Day 227: See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Is This Evil?

One day remains of this blog guys, then I’ll be free.

We spent the majority of today on the beach, soaking up the last of the Asian sun before we left for Australia the following evening. Although on occasion I reluctantly do a lot of things Sarah suggests, more often than not I do enjoy doing them. For example, had I not gone to the beach with her today I wouldn’t have seen a man sunbathing with his pet monkeys. Yes folks you read that correctly, there was a man on the beach with not one, but two monkeys… but we’ll get to that. After the beach we returned to the hotel for a few hours, then headed back out for an evening meal. All in all it was a good end to our Asian adventure, now allow me to explain what else happened on this day.

Sarah got her wish this morning when we got up early. The cheeky so and so woke me up 15 minutes before the alarm, our bed was so big that I didn’t feel her get out, it was only when I heard the toilet flush that I awoke. We then got dressed and went for breakfast. I took advantage of the buffet for the second day running, then we returned to the room to apply sun lotion and pack a bag for the beach. When we got downstairs the security guard helped us hail a taxi again, but this time there weren’t that many on the street. There was tons of traffic but few taxis. Eventually, after blowing his whistle to halt the traffic, he helped us cross the 6 lane motorway to a cab that had pulled over for us. Rather than go back to Kuta beach, we got him to drop us at Legian. In theory they were the same beach, it was just so long that it stretched over both Kuta and Legian. We walked a few hundred yards from the entrance to get away from the sewage like smell, and paid for a couple loungers for the day. I then got to work on yesterday’s blog, and wrote an introduction to the Erratic Ramblings for anyone yet to discover it. It was shortly after I’d finished, that the man with the monkeys arrived.

As he led sunbathing on a lounger, one of them led beside him like a hairy child. I’d never seen a monkey sunbathe before, and let me tell you, it’s quite amusing. I understand the severity of the situation, it was wrong that the monkeys were with him in the first place, but it’s not something you see everyday, and the sad thing is it’s not something you can do much about anyway. I don’t quite know how long this man had owned the monkeys for but they were in no rush to get away from him. There are two sides to every story, so maybe this man hadn’t killed their mother to get the babies like most poachers do, maybe instead he had rescued them. After all they seemed to love his company and all the fruit he gave them. Perhaps they were just in it for the fruit. And unlike most poachers, he wasn’t allowing people to hold them for photographic purposes. It’s weird to think that Sarah and I are accustomed to such sights now, I’m scared to think what would actually shock me these days.

Sarah and I continued to sunbathe until we began feeling thirsty. We left our loungers, at the risk of losing them, to grab some water from a nearby shop. When we got back we were fortunate enough for them to still be available. It was then back to sunbathing. Being the gentleman that I am, I “definitely” don’t notice other women, but today was an exception. As I led soaking up the sun, a woman with very large breasts came walking by. Much like the man with the monkeys, it was hard not to notice. There’s no other point to be made here, I just felt I had to write about it. Without warning the tide came in and was as high as our loungers. Sarah had had enough of sunbathing anyway (if you can believe that) and suggested we head back to the hotel to watch a film.
“Sold to the blonde haired woman at the back!”
I thought that was a great idea and packed our bag immediately. Before we could do that, we needed to collect our laundry. We walked a long way up the beach until we found an exit. Too bad we had to go by some shops along the way, Sarah stopped in a few and ended up buying a new sarong. There was an awkward moment when I took interest in some vests, but didn’t actually have enough money to pay for it. I had to explain to the owner I couldn’t buy them, but he thought I was making an excuse and kept reducing the price. In the end we walked away and located the laundrette. As we arrived they were adding the final touches to our clothes, a lady used a fragrant spray to keep them fresh as we transported them back. With 6kg of clothing we hailed a taxi and returned to our hotel.

We stayed in our room for hours this afternoon, partly due to the fact we discovered room service brought cooked meals to us. We took some showers to get rid of the sand from the beach, then we each devoured a burger. I also had an additional plate of spaghetti bolognese because of how good it was last night. Although we came back to the room to watch a movie, we didn’t actually get round to it. After I’d finished messing about with my blog, I played my Nintendo for a bit, while Sarah plucked her legs. It was around 5:30pm before Sarah said she wanted to go to the beach for sunset. We had been in Bali for over two weeks now and hadn’t managed to see a good one in all that time. In the distance she could see the large hot ball descending, and informed me there is a classic photo people take of it setting, which she also wanted to capture. I was still playing on my Nintendo while Sarah was waiting to go, it took me 5 minutes to save what I was doing and turn it off, then we had the pleasure of catching a taxi outside.

