When we got to CD we soon realised our arrival co-incided with the start of a major celebration. We learnt they always especially celebrate the October full moon but every two years the celebration is much bigger from what we could understand also commemorating an age old argument between four local villages and the subsequent reconciliation, and took place over just about the entire time we were there
There was a colourful procession along the main road, of local men in celebration outfits on the afternoon we arrived and all through our time there, there was much coming and going through the main street in trucks, bemos, kijangs and on motor bikes of brilliantly dressed families and individuals on the way to and coming home from the places of celebration.
The effects of the celebration filtered right through the whole infrastructure of CD at the Water Garden's restaurant on our first night, Julie Crampton the Director of Marketing was going around apologising to diners for the unusually slow service as they had so many staff away involved with it. In our first few days it was very hard to organise anyone to take us out snorkelling on a boat, and at the school and at the Ashram we found it impossible to make contact with anyone who could assist us in the distribution of the things we had brought over with us that we wanted to pass on in this area.
This latter problem' was solved with a visit to Shirley at Temple Café and Seaside Cottages who introduced us to Ayu at the Lenia Supermarket. Initially a misunderstanding over the age group the things we had brought were suitable for, made us believe we were heading to Amlapura, but on talking to Ayu some more, she thought it better to head for the school at Nyuhtebel (on the road up to Tenganan). Staff and pupils were very welcoming and after we handed out an initial few things individually, we were assured the staff would distribute everything to the most needy families. In floods of laughter from all the adults present, we did agree though to one of the older male staff being able to have a pair of satin boxers he had taken a special fancy to - part of a sleep suit our daughter had been given as a gift some years ago they were navy with 'Winnie the Pooh' designs all over. With little English but lots of sign language and smiles our visit was a lot of fun and I hope we were able to give a very small thing back to a few Bali people. The school was very much as I expected from previous reports poorly maintained buildings with stone floors and very few facilities but all the kids were immaculate in brown uniforms for the older ones and interestingly green and gold ones for the little ones and all seemed very happy, eager to shake our hands, pose for photos and converse as best we could. Some of the older girls were very competently running a 'canteen' with food being bought by fellow students.
We headed back to Ayu's home after this, as being from the country ourselves and kept busy with a small hobby farm at home, we were very interested to see the agricultural enterprise Ayu was busy establishing on the steep dry hill behind the town partly in an attempt to diversify after the serious downturn in tourism in the area since the bombing. Briefly this is the rearing of pigs on a small scale, crossing the traditional black Balinese pig with white western strains. The aim is to produce a line of bigger, faster growing cross bred pigs with a more even temperament and better mothering abilities than the local pig. For us it was a great privilege to inspect the pigs of various ages and water some of them and be shown the feeding routines etc. Ayu was a fascinating person to talk to with a great interest in helping those who have not fared as well as her .She has been of necessity, somewhat of a small scale entrepreneur since early childhood despite limited education opportunities and we talked for ages on all manner of subjects. Kerry has an interest in alternative health therapies and somehow he and Ayu even got onto that subject too. We left feeling like old friends and greatly indebted to Shirley for the introduction
We were able to get a boat trip out to the small islands offshore for snorkelling on our last day (100000) we went earlier than most and had a completely flat sea and as a bonus saw dolphins and many flying fish on the way out. The snorkelling was pretty good with lots of big fish but not a huge amount of good coral
After a late afternoon snorkel off the beach in front of the hotel one day, Kerry got talking to a large family group originally from CD but now living in Denpasar where dad worked as a taxi driver. They were in town for the celebrations and anxious to practice their English. They sat and chatted for ages as the kids splashed around having a ball all except one poor teenage girl who dad thought specially needed English conversation lessons and was brought in to take part in the talkfest
Next time - our trips to Padang Bai and Amed