Ketewel, top right

The villa at Ketewel, available for rent

First, the Google Earth images show where I was taken yesterday. The villa for rent or sale is at the end of that white path above. Just for interest.

I’ve been working to try to get the video files I shot yesterday of the Jasmine Villa down to a size able to be posted. It’s not easy!

This first one was converted using Handbrake and is 31MB. It’s still FullHD, just heavily compressed.

The next one is reduced to 1280×720, still HD but not Full HD. Even so, it ended up at 87MB (it’s longer than the one above). I don’t know if it’ll load.

Naaah! The first one took so long to upload that it’s hopeless. Battery will die first. Try this one and I’ll try to reduce the other files further.

Ciao.

Waiting for the funeral – Kuta Beach

 Another mixed day but generally, bagus!

I texted Yudhi at about 11am to ask for another meeting at about 2pm. Then kapow, I slept for a good hour. Sometimes you just slip quickly into a deep sleep and it feels good.

Yudhi texted back – please make it 3pm. So just before, I went to the lobby to wait and took the opportunity to ask about the NYE ticket again and why they hadn’t got back to me.

It’s a long story, but they won’t budge. No refunds, no credit.

OK, I still have the option of refusing to pay the final room service and restaurant bills. I don’t think they’ll add up to that amount, but it’ll be somewhere near that.

I am also going to say that I am VERY dissastified with the hotel and I’m going to give them the worst review possible on all the hotel web booking sites. See how they like that.

Later: it’s occurred to me that despite all my discussions at the desk, they never actually gave me “the ticket”! I never received the actual piece of paper. So I can legitimately say, but you never gave me what you have charged me for.
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Calm

Anyway, Yudhi finally showed to collect me at 4pm (for a 3pm appointment) and we set off, this time with the gorgeous Weewill in the front seat. It was nice, but I have never heard two people talk so non-stop! They just nattered in Balinese, on and on and on, no break, one talking for 5 mins, then the other taking over for 5 mins. At least I didn’t have to take part. I wasn’t offended, but I sure wasn’t part of their world for the next 30 mins.

We’d headed out along a major road into the countryside, I didn’t know where. Then off into a village, then along a winding rutted dirt country track which got rougher and rougher, through cow pastures with contented cows resting, chewing their cuds. Suddenly, there was the beach and surf. We finally pulled into a small group of buildings and a large villa complex. This was what he wanted to show me!

I said, Yudhi, this is NEVER going to suit me. What is the point? I would need a 4WD drive to get here and I wouldn’t be able to walk anywhere.

Just look, he said, so I did. Yeah, it’s huge, two storey and right on the beachfront and has four huge bedrooms and bathrooms and a huge entertaining area, both upstairs and downstairs. But what the hell he thought my reaction would be is a mystery.

It turned out to be at Ketewel, on the road to Gianyar, about 10km north of Sanur. Great place for a big group of people to rent for a holiday – $650pw, but useless to me. Four couples could rent this and that would bring the rate down to about $150pw each, which would be a fantastic holiday deal. Make a deal with a car and driver and you’d be set.

So back to Sanur and the Jasmine (2 storey) villa.

Jasmine Villa, from upper bedroom

This time I explored it upstairs and downstairs, and shot lots of pics and video. I don’t know what it is that attracts me, but it does. It’s the compactness, actually. I don’t want a huge place. This is not small, but it nestles around the block and pool.

It turns out to be north south aligned, as the sun was setting over the left side wall. That’s OK, good in fact.

Jasmine Villa balcony, Komar the housekeeper

There are lots of things I’d need fixed before I bought, though. A chromed grating in the bathroom was rusted, for example, and the tiling in the shower was pretty rough. Everything is open to the weather and needs a good clean. For a new, never occupied house, it looks quite weathered. Nothing a bit of elbow grease won’t fix. The wooden door and window frames need revarnishing already. Some of the paint work is pretty rough. But it’s OK, easily fixed.

While I was “filming”, I ventured into the housekeeper’s quarters. Wow, I surprised her husband (or some guy) and Komar was there with about four very young kids, all on the floor of a very small room with just a mattress. They were a bit embarrassed, but I made light of it and moved away quickly. It seems to be all they have and it’s their life. Crumbs, she’s not actually my choice as a housekeeper (no English, a bit uncool) and I may have to ask her to move out, but I’d hate to do it. Awful situation.

I have Yudhi’s approval for Komar to let me visit any of the villas in the next week or so to spend some time on my own looking at them. He says he has a potential buyer for the middle one now, but I suspect it’s all sales tactics. These villas seem to have been idle for months judging by the weathering of the surfaces.

