Left to right: Radu, Ryan, Trevor and Menno (the teacher)
I'm writing this as Menno (Netherlands), Radu (Romania), Ryan (USA), and Trevor (Canada) are coaching strong rhythms from the four djembes (African drums) we acquired yesterday. Live music and entertainment are the latest additions to our villa's atmosphere. The biggest change we've made was opening our villa as home base for the Bali Institute for Global Renewal (www.baliinstitute.org), a place for their office, as well as, a residence for Marcia Jaffe, the Institute's president. Okay, I've got to stop now. Can't write. The rhythms are too seductive. Got to move. See ya later. JEMBE!!!
What do you do when you see an ambulance with lights on and sirens screaming? You pull over and let him pass you, right? Not so in Bali. Here you continue your merry way along the narrow, winding, pot-holed roads or, you may even try to PASS him! I'm not kidding. The most hair-raising ride of my life and I wasn't even the patient. Two of our friends, a young woman and her mother from Holland, spent a week on the beach where they joked about the mosquitos. They wore long sleeves and sprayed themselves with Deet. Still, they both came down with dengue fever. The mother got it first and got it bad. Doctors made daily house calls to check on her (imagine, they still do that here) and decided to hospitalize her when she kept deteriorating. By now the poor woman had become painfully sensitive to light and noise and movement, everything that the ambulance ride offered in excess: hard stops and hard accelerations, going up and down hills, bumps in the road, making sharp turns, screaming siren... The hour-long ride must have been pure torture for her. Her daughter sat on the floor of the ambulance behind the front passenger's seat, cradling her, while I sat crouched on the protrusion of the left back wheel with my feet crammed between the litter and the back door. Did I mention that the ambulance was not much more than an old van with bad springs turned into a make-shift emergency vehicle? I should have taken a picture of the creative interior. Instead I was paying attention to the mother's breathing (with no clue of what to do if it stopped) and invoking every power in the universe to get us to the hospital in one piece. Every once in a while I would make the mistake of looking out the window only to freak out at the ambulance speeding to overtake cars and buses on streets that were surely meant for only one car at a time. By at least three dozen miracles we finally arrived at the hospital unharmed and with our patient still alive. When they opened the back door of the van, I got out and found my legs had turned to jello.
The emergency room was as you would expect for Indonesia - very friendly staff. A large clean air-conditioned suite waited for them. It had two beds (one hospital bed, the other a regular bed for a family member), dining table and 2 chairs, sofa, kitchenette, the works! The nurses seemed competent here and the instruments up-to-date. If my friends had not been sick, they would have luxuriated in their plush accommodations.
This happened last week. Since then the mother has recovered somewhat, but not enough for discharge. Although blood tests confirmed the daughter as having dengue fever too, she was fortunate to only experience mild symptoms. As soon as the mother is strong enough to travel, they will return home in time for Xmas.
STORIES
We've had the extraordinary fortune to offer our guests the opportunity to experience traditional Balinese healing by Jero Mangku Made Rata. Although he is renown as a "bonesetter," that's not all he does. People come to him for anything and everything. One of our guests had 3 plantar warts on his right foot that no medical treatment could remove. Jero Mangku concocted a paste that he heated up and applied to the warts. Once the paste dried and was removed, the warts simply fell off. Another guest suffered from repeated bronchitis and still another guest had a family history of serious stomach problems. As soon as I'll receive their written stories and the happy results, I'll post them here. Jero Mangku is also known for his ability to remove tumors. He promised to call me when he treats his next case, so I can watch and document the process.
COMING UP SOON:
I would like to invite you to experience Bali's traditional healers, mystical places, and delicious foods. Come stay at our villa and let us spoil you. Learn how the Balinese view illness and healing. Watch traditional healers treat patients. Receive a treatment if you feel so inclined. Visit Tampaksiring, the temple of holy waters, and Bali's mysterious Room 327 at the Grand Bali Beach hotel in Sanur (see previous posts). Enjoy a full moon or new moon ceremony and dance. Join Dayu (our cook) as she finds the ingredients for an authentic Balinese dinner at Ubud's traditional market. Learn how to prepare it and then indulge yourself in a banquet of Bali's culinary specialties. Sounds good? Let me know you're interested and I'll send you details.
