I haven’t written in a couple of weeks and now I’m on my way home after a brief stopover in Taipei.
Ubud. I’m already missing you, honey.
Ubud has got that small-town feel even though it is not that small. It’s easy to meet people because there is so much going on: Kirtan in gorgeous villas, cafes where fellow travelers and expats smile and invite you to sit and join them, weekly movie and meditation nights in various expat homes. Plus workshops for everything: jewelry-making, glass-blowing, Indonesian cooking, personal and spiritual growth groups, yoga, singing lessons…I could go on and on but I won’t.
At least a couple of times a day I would be riding my bicycle down Ubud streets and hear “Hello Kristin!” and it would be a fellow traveler, expat or local Balinese smiling at me and waving. Everyone knows everyone and if they don’t they will soon. So watch out if you go. 🙂
Last night Heiner invited a few people to his house for dinner to wish me goodbye. (So sweet.)
The conversation came to how life just flows so easily in Ubud. There really is so much ease in each day…unless there is not, which, according to the locals means you are not meant to be in Bali.
Susan posed the question to us at dinner: “Do you think Ubud is especially synchronistic and easy because people are relaxed and open here or because the Balinese people are so spiritually connected and do rituals for everything?”
Most of us at dinner agreed that it is probably a combination of both.
I had the experience more than a few times where I’d be thinking of someone and then there they would be, walking into a restaurant or riding past me on a motorbike.
This morning I woke up from what little sleep I had last night.
I packed up my backpack for the last time.
Then I was done packing.
I stared in the mirror and sighed.
I went and got a foot massage.
I came back to my bungalow and Wayan picked me up with the 3 nieces and 1 nephew. “They wanted to come say goodbye to you,” Wayan said as he hoisted my backpack into the back of his taxi.
The kids fell asleep within 10 minutes of our drive.
Wayan gave me his usual Taxi Cab Darshan and I lapped it up for the last time (for this trip, anyway).
“It doesn’t matter if you live in Australia, Japan, Canada, America,” he said, looking at me and smiling. “Love is in the heart. If you are connected in the heart then no matter where you live, you feel the love. If you not connected,” he shook his head and frowned, “You could be standing close and not feeling the love. But when you connected, the distance, it doesn’t matter. You understand?”
“Yes,” I said.
“When you get to America and you have the difficulty: the work very hard, the stress when it come, the problems, you remember what you learned in Bali, ok? What my priest taught you? The meditation. The not letting the mind be bigger than the heart. You can remember that?”
“I hope so, Wayan,” I said.
“You hope so?! You remember! You can remember. Ok?”
“Ok,” I said.
“And…,” he looked at me and smiled a wide, toothy grin. “I will miss you.”
That’s when I lost it.
I started to cry.
Sheesh. I have cried a lot on this trip. I guess I’ve needed to but my gosh. A lot of tears. Actually a lot of happy tears which is new for me. A lot of the tears came from being supported by the incredible people I met on this trip. Strangers who became friends.
“I didn’t bring any tissue,” I said as tears dripped down my nose and chin.
“You can use this,” he points to a shirt that sits between us.
“I don’t want to use your shirt,” I looked at him and smiled through my tears.
“No problem. You can use,” he said.
“It’s okay,” I said, wiping my tears with my hand. “Thanks for saying that Wayan. I realize I really needed to cry. I’ve been feeling so stuck this morning. I’m really going to miss Bali. I’m going to miss Ubud and you and all of the other people I’ve met here. This morning I’ve been feeling kind of numb, do you know what I mean? Now that I’ve cried I don’t feel so numb anymore.”
“That’s good.”
“Yes.”
We arrived at the airport and Wayan parked the taxi.
“We pray now and I bless you with the holy water?”
“Yes.”
He pulled a container of holy water out of his glove box and put flowers in the holy water and chanted a mantra.
Then he lifted a flower out of the holy water and splashed water on my head three times while he chanted.
I’ve been blessed by holy water so many times on this trip that he didn’t have to prompt me:
I lifted my palms up and placed my right hand over my left.
He splashed holy water on my hands three times.
Each time he poured it in my hands I drank it.
Then he splashed holy water in my hands once, twice, three times.
Three times I poured the holy water over my head.
Next he handed me a flower petal.
“Now we pray,” he said.
I put the flower petal between my index and middle fingers. I lifted my hands, palms together with thumbs to my forehead.
Wayan put his flower petal-filled hands to his forehead. He bowed his head and chanted in Indonesian.
I silently prayed for a safe journey and smooth transition. I thanked Bali for giving me the gift of really, truly getting to know Her. I expressed my gratitude for all the people who supported me in going on this trip: my managers who are running my company, the woman who is renting my house and who has taken such good care of it. I thought of my beautiful, big-hearted friends and family who expressed their support and loving words of encouragement before and during my journey.
I wiped another tear away. I whispered thanks for being able to go on this trip. I thought about all the people I’d met and the rich, rich experiences I had on this, my journey to my deepest Self and to other parts of the world.
We finished our prayers, put the flower petals that we’d prayed with behind our ears and said goodbye.
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