finally, bali

well.


it has been a long time.


i am going to attempt to get into a routine of writing this blog, but past experience tells me that there is significant potential that it may not happen as i plan..


this blog will be about my next eleven months and three days living and working in bali.


three years of creative arts took it's toll on my grammar and use of capitals etc (subverting the patriarchal language and all that), however the last two years of a Proper Job did reacquaint me with the shift key somewhat, so i imagine that i will drift in and out of writing styles etc as i go. i hope that you will not mind, and that it will not make this blog seem like one written entirely by some sort of self-obsessed hipster wanker.. i could launch into a rant about my fears of how writing a blog is self indulgent etc but that would be excruciating for me and for anyone else who happens to read it so i shall stop myself..


i am in bali on a volunteer program and about that i intend to give little away. we have been given strict instructions about media clearance and not bringing the name of our program or the funders (a clue, it is probably you) into disrepute by freely posting online/in the public domain about the ins and outs of our placements. and thus, even though i have little intention of writing terribly things, i will try to keep the more identifying/bureaucratic details to a minimum.


this is the end of the first three weeks. prior to that i was in jakarta for a week of intensive language training and in country orientation. after twenty hours saya bicara bahasa indonesia sedikit. i am not sure if i have put those words in the correct order, thus the sedikit about of bahasa indonesia i can speak.
but i am trying. i feel desperate to learn - i want to be able to understand the people around me, and to communicate things other than 'my name is erin' 'i am a teacher' 'i live in sanur' 'i stay at my boss' house' (not entirely true, but i don't yet know who to say i currently stay in an apartment above a factory owned by the person who is the founder and ceo of the organisation i am placed with).


i found the first week a challenge. i am staying with a another volunteer who is also my colleague (he is Actually Sporty, unlike pseudo-sporty me) - who is a really great guy, but, after three years living alone, and prior to that years of living in queer, generally women-only sharehouses, often with people older than me and never with colleagues, i found it to be very different. in addition (and possibly more significantly), although i had attended preparation workshops endlessly going over similar information (about being flexible, etc) to the point where i said to my fellow volunteers 'i can not possibly hear this one more time. get me to seven eleven for a bintang asap' i found the pace of my new workplace (where there is not really an office..just my house or my boss' restaurant on the beach..) to be challenging, as i am used to being busy to the point of getting a rash. (in-joke with myself. i get rashes at the mere mention of getting a rash. seriously, i just wrote that and then scratched my shoulder..). and here i was, suddenly, in bali to do a placement focused on swimming and water safety, in particular focussing on creating programs and training swim coaches to work with children with disabilities, and i was given a task - to work on a document and some activities to teach traffic safety to mainstream kids attending a soccer tournament. interesting.


however, in week two i embraced the bali pace of life. and got to swim with some amazing kids in ubud. and sat, working on my laptop at my boss' restaurant on the beach in sanur, and thought this is really a pretty amazing life. even taking the kids home in the school bus (not unlike the rosamond bus, however with different rules regarding seatbelts, kids sitting on adults knees', the bus driver pulling over to buy cigarettes and then driving and smoking..) we went past countless rice paddies, temples, little old ladies carrying offerings, dogs, more dogs, dogs that had red collars showing that they had been vaccinated (against rabies) by the organisation my friends work for, and other amazing sites, to the point where suddenly i was looking at these amazing sights as though i was used to them..


and then week three.. it has been relaxed, with a holiday for independence day on wednesday - on which my friends and i went up the east coast and went swimming and snorkelling, and then a very full on day (but a once-in-a-lifetime experience) attending a cremation of a lady who was a member of ubud royalty - which i will write about hopefully in m next post, as it was a very big day and experience.
i was, however, hit by one of the pyres when it was getting carried out of the palace, as were two of my friends, and two of us fell to the ground. i had flashes of 'this is going to be where i get trampled' (whilst wearing balinese traditional dress, no less) but luckily the men carrying the pyre helped us up and there was no stampede. oh heavens a what a crazy crowd experience!


and tonight - friday night - we are going to kuta (i tried to avoid it but then went there to attend the nippers program, and discovered that kuta beach is amazing at 8am on a sunday, when all my (feral) fellow countrypeople are either asleep, hungover, still drunk or a combination of the three..) to see Empire of The Sun which will hopefully be fun, although it is a costume event, and i did not bring any costumes. i fear i did not even bring glitter. very out of form, for me..


and so now i must go, and walk past the rice paddies and possibly corn fields to drop my washing off at the laundry.


as i said, i will attempt to write again soon. i hope that i do..


i hope you are all well.


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and finally. soon i will have a work uniform. it is a polo shirt. yep. a polo. that is all.