Bricole's Day In

After the chaos of yesterday evening, we had a relaxing day at our hotel in Ubud. It has a very exotic look about it and walking around the grounds is like walking through Adventureland at DisneyWorld. Our hotel is not actually that large in terms of rooms, however. It has only 17 rooms or something like that, so it was easy to walk around without running into other guests.

Later on, a former student of mine from my flight instructing days had gotten on a flight from Jakarta to visit me just for lunch before heading back. He and his wife treated us to one of his favorite places nearby. We sat on pillows on the ground. After about 20 minutes or so, Nicole and I kept fidgeting in an attempt to get comfortable. I had Nasi Campur, a rice dish with a smattering of other things like chicken, egg, and peanut encircling it. Nicole had chicken satay. My student managed to eat half  a duck.

Back at the hotel, Nicole and I scoped out the pool area which looks nice for later relaxation. It has been overcast all day and seemed to be threatening rain, but the most it ever did was very lightly sprinkle.

As it came close to dinner time, we ventured out a little bit into town, which consisted of some craft stores, hotels, spas, and lots of white people. You see, Ubud is an interesting place because Nicole and I can't really figure out why it is even a tourist stop other than the fact that it is a tourist stop. But how did it become such a stop is the question for the ages. Perhaps Instagram is partially to blame. If you see any promotional materials hawking Bali, you may have seen a young woman on a swing blissfully swinging above the jungle canopy as if she did not have a care in the world. This is actually a thing one can do, and is apparently so appealing to instagram people that it costs $35 for about 12 swings, or almost $3 per swing if you do the math.

So that care-free image that someone posted on social media is in actuality very forced. If the camera had zoomed out, it would reveal a line of people ready to spend way too much money on something that is, in effect, a lie. Now, having said that, I do not want to imply that Ubud in Bali is a miserable place. In fact, quite the contrary. We are feeling very relaxed here. The point of my rant is to show the kind of people that are drawn to this place. And as your favorite snarky blogger, I'm not going to lie about what I do or what I see. Ubud is not some kind of cultural mecca for Indonesia and I am not going to pretend that it is. It's a relaxing place for tourists such as myself, and a healthy reminder that what's important in life is actual experiences that don't always have to be shared with the rest of the world. I could post this picture of Nicole on Instagram and do all kinds of ridiculous hashtags about being inspired to be like Indiana Jones, but in reality we are like Marcus Brody and just lost at our own hotel.

On that note, I leave you with a shot of the Blanco Museum, just a few blocks from our hotel. What's at the Blanco Museum you ask? I haven't a clue. I can only speculate that it documents the rich heritage of the white, western, tourist in Bali. It most likely begins around the release of "Eat, Pray, Love," and continues up to a $35 swing.

Tomorrow we plan to leave the safe confines of our hotel, and really explore. #blessed