Monico Family Travels

  • Home
  • Instagram
  • Videos
  • Pedal power!

    Posted at 5:36 am by Charlotte, on June 25, 2019

     

    WhatsApp Image 2019-06-27 at 21.11.56(2)

    What better way to explore the villages of Bali than on 2 wheels (maybe 2 wheels with a motor if you ask James, but on this beautiful balmy late afternoon I appreciated hearing the sounds of nature around us, and the breeze blowing gently past us)?  Especially when its downhill ALL THE WAY (well 90% of it)!

    Our guide Made was the perfect balance of fun and informative.  He picked a trail that took us through some really remote villages, away from the tourist rat routes, and we stopped often to explore.

    Robin didn’t last long at our first stop – he squealed louder and escaped faster than even Bella and Emily!  Made showed us a vast web of golden silk orb spiders 10 feet tall and wider than it was high.  They live communally.  The spiders are highly prized as they keep the flies away from the neighbouring chicken farm!

    IMG_20190625_145329
    IMG_20190625_145403

    We learned that typical villages contain about 8-900 people.  This is a workable size for the water irrigation Subak collectives, and most of the houses in each community line just one or 2 intersecting streets.

    IMG_20190625_145837

    Families live IMG_20190625_145915 in compounds together.   You can count the number of families by the number of water pipes in leading in from the street!  Within the compound, sub-families have their own detached rooms or small houses, and often contain 3 or 4 generations.  As Sarah explained in her guest blog, the older generation are usually taken care of by their eldest son, who’s wife comes to live with them.  If a couple only has daughters, they need for one of their daughters to find a husband who is willing to come and live with them vs staying with his own family.  There is no dumping old folk in ‘homes’ in Bali!

    Each compound has an ornate gate, and then a ‘blocker’ so you can’t see from the street into the compound.  The ‘blocker’ will have a statue of one of their gods, often Ganesha who is the deity of good fortune. Daily offerings of flowers and food are made to the god, and also and also to the demons to keep them away (these consist of small pieces of banana leaf with rice on them as on the RHS below).

    IMG_20190625_150139
    IMG_20190625_150123
    IMG_20190625_150144

    Every village or town has its craft.  The village we explored specialised in making offerings and baskets from bamboo which is unfortunately for them not very lucrative.  Others community specialism examples are wood carving, pottery, bone carving etc.

    IMG_20190625_145942

    Drying bamboo for weaving

    The main courtyard at the front of each compound has 4-6 pavilions for various purposes including celebrations, sleeping (for the head of the family), a rice barn and a kitchen.

    IMG_20190625_150429
    IMG_20190625_150433

    Each compound also has its own pamerajan, or family shrine, which is always enclosed by a stone fence, and is positioned at the most auspicious northeast corner.

    IMG_20190625_151443.jpg

    Grandma making little pockets from bamboo leaves to house mini offerings:

    IMG_20190625_150947

    The kitchens were very basic and fire fuelled.  All the food is essentially rice based, or just rice.  Balinese don’t eat communally.  Someone cooks first thing in the morning enough for the entire household/compound, and then individuals graze and help themselves throughout the day.  Families are around each other all the time, helping, working and hanging out, so they don’t feel the same compulsion to come together for ritual eating that we do in the West.

    IMG_20190625_151225
    IMG_20190625_151153
    IMG_20190625_151021

    Family groups tend to own a pocket of paddies, and farm their own rice subsistence-style, in addition to working other jobs to support themselves.  The rice you see drying by the side of the road, or inside the courtyards is rarely if ever sold.

    IMG_20190625_150021

    As with all households in Bali, cockerels abound, and this one had a particularly fine fellow!

    IMG_20190625_150936

    We got some great paddy views on our descent, and saw plenty of harvesting, as well as the ducks cleaning out the last morsels of nourishment from the stubble fields.

    IMG_20190625_152424
    IMG_20190625_152226
    IMG_20190625_154247
    IMG_20190625_161807
    IMG_20190625_155709
    IMG_20190625_154041
    IMG_20190625_161914
    IMG_20190626_113950.jpg

    Loving the blues in this family group!

    It was astounding the number of temples we passed.  Every village has 1-3 temples (or more!), all of which are well tended and regularly used for offerings and celebrations.

    IMG_20190625_160210

    Some were nestled in pockets of jungle on the outskirts of town:

    IMG_20190625_152723
    IMG_20190625_153023

    We stopped for bananas and water under the BEST TREE EVER!!!

    IMG_20190625_161218 (1)

    We felt very much that we had opened up a deeper understanding of Bali and the Balinese over the course of this afternoon.  Its people are so warm and friendly.  Kids called out to us the whole way, and high-fived us as we passed through, and villagers welcomed us to explore their homes, and embraced our presence with the warmest smiles.

    • ← Welcoming Robin with a clifftop sundowner
    • Mepantigan: celebration of the spirit →

    Author: Charlotte

    | 8 Comments |

    8 thoughts on “Pedal power!”

    • sarah thorley

      July 13, 2019 at 8:43 am

      What a really fascinating excursion. I would even have ridden a bicycle myself, to come with you, (especially as it was mostly downhill)! It filled out, in your words and pictures, a lot of what I had briefly glimpsed in our own village, and read about. thank you.
      Can’t wait to see you!
      Sarah

      Reply
      • Charlotte

        July 13, 2019 at 9:11 am

        How wonderful to put our experiences together, the ones we didn’t HAVE together. Can’t wait to see you too. Charlotte x

        Reply
    • Mother

      July 14, 2019 at 9:31 am

      looks amazing and downhill bicycling certainly the best!
      It is great having the last bits of the story rounded out with more amazing photos.
      When one has hugely enjoyed a book and there are only a few pages left one can hardly bear to read them and end it for ever. Now on the contrary, on your return, there is the joyous opportunity to fill in the gaps, get the background, probe into characters and discover any unprintable episodes from the horses mouths…
      Mxxx

      Reply
      • Charlotte

        July 14, 2019 at 11:16 am

        Ha ha. You’ll get those in 2 years time! Xx

        Reply
    • Matteo Marzano

      July 16, 2019 at 10:17 am

      What a nice report !
      Thanks.

      Reply
    • Grandpa Suffolk

      July 26, 2019 at 10:14 am

      I love those paddy fields, and they replant them so neatly in a perfect matrix.I can certainly live with downhill cycling…..do you remember the trip back in Crete on our last night…..You were passenger on my bike and you, just possibly, had had one grappa too many? I was certainly pleased that was downhill.

      Reply
      • Charlotte

        August 4, 2019 at 4:31 pm

        Something about a teddy bears picnic?!?!? What could be more innocent ?!?!? Xxx

        Reply
    • Grandpa Suffolk

      August 4, 2019 at 5:30 pm

      Probably best left there!!!

      Reply

    Leave a Reply Cancel reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    • Follow Blog via Email

      Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

      Join 45 other subscribers