The simple word “Bali” usually conjures to the mind a plethora of exotic scenes: oneiric beaches, swaying coconut trees, tropical paradise where smiling locals massage our limbs aching from the hard work sitting at the office. However, while they certainly are well-founded, we know we will keep in memory another image of the iconic island: one of the Balinese culture, rich with music and dances, architecture and religion, paintings and sculptures.
‘Sometimes I think a man could wander across the disc[world] all his life and not see everything there is to see,’ said Twoflower. ‘And now it seems there are lots of other worlds as well. When I think I might die without seeing a hundredth of all there is to see it makes me feel,’ he paused, then added, ‘well, humble, I suppose. And very angry, of course.’
Terry Pratchett, Close to the Edge
2.30 am. The alarm clock harshly rings us back from a short but deep sleep. More mechanically acting than fully realising what we are doing, we put on our warmest clothes — four layers should be enough — and help ourselves to a few sips of warm ginger tea from our thermos flask. Over a handful of biscuits, the excitement of what lies ahead comes to our dull senses. We tie up our hiking shoes, switch on the headlamps and, now fully geared, silently leave our homestay.
After staying in dirty, noisy and overcrowded cities for more than two weeks, sweating unceasingly and depressing between grey, lifeless concrete buildings, we definitely needed a change. A decision was quickly made: we would go east, to where a handful of volcanos dominate the relief of Java. Positively excited — for as most of you might know, I adore those peculiar mountains — we left Yogyakarta by night bus and found ourselves in a completely different surrounding by the next morning. The volcano itself was only one of the positive surprises which made the destination more than worthwhile.
The rising sun was painting the sky in hues seldom heard of: shy purple, hesitating blue, grays melting into whites as the stream of dreamy clouds passed by. I closed my eyes, at peace.
I opened them again what seemed but an instant later. New colors had appeared behind the windscreen: different tints of orange were struggling to see which one would become yellow first. The time read 6.14. The lady had said we would arrive at 6, but then, we had left an hour and a half late, so…
The bus stopped, once more. I lazily let my eyes wander to the side to watch the passengers recover their luggage from the hold. There was actually only one passenger. It was hard to focus, but I did nonetheless.
It was Aldi.
And he was frantically making me sign to get off the bus.
Almost as quickly as we went through it. Following our beautiful, inspiring journey through Myanmar, we only spent a grand total of ten days in Malaysia — where to head to, given so little time? After Kuala Lumpur, the thriving megalopolis which was no more than an arrival point for us, we quickly made our way to Pulau Perenthian Kecil (small Perenthian island) before exploring Penang and its bright, exploding mishmash of cultural heritages.
You might have been wondering how the daily life of a traveller looks like? Though we would love it to be so, it is not all about admiring amazing landscapes, eating delicious food, lying on the beach and gaping before ancient monuments — it also involves sleeping in creepy places, sweating in the heat of the merciless sun and being shaken for hours on bumpy bus rides. About the last, I want to tell you a bit more, for we often spend fairly long hours in those buses. After all, they are the cheapest and most common option to get from one place to another. I do not know how many times we already made our way to the bus station, had to ask at least five locals which one was our vehicle and if it really went where we wanted to go, then waited for the bus to come, holding our backpacks before storing them in the luggage rack — only keeping our valuables, the guitar and a pullover (for the air-con) with us — and, finally, got into the bus. During those journeys, I always learn a lot about the country, how its system works (or does not work) and how its people behave. Let me take you on rides through different nations we have visited!
The openness and friendliness of the Burmese people allowed me to practice something I usually seldom do: portraits. So during our three-day trek from Kalaw to Inle Lake, going up and down hills, between rice terraces and vegetable fields, passing through remote villages and sleeping in a monastery, I tried to capture the diversity of the people we met on the way.
