A Bowl of Stupid

Wanderer, there is no path, you lay down a path in walking.
-Antonio Machado

I’m off for a few days, at least. I didn’t put things together very well (again) coming back from the States last month, so I’ve got to head to Kuala Lumpur for a few days to renew my Thai visa. Since there’s nothing going on here this late in the year — what with last weeks holidays here in Thailand and everyone else heading to their native lands for the Christmas holidays, I’m gonna make a trip out of it. Do some bus ridin’, do some train ridin’, do some divin’. All that kinda shit.

Should be back in several days, though. And I may update along the way, although — GASP — I’m not taking my laptop with me this time. We’ll see how it unfolds …

The Fifth of December is a huge day here in Thailand — it’s the birthday of His Majesty King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world’s longest reigning monarch.

Known in Thai as ‘Wan Chalerm’. The King has a very special place in the hearts of the Thai people. He completely revitalized and redefined the country for the modern era. As a foreigner, it’s my view that the most important thing His Majesty has done is provide a firm foundation for the modern Thailand we know today, allowing it to weather, relatively unscathed, the turmoil that beset other countries in the region since the end of World War II.

In celebration of The Kings birthday, buildings and homes all over the country are elaborately adorned with flags and portraits of His Majesty, predominantly in the color yellow. On the evening of the holiday itself, the streets around Ratchadamnoen and Sanam Luang are closed to traffic and thousands of people take to the streets.

However, for anyone in town not familiar with HM the King’s birthday and the intermittent week-long holiday associated with it, you may get a slight ‘Twilight Zone’ twitch when you notice everyone but yourself wearing pink shirts and randomly throwing lit firecrackers into the street. It’s just another of the awesomely quirky things about Thailand (much like being caught on the BTS train here at 0800 or 1800 each day, when everyone simply stops moving — they just stop — for the duration of the Thai National Anthem).

Since the King’s actual birthday fell on a Saturday this year, the official state holiday was yesterday (7 December), while Constitution Day, another public holiday, is this Thursday (10 December) to commemorate the start of the constitution monarchy in 1932.

The result of all this is that it feels like a mixture of July 4th and Thanksgiving (back in the States) — there’s essentially a 2-day work week, with most people not even going that far. So it’s relatively quiet here in Bangers right now. It’s a welcome change of pace, and it’s another reminder of why Bangkok is such a great place to live.

**

Although I’ve cut down on my publication of posts here over the past 6-8 months, it doesn’t mean I stopped writing entirely. To the contrary, I’ve probably been writing more, albeit more personal works not really suited for mass consumption (and subsequent regurgitation).

However, by both choice and necessity I’m settling down to (what I hope will be) a long term commitment here in Bangkok. I’m also becoming re-acclimated with the concept of living like most everyone else does — getting a job, getting an apartment, going to work, going to the gym, paying bills, hopefully one day accidentally getting shot in the head during a daring daytime robbery attempt — you know, the normal stuff.

That being said, I’ve found myself inside and on the computer much more than I have been in recent memory. Similarly, I’ve worn a suit and shoes probably more during the past 10 days than I have during the last 4 years combined. Honestly, I will always prefer sandals to closed-toe shoes, but I can’t say I don’t like the change more than just a little bit.

The whole “ex-lawyer surfer bum” thing does get old from time to time. And dressing like a grown-up again has also reminded me of just HOW MANY TIMES I’ve reinvented myself during the 5 years alone — which I sorta started writing about last month en route back to the States for 2 weeks. So I thought I’d put it up here (not that anyone’s really still reading this shit anyway).

** Yeah, the picture has absolutely nothing to do with this. I just like the idea of a polar bear taking a piss in a public bathroom.

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I’ve just started reading Sean Wilsey’s autobiography, “Oh The Glory Of It All.” From what I can tell from the first 100 pages or so, it’s not the most compelling of reads, despite the columns of many corporate shills professing otherwise. However, the way I figure it, I’m going to be spending the majority of the next two (2) days in the air (which I am now, en route from Saigon to Hong Kong), so I’ll have some free time on my hands to read.

At the outset, Wilsey goes through great pains to describe his parents and their history. What I find personally remarkable about them is how, although his parents took different paths, joined up briefly, and ultimately wound up in different places, they both seemed to have lived multiple lives. Both Wilsey’s mother and father were each married four (4) times. They each seemed to have separate families dating from different times in their lives. And they were both masters of reinvention.

