'round,
Alex