It Existed and It Was Nice: Bali Again.

Starting from the middle of May, I was in Bali for a month again. 

I'm surprised this hasn't happened earlier, but I dropped my phone in the ocean. It didn't even feel real! I picked it out as fast as I dropped it and it all happened so fast that it didn't feel like it happened at all. Oh but it did happen. This all happened in the middle of my stay in Bali and I decided to fix my phone back in Singapore (it would take a month or more to fix in Bali because apparently everyone's dropping or ruining their phones and there is a backlog of work). In the meantime I got a phone that I forgot existed. You know what else I forgot? Having to press a key whatever number of times to get to the letter that you want. Remember that?! Or having to press "1" several times to get to the punctuation mark you want? It was so frustrating to not be able to type my thoughts as they came and I had to reduce what I wanted to say down to the bare minimum because it was just annoying to text anything longer than 5 words. I can understand where the use of "r" for "are" and "u" for "you" came from. 

When I got back to Singapore, my dad let me use one of his phones. So massive! I was telling my mom that you know how back in the 80s people had those massive cellphones? How come we're returning to something so huge again? I'll tell you why, cause big screens are awesome. After using this phone for a couple of weeks, I really loved seeing everything so big. Of course it is awkward to hold and you do feel like a bit of a noob holding something so ginormous that it sometimes requires the use of 2 hands (or always does), like how much bigger do you need it? But hurrah, Singaporeans are awesome, were able to fix my stupid mistake and now I have my iPhone again. And it feels so weirdly small. 

Anyways, enough of my thoughts/experiences with phones, here are some pictures from that month in Bali: 

There was this celebration happening called Galungan (which people could only really explain to me in vague terms, but from what I understand and Wikipedia tells me, it's where the Balinese people go to several different temples, making offerings and praying to their ancestors). These (penjors) were everywhere, lining streets, swaying in the wind. 

I asked people to explain them to me and all I really got was "it's like your Christmas tree". 

Misha. A Czech-speaking Balinese dog. She was found in a really bad state in a rice field as a puppy by the owners (Czech and super nice) who rented out the place I was staying in. Isn't she pretty? And aren't you glad she's alive?!

Neighbors. Chickens in a fancy cage. 

Monkeys at Uluwatu temple. So all the yellow bobs you see are cobs of corn and it was a funny sight to come upon, just a bunch of monkeys sitting around eating cobs of corn. Who gives them the corn? Why corn? At Ubud they get yams. Why yams? Who decided monkeys like corn and yams?

It was a peaceful spot that overlooks the ocean and I wanted to hang out there for a bit. So I did. And all of the sudden I feel something on top of me. It was a monkey! I was starting to freak out because unlike a lot of people who come to see these guys, I don't want them on me so that I can take a picture. I heard that these monkeys are more aggressive then the ones you find in Ubud. I was told to just stay calm and eventually the monkey would get disinterested in me and just climb off. I tried to stay still but the monkey just seemed to like me more and more, picking at my hair, starting to groom me. And then another monkey came onto me and the first monkey was starting to dig into me with its teeth and I just couldn't take it anymore and got up and freaked out a bit and thankfully they got off of me without breaking my skin or hurting me. I looked back quickly and they were hissing at me with their teeth. It was terrifying. 

Sooooo...don't hangout with the monkeys unless you're cool with them climbing all over you.

Me camouflaging really well into a spot called 'Honeymoon'. lol seriously, where's my face. 

The last photo I took before I dropped my phone in the water.

I saw so much more of Bali after my phone died and I wish I could have shown you. More lush scenes. Waterfalls. A dead pig being cleaned in the middle of the street early in the morning with this gigantic torch. Flower petals in different colors scattered on the surface of dark water where locals were bathing and being blessed by the water. Local kids finding a snake in a soccer field and taunting each other with it and then playing soccer and chasing each other with their motorbikes. lol, things that I ate (which seemed to mostly be satay). Feeding cows long stalks of grass. Ricefields. Dogs. But you and I have to just trust that it existed and I saw it and that it was nice.