Araki Reggae Jam Session

And so we landed in Bali, unsure of whether or not our hostel was still booked for that night (we were not sure we could get a flight that day, so an email was sent cancelling it...sweet!!). We were able to get a taxi to Candidasa, where our hostel was located. This taxi ride took approximately 2 hours, and we finally arrived at our hostel at about 1am. During this ride we saw an excess of motorbikes, wild dogs, and stopped for directions to our place not once, not twice, but thrice. At one point we even enlisted a gentleman of a motorbike driver to lead us for a bit. However, once we got out of the taxi and had finally arrived, we were elated to find out that we still had a room booked, it was basically a house on stilts that was gorgeous beyond description, and it was on the Indian Ocean. The photos don't really capture how sweet our place was...Lumbung Damuh is going places, you heard it here first. Anyway, we went to sleep, perhaps dreamt a little, and woke up the next morning.
Dave and Giles wasted no time (following our breakfast that was served to us at our table...walk like a peemp) in gaining access to surfboards. I swam a little bit and tossed a number of rocks at other rocks. Other rocks were to be tossed following the mastery of tossing the aforementioned rocks at a particular rock that I had previously chosen to be my target rock, when I wasn't slipping into a boredom-induced coma. The surf was, however, pretty sweet/gnarly/tubular and we made friends with some of Lampot's (one of the owners) friends. That night was to be the second birthday of Lily, the daughter of Lampot and Tanya (the other owner), so we set off into town to get some gifts and check out the surrounding scenery. Candidasa is a nice little town. Quaint, if you will.
When we came back the party was pretty much in full swing (all things being relative at a two year old girls birthday party) and after judging a few contests amongst the kids we hung out with Lampot's friends (of which there are an apparently limitless supply) drinking shots of Arak, a coconut liquor, with tonic water. Everyone sat crosslegged (aside from your right honorable gringoes) in a circle and my friends, the Arak was flowing that night. Flowed like wine. In between this we participated in a game that could best be entitled "Place a raisin on some flour, cut the flour until the raisin falls, tell the hapless victim to pick out the raisin with his teeth and then when I place my naive and trusting head in the flour the previously nice and gracious Tanya slams my face into flour, draining all the moisture out of my mouth causing me to go red in the face, a fact which was fortunately hid by the two pounds of flour caking my features, then watch the next person do it while doing my best to not weep silently." Dinner was also had (amazing) and fairly soon guitars were brought out for what was to be a massive Arak-fuelled singalong. Needless to say, interesting insights were made into the penetration of American pop culture into Indonesia). Bob Marley is, as would be expected, quite popular. It seems that possession of the Legend album is not restricted to every single person in the Western world...every single person in Indonesia has also purchased it and memorized it. The 4 Non-Blondes was an interesting choice, as were the particular Beatles songs. A number of Indonesian reggae songs were also sung, though not by us, due in part to our relentlessly embarassing unilingualism. Strangely, Bombtrack by Rage was also a popular choice, though thankfully nobody attempted to sing along. Fairly soon, the Arak taps were pumped dry and the party rapidly peetered out.
The next morning we woke up early and went on a surfing trip about 25 minutes east of us. We saw wild monkeys, this being my highlight of the trip thus far (a sentiment not shared by everyone, unfortunately). Dave and Giles surfed, I attempted boogie-boarding, which by name alone I hereby ban from existence, and we were all consistently amazed by the surfing abilities of our Indonesian friends. After this we travelled back, through the glorious, glorious monkeys again, and were soon to leave for Bingin Beach to stay at Tanya and Lampot's friend, Sticky.
The drive was about 2 hours and we saw much more than we did our first taxi ride in Bali. We eventually made it to Sticky's, and were relieved to see that Sticky's Place is considerably less sinister than it sounds. It's right on the beach and is absolutely phenomenal. According to Dave and Giles, the 'break is awesome' and it 'barrels all the time.' For the surfers out there, this must be extremely good news and it provided considerable viewing enjoyment when we went out to the beach today. We hit up Dreamlands beach, and it was actually extraordinarily gorgeous. Sticky is a very nice man as well, and rented Dave and Giles surfboards. I read quite a bit on the beach while shielding my extremely pale skin from another sun-ray strafing. Dave is tanning the best, Giles is doing alright (though his face was massacred a little bit by the sun) and, as should be of no surprise to anybody, I am doing the worst by a long shot. My back looks like a red alien threw up on it, truth be told. And this, finally, brings us to where we are now...at an internet cafe.
Statistics List
1. Malaria cases - 0
2. Vivid dreams caused by malaria pills - 1, I think
3. Times that Indonesian people have been anything less than completely friendly to us - 0.
4. Times a strange man in Shanghai approached us and pointed at Matt harshly, then raised one finger and walked away - 1, thankfully.
5. Times that has haunted Matt's dreams - far too many to mention.
6. Times that has caused Giles and Dave much enjoyment, mirth even - once again, far too many to mention.



This is "The gang". These guys put us to shame with their knowledge of American rock classics (+ Bob Marley) They can barely speak 3 words of english yet they knew all the words to these songs, and we were clueless. Sounds lame - but do yo know EVERY word to Hotel California or "What's up?" by 4-non-Blondes? Yeah, I didn't think so...


We had some serious difficulty judging this dance competition - these kids had serious moves. Again, we were put to shame.


Matt, becoming his worst nightmare; a clown.


This is us with Lampot and Shaki after a pretty successful little surf expedition (the Only reason why it wasn't 1000% successful is because Dave and Giles sliced their feet on rocks, and Matt got the sunburn of his life)