Cat Poop Coffee

My guess is that more than one of my blog readers think that I have an unusual fascination with poop. You might be right because I do seem to write about it quite a bit. However, for this entry, it is entirely appropriate! Yesterday, Gundula and I rode to a coffee plantation about 40 minutes northeast of Ubud. Our only goal: to drink kopi luwak, one of the most expensive and supposedly best coffees in the world. In Ubud, a cup of kopi luwak goes for $25 USD. According to the research I've done, a cup in NYC can cost between $40-50.

I first heard of kopi luwak in the movie Bucket List (Jack Nicholson, Morgan Freeman...excellent movie and I'm living my bucket list right now!!). The civil cats (we saw one...kind of looks like a possum) eat the red cherry coffee beans and digest them. The locals pick the beans out of the cat's poop and proceed with processing the beans. I drank it like a man with no cream and no sugar.

I don't like coffee because of the way it made Mom and Dad's breath smell when I'd kiss them goodbye each morning on my way to school. (sorry for sharing that!! xoxo). Once I got old enough to try coffee, I realized that I just didn't like the taste. Other than my love affair with tiramisu, I don't like anything coffee flavored. The cup of kopi luwak was and will remain the only cup of coffee I ever finish. Gundula, who does drink coffee, found it very smooth and delicious. She really enjoyed it! I found it hard to get the last few drops down...you can see what was left in my cup in the picture!

At the plantation, we also sampled Bali coffee, ginseng coffee, hot chocolate, lemon tea and ginger tea. They grow their own tobacco, so I also sampled a hand rolled cigarette. It made me cough. Finally, we sampled coconut wine (45% alcohol...brutal!) and black rice wine (tasted like disgusting syrup). Aside from the absolute monsoon that we found ourselves driving home in, it was a pleasant day.

I got in my first motorbike accident a couple of days ago. I was on my bike completely still waiting for the approaching car to pass by on the narrow, bumpy road and the approaching car scraped my muffler and bent the license plate on its way. Luckily, the bike I have rented for the past week has dents and scratches all over the place so hopefully they won't notice the new ones when I return it! I was completely fine after the scrape and run. My only ailment at the moment is a heat rash that I can't seem to shake. Today, the pharmacist smartly informed me that I should stay out of the sun and heat. Good point doc.

Earth Day!

The last week has been incredibly busy, relative to last week. Monday and Tuesday it rained quite a bit, so Gundula and I spent a lot of time in cozy coffee shops and swimming in the rain. I also took a lot of naps (okay, so that part wasn't quite so busy). On Wednesday, we had our second silver making class. I made another ring and a pair of earrings…such progress! That afternoon, we started preparing for the three day Earth Day Environmental Art & Music Festival. Our first job: digging holes for the tree planting ceremony. It was great fun to dig holes in the rain and to get extremely muddy!

Thursday morning was the tree planting ceremony with about 50 children from two neighboring schools. I led a group consisting of eight: three pre-teen Balinese girls and five 7-8 year old Balinese & Western boys. The girls were calm, helpful and quiet. The boys were entirely the opposite…wild! It was all I could do to get them to stay focused on planting the tree. They were much more interested in throwing mud on each other, making mud mustaches and seeing who could get the dirtiest. It was a blast…since I haven’t really been around kids in a long time, it reminded me of how much raw energy they have and of how thankful I am that I am not a teacher! ;) The funniest thing that happened related to poop. During the first 3 minutes when I had the group’s attention, I explained the planting process: compost into the hole, some soil, plant, more soil, mulch, etc. One of the more vocal boys said, “I’m not touching the compost. Compost is poop.” I couldn’t stop laughing long enough to explain that the compost we were using, while directly from a compost toilet, had been completely through the composting process to remove all of the “bad” parts of poop. Hilarious to hear five boys discussing holding poop in their hands...