MORE STORIES:
Bali has changed us to the core. It is its own universe - at once dense and clear, baffling and necessary. Excess is normal and nothing is what it seems. A ditch is not a ditch; it's the god of water passing by your house. And don't think you can act like the Lone Ranger because you are not just one person - you are quintuplet, born with four other "siblings": Placenta, Blood, Water, and Navel, who stay with you and grow with you as long as you live. Invisible to the normal eye, they nevertheless exert real influence. Any imbalance in relation to your "siblings" has consequences. It's like carrying a whole family around with you wherever you go, a family that can read your every thought. So it's here where I learn again how stories enchant and knit the world together. I never dreamed I would receive so much.
Our gardener Bendot surprised me with a late night visit of his 12-year-old grandchildren Novang and Sintya, still attired in their dance costumes after their "Kupu Kupu" (Butterfly) performance. He wanted me to take their photos. I happily obliged. The moment we finished, both girls snatched up their cell phones from Bendot who was holding them, and started texting. Of course, I had to take a picture of that too.
Jero Mangku Made Rata has such an easy way about him that I like him immediately, no reservations. A solid 50-years-old guy, graying hair pulled into a bun with a ready smile and a satchel filled with his bottles of oil, he looks prepared for anything. He has come to our villa to treat my friend Ria who is visiting us from Hawaii. Like Slava, Ria also has a problem with her feet. As Jero gives her the full treatment, he finds other parts to heal as well. He tells her she is very "pure." Although Ria is a vegetarian, I don't think he's referring to that because he sees no problem with eating meat or smoking cigarettes. Jero derives his power from meditation and he picked up on Ria's daily meditations. The pain, though, is more than Ria likes, so he gives her his "western people treatment." "Balinese people can take a lot more pain," he jokes. What would need only one treatment for a Balinese requires three for a westerner, which is fine with Ria, as long as she gets the desired result. And she does, plus a few more unexpected bonuses.
The first time I ask Jero how he became a healer, he answers "Meditation." I'm disappointed. You know me, I like a more dramatic story. Like the one about the farmer who found a dead baby girl on his land (most likely aborted - more about abortions later). He buried her with the required rites but then went further, acting as if she were still alive, and honoring her with every ceremony needed for a child growing up strong and healthy. The story goes that indeed the girl grows up in heaven and is in constant communication with him. When someone falls ill, she tells him what the person needs to get well. And that's how he becomes a healer. The girl is now a grown woman, beautiful and happily married - all in heaven, of course. Through her he can also speak with the dead. The people who told me about him promised to take me to him next time they go. I look forward to that.
Back to Jero Made Rata. When he comes over to treat Phil, I take another stab at it.
"What kind of meditation do you practice?" I ask.
"A mantra." he answers, "I have a meditation center and many students."
"Can you teach us? Can you give Phil and me your mantra?"
"Yes."
"Do we have to come to your meditation center?"
"No, I can give it to you now."
By the way, the above is a liberal translation of our conversation because Jero Made Rata does not speak English. Even though I can pretty well understand him (Yes, my Indonesian is picking up - Yay!), I still like to have Dayu present to translate the finer points. When I go to Jero Ardita, Suamba serves as my translator.
Jero Made Rata gives us his basic mantra, an easily-remembered 4 lines of Sanskrit that we are free to translate into English as long as we keep the feeling of the mantra in our heart. Then he has Dayu fill two glasses with water and pick 5 flowers of different colors for each of us from our garden. Taking one flower at a time, he silently blesses it with a mantra and places it inside the glass of water. The flower water looks beautiful.
"Drink." He says, "Leave a bottom of water in your glass."
As I bring the glass to my lips I'm overcome with the perfume of flowers. It is as if all the flowers in the world have gathered their essence into my glass. The taste of the water surprises me too. This is not like our regular bottled water. This is unexpectedly sweet, like drinking Maroccan rose water. When I mention my surprise, Jero smiles and says that I'm tasting the mantra.
He then instructs us to pour the last bit of water in our hands and "wash" our face with it, three times. At night we're to say the mantra three times and meditate. He does not specify how long.