It’s an issue I’m dealing with right now, actually. I’m leaving Asia, and heading back to the States, for the first time in a couple years. America is the country of my birth. It’s where I was raised. And where I was schooled. And it’s where I lived my entire life, up until just a few years ago. But going back now, it seems like a lifetime ago.

Although I’m still relatively young, I feel like I’ve already lived several lives at this point — Philly, Arizona, Alaska, Oregon, San Diego, California, Florida … geek, student, fisherman, slacker, law student, attorney, surfer, rebel. I’ve changed and altered myself almost every time I’ve moved that I can barely recognize those prior person(s). My latest, and most public, persona is what now lingers.

But I feel it turning. I have been for a while now. A new persona is needed mainly because I need money, and I need full-time work again. But, as I’ve mentioned several times over the course of the past year, it’s also because my current lifestyle is losing the appeal it once held for me. And my desire for change is metastasizing more each day. If things work out the way I hope they do, I can finally see the next reinvention — more than just the amorphous ‘need’ I’ve voiced previously.

MEH (mē’)

1. (n.) A multi-purpose response, primarily used to imply a degree of indifference.

2. (n.) Vietnam, a country of southeast Asia in eastern Indochina on the South China Sea.

My posts on this blog have been less than prolific in recent months, I know. That’s not to say that much hasn’t been happening in this time. To the contrary, it has — I simply haven’t written about it.

This can be blamed on the fact that I’ve become obsessed with finding a full-time paying gig in Thailand and/or Singapore, which admittedly does take up a lot of my time. However, the ‘truthier’ reason is that I simply haven’t had anything all that stunning to write about.

Don’t get me wrong, over the past several months, I’ve taken a trip back to Sri Lanka, I’ve moved from Bali back to Bangkok, I’m heading back to the States in a few days for the first time in a couple years, and I’m currently in Saigon helping out a friend.

But all of this has been done before, nothing has pissed me off significantly where I felt the need to write about it, and nothing else has happened warranting a full-fledged blog post. Rather, over the past several months, I find that everything I have to say can be said with a 1-line status report on Facebook.

That being said, being back in Saigon has finally piqued my vitriolic creative juices again.

I’ve been to this country three (3) times now, and even not including the times when I had my money grifted at the border crossing and my digital camera stolen from my bag, I STILL have yet to find anything even remotely redeeming about this place.

It’s not so bad that I actively dislike the place, it’s just that, in relation to all the other countries in the region, Vietnam is a Southeast Asian version of Carnival Cruise Lines — on paper, it appears just as good as … say, Thailand or Laos or even Indonesia. But then, when you actually get there, you find out the other passengers are trashier, the cabins are dingier, the food less tasty, the daiquiris watered down, the cruise overbooked, and the crew less accommodating than other cruise lines. And sure, the pool LOOKS great, but there’s a lingering feeling the entire crew has been surreptitiously pissing in the pool every time your back in turned.

The total effect of all this is to leave a nasty aftertaste in your soul, despite any efforts to the contrary.

Maybe my problem (if it can be called that) is that I’ve grown to love Thailand and Laos to such an extent that everything else pales in comparison (even Indonesia, which I also like). As a result, as it now stands, I’d rather hang out in my hotel room surfing the net rather than go outside, dodge traffic, and otherwise watch the locals piss in my pool.

It’ll be interesting to see how I react upon my return to America next week.

So, it’s been a whole year since I moved to Bali. Looking back, I can still (barely) remember my reasoning for doing so:

At the time, I was basing myself out of Bangkok, but throughout the extensive (Northern Hemisphere) summer, I was only staying there 2-3 weeks every other month and spending most of my other time jockeying around the Indonesian archipelago, looking for surf.

It was costing my heaps of money in terms of running back and forth to Bangkok for visa runs, to pick up clothes, pay bills, and other random crap. Plus, at the time, there were no inexpensive direct flights from Bangkok to Bali (which Air Asia now has), and I was spending additional moneys heading through Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta, and elsewhere — most of the time heading to, or through, Bali for surf supplies before heading to another destination.