And another thing about poop…for the last week or so, I’ve seen random droppings in my bathroom, way too small for the spider that seems to have moved in. My guess was mouse or rat until I had to move the dresser to retrieve a slip of paper that had fallen behind. There was a massive gecko just hanging out on the wall…I screamed because it was so large and so close to the paper I wanted. The guys working at the hotel where I’m staying had a good laugh at my expense, but, at least I know where the poop has been coming from. Now there are three of us in room 6 at the Swan Inn: a spider, a gecko and me.

On my way home from the tree planting morning, I stopped to look at some art in a shop on the side of the road. They had some beautiful pieces, and as I really haven’t purchased a souvenir from Bali yet, I decided to buy a decent size canvas painting. I noticed, though, that the particular one that I had chosen was not signed by the artist. To get it signed, I had to drive another 20 minutes north of Ubud to the artist’s home. My coming was apparently a big deal as every family member in their family village came to see me. None of them spoke much English, so communicating was a bit challenging, but it was such a wonderful experience to meet the artist, see his workshop and see the way a typical Balinese family lives.

I spent most of Friday afternoon running errands, setting up for the festival and handing out fliers and posters to local restaurants. Saturday was a very long, very hot day! The festival started at 3, but the volunteers arrived by 9 to help with the set up and with organizing the vendors. Somehow, I got put in charge of a whole lot of things and so spent the morning running around like crazy trying to stay on top of everything. My official job title once the festival started was, importantly, Bar Ticket Girl. I strategically chose a job where 1) I could sit down in the shade 2) I was close to the stage (great music!!) and 3) I could meet all of the men who wanted a beer! I also filled in at a booth where people where encouraged to write an idea to help save the earth on a slip of paper and post it on a concept web board. A group of pre-teens from a local Balinese school all came together to the booth when I was there. One of them wrote, “heal the world” on his slip of paper and I started humming Michael Jackson’s song. The next thing I knew we were all singing the song together, loudly. It gave me goose bumps and almost brought tears to my eyes….very moving.

Gundula worked at the kid’s section of the festival the majority of the day. She thought it would be fun to paint a huge butterfly all over my face. For some reason, neither one of us could stop laughing as she was painting me. I was the oldest person at the festival with a Lepidoptera on my face. ;)

Today, we went to a cremation ceremony. In the Balinese culture, they celebrate life by playing music, cheering and having a parade. An older woman had passed…we saw the men lift the cardboard coffin draped in colorful tapestries onto the top of a gold tower to be carried by bamboo. Once the deceased was in place, the parade started. The parade was led by a cardboard bull being carried by bamboo, followed by the Tamalan percussion band and the gold tower. We walked through the streets for about a mile until we arrived at the cremation site where they moved the coffin into the bull, performed some blessings and made offerings. Then, each member of the family/community lit an incense stick and together lit the bull on fire. The entire atmosphere was relaxed. No tears. They had a few people selling food, people were smoking cigarettes and one of the men chanting a blessing answered his cell phone call while he was up with the body. Definitely nothing like any funeral I have been to at home, but in all honesty, I like this one better. It was a positive, beautiful and peaceful celebration.

Author’s note: I had to look up another word for butterfly for effect…I didn’t just know that. xoxo

Lazy Days in Ubud...

The week following my adventure to the Komodo Islands has been quite relaxing and uneventful, comparatively. Michelle and I made our way back to Ubud last Monday. I don’t really know what I’ve done with my time and a week has already past! It’s amazing how quickly time goes, even when you have nothing in particular to do! Gundula happened to also be back in Ubud, so it has been great to be with her again! The three of us have basically spent the week hanging out and eating our way through Ubud…the food here is amazing…so fresh and healthy!

In addition to eating, Gundula and I took a West Coast Swing class where I volunteered to dance the male role because there weren’t enough men in the class. While dancing, being the male is a lot more challenging than I expected because you actually have to pay attention to what you’re doing and stay on count. I realized that I prefer the female role much better…you can just enjoy the music and get pulled around by the guy!