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Anyway, I stayed on in Sanur when Yudhi and Weewill left, and I wandered down the street to have a drink in the pubs. Great area, full of night life and restaurants. I had a  couple of beers in a pub, (playing ABBA! Yeah!), made even more memorable by the fireworks rockets every few seconds. All over Bali, they are celebrating New Year all week with fireworks. Nice.

Then I caught a taxi back to Denpasar. The driver moaned but the traffic wasn’t bad – we were slowed but never actually stopped by traffic jams. The meter showed Rp.67,000 but I had a Rp.100,000 note (A$11) so I said keep the change, Untuk anak-anak, for the kids. He appreciated it.

Musical kids, Ubud

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Now in Denpasar, as well as the fireworks and rockets, Nature is making its own New Year welcome. Thunder, lightning, fireworks rockets and rain are flashing, crashing and lashing, sometimes virtually simultaneously. (The rain is coming through the window frame, making the glossy tiled floor wet, right near the lamp power switch by the bed! Great hotel.)

I crashed, myself, at about 1030pm and slept immediately. But I awoke some time later (there’s no bed light so I can’t turn the light on to see my watch!) It must have been before midnight, I assume, because if I thought the fireworks were spectacular earlier, they were just continuous now. I didn’t mind at all, but the noise of explosions was just non-stop, like a battle. There must have been tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of bangs and explosions. It was just an amazing, continuous din.

To me, this shows exuberance and a sense of fun. I’d guess these fireworks are home made, because to buy so many would be expensive and they were coming from everywhere around. Unfortunately, my room has no view of the street, only other rooms and the pool, so I could only see the flashes in the sky. I tried going to the window, but the floor was wet where rain had seeped in and the foot switch for the lamp stand was there, so I dared not go any closer.

Dark and brooding. Lava flows, Kintamani

It went on for a long time and I drifted off to sleep again, to dream of tense work situations involving strange video cartridge machines and odd test equipment from England. Huh! Even after ten years of retirement, work still dominates my dreams.

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Oh, yes! My favourite electronics magazine Elektor has reported on a new treatment for sleep apnea, which I got.

“Persistent oxygen starvation often results in daytime fatigue, lack of concentration and decreased alertness and can go on to increase the risk of heart attack and stroke. Depression, muscle pain, inefficient metabolism, diabetes, impotence and a host of other ailments are also associated with sleep apnea.”

You bet! I can verify that. I’ve got my CPAP machine and it works, but travelling with it is a nuisance and I’m terrified of losing it or having it fail in a foreign country. And it weighs 2.5Kg and takes up a fair amount of space in my case.

“The Upper Airway Stimulation (UAS) therapy designed by Inspire Medical Systems stimulates the nerve that controls the base of the tongue with a small electrical pulse during sleep, to keep it toned and in place [ie to stop it relaxing and blocking the airway].

“A pacemaker-like device is implanted under the skin, near the collarbone, and a wire is fed to the problematic twelfth cranial nerve. A sensor detects when the sufferer takes a breath and instructs the implant to stimulate the nerve. The system is adjusted so that the tongue receives just enough current to keep it from blocking the airway but not enough to disturb sleep (or result in any rude mid-snooze gestures) and a remote allows the patient to activate and deactivate the system. A timer can also be set so that the zapping is delayed until after the user is asleep.”

Duck! Low flying canards.

However, as usual, it’s just entering clinical trials in the US, so I reckon I might have passed on to the big sleep by the time it becomes available and I won’t care any more. Sigh.

I’m at breakfast on Saturday and again have had to sit a mile away from the food. Once again, I picked up a tray to carry my stuff, and they did it again! They took it off me. OK, I said, please carry this, and I put my OJ on the tray. But when I got back to my table, there was no OJ! What kind of crazy hotel is this?

Cukup!  Meaning, enough! I can’t wait for Monday, to get out of here.

Spiders on bats!

Like the spiders and the bats, we should try to get along, right?

If you’d got the impression I was irritated by this hotel in the past two days, then I have to tell you, I’m REALLY angry now.

First, I’ve realised that it’s an Islamic owned hotel, so there’s no bar and no alcohol available for sale. If you order a club sandwich, expect to get what they call beef bacon, like corned beef. Don’t expect bacon with your eggs for breakfast either, or pork to be on the menu.

But that’s not a gripe. My gripe is first, that requests at the desk produce no action. “We’ll get back to you” means nothing.

