Peace and serenity in Sidemen

June 23, 2013

Here I am, sitting on the balcony of our $60 a night villa in a peaceful place called Sidemen in the country, far from the bustle and noise of city life, looking out over a lusciously green valley of terraced fields of rice almost ready to harvest, with low lying mountains on each side of the gentle valley, and majestic volcano Agung presiding in the background. At the bottom of the valley is a river we hope to swim in tomorrow. On the mountain ridge top is a temple with hundreds of steps leading up to it. It calls to me to climb up there for a visit.

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Our tropical little villa, built by a Canadian who lives here two months out of the year, is surrounded by flowering trees of jasmine, bougainvillea, frangipani, and trees with exotic orchids attached symbiotically to their bark, blooming in their full glory, unfettered by pots on someone’s coffee table. 

In the garden around our villa are a profusion of edible plants, including rows of peanuts, papaya, coconut, banana and lime trees, mounds of lemongrass, ginger, basil, rosemary, and turmeric and other culinary herbs and spices I’ve never heard of with strange sounding names, all looking happy with their lives free of stress, unlike the plants in my backyard in New Mexico whose lives are about struggle for survival. Our housekeeper harvested some fresh lemon grass , and dug up some ginger and turmeric roots just now for us to put into our meals.

Throughout the house frangipani and other colorful flowers have been placed everywhere to welcome us, including on the pillows of our beds, on the toilet paper holder, and other whimsical places.

I hear the gecko with its demanding call, as though it’s trying to tell me something. And there’s the loud croaking of the frogs. They are abundant and healthy around here. Both creatures, geckos and frogs, can be found attached to people’s walls on the inside of the homes as though they were trying to reclaim their territory. Some of us had geckos on our bungalow walls at Arjana II where we stayed in Ubud as well.

Deborah, a retired social worker and one of the OGs I feel most comfortable with, shares the villa with me. It is a welcome relief to be in silence with each other after many days of continuous social interactions on the trip with many different personality types, some quite a bit more challenging than others. I’ll leave it at that and let you use your imagination.

Our handsome tropical house has two rooms, a spacious downstairs with combined kitchen and sitting area and large balcony that serves as the dining area. The spiral staircase leads to the bedroom with a large adjacent balcony, open aired with an overhanging roof. Deborah will be sleeping out here en plein air. I’ll be in the bedroom which is almost like sleeping on a porch with its unobstructed views and a gentle breeze.

The house is built with old teak wood resistant to termites. It’s a simple, handsome structure with special touches, like hand carved armoire in the bedroom and hand carved mirror frames, a deep and luxurious marble bathtub, and a pale stone and deep green tile shower area that is partly outdoors and looks like an alter to Mother Nature with tropical plants growing out of the walls of the showering area.

The house is airy and feels like we are living out of doors. The large windows are without screens or glass, with wooden shutters that can be closed at night. The glass doors that partition the house from the balcony can be folded all the way to the edge on each side, co-mingling the inside with the outside. The walls are made of woven mats. The floor downstairs is of marble tiles, the upstairs is of teak wood.

On our afternoon walk to reconnoiter our surroundings, we run into a Canadian woman who has lived in Bali for seven years. She came initially with a friend, fell in love with Bali, returned home to Alberta, quit her job as a consultant for the government, and moved permanently to Bali. She began her Bali life in Ubud, but eventually longed for the peace of the countryside as Ubud became increasingly like a big city. She chose Sidemen as her spot and is currently having a house built for her that she designed. She appears to be about my age. I tried to picture myself doing such a thing but the truth is, with age I have become increasingly more appreciative of my community where I have roots. I’ll probably still be in Santa Fe even if it turns into a desert. I used to wonder why some people never left their homeland even when it became clearly uninhabitable. I am starting to understand.

