One of the workers led us to another shaded area on the opposite side as yesterday. This was the music area it seemed. There were several gamelan gongs and other Balinese instruments strewn about. We were going to learn how to play the gamelan. The gamelan was like the Balinese version of a xylophone. There was a hammer-like tool that you used to play it. First the instructor just played all the different notes on the instrument and taught us how you have to use the other hand to silence the note so it doesn't intrude on the note you're playing next. He then taught us a tune, which both Montana and LuRue got down eventually, but it did take awhile. LuRue got taken to another easier instrument on the second tune he taught us. Montana eventually got both tunes down and able to play them back to back, over and over, while LuRue play background percussion with some other instrument like a soft gong.
Next up we were taken to the art place, where we had our classes from the other day. First up we had palm leaves making (Membuat Anyaman). We were first taught how to weave palm leaves through other palm leaves to create a design. I know that's a terrible description, but I'm not sure how to describe it without showing. There were already pre-made palm leave circles for us to practice on. We got that down pretty easily. It was time to start from scratch. First, we took a section of a bamboo leaf and created a circle. We had to use a few more so that it could create a thick enough circle. I'm not sure if any of this is making sense. We then used the bamboo weaving technique to hold the circle together. We did a few more layers like that and we ended up with a cup coaster. LuRue seemed to get that down much better than Montana. She had hers done by the time Montana was half way through.
Next we had wood carving. LuRue had expected this to be pretty easy. She expected to be taking a knife and chopping off little bits of to create a probably deformed figure. That was not the case. How the wood carving worked was there were pre-drawn images for us to choose from. We then took a hammer and metal piece and hammered the metal piece into the wood in such a way to have it take little grooves of the wood out. You were supposed to hold the wood between your feet in almost a butterfly yoga pose, but with LuRue's knees, she could not maintain that. LuRue's helper put her wood on a stand for her to use and he held it still for her. Montana tried to do the butterfly pose for a bit, but her feet fell asleep after a while. Montana's helper then put the wood in between he's feet. Neither Montana or LuRue got the whole following the line thing down, but our helpers helped us out a lot.
Earlier that day, we had been invited to the the 22nd anniversary of the Alam Hotels at Alam Shanti at 4:00. We decided we'd go if we had time, which we did. Having no idea what to expect, we headed off to the anniversary. We were greeted by a worker who led us down several several paths to a restaurant-like setting. He sat us down at a table. We still had no idea what was going on. After a few minutes, we heard weird cheering and eventually decided to check it out. There were workers there eating a buffet of Balinese food. We never did figure out what the chanting was for. On our way back to our table we saw some tourists from our hotel going through a buffet of more touristy food. There was a lot of food that we had already tried and knew that we like (or at least could stand).
We got back a hour or so before it was time to go to our shadow puppet performance. Several times, when we had gone to restaurants we had seen something on the dessert menu called black rice pudding. After trying to order it a few times, we finally figured out that you have to order it in advance. We don't know why. So yesterday we had ordered some black rice pudding for today at 7:00pm. We headed over to the restaurant to figure out what this black rice pudding was. LuRue ended up thinking it wasn't too bad. Montana on the other hand had to force herself to eat it.
It was time to go to shadow puppets. Montana had scheduled a shuttle to take us there at 7:30 the day before. No one was there. Eventually, Montana went to the desk and asked. The desk people either had miscommunication or just forgot, but either way we figured it out and we were off to go see shadow puppets.
The stage for the shadow puppets were just a few, about twenty, chairs in front of a white sheet of cloth which was back-lit by a large flame. This allowed the figures to show up in shadow form. Even though we were given a sheet that had the synopsis of the play, neither of us could follow it at all. We couldn't even figure out which characters were good and which were bad. There were a few lines in English, but most of it was is Balinese, which made it even harder to follow the story line. But a man explained that it was basically that good triumphs over evil. Either way it was fun to watch. Our last activity in Bali. We're sad to go, but trips don't last forever.
You guys sure are finding a lot of different things to do every day. Do you miss snorkeling? Which activity today did you like the best?
ReplyDeleteWow! I can't believe you guys are wrapping things up already, but that's what the calendar says. Sounds like another interesting day. The coasters look good! And there are a lot of black rice pudding recipes on the internet, so you can make it when you come home! One recipe mentioned soaking the black rice overnight, so maybe that's why you had to order it in advance.
ReplyDeleteYour photos say a 1000 words on these intricate Balinese art forms. Hope you got to record your gamelan playing. Wood carving looked very difficult--no way could I have held that pose for even a few minutes! I am quite sure I would have loved the black rice pudding--maybe you'll learn to make it LuRue?? Shadow puppets seem like a great final activity. Yes, I agree with Eric, can't believe this trip is coming to an end. Thank you for letting us 'go along with you'.
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