• After two days, I still haven’t got a rubber shower mat and it’s pretty clear I won’t get one.

• After two days, a promise that the manager would contact me re lack of wi-fi in the room has produced nothing.

• After 36 hours, my complaint that the fridge doesn’t freeze ice cubes has produced no response.

• As well, there’s a safe in the room, but it’s locked and it’s at floor level. Yes, I could get it unlocked, but I’m not getting down on the floor to operate it.

But yesterday, they really excelled themselves. They delivered a letter asking me to contact the desk re the New Year’s Eve celebrations.

What did this mean? So I asked at the desk after breakfast, what am I supposed to collect?

“Your ticket for the New Year’s Eve party, sir.”

But I didn’t ask for this, nor do I want it, nor do I want to pay for something I didn’t ask for.

“Your travel agent requested it, sir.”

Well I did not ask them to, and I can’t attend any party because I’m sick! and I pointed to my distressed face with runny nose, teary eyes and feverish brow. I don’t want this.

“Sorry sir, our manager will contact you.”

Well, 24 hours later, they haven’t, as I’ve come to expect.

Today I’m going to say I do not expect to be charged for this. I will not be attending any New YEar’s Eve party. I would add, especially a dry New Year’s Eve, but I’d better not.

But late yesterday, they beat all that.

I’d run out of rupiahs and asked at the desk where the nearest ATM is. The guy looked confused, then said he didn’t know, but he thought I would need to take a taxi. There’s nothing around here.  (I already knew the Circle K across the street didn’t have one.)

I walked away, but went back and said, OK, can you change this for me please, and handed him a $50 note, Aussie dollars.

He looked at it suspiciously and said, “Sorry sir, only US dollars.” What! I said. This is Australian currency. It’s now stronger than the US dollar.

“Sorry sir. I think you need to take a taxi.”

But I haven’t got any Indonesian money. I can’t take a taxi!

He just shrugged. So I walked away fuming! They can see I’m becoming more and more upset, but it just doesn’t seem to make any difference.

I also discovered today that the room cleaners (men, not women) don’t replace the glasses and cups and teaspoons you use, they just rinse them under ther tap in the bathroom and put them back on the shelf!

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Kewell, eh?

Later, I walked 150m down the road to the RTC Centre and found an ATM, no trouble at all. Who are these clowns at the hotel?

I went to the RTC Centre (a big electronics/laptop/computer centre) to see if I could buy a USB modem with a data allowance to overcome this lack of WiFi. No problem! A USB 3.5G modem with 2 weeks’ data allowance – A$55. Bargain! The lovely Marisa from Sulawesi sold it to me but I needed to go back to the hotel to get the laptop for her to install it.

Monkeyin’ around on the lap, top

Boy, traffic at 6pm, be careful. I crossed several roads OK, but even when you thread through stationary cars, motorbikes suddenly come at you over the double lines on the wrong side of the road! Or even on the footpath! They ride up at you to bypass the throng on the road!

So I took the laptop back to the shop but after an hour of install/uninstall/reinstall/call-the-expert, it just wouldn’t register any signal at all. Yet it worked in the shop’s computer and in the expert’s laptop. What’s going on? I gave up at that point (7.45pm) as I was knackered and said I’ll bring the laptop back tomorrow (today).

This tallies with a Digitech High Sensitivity WiFi adapter I bought in Perth which will not work, because the computer just won’t recognise it as a USB device. Same with this modem.

I’ve tried every trick I know – turn off Anti Virus, Run as Administrator, disable laptop’s own modem, but nothing works. How come this top-of-the-line Sony laptop with a standard Win7 installation won’t recognise USB devices which work fine in another computer? GRRRRR!

Calm, calmer, karma

First, which of these is correct?

Answer, they both are. This is “design”, I think. OK, but how do you hold them, fill them and set them down? It makes you feel on edge.

Another faskinatin’ day in the land of surprises. We had a big wind storm last night. This was the view a few days ago:

This was the view this morning. All the camouflage netting blown away. I was woken during the night by the noise of rain on the windows but I didn’t realise how strong it was until today. Trees were down causing traffic chaos, as I found out. No worries in Bali.

Anyway, I moved from the Harrad’s to the Aston in Denpasar today and wow, this is 5 star. All glass and marble and murals and bas reliefs and corridors like airports, wide, vast, endless. Beautiful paintings everywhere, for sale too. They’re originals, not prints.

That’s the facade. The room is less salubrious than Harrad’s was, narrow, dimly lit, chipped paint.  But the window opens! This means I’ll be able to sleep with the beautiful night air wafting in. Aaaah! And the beds are the softest I’ve ever felt. Can’t wait.