Phil drinking his 5-flower water
Jero invites me to come to the Full Moon ceremony at his compound. Not knowing if it requires sitting for long periods on the floor, Phil opts out and I take Dayu with me instead. I don't like wearing sarong and kebaya, they're hot and constricting, but if I want to take photos of the ceremony I must be properly dressed to enter the temple. It turns out I didn't have to bother.
Suamba drives us out to Saka Village, about 20 minutes away and we easily find Jero's compound. Motorcycles line the entrance like dominoes waiting to get kicked over. When we enter, Jero is already in ceremony, his back turned to us. What he calls his meditation center is a small pavilion where he also does his healings. It is presently occupied by three of his students in various stages of massaging patients. The back wall of the pavilion is ludicrously stacked with cabinets, an old but working TV and two humongous speakers. The TV is on but thankfully muted. The courtyard is filled with groups of people sitting quietly on mats, benches, and old chairs. Some are smoking. Bird cages without birds hang from rafters and tree branches. A laundry rack displays drying T-shirts. Here and there a couple more motorcycles. A small boy and his grandma are watching TV on a side terrace. Chickens, dogs, and a cat roam amidst the chaos. I must be adapting to Bali because I like it.
Jero Mangku* Made Rata came to our attention when we first met our next door neighbor, Herman Suhendro, who had broken his pelvis in an accident. The accident had happened just 8 days before we met Herman but, incredibly, other than a slight limp he was walking around fine. X-rays showed he had needed surgery, but he refused. "Just give me painkillers." he said. He then called Jero Mangku Made Rata for a treatment. A 15-minute massage did the job. Two weeks after the accident Herman walked like nothing ever happened.
If I had not had a similar experience in Hawaii, albeit on a much smaller scale, I would not have believed it. Some years back I broke my "ring" toe on my left foot. It turned black and blue, almost doubled in size, and was so painful that I had a hard time standing and walking. You don't know how many nerve endings you have in your toes until you hurt them. Lito, our Filipino yard man, saw me struggle and suggested I see his father Johnny in Wahiawa who was good with broken bones. Mornings Johnny works in the pineapple fields, afternoons he sees people in his house for healings. I arrive at 4:00 PM and wait in line. Johnny apparently treats a host of other ailments as well.
When it is my turn, he has me sit in a chair in the living room while he sits on a low stool facing me. He pours some holy oil in his hands and begins massaging my toe. I nearly jump out of my skin. Son of a bitch, that freakin' HURTS!!!! I break out in a sweat and cuss and cuss. Johnny pays no attention to me, he has a firm hold on my foot and simply continues pulling and twisting the toe. I grip the chair, breathing hard, and pour out sweat. I don't know how long it takes - a couple minutes, not more than 5 - but I suddenly realize that the pain has stopped. I also realize that it actually stopped a while back but I was so busy being into the drama of being in pain that I did not notice. A strange and funny revelation. Relaxed now, I watch Johnny manipulate my toe, turning it this way and that, pulling at it hard and pushing it forward and back. Funny, no pain at all. Still swollen and black and blue, though. But Johnny can solve that too. He has Lito gather three betel leaves from the bush in his yard and heats the leaves with a few drops of holy oil on the stove. He then wraps the hot leaves around my toe and secures them with a strip of cotton tied around them. "Leave it on through the night." he says. First thing I do in the morning is take off the leaves and... behold!... a splendid toe! The only reminder left of its recent trauma is a lonely little blue spot in the corner by the nail. But that, too, will be gone within an hour.
So, yes, I believe Herman's story. I want to meet this Balinese bonesetter. Our friend Virgil Mayor Apostol is getting ready to publish his book on Rumsua Ancestral Healing (http://www.rumsua.org) and e-mails me a request for photos of a Balinese healer to include in the section of Southeast Asian healing methods. Other than sheer curiosity, I now have good reason to find this balian (Balinese traditional healer). But I learn that it's not so easy to get a hold of Jero Mangku Made Rata. He is in great demand, traveling all over Bali to where he is needed in emergency. Meanwhile, Virgil is on a deadline.