We took a jewelry making class where I struggled for four hours to make a sterling silver ring. My ring was actually quite difficult to design, cut, hammer, file, weld and polish. After starting over for the third time (thank goodness that silver can be melted and reused!), my teacher paid a lot more attention to me and didn’t let me weld on my own. While using the electric polishing wheel, my ring shot out of my hands and hit the wall no less than 4 times…the teacher promptly took over for me. I’ve got another design that I want to try and make this week, so we’ll see if I show any improvement! Hopefully the teacher will actually let me sign up for the class!

On Saturday, Gundula and I went for a beautiful walk through the rice fields on our way to Suri Organik, a fabulous restaurant that sits above the rice terraces outside of Ubud. The grilled vegetable salad with fresh feta and rambutan (a local fruit) pie was incredible. We spent several hours relaxing on the cushions on the floor, met some nice guys and swatted butterflies, dragonflies and mosquitoes away until dark…it was such a relaxing way to spend an afternoon!

Speaking of mosquitoes, it seems that they have decided to eat no one else but me. Michelle and I shared a room until Friday when she left…each morning she would wake up with no bites and I would have at least 5 new bites. Luckily, my body overreacts to bites of any kind and so I am now covered in red welts. When I cover those welts with the equivalent of calamine lotion, it looks quite fashionable (read: sarcasm). I have been wearing bug spray constantly and it’s obviously attracting them instead of repelling them. I hope it's okay that I am not taking anti-malaria tablets…if I come down with a fever, I suppose I’m in trouble!

Aside from eating, dancing, making jewelry, getting bit by mosquitoes and laying around rice fields, I have done a little bit of sight seeing. I just missed seeing all of the lotus blossoms in bloom at Pura Taman Saraswati, a temple to the north of Ubud. I have taken walks on roads off the map to get a feel for the local’s daily life…the Balinese are such peaceful, happy people. Their smiles are contagious and it makes me happy to just walk around and say hello to them! We’ve listened to great live music every night: reggae, Latin, classic rock covers. I have decided to stay one more week here before I start traveling again. I’ll be volunteering from Thursday-Sunday at the Earth Day Festival they are hosting in Ubud. Ubud is a wonderful place to slow down, relax and enjoy life and I’m doing a really good job at it!

Komodo Dragons!

First, thanks to all of you for your emails and concern related to the recent earthquake. I was far away from Sumatra where the earthquake hit and since I was on a boat when it happened, I didn’t even know it had occurred until late last night when we got back to shore. Please keep the victims and those affected in your thoughts and prayers….

The beginning of the tour ‘Hunting Komodos by Camera’ that I joined Tuesday started off by driving across the island of Lombok. We boarded the boat after a few stops along the way at a pottery village and a ship building village. 17 people in total were on the tour, and I was the only one from the Americas! We all got along really well from the beginning. Our first stop was a very small island where we attempted to add to the coral regrowth program, snorkeled, played beach volleyball and had dinner by a bonfire on the beach. I got a bit torn up diving for the ball because there were bits of coral in the sand! In the past, the Indonesians used blasting as a means of fishing which destroyed and scattered a lot of coral all over the shore. They are making good strides towards redeveloping the reefs though, which is a great thing. Everyone was asked to sing a song by the bonfire, although only 3 of us actually did. I performed with I’m a Little Teapot for my new friends….not to sound too cocky, but I’m really good at that one. ;)

The first full day on the boat we did a hike to the top of a mountain overlooking a saltwater lake, formed by a tidal wave that filled a crater made by a volcano. It was a 30 minute hike, straight up. With sun screen and bug spray covering me from head to toe and the fact that I haven’t had a proper work out in over 2 ½ months, I swear I have never sweat so much in my life! Hence, I was very excited when I finally made it to the top! We stopped that evening at Kilo Beach, where the entire village came out to greet us. The kids were amazing and very eager to practice the little English that they knew. They absolutely loved having their picture taken. The next time I travel to a third world country, I will have a Polaroid camera with me so that I can give them a copy of the picture too! They had a volleyball net and the locals invited us to play against some local girls. I haven’t played a sport in front of that large of a crowd in over a decade…there were easily over 200 people surrounding the court. Everyone was laughing and clapping, regardless of how bad we played…it was quite embarrassing for 3 guys, 2 other girls and I to be beaten by villagers whose average age was 16. Oh well!