But there’s no wi-fi in the room!! I protested, to no avail. I have to go to the lobby. This is not good and I’m going to protest again to the manager. I’m paying top dollar for this 5 star room and I’m going to stamp my foot for once. It’s ridiculous in this laptop age.

The counter staff are ice cool, slender, beautiful, dressed in immaculate black, embroidered style conscious uniforms. And that’s just the guys! No, it’s the cool wanitas, the girls. Not nearly as friendly as Harrad’s, but maybe they’ll warm up.

OK, once I’d been brought here by the scenic route: right up over the top road through rice paddies and villages to try and avoid the traffic chaos, taking about 45 mins and costing Rp75,000, I settled in.

I texted Yudi, the Hibiscus villa owner and sales guy and asked him to collect me in Denpasar. Wow, traffic jams on a rainy day. Anyway, he eventually arrived at 4.30pm and we set off, I thought, to Sanur to see the villas I saw yesterday. But I soon realised that Yudi likes to talk, and talk, and talk, and show me his studio and his restaurant and his art and sculptures and how well off he is. He’s a developer and architect, he says, and if it’s true, he really is.
So we went by an amazingly circuitous route to his premises, which really are terrific:

Yudhi, the architect/designer/developer of Hibiscus Villa.

He has an office, restaurant, art studio and a huge parcel of land in his own 10,000 sq.m rice paddy location near Sanur. Wow.

He served me coffee, or rather his girl Weewill did (don’t know the spelling). What a gorgeous lady. It seemed to be an attempt to impress on me how creative he is – why, I don’t know. He has lived and studied in Perth and his father lives there, in Fremantle, and he wants me to deal with his father in this villa sale, so I have to wait for his dad to arrive on 5 January from Perth. Maybe his dad’s the enforcer.

Anyway, after rushed coffee we set off to the villas I saw yesterday, the subject of all this waffle. These are the Hibiscus Villas in the map yesterday right near the Mercure Hotel.

It turns out that the one I would have wanted, the smallest one, is already sold. The other two are for sale but one is two storey and the stairs are external. I just couldn’t cope with them. If they’d been internal, I might have installed a chair/stair lift but I didn’t waste time on this. That left the middle one:

Yudhi, Komar the housekeeper, Hibiscus Villa.

Hibiscus kitchen/dining/living

The bathroom of bedroom 1 is completely open air! There are no walls except the one you see.

 It’s just occurred to me that if I bought the two storey villa, I wouldn’t actually need to go upstairs. It’s only the two spare bedrooms up there – the main and one other are at ground level. Anyway…

Look, if this was all I was offered in Bali, I’d be happy. It’s beautiful, it’s amazing, it’s brand new, it has fantastic potential to be furnished and decorated and I could live here very happily. But somehow, despite the location, it has oddities. Yes, it has four bedrooms, but each main is a pair with a smaller one and they share bathrooms. There are only two bathrooms, not four as the brochure says.

I was surprised to find, too, that the housekeeper is already in employ and on the premises. Her name is Komar (above) and she speaks no English. She wouldn’t suit me, I don’t think.

This video is 1m 39s and shows the drive, Yudhi and Komar and the villa. I hope the quality comes though this time.
 
So despite the great location and all, I didn’t feel I had to grab it, which is lucky I suppose. He says he has other rental properties to show me, so I’m sure we’ll be talking again. Nice enough bloke, despite the silver tongue.

All in all, a nice day, nice and cool and wet, with lots to interest me. Even the drive to Denpasar in the morning via village routes to avoid the traffic jams, was cantik. Love this place.

Btw, property in Bali is appreciating on average 20% pa and there’s a new second airport planned. Due to restricted finance and conservative banks, it’s also not subject to wild speculation. Hmmm.

I’ve just done a first: ordered a room service dinner. Too tired and disshevelled to go out. Appetiser and Tom Yum Goong soup – Rp84,000 or $9.33. I may never leave the room again!

Oh no! I’ve just discovered – there’s no spoon for the soup!!!

Malam.

Wed morning: despite being a dog lover, the local hounds set up a performance of A Christmas Oratorio by Johann Sebastian Bark last night at 1.10am. I couldn’t get back to sleep again, so watched the trash CNN and Discovery American rubbish for a while. There’s no light over the bed! Couldn’t read in bed.