The usual security guard had finished his shift for the day and was sat with a friend conversing. He didn’t want to help us hail one this time, so it took us twice as long to get one to stop. The fist few wouldn’t take us for anything less than 50,000 rupiah (just over £3), which was double the usual cost. Then a random driver stopped and tried charging us 100,000 rupiah, again we said no. Eventually one stopped and took us on the meter to the beach. For some reason the traffic appeared to be redirected as we grew closer, meaning we had to take a lot of side streets to get to our destination. We ended up getting stuck in traffic no more than 200m from the beach. We paid the man and decided to get out and walk the rest of the way. It was too late when we arrived, the sun had gone and Sarah was angry. An argument ensued as to why we missed it, with me getting defensive when Sarah blamed me straight away. I only had a small part in it, but I’d like to think the 10 minutes waiting for a cab, and the 15 minute car journey had something to do with it as well. We still sat on the beach and watched the sky go through the colour spectrum, before taking some pictures and moving on. Now that Sarah and I resented each other slightly, we didn’t really want to do anything. Sarah claimed it was our last night in Bali and it was ruined. I did my best to cheer her up as we walked along the beach in an attempt to find the beachwalk shopping centre. That didn’t happen, and only fuelled the fire worse when I guided us the wrong way entirely. Along the beach, a little farther away, we saw a sign which read “turtle release 4:30pm”, another thing we had missed, this also didn’t help matters. We kept walking until we eventually reached a different mall. It was filled with designer shops, all of which we couldn’t afford to shop in, so we walked straight through and asked for directions. A local man set us straight, and saw an opportunity to drive us in his taxi. We said “no thanks”, then continued to walk a new part of Bali we hadn’t seen before. Building after building, there was nothing but expensive restaurants and surf brand shops. When we got back to familiar territory we explored the markets and found the beachwalk mall. By now we were scarcely low on money, and the only way we could afford to buy branded clothing would be if we were to make a withdraw. Seeing as we didn’t have our cards on us, we left after only 5 minutes.

We then walked down Poppy Street to find somewhere to eat tea. By now Sarah had perked up a bit and we were talking to each other again. Although I wished we weren’t, every time Sarah spoke she tried encouraging me to get a massage with her. Along the road someway, we stumbled upon a cheap massage parlour, and just to shut Sarah up we went in. Now, you remember earlier when I said I reluctantly do things Sarah suggests, but actually end up enjoying them? Well this would be one of those times. We had a half hour reflexology treatment, followed by a half hour back massage. Both of which came to a total of £5 at the end, very cheap I think you’ll agree. I preferred the reflexology to the back massage as I’d never had it done before, although, having a stranger rub my feet is a punishment I wouldn’t wish upon anyone. It felt really nice and I nearly fell asleep, but there was a slight painful sensation when he squeezed the little toe of my right foot. I didn’t know what that meant, so later that evening I researched. Apparently the little toe is connected to your ears, maybe I’m going deaf. I think Sarah was really chuffed with not only the foot rub, but also with what the lady had to say. She compared her arm with Sarah’s and told her they had the same coloured skin – this was by far the best compliment anyone could give to Sarah. After the half hour was up it was time for our backs to be pampered. I didn’t enjoy it much, as the whole time it made me aware of just how much weight I’ve lost. There was no muscle anywhere for my masseur to work. As he rubbed the oil into my back I could feels his fingers playing my ribs like a skeletal xylophone. Had I gone there at the start of the trip it would’ve been another story entirely, there was plenty muscle to work with then. My treatment was concluded with an Indian head massage, I found it very difficult to answer his question while he did this because of how relaxed it made me, I was like putty in his hands. When the hour was up we paid the cost and left them with a tip, then we went to Mozzarella for tea.

This was the restaurant we’d eaten at with Sarah’s parents. The food was so good then that it brought us back for a second visit. I ordered a massive helping of pork ribs. In their menu it claimed to be one of their best dishes, and I’m not surprised, it was fantastic. Sarah had an equally as tasty dish when she ordered the mushroom and cream pasta. Surprisingly, for the size of food we ordered it took no time at all to arrive, it couldn’t have been any longer than 10 minutes maximum. As we sat opposite each other at a candle lit table we contemplated everything we’d done so far. We were really sad to think this was our last full day in Asia, the past 8 months had flown by. Neither of us were fully ready to embark on an Australia adventure next, we were still having too much fun up in the clouds, but all good things must come to an end. We couldn’t have asked for better meals than the ones we had, afterwards we settled the bill, then went outside to find a taxi.

Because it was a quiet road it didn’t take long, and the driver didn’t charge us much. We were a little farther away from our hotel now, so rather than have a meter running we agreed a price of 30,000 (£2) to get back. As we grew closer I pointed out our hotel to the driver and he dropped us at the entrance. We then climbed in the elevator to the second floor and retired to our room. I used my phone to Skype my mum again, as it rang I looked in the mirror and saw the full extent of my sunburn from earlier that day. My lower back and upper legs were scarlet. My bum now looked whiter than ever. It was only a short call lasting around half an hour, but in that time my mum mocked my tan lines. After that I had a quick shower, then we attempted to watch a movie in bed. This didn’t work for one reason, when watching a movie with Sarah, she tends to like having all the lights off. This in turn made us tired, so much so that for the second night running we had to pause the movie. I then struggled to stay awake as I wrote this post before going to bed.