Monday, June 24^th

The light comes at 6:30 am. From my bed I see the grey shapes and outlines filling in with increasingly vibrant colors. The morning air is cool in this highland part of the country. We actually sleep with thin blankets. Deborah is out on the balcony still asleep in her bed with the mosquito netting. It is blissfully peaceful. I feel like I have landed inside myself. I feel grounded and calm and rested, yet at the same time, my heart is bursting with joy and gratitude at being able to quietly commune with the present moment.

Kadek, the housekeeper, knocks on the door. He has come to make us breakfast which is included in our stay. While he skillfully chops, he tells us about his home, his culture, and answers our stream of questions. When asked how he feels about all the tourists who come to his country, he acknowledges his concern that Bali is becoming overdeveloped and his wish that the government would be more active in limiting the amount of development that is happening. He only goes to the city reluctantly to buy supplies. He appreciates the peace of Sidemen. He tells us about the ceremonies, like the “teeth filing” ceremony he had when he was 19 which is done, as he explained, to remove evil, like greed and envy and harmful thoughts, from the body and mind. He said that in traditional Bali way, the men only do the cooking when it’s to prepare for ceremonies, otherwise it’s the women who do the cooking. We tell him we regard his making breakfast for us a kind of ceremony.

After breakfast Deborah and I wend our way down through the rice paddies and irrigation ditches to the river. We walk barefoot like the rice farmers because the sloping ground is slippery with moisture. Our flip flops don’t offer much traction. It feels divine to be connected directly with the earth, soles on soil and plants, good for the soul. We walk slowly and mindfully. We drop all the way down to the bottom of the valley, to the refreshing river with clear water and plenty of it. We see some boys bathing and wait until they leave to enter into the water and soak in this wondrous scene. After resting on some rocks, we continue up the other side of the steep slope of the valley. The path becomes difficult. Both Deborah and I slip into a deep irrigation ditch and become soaked to our waists. My iPhone is in my back pocket and becomes soaked as well. So, after this set of pictures, there won’t be anymore. The phone no longer functions. I feel lost without this great little camera. I’ve placed it in the sun, although there’s so much humidity in the air, it might never dry out thoroughly. I wonder if it will ever work again. I did manage to transfer a few pictures to the computer, but they are of poor quality. I'm sad about that because I so much wanted you to be able to get a sense of what I've been seeing.

Soaking wet, we found a house with some workers who offered us fresh, young coconut water they fetched up in the coconut palm. They had a good laugh when we mimed what happened to us. They showed us a better route to return home on. Tomorrow morning we’ll try to reach the temple on the mountain ridge top.

The last few hours I’ve been reading a book, a real luxury for me since I’m so busy with my medical practice and use free time to mostly read information related to medicine and healing modalities. But now I’m immersed in Natalie Goldberg’s new book, The True Secret of Writing. Her mantra is “Shut up and write.” It’s inspiring and makes me want to figure out how to make time for writing on a regular basis. It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a few years, but make excuses, mostly about not having enough time.

Soon, I will walk a few kilometers to the hotel that has wi-fi and send off this post….if their internet is working.

Rows of peanuts growing next to our villa

Bed on the balcony with mosquito netting

Flowers throughout the house welcomed us on our arrival

Our balcony with fields of ripe yellow rice  in the background

Our toilet paper holder

Our villa, a bit of heaven for three days

The front of the house

Another view of the villa

Flowering trees everywhere

Young cow with Bali eyes

Chicken coop

Restaurants are out of doors

Terraced rice fields

Hibiscus flower

Kadek chops the spices and herbs as he tells us about his culture

Deborah lingering over breakfast on the balcony

Agung volcano presiding in the background

Our neighbor's villa

My bed with mosquito netting which I didn't need to use. 

Armoire

Looking up at the ceiling

Walls are made of straw mats

Our outdoor/indoor shower

Bathtub

Rice fields ready for harvest

Our villa on the left

Down by the river at the bottom of the valley

Deborah bathing in the river

Last picture before the camera got soaked in the irrigation ditch. Sigh.

“You must leave your home and go forth from your country. The children of Buddha all practice this way.”

 --------------From the 37 Bodhisattva Practices.