And I reckon my CPAP mask is introducing bacteria into my nose. I’m constantly sneezing and coughing and generally feel crap with a sore throat and slight fever. I have anti-biotics here, but I’m reluctant to start as they’ll upset my gut bacteria. I may have to visit the BIMC on spec to try to get to a simpler fix. It’ll be a good experience.

Again, the shower recess is like wet glass. I’ll complain again and try to get a mat. There are only two bath towels, no hand towels or face washers! In a 5 star hotel! And at 8.30am, the door bell rings and it’s a guy asking if I have any laundry. What??!! If I’d still been in bed, or in the shower, I would have been even more annoyed.

Now, at breakfast in the restaurant, I’m even more irritated. It’s vast and very noisy, full of Asian/Chinese kids. I have to walk a good 20m, even 30m to reach the food tables. I picked up a tray to save walking back and forth, but a hotel employee took it off me!!! I’m not allowed to have it evidently. He took my OJ and delivered it, but I had to collect all the fruit plate, toast and the eggs/veges on two plates stacked in my left hand. Couldn’t find the butter – hidden from view behind a pillar. Got back to the table (25m walk), found the papaya had stuck to the underside of the top plate and some of it fell on the floor.

Sat down and found I had no knife!!!!!!! Another 25m walk to get one. This time I grabbed every utensil I thought I could possibly need, whether I did or not. But I forgot coffee. Grrrrrrr. A waiter got it for me, but despite me asking for milk, he didn’t bring any. I sent him back. But the coffee’s cold anyway.

And the mini-bar fridge in the room was empty. I put water in the ice cube tray, but despite 4 hours yesterday, it didn’t freeze. I got a bowl of ice sent up, but it’s clear the fridge won’t freeze it. This morning, the ice cube tray was still water.

And the road outside is a three lane each way highway. There’s a hotel employee there just to stop traffic for guests to cross. Take life in hands.   Would I recommend this hotel? No way, Jose

Calm, calm, karma.

No internet in the room in a five star hotel??!! This hotel is infuriating. More soon.

Bali just keeps throwing up surprises. It gets better too.

I waited around all morning for Dedey to contact me about the Emerald Villa, but nothing happened. Nor did I hear from the Emerald management. Uh oh, guys, you’re going to lose me.

OK, so I was browsing the web and realised that the Mercure Hotel Sanur is far better than the Puri Dalem I’m booked into on Monday 3 January for not much more money (4 star vs 2 star for $40/night more, and a much nicer location). I don’t really want to be in Denpasar, so I looked at cancellations but it seems I’m stuck with DPS due to the New Year’s Eve thing. (I wish they’d hold New Year at a differnt time of the year.)

I’m paying $188 for Friday night! and I don’t even want to be there. But I just can’t find another hotel on that night. My credit card has already been charged, so I’m stuck with it. It’s a pretty spiffy hotel, even so.

I’m booked into the Puri Dalem on Monday 3 January, but having seen it on Saturday, I think I’ll pass. Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be (Sam Goldwyn).

The Mercure looked excellent, but I was amazed to find that the web site said internet payable. What??!! So I taxied over there with the intention of saying, “This is a deal breaker. I want to book, but internet has to be included.”

It turned out that it’s payable extra if you want a computer provided! Er, sudah, guys. I already got one. So I’m going to cancel Puri Dalem and book into the Mercure from Monday through to the following Wednesday when I fly back to Perth. Wow, what a beautiful hotel. All the rooms are bures, thatched roof cottages and the grounds are just gardens leading down to the beach. I felt good about it. Better than the Besakih, but at $96 a night, it should be.

That doesn’t include breakfast! That’s $15 extra. No thank you, but straight across the street is a beautiful little restaurant that serves, wait for it, breakfast! They’ll be seeing me.

OK, that sorted, I set off jalan-jalan along Jalan Mertasari. What should catch my eye but this:

I walked up the lane (a good 1.5 car widths, meant for vehicle access) and found this:

Hibiscus Villa, garages

There are three villas, all vacant, each with a 2 car garage.

 This is the smallest of them, which is the one I’d be happy with. There’s a cheaper one, but it’s two storey and I can’t handle stairs. I couldn’t see much, but they looked pretty nice through the fences. These are villas for sale, but again, the location is terrific and I loved the look of them. All are different but all are 4 bed, 4 bath, with pool and two car garage. Each is on about 500 sq.m. of land with its own bore and freehold. Modern, recently built. Magnificent design.

So with a new spring in my step I grabbed the brochures and found they’d already been reduced in price by about $20,000 each from the sign price. Wow.

So I just walked around there and loved the street, it being full of nice restaurants and other villas and swish houses and hotels. This is a nice area!