So, although I had never been a fan of Southern Bali (the over-commercialized center of the Indonesian tourist/surf scene), I decided to give it a go in the hopes the island would grow on me — I’d practice my Indonesian, be able to surf on a more regular basis, and save some much needed money.

One year later and, despite all I’ve learned in terms of Indonesian culture, the international surf scene, and my own surfing abilities … I am, quite possibly, less of a fan of Bali than I was before I moved here last year.

The main reason for that is (apparently) indicated in the Taylor Steele movie I referenced in my last post — now that I’ve been here and I’ve been able to get a feel for some areas still untouched by tourism, it puts into sharp contrast the tourist nightmare that exists everywhere else on the island. And the greed, crowds, and incongruous stress that has become indicative of life here.

It used to be a lovely island, a tropical paradise. But no longer. That era is long gone.

It’s getting far too tiring to live here. The positives no longer outweigh the negatives. And it’s time for me to go.

I usually don’t post movie trailers here at all, let alone ones featuring story lines mimicking my own personal tale so closely. However, ‘The Drifter’ is different.

Primarily because I’m a big fan of the film’s star, Rob Machado (one of the preeminent ‘soul surfers’ of my generation, and whom I’ve actually met several times a decade ago while I was living in San Diego, and again later here in Indonesia), and its director, Taylor Steele (one of the more prominent, and talented, directors of the modern surf film).

Again, the apparent crux of the film echoes my own journey so closely that it’s eerie (except for the fact that I’m not a professional surfer, not world famous, not sponsored by Hurley, and in no way, shape, or form nearly as talented as is Machado).

‘The Drifter’ has been shown around Bali for the past couple months in the pro and semi-pro surfing circles, and it is being released in earnest later this Fall, 2009. Steele is outstanding in his ability to weave into a typical surf movie the other, and the majority, of what actually takes place on a surf trip — 95% of which takes place OUTSIDE the water.

It’s a fantastic film. It’s a beautiful representation of the Indonesia that still exists in ever-dwindling portions of the country. And, most importantly, it’s a brilliant showcase for one of the best surfers in the world today. Take a look, and go see it when it opens in wide release.

As I mentioned in my last post, one of the reasons I’ve been kept fairly busy lately is because I’ve had friends visiting me here in Bali for the past few weeks. Included in those visits was one of my best friends from Miami and his parents. And while he already has a couple brothers, I know him well enough that he feels like a brother to me. We have different perspectives on life, and he’s always been good at getting me to see things from other perspectives.

His recent visit was nothing new.

By now, it’s no secret that I have what, on my better days would be considered a ‘distaste’ for southern Bali’s ever-increasing tourist industry. On my worse days, it would be better defined as ‘utter contempt’.

The biggest issue is that Bali has absolutely no infrastructure. It’s streets, plumbing, landfills, and power plants were never built to accommodate anything more than the villages that occupied the island 25-30 years ago. This means frequent power failures, sewage in the ocean, traffic jams, and an overall decrease in the quality of life.

Personally, I call Kuta, Bali (the main surf tourist center) ‘the ghetto’. I try to avoid even going down there unless I need surf supplies simply because, although it’s only about 5-8 km away from my home, it takes about 30-40 minutes to get there. And once there, you must deal with the constant assault by tour operators, massage ‘therapists’, and shop keepers — all vying for your money, one way or another.

It is, in a word, a mess.

As the years pass, this mess has expanded ever further beyond the borders of Kuta, Bali — and it now reaches through Legion, Seminyak, Canggu, and up through Ubud into the southern hills. And since there is no such thing as ‘city planning’ or ‘civil engineering’ in Indonesia — the result is one vast, unregulated, illogical mess of random shops, alleys, roads, and hotels.

As noted previously, this has always been a source of irritation for me, for a variety of reasons.

First and foremost is because, if you look closely, you can still see the remnants of Bali’s original beauty. There are still random temples and rice patties and roaming cows in the midst of new hotels and villas and shops and parking lots. This place really must have been an absolute paradise once upon a time — as recently as 20 years ago, from what I’ve been told.

The second reason is more pragmatic — there reaches a breaking point for unmitigated and unregulated expansion. Sure, you can build dozens of 2500 person hotels and villas up and down the beach, but if the roads can only accommodate 1000 people, then what’s the point? Ultimately, it just gets too frustrating to deal with.