I ask Ida Bagus Suamba, our driver, if he knows any healers. Duh, that is like asking if there are any temples in Bali. Suamba takes me to the compound of Jero Mangku Ardita who works together with his wife Jero Dasaran Ni Ketut Leseg. Jero Ardita, the husband, is a slight figure of a man with a very kind face and a joyful smile. His wife, Jero Dasaran, is someone I call a "Guardian." Equally slight in stature, she's nevertheless a person to reckon with. (This may be a delusion, haha, but I kind of identify with her!) She is a holy woman in her own right, a formally acknowledged medium.who channels the messages from the gods.** (I act like I do that too, although Phil says I act like I am god.). She channels the spiritual causes for the disease and the gods' recommended corrections, like in "You did not pay attention to an ancestral spirit, so now you must give it the following offerings on such and such date." She also prepares the spiritual medicines, like holy oils. Jero Ardita then heals the patient with oil, massage and/or heat. He also consults the lontar (holy books). This is my own simplified version of how I understand these two healers work. I'm just now getting an inkling of the Balinese way of keeping the world in balance . The more I learn, the more I like it. Anyway, I go there to talk with Jero Ardita and watch him in action, so I can take pictures for Virgil.
Suamba offers himself for Jero to massage. Being massaged by a balian is very different from going to the spa for a massage. The balian looks for, and finds, the places where you hurt because that's where the imbalances are, that's where he needs to work. So no, it's not the most relaxing way to spend an afternoon. But Suamba sacrifices himself heroically so I can take my pictures.
I ask Jero Ardita about the oil he uses. I remember Johnny, the Filipino bonesetter, using coconut oil from young coconuts that is prepared only once a year in the Philippines during Easter. That is what makes the oil holy. Jero Ardita explains that he uses three different kinds of oil. There is an oil for massage, an oil for ingesting (Suamba says it's nauseating, he always comes prepared with chewing gum to get rid of the taste afterward), and an oil for squirting up the nose and into the eyes. Uh... yeah... the last one is to dispel evil spirits.
Jero Ardita uses 11 different kinds of coconuts to make oil with. Other ingredients are added to it, like rock mushroom, mistletoe, roots, seeds, etc. The materials and ingredients for the oils are collected and mixed on the dates that are propitious for it. Then another special date must be divined for the activation ceremony, during which the gods are petitioned to enter the oils. Without that last step, the oils are useless.
While Suamba is being massaged, three men walk in with a basket of offerings, a father and his two sons. The younger one surprises me with his perfect British English. He tells me he studied in London and he's here at his father's urging to learn whose reincarnation his newborn son is. Really? Now that's something totally new to me. Not the reincarnation part, but that it is a common practice to consult a balian about your baby's reincarnation. When I ask Suamba later why that's done, he says that maybe you learn about some unfinished business that your baby has come to finish. Maybe an ancestor promised to build a temple but died before accomplishing it. To have that ancestor reincarnate in the baby is a message to the family to get their act together and build that temple. I learn that one ancestor can reincarnate into more than one person and that two ancestors can reincarnate together into one person. This is fun stuff. Since then I've been asking every Balinese if he/she knows whose reincarnation they are and if it rings true for them. Some know, others say they've not been told, or their parents never bothered consulting a balian. I wonder which crazy ancestor(s) reincarnated in me and what unfinished business I still have to finish for them. You think I should find out?
A woman shows up with the remnants of a skin disease on her arms . She tells me that she came for treatment a week ago, suffering terribly from painfully itching and oozing wounds on both arms. Jero Ardita healed her in a few sessions. I'm soon to witness how. While he is spreading oil over her arms, his wife heats up a metal rod. Earlier I had noticed a large stone on the ground and wondered what it was for. But now I'm busy taking photos of the woman's arms being oiled and am not paying attention to the stone. I'm standing right next to it. Suddenly I hear the scream of metal against stone and feel the burn of hot sparks on my left leg. I jump. The sparks came from Jero Dasanan hitting the white hot metal rod against the stone. She now hands the rod to her husband. He prays over it and applies it to the skin of the woman's arms in long up and down strokes, inside her arms, outside... over every inch of her arms. The oil sizzles off her skin. I see it. I hear it. Her skin is smoking but does not burn. I hope the smoke will show up on my photos. It does not. Too bad. But I saw it.