I walked and walked, in the rain and the cool wind, feeling very mellow. This is getting better all the time.

The path I followed, above, was about 1.5Km and I was pretty tired, so taxi back to the hotel about 4pm, where I looked up the web site for the villas and found they have a huge range for sale and for rental, starting as low as $220 pw and going up to $1,000 per night and more.

Anyway I’ve left an email asking them to contact me in Denpasar tomorrow and I hope to view the villas asap.

Daring men? This is a real photo, not altered.

Meanwhile, the Ray White agency has just phoned me and it’s the other guy who was there last Thursday, Lucky. He informs me that Emerald Villa management will charge me $700-$800 per month management fees (an extra $8,400 pa) and he can get me a special deal of about $32,000 on these villas!

Ha! If it wasn’t so pathetic I’d wring his neck. My friend Len in Perth, who’s an old Bali hand, says, “Walk away, fast as you can!” and that’s what I’m doing. It looks like Emerald Villas are not going to work after all.

Makan.

Later: I had my final meal in this hotel’s restaurant and it was another farce. The guys are really nice and try to get it right, but they just don’t. The Nasi campur was described as coming with peanuts on the menu, and I pointed it out to emphasise that I was looking forward to them. He nodded enthusiastically.

But 5 mins later he’s back saying “Sorry, sorry, we have no peanuts.” No peanuts in a restaurant/bar?? OK, too bad. But when the dish arrived, there were two hard boiled eggs instead of one, and then they brought out a bowl of krupuk, the prawn crackers, adding to the ones already on the plate. Not just any bowl, a large soup bowl full of the things. It was way over the top and far more than I wanted or could eat.

They try, but too often the reality doesn’t match the menu. Last night I ordered fried fish with a green chili sauce. “No bones?” I asked. No bones sir. I expected a fillet of fish. But it turned out to be three small pieces of fish in a batter, but with the tough texture of chicken, and tasting nothing like fish.

I ordered a small bowl of sambal, soy sauce with chopped chilis in it, and I couldn’t help noticing the endorphins flooding through my head as I ate it. It’s both pain and pleasure at once.

Next morning’s all pain and no pleasure though! Malam.

Selemat malam,

It’s been a quiet day today – bit of a sore throat. But I did get out to Benoa this afternoon.

First, the pool is alive!

Pond life

These are the first swimmers I’ve seen all week. I think they’re looking for coins.

I took a taxi out to Benoa at about 5pm hoping to get something comparable to this:

Gunung Agung 1986

I’m not sure where I took this from, but it was somewhere near Benoa, I think.

Well, it was a nice drive this afternoon, but Benoa is now so developed as a port that it’s not very nice any more. Not that it’s bad:

Riverboat steamers?

It’s just crowded and seedy. But I liked this:

I miss my Minnie!

By the way, what do Indonesians say when they answer their mobile phones? ‘Allo? Yes they do.

Here’s a bit of video – see how this goes:

This is HD from the Pentax SLR. I find it’s fantastic to only have one device to carry, but trying to refocus my eyes from the distance to the rear LCD of the camera is hopeless. In video mode, all I have to go on is the rear LCD. In bright light, I really can’t see much of what I’m shooting. I think the answer is going to be to buy another Pentax body, so that one is always set to video and I won’t have to swap lenses or reset the camera.

Besides, I suspect a new semi-silvered mirror model is coming in January. Gotta have the latest!

I hope I’ll be hearing from the estate agent and the villa management tomorrow, so that I can move on with securing the villa. The estate agent sounded quite offended in a reply email when I asked him why I needed to deal through him when I can deal direct with the management, but gosh, mate, who are you acting for? Me or the owners of the villa? Where are your loyalties? What do you add to the deal for me?

I hope Xmas has calmed him down. He’s a Catholic. All will be forgiven, I’m sure.

Dinner time. The restaurant frustrated me again last night. I had a beautiful prawn soup for entree, but the salt and pepper squid for main was NOT the same as I had earlier in the week – just not as good at all. Different chef, different dish. The most reliably enjoyable dish? Nasi Campur. Always good. After I’ve added extra chili, of course! What will tonight bring?  Oh well. Malam.

Hummer H2 – for rent

Boxing Day – it’s just Sunday here and another grey, rainy day. I love it. The rain was so heavy outside I could hardly hear the staff in the restaurant at breakfast. Nice!

The pic above shows the hotel driveway – the rain makes a heck of a din on the roof above. How about that vehicle, eh? It’s available for rent. Just the thing for a drive up to Kintamani. Don’t worry about the roads – just take a shotcut straight up the mountainside.

