A Bit of Exploring Around Ubud

We had a good night's rest that was interrupted only by weird creaking noises that led me to believe a monkey had broken into our room and was dead set on robbing the place. This is the only possible explanation for such noises. After breakfast, we went for a hike along Campuhan Ridge, which is right next to where our hotel is located. The best part if the hike was actually before it even stqrted. There was a small temple adjacent to the trailhead that had some nice statues. Unfortunately it was closed, so we could only observe from the outside, but it was kind of neat to see a little bit of actual culture. Then we began the hike up the ridge. The views were ok, but it doesn't really warrant the title of most popular hike in Ubud.

After getting quite sweaty and sticky from the hike, we got some drinks at a mini-market and walked into town a little ways where I had seen a path that went through some rice paddies. The path was very unassuming at first, cutting in and out of alleyways, but eventually opened up into an expanse of rice paddies. We only encountered two other people during our walk, and in my opinion the trek through the rice paddies was 100x better than the ridge hike. Eventually the trail made a big loop and we found our way back into the chaos of central Ubud. By now we felt fairly expired, and we needed to get some food.

We ended up going to a place called Zest, which specializes in vegan fare. Normally I would scoff at such food blasphemy, but I have had chicken in pretty much every meal since I first landed in Singapore. I've even had chicken for breakfast and I was ready for a change. I ended up ordering Nasi Campur again (sans chicken), but I can't truly confirm what I was actually eating. What I can confirm is that the clientele was . . . different. First, everyone seemed to know each other, while at the same time not really know each other at all. Example conversation: "Oh my gosh, it's you! We need to catch up some time, I'm just up the road." "Yes it's so nice to meet you finally." Apparently the two were facebook friends, but not friends IRL (in real life). This was not the strangest thing observed. Everyone was dressed exactly the same. The women wore flowing sarongs. The men wore plain t-shirts and sported man buns as the hairstyle of choice. Now, I personally find such a hairstyle to be quite silly, but I won't judge someone solely on their haircut or clothing choice. What I will judge is the sheer hypocrisy of this whole culture of white people finding themselves in Ubud. The two people across from us at our couch table were busy taking selfies and keeping tabs on their social media accounts and saying things like, "Look how many likes this has already!" The pictures might have portrayed a care free lifestyle that might accompany a click-bait blog post that says something like, "5 Reasons You Need to Quit Your Job and Move to Bali (#3 gave me the runs)" But the people across from us were not the easygoing, fun-loving hippies they (and presumably everyone else in the restaurant) were pretending to be. They were terrible social media whores. And they weren't very nice to the server, either. They kept complaining that their pizza was taking too long. So next time you see a picture on social media of people looking like they're having the most blissful and peace-loving life abroad, just picture those same people complaining about a pizza.

Sigh. Lunch exhausted me. It only seemed fitting that we go to the pool to relax for a spell. Our hotel is like a protected retreat. Unlike someplace like Cancun, where all-inclusive resorts act as boundaries between tourists and the local population, I feel like our hotel is a way to escape the other tourists. It's quiet, unpretentious, and welcoming. It is what people on the outside pretend to be and then yell about their pizza taking too long. On that note, we ventured out to hire a taxi to drive us to Tegallalang Rice Terraces. Nicole and I both knew we were essentially venturing into some kind of tourist-trap hell, but the pictures we had seen online looked nice, so we gave it a shot.

We went later in the day, close to sunset, so we figured things would have calmed down. It is possible that it was worse earlier in the day, but there were still far too many people for my liking. And it's not just the numbers of people there, it was what they were doing. Bearing in mind that these are rice paddies and have potential for mud, slippery surfaces, and uneven pathways, there were women in fancy dresses putting on their best instagram poses. It all seemed criminal...and stupid. Nicole and I saw a small pulloff where we wanted to take some pictures of you know...the terraces, but we had to wait while a group of grammers took turns making sexy poses with the rice paddies (as one does). There are about 3 poses that the grammers like to do. 1) The back to the camera, arms spread wide as if to say, "I don't want to seem totally vain by showing my face, so I'll just turn around and obscure your view of this interesting thing in front of me." 2) The sideways, toe-pointed, hand on face, mouth slightly open as if to say, "I wore a dress to a hike because you never know when a photo-shoot will start, and phew I'm glad I did" pose. And finally 3) The hand behind the back, fake-walking away, while holding the camera phone user's hand is if to say, "Follow me to exciting adventures!" I imitated this yesterday in a picture I took of Nicole, but I don't think we executed it entirely right. Conclusion? All of our photos are crap.

Now I feel I must reiterate, my gripes are not with Bali or Ubud. My complaints are geared toward a large swath of people who are coming to Ubud. As a whole, we have found our time here very relaxing in spite of other people who are working really hard to show their followers that they are busy relaxing too.