Jero Dasaran goes into her medicine temple. She prays and prepares an oil for the woman to take home and apply on her arms. The oil is poured in a small plastic bag, the top of which is tied into a knot. The woman is admonished to perform cleansing ceremonies. She is happy. She shows me the oil and tells me again how bad her arms were before Jero healed her. And look at how her skin is now! She wants me to touch her skin but I'm finicky. I just smile and say, "Bagus. Bagus sekali." (Beautiful. Very beautiful.).
I ask Jero Ardita how he became a healer. Did he train with his father who was a famous healer? A portrait of the old man hangs on the wall. Jero answers that he never got trained. He never even knew he would be a healer. It just happened one day after his father died. It happened like an instant download. He took up where his father left off. I nod my head. Instant reincarnation. Why not?
One more story about Jero Ardita. One of our guests is Slava, a scientist from Moscow. He and his wife Ira are hereon vacation, celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary. Their daughter Marina paid for their trip and wanted their stay in Ubud to be a healing experience. Little did she know what kind of healing experience was in store for Slava. He was suffering from a painful condition of his right foot which made it hard for him to walk, much to Ira's chagrin, who of course wanted his company on her walks. Slava somehow agrees to see Jero Ardita, even though he thinks "healers don't heal, they just play tricks with your mind." I come along to take more pictures. When Jero Ardita starts working on Slava's foot, poor Slava can hardly stand the pain. I tell him it won't last. The pain will soon go away and his foot will be fine. Sure enough. A few minutes later Slava is astonished that he feels no more pain. "I'm a scientist," he says, "I don't feel any more pain, but I don't believe it." When we get home, he and Ira go for a walk and I don't see them for a long time.
I send the photos off to Virgil and then I hear from Jero Mangku Made Rata, the bonesetter.
To be continued...
Jero Ardita applying a white hot metal rod to the arms of a patient.
* "Jero Mangku" is the general term for a healer. It's often shortened to "Jero," followed by their name: Jero Ardita, Jero Made Rata, Jero Ni Ketut... In addressing them it's enough to call them simply "Jero."
** In the late 1980's the Indonesian government funded a study of Balinese healers, testing them and verifying claims of healing. Jero Dasaran was one of ten Bali healers certified to be a true healer. The findings were published in the book, "Usada Bali" by Dr. Ngurah Nala, MPH. (PT Upada Sastra), 1990.
This question assumes I don’t have it yet, but I do.I already have everything I could possibly want and more:
-68 years of being alive, 30 of them with the one I love.
-All basic needs met in abundance
-Love in over-abundance: Outrageous-mad-sweet-crazy-hilarious love, against-all-odds love, scandalous love, delicious titillating forbidden love, fake-it-till-you-make-it love, macho love, mother love, puppy love, horny love, dangerous love, unrequited love, up & down/off & on tumultuous fighting love, swoony kind love, neurotic love, old coot love, love-to-smell-new-baby’s-breath love, forgotten love... the list goes on
-Health & sickness
-Friends & enemies
-Success & failure
-Obsessions
-And plenty of magic along the way…
So what else is there to want?Okay, I can work more on Equanimity and Living in the Present, but that’s pretty much an ongoing thing, not an end product.
2)WHAT CAN YOU OFFER THE WORLD THAT NO ONE ELSE CAN?
Assuming that everything I do affects the world somehow, the best thing then would be for me to unconditionally be happy and grateful.I take that to be my full-time job.
How to be unconditionally happy and grateful?
"What would you do if you knew that every good thing in your life depended on your getting enough rest? Because it does."
Top: Dr. Carol Shaffer, Charlie & Wayan (our carpenter) Middle: Charlie playing accident victim with Wayan giving First Aid Bottom: Heimlich Maneuver crack up - Wayan, Suamba (our driver) and Ketut
From the beginning we felt that our staff should be trained in First Aid, but the price of the training gave us pause. Dr. Carol Schaffer to the rescue! She works as a hospitalist in the Bay Area and came to us via www.couchsurfing.com. On her profile she writes that she likes to share her medical skills. Perfect! Phil and I ask if she would like to do just that by teaching our staff First Aid. Carol graciously agreed and yesterday taught our staff and various other friends what to do about cuts, burns, falls, choking, drowning, nosebleeds, insect bites, snake bites, and most importantly... hygiene - not so easy a thing to practice in a Third World country.