The title of this post refers to my concerns about this hotel. I dunno whether to say anything or just let it slide, but that’s literally what could happen and it could happen to me.

There are so many dangerous things about this hotel that if I fall and injure myself, I would definitely take action against the hotel for damages. I’m afraid my legs have become very weak in the past year and I’m having to use a stick. But:

• There are about eight steps up from that Hummer level to get into the lobby. There’s a sloping ramp on one side, but it’s so steep that I have trouble negotiating that too, especially when it’s wet.
• When you reach the top of the steps, you have to go through a security scanner. But to get through it, I have to put my stick and bag on a table and sidle sideways with nothing to hold onto along a slippery tiled route no more than 400mm wide. As I do this, the steps are just behind me. If I slipped, I’d go backwards down the steps!
• Everywhere in the hotel is glossy smooth tiled, including the room. It looks great and feels nice, but if any water gets on the floor, for example outside the bathroom or in front of the fridge or after I come back from the pool, it’s a skating rink!
• I may have mentioned the shower floor, but I will again. It’s also smooth tiled, with not a single handhold to be found. Once soap gets on it, it’s like walking on glassy ice. I asked the hotel for a rubber mat and to their credit, I had one within two hours, but it’s a hard industrial mat and a bit hard on the feet. This morning I found that they’d laid it down with the spikiest side up! By turning it over, it’s not so bad.
  Hah! I whinge when it’s smooth and I whinge when it’s rough. But it’s not difficult to get it right. There should be those friction strips or similar in the shower, or just the simple suction cup white bath mats.
• The pool is completely railing and ladder free! There’s not a handhold to be found. I had a swim yesterday and getting out, up some underwater steps, as I stepped onto the paving I fell over. Not hard, but because I can’t get up again, and because there’s no railing, I had to slide myself back into the water and try again, successfully this time. No harm done, but…!
• To reach the pool, you open a glass door and are confronted by a set of cement stepping blocks for a pathway. They’re about 500mm square and about 400mm off the ground, with gaping gaps between. It looks sort of pretty, but it’s a disaster waiting to happen. Smooth cement, water, and big gaps. If someone doesn’t slip and break a leg or hip I’ll be very surprised. There’s no alternative – no way to avoid them. You’d have to step off, down about 400mm onto a muddy surface. No thanks.

In the room, the deficiencies are so glaring that although I’m quite enjoying my stay, I’m getting frustrated. The hotel Sales Director with the marvellous first name of Ulysses seems to have taken a shine to me, so I think I’ll have to write him a letter for when I leave on Tuesday. There are so many silly little annoyances that could be fixed at almost no cost, yet are spoiling my stay:

• No pen in the room (ball point pen, I mean) or note paper. There’s the usual folder of A4 paper and envelopes, but I just want a jotter, not a bloody letter.
• The soap is not replaced as it wears down. I had to ask for more soap!
• There are only two small glasses, and even one of those went missing one day.
• There was a plastic swizzle stick which had a spatula end that I used to make my coffee, but after I threw the used one in the bin, it hasn’t been replaced! I have to take a teaspoon from the restaurant, but I keep forgetting, as now.
• The packet coffee in the room was like leather it  was so old! It smelt like leather too. I had to buy Nescafe cappucino packet coffee – but you can’t get it without sugar.
• OK, so I bought powdered Bali coffee. But I’ve got no spoon or milk.
•  There was no creamer for the coffee. I had to ask.
• The fridge is inside a cupboard which has a door with no handle or even a finger recess. It’s one of those push-push latches, but it doesn’t work, so I break my fingernails opening the door.
• Being inside a cupboard, there’s no way for the fridge heat to escape, so it’s pushing sh..t uphill to keep cold.
• The ice cube tray is very small and I can’t get the ice cubes out! I’ve actually broken the tray while twisting and turning it to extract the ice. When I do get the cubes out, they fly out onto the desk and floor. Now, of course, when I fill it with water, it leaks on the floor, making the floor dangerous as I said.
• Again, being inside a cupboard, the ice is struggling to form overnight, because the fridge is so inefficient. Crazy!!
• There’s no bottle opener in the room. Luckily I’ve brought my own, but if I hadn’t, I’d be damaging the furniture trying to remove bottle caps.
• I’ve brought stainless steel wire rope cables for suitcase and laptop security, but there are absolutely no holes in the furniture to thread them through. I can’t use them. All I ask is some eye bolts or something to loop the cables through.
• There’s a small room safe, but it’s too small to take this laptop, and this is only a 13.3″ one.
• The desk chair is all fashion with white fake crocodile skin vinyl covering, but so uncomfortable!