The next morning, I was giddy with excitement as we docked at Komodo Island. As we approached, I acknowledged that the dragons are quite smart to have chosen that island to live….Komodo actually looks like a place where dragons belonged…very barren savannah with few forests. In total, we saw 2 adult dragons and 1 baby dragon. I got yelled at no less than twice by our guide which you are required to have in the park for safety reasons. The first time I was yelled at was because I was swinging my water bottle as we were approaching the first dragon. I was excited! The guide immediately scolded me because movement like that indicates to the dragon that I might want to feed it. I did not want to feed it, so I stopped moving my bottle! The second time, I walked behind one, alone, and stopped to take a picture of the dragon from a different angle…I was promptly yelled at to keep moving.

From then on, the guide didn’t leave my side. I was happy for that when he spotted a king cobra AND a green mamba, both deadly poisonous snakes, in the same nearby tree and promptly warned me not to get any closer! The green mamba was just hanging out and the king cobra was slithering through the tree after two mice that we could see trying to hide in the leaves. We all gathered round to watch…I was closest to the green mamba because he didn’t seem interested in moving. Then, all of a sudden, the mamba dropped down to a lower branch just like that. I screamed and jumped back easily 6 feet knocking down a German guy and an English girl along my way. I didn’t know who I had knocked over on my flight backwards because I didn’t look and I didn’t apologize (until later!) because I was traumatized and wouldn’t take my eyes off the snake!! Needless to say, it took quite a while for my blood pressure to return to normal!

After Komodo Island, we cruised to Red Beach where we did some of the best snorkeling I’ve ever done. The reefs were amazing…tons of fish, a lot of which I had never seen before. We spotted a large sepia (in the octopus/squid family), about 2’ by 1’, making its way along the reef. I also stumbled upon a 1 ½’ crocodile fish chilling out near the rocks. It is apparently extremely rare to see that, so I was excited to have spotted something so unique.

The next day, we went to Rinca Island, the second largest of the four islands where you can find Komodos. You’ll be happy to know that I was very well-behaved perhaps due to the slight hangover I had from drinking arak the night before (arak is a local liquor made from palm trees…40-70% proof but it goes great with OJ and Sprite!). The place was crawling with dragons! We spotted 19 dragons in the first half hour…they like to hang around the rangers station cafeteria. They can smell blood up to 2 km away and so always linger where the humans prepare food.

On our 5 km hike through Rinca Island, we saw a water buffalo that had recently been bitten by a dragon. The dragon’s saliva contains at least one bacterium of 60 that is highly septic. For large animals like the buffalo, it can take up to 3 weeks for the animal to die. Then, the dragons devour its cadaver. This buffalo had already been bitten but still wasn’t dead, and a dragon was close by waiting for its final breath. It was a chilling scene to witness. In all, I saw 25 dragons, just slightly over 1% of the dragon population on Komodo (approx. 1,300 dragons) and Rinca (approx. 1,000 dragons). The largest was over 6’ and the smallest just under 3’. It was an awesome experience to see the largest living lizard and closest relative of the dinosaur alive!

As the sun was setting Friday night, we sailed with a massive school of dolphins, easily 30-40 of them… the most I have ever seen at one time. They were in the mood to perform and put on quite a show for us: they swan under and around the boat, jumped, twisted in the air and followed us for at least 5 solid minutes. With a perfect sunset and dolphins swimming all around, it was definitely one of those moments where you’re left feeling that all is right in the world and you can’t stop smiling.

Gili Islands

The ferry ride from Bali to the Gili Islands was beautiful. Along the way, I saw my first blow hole in a rock which was, surprisingly, very cool! I also saw a dolphin fully breach the water. Lastly, I saw a small shark jump about 4 feet out of the water chasing a fish who had also jumped all the way out of the water! Lots of activity here in the Indian Ocean!