In return, Carol, Phil and I learned about some questionable Balinese folk remedies: chew a pah iduh leaf (grows in rice fields) into a paste and place it on an open wound to stop the bleeding, add some water to pamor (some kind of chalk) to soften it and place it on the insect bite, use honey on a bee sting and dry coffee on a burn... oh yeah!
Earlier Dayu had already educated me about her family's beliefs and customs about pregnancy:
A pregnant woman should not eat meat from kerbau (water buffalo) because it would prolong her labor.
She should clean everything and keep it clean so that her baby will be beautiful.
The expecting couple should not cut their hair until after the baby is born. Ketut, Dayu's husband, now sports a full beard and moustache. It makes him look like a monkey, he jokes.
Now that our staff has learned the rudimentaries of First Aid, they have more tools and more choice in case of an emergency. It will hopefully help them stay calm so that they can make better decisions.
When the fire broke out in 1993, Grand Bali Beach Hotel was already close to 30 years old. Therefore, stepping into Room 327 was not like going back only a couple of decades, but getting catapulted back all the way to the 60's. In spite of the festive altar with its fresh flowers and food offerings, the smoke damage has given the room an overall sepia tint which makes it feel even older and chicken-skin eerie. Everything in the room is left the way it was from the start. Original carpet, brownish, worn thin. Original cream-colored moire drapes and sheer curtains. Two twin beds with upholstered headboards, separated by a nightstand with a built-in radio. Remember those radios with their beige woven cloth fronts and gold-rimmed knobs? Our guide Indra lifts up a corner of one of the bed covers to let us feel the original bedsheets underneath as if touching them will prove their authenticity. I need no persuading, though. The seared mirror by the door, the twin decorative plastic panels over the beds, old-fashioned table lamps, rattan seating in the corner, 4-drawer cabinets, dressing table, wayang kulit puppet in a frame, the telephone and small clunky TV have taken their hold on me. In the bathroom, the toilet is a high, slender throne with a telephone on the wall which must have seemed a luxury at the time. The tub holds fresh water and flowers. On the tub's ledge sits a black wooden bowl in the form of a duck filled with the original hotel amenities: bar of soap, small bottle of shampoo, bubble bath, a man's razor... all of it pretty grungy with age. I take it all in and wonder if the last guests that used this bathroom and slept in those beds had felt anything at all, if they had any strange sensations - a mysterious breeze maybe, a vivid dream - that foretold Kanjeng Ratu Kidul's intentions. I wonder if anyone ever thought to contact them. Unless, of course, the records of the guests were destroyed in the fire.
Much to my chagrin we were not allowed to take photographs, so I was delighted to find some pictures on the internet, taken by Roy James in 1994. http://www.jawakidul.nl/mystiek.htm Scroll all the way down. It shows the room before it was made into a shrine. The room is now dominated by an altar for, and paintings of, Kanjeng Ratu Kidul and by tributes to Soekarno in the form of large framed photographs and the Indonesian flag. In addition to the fresh flower and food offerings on the altar, you'll find a full breakfast tray on the coffee table, served fresh every morning. Visitors have also left gifts that are displayed incongruently on the beds: a silk purse, beaded necklace, wooden shoes souvenir... Maybe I should bring a lei of koa beads next time I come. Yes, there will be a next time. I promised Paul I would contact Ibu Agung Okawati, Room 327's caretaker/priestess, after the holy day of Galungan for another visit. She was working as head waitress at the time of the fire and is the one to go to for first-hand knowledge. In addition I will help Paul set up a writing workshop next year on Magic & Healing in Bali. It would include a visit to Room 327 and visits with some Balinese traditional healers. Balinese traditional healing is a huge topic that I'm planning for a future post. Stay tuned.
PS. I haven't figured out how to add a slide show to my blog or how to solve the problem with adding comments. Hopefully that will come soon. Meanwhile, please feel free to become a "Follower" of this blog so you'll get notified automatically when I publish a new post. If you're on Facebook, you can click on my posts there. Om santi santi santi om!
