In mid-November Green School had a four day weekend, so with a rotating mix of four other Green School families we booked up most of a small boutique hotel along the beach in east Bali for a long weekend getaway.
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| We stopped at a roadside restaurant that caters to locals for a lunch of ikan lilit (fish satay) and fish soup. We asked for a menu but they didn't have one - this was the only dish they served. It was spicy and delicious. I fully expected us to get sick from this meal as the food was not prepared with the purified water used at tourist restaurants, and was happily surprised when none of us did. |
After lunch, we took a detour to visit the village of Tenganan, the only place in Bali that makes the exceedingly difficult and time consuming double ikat weavings called geringsing. According to our guide, and as described in Wikipedia, "in geringsing, both the cotton warp and weft threads are carefully dyed and cross-dyed before weaving; the finished pattern only emerges as the cloth is woven."
Tenganan is one of only a couple of villages in Bali that retain the ancient customs of the Balinese that date to before Bali came under the sway of the Majapahit kingdom in the 1300s. The Majapahits brought with them the Hindu-Javanese culture now practiced throughout Bali. The village used to be very isolated but now welcomes tourists.
No outsiders can live in Tenganan. Villagers must marry within the village. If a villager marries an outsider they must leave. With only around 300 villagers that is a challenging requirement.
The dead of Tenganan are buried, not cremated. Tenganan is also known for ceremonial fights using the spiky leaves of the pandanus plant as the weapon. While the battles aren't that dangerous they are bloody.
We and our friends, another Green School family that we were traveling with, were met in the parking lot by Nyoman, our guide from the village. He took us to his family compound where he showed us the single ikat and double ikat, geringsing, weavings made by his family. Weaving a geringsing is painstaking and is done on a very simple handloom.
A new geringsing weaving can only be started during a new moon or during Kajung Kliwan, when the moon is halfway between full and new. The geringsing are worn in all the major life ceremonies. Nyoman explained that the geringsing has magical powers. Doctors told him that his wife would have a difficult child birth and would need a Caesarean operation, which he could not afford. Instead he gave his wife a special herbal drink and covered her each night with a geringsing cloth, and she had a normal delivery without problems. We bought a geringsing that we liked very much, but only after Nyoman asked his mother, the weaver, for permission.
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| Nyoman demonstrating the weaving technique |
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| Our friend Michael draped in a geringsing |
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| the main ceremonial and gathering area |
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| view along one of the village streets |
Then it was on to Seraya Shores, the small hotel that came highly recommended by our friends for whom it is a favorite spot in Bali. We now understand their attraction to it, as you can see from the photos.
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| Our room was on the second floor overlooking the pool |
The kids ran in packs, and even turned our bathroom into a water theme park.
The adults managed little bits of relaxation and even some grown-up conversation at the delicious, healthy dinners which were served family style.
Most of our days were spent at nearby White Sand Beach, one of our favorite spots in Bali. It's where we went with Gran and Papa Joe back in February. Charlotte spent hours on a boogie board waiting for the incoming surf to give her a short lift. We returned to Cakra's warung and had freshly caught grilled fish for lunch.
On our last day there we were surprised to find a group of road bikers trying to navigate their way down the heavily rutted and pitted road to the beach. A sign on the beach shed some light on the mystery as they were taking part in a 100 km "Psyclo" ride around Bali and were wrapping up the ride with a party on White Sand Beach. We took up a spot at the far end of the beach away from the party and had another fun day jumping waves, playing in the sand and relaxing on the beach.
photos by Lynn and Nat
Tenganan's marriage rules don't bode well for its continued longevity. If they export marriageable residents but import none, they are sure to shrink, unless they produce very large families. But even then, such close intermarrying can't be ideal if the villagers carry any unpleasant recessive conditions in their gene pools. But the weaving is beautiful!
ReplyDeleteNyoman said the village's population is growing although slowly. I read in a guide book that the villagers keep careful track of various kin groups to make sure that marriages occur outside of the same kin group.
DeleteThough when we stopped during our tour to watch weavers at one of the shops, and we asked Nyoman whether the weavers belonged to his family, he laughed and said that here in Tenganan everyone is part of the same family.
Aaah ... how well I remember our day at that glorious white sand beach!! ... One of life's special experiences.
ReplyDeleteFunny you mention the meal you had en route there. I was just wondering this morning whether, having been in Bali about a year, you'd acclimated well enough to eat at local warungs without consequences. Maybe this was just a lucky meal? ... it looks good!
This was our first time eating at a roadside restaurant, and we only did so because our friends we were traveling with wanted to give it a try. Aside from my first bad experience at a beach warung we have eaten safely several times at beach warungs - usually grilled fish and rice, but also french fries.
DeleteI don't know to what extent the risk of eating at local warungs is due to our stomachs not being acclimated to the food, and to what extent it is the risk that the food is simply not safe or healthy.
This morning, Ibu Made, the woman who helps around our house, said that she had been up all night throwing up and going to the bathroom after eating some pork satay. So being Balinese is by itself not enough protection when the food is bad.
We heard a horrible story from a Green School family who had lived for several years in Jakarta. The granddaughter of their driver suffered kidney failure after eating a colored ice pop. The vendor had used industrial dyes to make the colored ice rather than more expensive food coloring. We don't know whether it was due to callousness or ignorance but the result is the same.
Since the water isn't safe and the food handling practices of the local warungs are suspect, even though most of the food is probably delicious and safe to eat, we haven't wanted to take the risk.