After a lazy morning enjoying the rain and reading on my patio John stopped by he said he had the day off and did I want to go and see his home and meet his family. This is something I have been pushing for a long time. We work so closely and I really didn’t know much about his personal life. First we went to a visit two of the villages doing my jewelry. I’m glad we stopped in because they misunderstood my request to add an extra loop to the end of each bracelet. We caught it in time so all is well I was pleasantly surprised as how well they followed my drawings/designs on my pendants. At the second village he was very understanding when I asked him to redo three of the pendants where he did not follow my designs. In all cases they ask John why I can’t bring them business throughout the year… this is good as it lets me know that they are happy with the pay and want more business.
Finally I got to see John’s house I visited for about three hours just watching local life in a Bali village compound. John is doing major construction so I watched the workers lay cement and work on building his new kitchen. John's new kitchen is first class for traditional Bali style. It is interesting how everything is a separate building, the kitchen, the computer room, the sleeping quarters for each family member. His m0other sleeps in an open air building in the center. The father in his own room sharing a building with John’s sister, and John and his immediate family in another. John as the youngest of nine siblings is responsible for taking care of the parents and his sister who is unmarried because she was burned as a teenager. He is responsible for the well being of eight people. His father has diabetes and is very ill has to be carried everywhere. After seeing what he is responsible for I fell the need to pay him more. His sister was very hospitable bringing me tea and Bali cakes. His son was very shy and his wife (also named Ketut… same as John’s real name) and two daughters Putu and Kadek, are very Chanté (beautiful). John was having his new computer and internet installed so I just watched as they all worked. It was really nice. His connection was horribly slow… I gave up on just trying to read a simple text email. When we retuned to Ubud I had him leave me off for a massage with Putu. I had a wonderful 90 minute massage. Putu has gotten lots better in the last few days as her aunt Desak, who is also my good friend of many years, has returned from her new life in Melbourne, Australia for vacation and has been teaching her some more techniques. It has been nice talking to Desak about the good and bad in her new life abroad and what she misses most from Bali and what she likes from Melbourne. We have always been able to talk about everything, even really personal things like depression and major decisions in life. I’m so happy that Desak’s visit back home overlapped with my trip to Bali.
I finished up the evening with a full moon part and buffet at Barandi it was an interesting evening as I met many new people. I wish I had taken a photo of the eclectic crowd. I talked to some Canadians who do clothing designs really cool and futuristic. They looked a little like someone out of the movie Waterworld with long Rastafarian hair and unique clothing. She loved my jewelry, I should have asked her to model some for me. She was very exotic looking. I also met a guy names Eric from New Zealand who has my zest for travel and an importing business that makes it very easy for him to stay on the road. He comes to Bali four times a year for one month and he also travels to India, England, and Africa. He was handsome and interesting to talk to. Maybe after all this hard earned degree in graphic design I’m really meant to be an importer/exporter traveling all over the globe. The band was a bizarre but nice mix called Bali Trance. A little burning man mixed in with Africa and Bali. How is that for a bizarre combination? I walked home in a light rain enjoying the added light from the full moon especially as I rounded the ever dark and sometimes scary walk past the sacred monkey forest. Of course it is a normal night walking which woulod not be complete without the usual hair raising experience complete with goosebumps when a less than friendly local street dog encourages me a swift trip through his territory. I met a vet today who has a van and travels all over the island of Bali treating dogs everyday… all day. She was feeding some of the mangy dogs some food and water when I passed by. She said it costs $50,000 US per year to run her charity operation.
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