See what I mean? All these are simple, almost no cost items, but they annoy the hell out of the customer. Not to mention laying themselves wide open to liability and damages.

I dunno why they don’t employ me as a hotel consultant, flying all over the world checking out hotels and advising them of my assessment of their rooms. Oh, Mr Croft, we’re so grateful, have a week in this 5 star in Nusa Dua and tell us what you think. Ha!

Waffle on, can’t I?

Fried egg anyone? It’s the new, compact, easily packaged, stackable, non-runny fried egg invented in the home of convenience foods, good ol’ USA. It comes complete with holes for pegs on your plate to hold it in place while you eat. And “This side up” markings.

No seriously, it’s a new super efficient LED designed to replace light globes. It gives the same light as a 60W globe but uses only 11W. That’s just a liitle more than a compact fluorescent (8W), but with a theoretically indefinite life, unlike CFs which do wear out.

We are moving to higher and higher efficiency lighting. Even street lights can be LEDs these days, with far better efficiency and no burnouts. The installation cost is high, but the payoff is high too with no maintenance costs. And another lot of low skilled council workers lose their jobs replacing lamps. Can’t be helped, I’m afraid.

Christmas Eve in Bali. It seems unreal. First time I’ve ever been away at Christmas.

Here. there are signs of Xmas everywhere, with snow and trees and tinsel and Father Christmases and Xmas Sale signs. But tomorrow, on the day, it’ll be business as usual, and the same on Sunday. Why not?

Tropical Santa Bali 2010

 I waited around this morning for emails or texts from the estate agent or villa management, but nothing, so I took the hotel shuttle bus to Kuta. Again I’m the only passenger. If it’s so busy at Xmas, where is everyone? One taxi driver today lamented the lack of tourists – I was his first fare at midday.

Anyway, I went hunting for big camera shops, to Galeria first. Phew! Perth has nothing like this. All the big names are there, Dunhill, Gucci, Prada, Bally, etc etc. Big deal? But the range of clothes and furnishings even in the normal shops is huge, far better than we ever see in Perth. There’s just no contest.

And the rise in the middle class affluence is also obvious here. Yummy ladies in fashion clothes everywhere, with money to spend. Good luck to them. It’s good for everyone.

Anyway, taxi to another big centre to look for cameras, but nothing. A small Fuji Image shop confirmed that Denpasar is my only hope. OK, later.

Then I walked (note, walked KG) to Kuta beach and took some shots, then walked again all along the Kuta beach front path to the south toward Kartika Plaza. See Google view. It was about 1.5Km.

Following the yellow brick road, literally

But what a change there’s been in 27 years! It’s a mix of nice development of people facilities, rubbish strewn beachfront, gross hotel intrusions onto the beach and crowds! People everywhere. Many of my shots from 1983 and 1985 such as this:

Beach cremation Kuta, Bali 1985

were taken here, and it was just open sandy beach then. I’m pretty sure this was the same location. Turn left at Jl Pantai Kuta. Not now. There are some quiet shady spots, but it’s a bit grotty.

However:

Kuta boy, Christmas 2010

When your ship comes in… Kuta 2010

Kuta guard, 2010

I reached the Kartika Plaza and Centro shopping centre just about dropping from fatigue. Energy fadeout! But people assist – they move aside, and take your arm and help you up steps, not like at home.

Language lesson: I had another look at some fine leather shoulder bags. I asked the girls, how do you say “genuine leather”? After much discussion and giggling, it seems “kulit asling”.

Ah, OK, kulit means leather and asling means original, as in orang asling, the original men of the forest of Java.  I resisted the temptation to buy, I don’t know how, when I could smell real Italian leather in a Condotti shoulder bag, just right for my laptop and camera, but I did.

Back at the hotel, I was pretty knackered and thought I’d better lie down for a bit. Bang! Out like a light. More than an hour later, I woke and realised the room door wasn’t fully closed. Ah well.

Later still, I had dinner in the restaurant and took the opportunity to ask at the desk, if kulit means leather, how come “Wayang Kulit”, the traditional puppet play of Java?

It seems kulit actually means “skin”. So the wayang kulit is the projected puppet play onto a screen of skin/leather. Aha. And cukup, which I thought meant “full” as in full as a goog, actually means “enough”. So I asked about full, as in full tank of petrol? And he told me, and I’ve forgotten what he said! Besok.

Malam.