The Gili Islands consist of three small islands: Gili Trawangan, Gili Meno and Gili Air. On all three, there are no cars or motorbikes, only bicycles and horse drawn carriages. Interestingly, there are no dogs on any of the islands…only cats with stubs for tails. Most of the activity occurs on Trawangan, the largest of the three islands. Meno and Air are more for honeymooners and couples, so I stayed as far away as possible from those two for obvious reasons. It takes only about 3 hours to walk around the whole island. The water here has certainly been photographed for every island article every printed because it is a perfect turquoise blue. Visibility is amazing…up to 30’ crystal clear in a lot of places. Basically, I’ve never been anywhere more calming or more beautiful. The biggest decisions I have to make each day are what sort of fresh juice to order and which beachfront restaurant to order it from! It’s really tough!

On my first day on Gili Trawangan, I rented a bicycle and cycled around the island once and then half way around again. I stopped along the way for a swim, nap, etc. I ate lunch in a bamboo hut that sits over the water with breathtaking views of Bali and Lombok islands. A funny thing happened, I was napping on the beach and an Indonesian guy, about 23, walked up and sat down right next to me. He asked me where I was from, my age, if I was single, etc. Then he told me he liked my body. I can now check “be approached by a male gigolo” off of my to-do list. I haven’t mentioned yet that he wasn’t wearing ANYTHING but a small t-shirt. Very interesting marketing strategy I must admit! I was prepared for it though…I had been forewarned that the men on the Gili’s try to make extra money by hooking up with the foreign girls.

On Saturday, I biked again around the island but this time rented snorkel gear. It was by far the most awesome snorkeling experience I’ve ever had! I followed two turtles for over 30 minutes each. I watched them move coral to find what they wanted to eat, scratch their stomachs and backs on coral, come up to the surface for air and just swim around in the water. They are such peaceful creatures! Floating in the water, watching the turtles and listening to the midday Muslim call to prayer from the island was one of those moments in life where you think that it just couldn’t possibly get any better. It did a few minutes later when one of the turtles came close enough to me that I could rub the algae off of its back! Amazing!

Sunday I did absolutely nothing. I got to the beach by 11 and read, slept and swam until the sun went down. I love days at the beach like that! They have an outdoor theatre on the island, where everyone lays on mats. I watched It’s Complicated and Dr. Parnassus last night…coolest movie theatre I’ve ever been to because I got to lay on the ground outside and because they served Nutella milkshakes…why haven’t I ever thought of making one of those at home?!

Today I took a glass bottom boat snorkeling around the other two islands. We saw five more turtles today, although the currents were too strong to stay and watch them for any length of time. There were a ton of beautiful parrot and angel fish. The coral isn’t nearly as impressive as the Great Barrier Reef, but the visibility was way better.

I leave paradise early tomorrow morning to start a 6 day cruise to the Komodo Islands. I am so excited to see a Komodo dragon! I will be even more excited if I see it kill something, preferably not me or another human. Along the way, we’ll be stopping at some pretty remote dive/snorkel spots, so I hope to see a lot more turtles and hopefully some reef sharks too! I’ll be sleeping on the deck each night…it was $100 cheaper and I figured it would be way cooler to do some star gazing as I’m falling asleep. If you don’t hear from me in about 7-8 days, you should assume that I got eaten by a dragon.

Hygiene Update: there is no fresh water on the Gili’s unless you pay for a really expensive room. Therefore, I have, since Thursday, been covered in a thin layer of salt. Add sunscreen and bug spray on top of that and you have an idea of how badly I want, and just might need, a real shower. But, as I’ll be boarding a ship for the next 6 days, I’ll definitely not be clean for a total of 11 days. You know you are in paradise when you completely give up on being clean….right?!? On a positive note, I don’t think I’ve ever had a better tan!

Bali - The Beginning

I just finished uploading a lot of pictures from my first 3 weeks in Bali. You'll see a lot of sunset pictures that just don't do the real thing justice! Click on the link below to view them and enjoy!

http://picasaweb.google.com/jamie1209/BaliTheBeginning#