Paul Spencer Sochaczewski came over for breakfast yesterday (Balinese pancakes, mango, papaya, eggs, applejuice, peach tea - Thank you, Dayu!) and mentioned that on the way to the airport he wanted to stop by the Inna Grand Bali Beach Hotel in Sanur to visit Room 327. My ears instantly perked up. I had first read about the room in a book recounting Bali's tales of magic. The story involved Indonesia's first president, the charismatic and revered Bapak Soekarno; a mermaid goddess, Kanjeng Ratu Kidul (Goddess of the Southern Ocean); and a devastating fire. Here's what happened.
The Inna Grand Bali Beach Hotel was built at the inspiration of Indonesia's then president, Soekarno, a firm believer of spirituality and the supernatural. At the start of the construction, Soekarno pledged to dedicate one room in honor of the Goddess Kanjeng Ratu Kidul. However, before the completion of the hotel in 1966, Soekarna was overthrown and the pledge broken.
On Wednesday, January 20, 1993 over 400 guests and 1000 staff members, as well as, the rest of Bali were shocked when a fire, which started on the ground floor, raced upwards through the hotel's 10 floors. At one point huge tongues of flame leapt from every window in the hotel, black smoke poured from the building and darkened the sky over Sanur. Firefighters were able to see that all the guests and staff in the hotel were led to safety and to limit the blaze to the main tower. It was two days before the building had cooled and the smoke had cleared sufficiently for officials to enter the building and assess the damage. The tower was ravaged and there seemed to be no corner left untouched by the flames. Already observers felt that Bali's magic had seen to it that there had been no serious injuries in what was undoubtedly Bali's biggest fire. But there was more to come.
When workers opened the scorched door of Room 327, they were stunned to find that the room was virtually untouched by flames. While the heat in adjacent rooms had been so intense as to melt the steel railings on the balconies, Room 327 still had linen on the bed and curtains on the windows! There were glasses and bottles of Aqua on the table as if ready for the next guests, bathrobes hung in the closet, and there were pictures on the wall. Even though every telephone in the hotel had melted in the blaze, Room 327's phone seemed ready for its next call. It was as if the goddess Kanjeng Ratu Kidul rose from the churning waters and said, "Okay, people. Listen up. See that room there? Number 327. That's mine."
The hotel was rebuilt, but Room 327 was left the way it was found and has become a shrine in homage to Kanjeng Ratu Kidul and, strangely enough, to Bapak Soekarno, as well.
Since Paul had written a chapter on Kanjeng Ratu Kidul in his book, "The Sultan and the Mermaid Queen," he had made arrangements with the hotel management to see the room for himself. No way I was going to pass up this chance, so I said, "I'm going with you." And Phil said, "Me too." And off we went in search of magic.
Soekarno may have been divinely guided in building the hotel (it heralded Bali's future as a tourist destination), but damn, it's an ugly thing. Never mind, we're here for the room. Our guide is Indra, a friendly woman who is in charge of visitors. She apologizes for her limited knowledge of the room. She is standing in for Ibu Agung Okawati, the priestess who is in charge of the shrine but who is off preparing for Galungan, one of Bali's most significant of holy days.
We take the elevator up to the third floor, step out, turn the corner and almost immediately stand in front of the double door leading to Room 327. We take off our sandals and step into a time warp.
It's not every day that you can watch a royal wedding. A month ago the king, Cokorde Oka, picked his bride up in Karengasem to bring her to his home in Lodtunduh with all the ceremony and processions it entails. A month of preparations and finally the wedding yesterday. Running up to the day of the wedding the rain had been pouring down endlessly, flooding yards and roadways. I asked Dayu what would happen to the wedding processions if the rain continues on the day of the wedding. "No problem," she answered, "The priest will stop the rain." And that's exactly what happened.
Since I was down with a bad cold, I told Dayu to go and gave her my camera. Dayu's family is of the Brahmana caste from Lodtunduh and her uncle Agung, our back-up driver, is somehow connected to the royal family. His daughter, Agung Attik, and his son, Cok De, were to take part in the important tooth filing ceremony that preceded the royal wedding. When Dayu brought the camera back this morning she told me that she had given it to her uncle instead because he could be in closer proximity to the activities.
