Indonesia Bali and Lombok
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		Our first non-western experience was in Indonesia.  We visited the island of Bali with a short trip to Lombok over the course of two weeks.  The trip basically consisted of three distinct experiences including boats and beaches, volcanoes and temples, crafts and rice paddies.
		We took a tour bus to a small fishing village on the east coast of Bali, called PadangBai.  Not yet a major tourist center, PadangBai had an authentic village feel to it with small family-run store fronts, unpolished trails to the beach, and locals at work. There were quite a few street vendors selling sarongs and handicrafts and every other person that we walked by would shout, "transport?" (which became a running joke) in the hopes of overcharging us for a ride somewhere.  We stayed at a sweet guest house, called Kembar Inn, which had an open-air patio overlooking rooftop temples where we had breakfast each morning.  We met a fun bunch of travelers, sampled the fresh fish at a number of restaurants, and saw some live blues music at a local bar.  Bill even had the opportunity to sit in on the djembe (two nights!).  We did some snorkeling and diving in the Lombok Straits at Blue Lagoon and Nusa Penida, a nearby island, absolutely gorgeous coral and heaps of fish.
		In PadangBai we were introduced to one of the practices of Hinduism which involves making offerings to their God.  Offerings might consist of small bits of rice, incense, flowers, or fruit artfully placed in a tray made from folded banana leaf, for example.  Offerings seem to be made at any time of day and anywhere.  There were small temples outside every room or bungalow we stayed in; they are visible in storefronts, on the street, in the rice paddies, and our hiking guide even left offerings on the volcano.  The offerings often end up being discarded or eaten by random animals such as goats (see photos).  One morning we got up early to witness a particular festival called Kuningan during which people dress up and congregate at the temples to make offerings.
		The other thing that becomes readily apparent is that everyone has the same name, or at least the same four names.  It turns out that people are named by their birth order:  Wayan, first born; Made', second born; Nyoman, third born; and Ketut, fourth born.  Then the sequence repeats. There are some variations on this and some gender exceptions, but pretty much everyone we met was named Wayan from taxi driver to hotel manager to hiking guide.
		PadangBai is also the launching port for the ferry to Lombok, the neighboring island which is largely Muslim in contrast to Bali which is largely Hindu.  We took a busride on Lombok north to meet the boat to Gili Trewangan, a small island with an MTV party reputation.  From the bus we saw several mosques, busy small villages crawling with motorbikes, and a rainforest with roadside monkeys.  After being bombarded by street vendors we were piled onto a fairly primitive, painted wooden boat with wooden outriggers and motored over to the island.  Gili Trewangan was an interesting mix of old and new; the main drag on the beach is dirt and mini horse-n-buggies travel up and down, but the strip is also lined with dive shops that have swimming pools, fancy lighting, and poolside pubs or outdoor theaters.  Our bungalow, Rhuma Kita, was quaint and off the main drag in the back corner of town, with a lush Balinese-style garden, giving us contact with local villagers.  With tourism slow in Indonesia, there were very few people on Gili Trewangan and there was luckily little or no MTV atmosphere to speak of and it made for a nice couple of lazy days on the beach watching sunsets and outdoor movies.
		On the return ferry looking back at Bali, we could see Mount Agung  a 3,142 meter volcano visible above the clouds.  From PadangBai we hopped into a public bemo (small color-coded mini-van bus system that the locals use) negotiated what was surely a gringo price, passed through a town called Klungkung, and landed at the Lembah Arca hotel (apparently also a part-time brothel, little did we know) at the base of Mount Agung.  We hired a guide, Wayan, a 52 year-old man who had climbed every mountain on Bali and climbed Mount Agung an average of five times a week!  He and a driver picked us up at 1:30 am(!), drove us up to Pasar Agung (one of the temples at its base) in the dark where we started our 7-hour hike.  After two hours of hiking straight up over fairly rocky terrain, 2 women scampered by in flip-flops carrying trays of offerings on their heads.  Bill had on his headlamp and we both wore our hiking boots and camelbacks.  By 6:30 we were above the clouds watching the sunrise and could see the Besakih temple below.  Bill and Wayan proceeded to the crater's edge while I took in the serenity. After our descent (straight down, sore quads!) we visited the Besakih temple wearing sarongs over our hiking gear, cute.
		A long night's rest later we made our way to Ubud.  Negotiating our illegal ride was a trick because of a bungled cash situation and no cash machine or money-changer in the tiny sweltering villages at the base of a volcano on the middle of an island in Southeast Asia, duh. Ubud is the arts center of Bali; there are all sorts of classes offered so we signed up to do a cooking class (Bill) and batik class (me) and both were great. We also took the lonely-planet-suggested "scenic walk through the rice paddies," which put us back about 10,000rp (a buck-fifty) when we were 1) offered a fresh coconut from a one-eyed farmer who had climbed a tree and hacked open a coconut on our behalf and 2) "guided the shorter way" by another wily field worker along the route.
		Two weeks proved to be too short for a visit to Bali, let alone Indonesia.  There are more shorelines, temples, and villages to explore. We were just getting a handle on the food, Bill was starting to build quite a vocabulary in Indonesian (bagus, hati hati, sin can can), and there were tons of antiques to peruse.  But, we decided to move on to Singapore.  We found out that our volunteer opportunity in SW China will indeed be happening in August/September now that SARS has cooled down. So, after a few days respite in Singapore we will head to Hong Kong and make our way to Beijing to meet up with our group....more soon.