Sunday, August 1, 2010

Bali: The Final Days

Friday, July 16, 2010:

This was our last day in the program and in the morning we were all madly rehearsing trying to remember all the parts of the pieces we were going to be performing that evening.  After lunch we all made offerings to decorate the Pondok for our performance and then took a break for the afternoon to rest up.

Making offerings
to decorate the ceiling
It was fun to hang out with everybody before the show and the show itself was fun, too!  There was actually a pretty decent turnout of an audience considering that we were all foreign visitors who had only been studying these tradition arts for three weeks, but I was touched that so many people came to hear and watch us perform.  It started raining halfway through our performance, so the audience had to crowd onto the platform with us, but hey, that's Bali, right?

After the performance we all hung out for a while before calling it a night.  What a fun time!

Saturday, July 17, 2010:

This was my last day in Bali.  The afternoon was spent as a group reflecting on our experiences in the program and we did a final prayer service to close up the institute.  It was definitely a bittersweet time for us all and I'm so glad I had the experience.  When our time together ended at 5pm, my driver came up to me and said, "So I'm driving you to the airport at 10pm tonight, right?"  I thought I wasn't leaving until tomorrow!!!  I had to run home and pack in a mad rush and then had time to briefly stop in at the karaoke bar where everyone was hanging out to say a quick goodbye and run off to the airport to begin my 30 hour trip.  It was such a bizarre feeling as I was planning on an addition 24 hours to prepare myself to leave, but maybe it was better this way.  It was much more surreal, that's for sure.


And with that my tale has come to a closing, I hope you all enjoyed the pictures and thanks so much for reading!  Hopefully I'll have an update in the next day or two with some actual knitting content.  Have a great day!

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5 comments:

  1. JaceyAugust 2, 2010 at 9:33 AM

    Whoa, I'm glad your driver came and asked you, or you might have missed your return flight!

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  2. stephenAugust 4, 2010 at 10:02 AM

    Thank you for sharing with us your experiences in Bali. It's been fascinating to read of your experiences and to see images of some of what you'd seen.

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  3. pjmmaAugust 4, 2010 at 12:53 PM

    What a fantastic experience in Bali! Realizing that you were leaving that night rather than in 24 hours must have made for wild ending :) Just another thing to help you never forget your time there!

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  4. knitwickAugust 9, 2010 at 8:52 PM

    I'm glad to hear that your final performance went well! It looks like a fantastic trip and a great experience. Hopefully you'll get to visit again.

    What's up with the airport thing, though?! You didn't know when you were leaving?

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  5. CécileAugust 18, 2010 at 2:45 PM

    Peter, I'm glad you mentioned your blog on the podcast. I'm not much of a blog reader, but I read through your Bali posts. I love to travel and read about other people's travels. What a fabulous experience that was for you. You have some fantastic photos! It's hard to believe your first trip out of the country was to Bali! half-way around the world.

    Good luck in Pittsburgh! And I hope you get to do more interesting travel in the future.

    Ceci

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