The tooth filing started at 6:00 AM and lasted till noon. At 3:00 PM the wedding ceremony began, ending at 8:30 PM. Then it was party time. Dayu left at 10:30 PM and the festivities were still going strong.
There were three dance performances going on simultaneously in three parts of the "palace." Imagine the holy-moly ruckus of three gamelan orchestras playing at the same time. After the formal wedding ceremony the king and queen were carried, seated on their thrones, to the market around the corner where they distributed rice and other food presents to the people. Because the wedding ceremony is a serious affair, you will not see the king smile throughout. If my wedding required that much ceremony and, let's not forget, money!, I don't think I would be smiling either. The Balinese have infinite patience indeed.
LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM at Windward Community College in Kaneohe, Hawaii has the distinction of being my first writing teacher. The very first Writing Retreat I attended (http://windward.hawaii.edu/Writing_Retreat) I came up with a simple poem. Lillian encouraged me to enter it in Rain Bird, WCC's literary journal. Much to my surprise that poem, and others as well, were accepted. I was off and running. Needless to say, I became a Writing Retreat junkie. I also thought I was really hot stuff, the latest e. e. cummings. At least.
While still harboring the delusion of being hot I met PAUL SPENCER SOCHACZEWSKI , author of the books Soul of the Tiger, Redheads, and his latest, The Sultan and the Mermaid Queen. http://www.sochaczewski.com It was a time when I was writing obsessively about a certain female body part down there. (Will I get reported for using the V word?) One of my fellow students (a guy) became exasperated with me. "V.. V... V... Is that all you can talk about?"
Paul not only took it all in stride, he was very encouraging. He called my work "red-blooded," something like that. Or maybe I made that up because I wanted him to say that.
Last month after reading my blog Paul wrote:
Thanks for this.Sounds like you’re on a terrific journey.
Re earthquakes. There’s a chapter in my book Soul of the Tiger on volcanoes, cycles of life, Shiva and rebirth, regeneration, pissing off the gods, etc.
And marrying below your caste.I recall a royal wedding in Bali many years ago in which the boy, the prince, was Syatria and his bride was Brahmin, which obviously is higher.So before the wedding she had to undergo a ceremonial death and then be re-born as Syatria. She was still ravishingly beautiful, so obviously the warrior/royal caste worked for her.
Phil and I signed up for Paul's all-day workshop on "Exploring Your Personal Odyssey" at the upcoming Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (www.ubudwritersfestival.com). In case you didn't know, Phil actually has a real book to his credit, The Paranoid, a psychiatry textbook, now out of print. Phil is way more of a writer than I am; he journals extensively every day. But I am a BETTER writer (Ha ha! she gloats) because Phil writes like an academician, in bullet form, which is good for writing analyses, synopses and scientific articles for conveying information. I, on the other hand, am a POET. And that says it all. This should not be cause for marital tension as long as he can't see me looking down my nose. Where did I read that making yourself out to be "better than" is a serious symptom of self-hatred?
Oh, I forgot, Phil can write really, really corny love poems. I adore them.
During my last four years in Hawaii I was fortunate to attend the annual Solo Workshops with acclaimed film director MARK TRAVIS (http://www.markwtravis.com/solo_workshop.html). The Solo Workshops are autobiographical writing and storytelling workshops that always got to me at a deep cathartic level. I used to joke that I came to them to cry.
The three questions I learned from Mark are:
What is the story about? (What's really behind the events of my story?)
Where am I in the story? (Reciting a list of events is boring. What is my take on the events?)
And the hardest of all questions: What would I write about if I had no fear? (By extension: How will I live if I had no fear?)
The Solo Workshop is designed for writing autobiographical stories for performance, but if you're not interested in performing, it still is a glorious way to write. The contact person in Hawaii is Alice Anne Parker: AAParkerHH@aol.com
I've had many wonderful writing teachers. Did I tell you that I'm a writing workshop junkie? I'm grateful to all. Here are two that specialize in the spoken word:
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