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Australia
The last week in Australia was awesome, first the surf camp and then a weekend in Sydney. I'm afraid I'm not yet the pro surfer I intend to be, but I did learn a lot and also managed to catch the bigger waves.. I have to say, surfing is A LOT harder than it looks. First two-three days it was so much fun and every lesson I was improving, but I think the day four was the worst. I got slammed around the ocean and hit my head with my board a few times and as I emerged from the sea, I felt like I've been to a battle. Day five when they woke us up at 5 am, for our sunrise surf, I could barely move. Every place was sore, I had blisters in my hands, my neck was so stiff that if I wanted to look somewhere I had to turn my whole body, by ear hurt and was blocked... (surfing doesn't sound like so much fun anymore, does it?) But in the sea we went and as soon as you're back in the water it's not so bad and when you catch a good wave it's all worthwhile. Even I had my weaker moments, when I considered swapping surfing to golf, or some other calm and not so painful sport, I still love it and hope to go surfing again soon!
The last weekend in Sydney was the perfect ending to the Australian part of my trip. Me, Anna and Hannu, mainly planned the weekend around eating - Sydney has so many great places and I had to over indulge on cheese and wine, since there wouldn't be much of them in Asia. On Friday we joined a Mexican fiesta in Cafe Pacifico (yep, the same that they have in London) and Saturday we spent the day with lovely Yuki (a Japanese member of the kiwi family), had a picnic in the Botanical Gardens, walked around the city, a pre dinner snack in Zambreros (a great new mexican fast food place. They're popping up like worms after rain in Sydney, so why can't we have even one in Helsinki?) and then had dinner in THE BEST Thai restaurant "Spice I am" and later on caught up with my surfing buddies. Sunday we had time for a quick breakfast with Lauren (my old friend from my AFS year in Canada) and one last burrito before we headed to the airport. A weekend filled with friends and food, what else could you ask for?
BALI
I'm in Bali now and it's very very hot and I'm loving it. I spent the first few days with Kimmo in Nusa Dua. We had booked a luxurious five star hotel and just chilled for the first few days. During our stay it was Nyepi day, a Balinese new year and the day of silence and meditation. They even close down the airport for a day, while all the Balinese are pretending to be dead, so that the evil spirits will leave the island alone. Since you're not allowed to leave your hotel for 24 hour, we wanted a nice hotel with a pool and other amenities, like five different restaurants, mini golf, a gym and so on... After the hotelstay, it was time to join the other travelers and we downgraded to a guesthouse in Sanur for a few days. Then I decided to come to Ubud and Kimmo went to Lembongan island.
So I took the short bus ride to Ubud (Bali is really small, so it's easypeasy to reach new destinations). I found myself a nice hotel with a pool, which is important, since Ubud is inland, and soon made friends with an Indonesian staff member, Wayan. He wanted to take me out for the night and show me around. (I thought show me places, but actually he meant what he said; to show ME around. To his family to be exact..) I'm not completely ditzy and as I hopped on his motorcycle, I was fully aware that there might be some sort of a price to pay for his friendliness. But I was eager to see an Indonesian home and didn't have any other plans for the evening. Also I didn't want to be skeptical, so I decided to give him the benefit of a doubt and away we went.
His village was a lot further than I expected, but when I wasn't terrified of the traffic and his daring over-takings, I actually quite enjoyed the ride. The rice fields were endless and very picturesque and it was nice to see places without any tourists. We got to his village, went to eat some satays on the beach and then went home to meet his family. (He later told me he introduced me as his girlfriend but little did I know, I was just smiling and nodding away. One more reason to study the language!) His family was friendly, but as we didn't have a shared language, except with his uncle, the conversation wasn't exactly flowing. But still there was a nice atmosphere. The whole family lived there, brothers cousins, uncles.. There were four separate buildings, which acted as bedrooms and then an outdoor kitchen and a temple area, with four small and one rather large temple.
Before we headed back, Wayan prayed for a safe ride back and left about ten incense sticks to the temple, so I was quite confident hopping back on the bike. We stopped at a night market in another town and I ate the weirdest thing in my life. I don't know what is was, and frankly don't want to know, but it was sweet and slimy and colorful and Wayan couldn't even explain what it was.. I bought a corn for the ride home, so there I was happily chewing away as Wayan was dodging the cars. We had dinner at a little warung before heading back to the hotel. It was all smooth sailing till then. Suddenly Wayan was head over heels in love with me, and either he falls in love really easily or then it was an act (I suspect the latter). At first I was polite, but then it started to get irritating and I tried my best to get rid of him. We were sitting on my porch and he was weeping by my feet. The scene was so ridiculous I wanted to laugh, but I managed to hold in those chuckles. Finally I had had enough and just left him there and went to bed. But he still wouldn't leave my porch and there were no windows, only mosquito nets and curtains, so I could still hear him sniffing outside..
The next morning he apologized and I told him very clearly that we can only be friends. So in the evening we went out again. (Hey, before you say anything, I wasn't really spoilt for choice of friends here, so I was happy to have some company.) Same thing as the previous night, we had fun in a jazz club but as soon as we got home, he started the "I love you"s. He was like "why don't you believe me? I really love you" and then I was like "I do (although actually I didn't) but I just don't have those feelings for you.." and then that went on for a while, until I left him standing in front of my door, but I told him firmly not to sit on my porch. Wayan had invited me to a family celebration/ceremony later on this week, which I had earlier accepted, but I just can't go now, which is a pity, since it would've been very interesting to partake and see a Balinese ceremony. But in the turn of recent events, I wouldn't be surprised, if it was our wedding, that they were meant to be celebrating..
Ok, I've been babbling on about nonsense for ages and it's getting late, and I haven't even told you yet what Bali is like, so I promise to tell you more about Bali in my next blog.
Sampai nanti!
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