But here’s where my mate comes back into play — even though he’s also lived in Asia for a while (and is used to this type of third world disorder), when I took him down to Kuta, he loved it. He loved the mess, the mayhem, the chaos.

Sure, it’s a mess now, but even though the concept of ‘logic’ is a rare commodity on Bali, it will eventually prevail — whether due to developers, politicians, or the tourist industry. They will build bigger streets, and power lines that actually work, and buildings that don’t collapse every 5 years.

Indeed, just yesterday — only one (1) day after my mate left — I noticed something:

They just completed a monstrously huge mall complex right on the beach in Legion. It sticks out like a sore thumb, simply because it’s well built, has underground parking, and would fit in at any major beach town in New South Wales, Queensland, or California. I also noticed another large shopping center being built where some older shops had just been demolished in Seminyak.

My friend was right. Sure, Southern Bali is a mess — but it’s got character. There is no other place I’ve been to — in Asia or elsewhere — that is quite like it. Yes, I complain now, and I mourn the loss of Bali’s innocent recent past. But I sense that will be nothing compared to what’s coming.

I’ve no doubt that, within only several more years, Bali will turn into every other tourist beach town in the West. And while the traffic may ease, and the electricity may work, and the fresh water may flow — something will be lost in the transition.

Because of that, I thank my friend for lending me his perspective. Probably for the first time since I moved here last October, I’m glad I’m living in Bali now. Just as I’m jealous of the blokes who rave about how pristine the island was back 20 years ago, I’m sure others will be jealous of my stories of Kuta 20 years from now, when I can tell them of the chaos — back when it wasn’t just another beach town.

I know, I’ve been slacking off with the blog lately. But between looking for work, and friends visiting me here on the island, and the surgery and various doctor visits, I haven’t had either the time or the inclination to write. Nor have I really done anything worth writing about lately — so, unless you freaks are just SO bored you want to read ‘ate, slept, walked on beach, changed bandage, slept, ate’, rest assured, you haven’t missed much.

But now that I’m back on my feet (and my surfboard), I’m starting to feel a bit more like myself. Which, in turn, means that I feel like bitching — in written form — again.

First off, in response to what I heard were less than satisfactory reviews to my posts concerning my trip to Hong Kong several months ago, I will say only this to anyone who felt that way: … how to put this politely? umm … fuck you?

I’ve never made any secrets about the fact that, in addition to documenting my travels over the past few years for both my own posterity and for my friends and family to keep track of my whereabouts, this blog is also an outlet for me to bitch and moan. When I do it about celebrities and politicians, I get all kinds of fan mail. But when I do it about friends and family, I get grief. But it’s just a freaking blog, people — let’s keep things in fucking perspective.

Let me say this again another way — I don’t know Fergie. She may be a lovely person for all I know. But that will never prevent me from comparing her to Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Simply because it’s out there.

Similarly, any one of you people reading who has ever been married, has ever had siblings, or has ever had parents (… wait for it) — you can all attest that you have, at some point or another, gotten irritated at them, wanted to yell at them, or simply wished to slap the living shit out of them. Yet, just because I may get irritated with my friends and family at any certain point in time does not take away from the fact that I love them.

And if you think you know what exactly I’m talking about in my posts, you’re wrong. You’ve got no fucking clue. You may think you do. Indeed, I TRY to get my readers to think a certain way, because it makes for a better read — often times in direct contradiction to my actual thought processes. But you’ve no idea what I’m actually thinking. Especially those of you who’ve never even met me in person.

So, if you want to read this dribble, so be it — feel free to. But you’re the one who clicked onto this website. You should know just what to expect by doing so.

[Me, post-operative -- with new nuclear power core]

I’m just not the hero type. Clearly. With this laundry list of character defects, all the mistakes I’ve made, largely public. –Tony Stark

So it’s been a while since I’ve posted anything here.

To be honest, it’s due to several issues really — I’ve been traveling throughout Nusa Tenggara a bit, I’ve been spending some time with friends, most of what I have to say can just as easily be posted via Facebook, and finally, … well, I’ve been getting my chest opened up by doctors and stuff.

So, while I suffer no illusions that anyone still visits this blog on a regular basis — mostly due to my frequent bouts of inactivity while traveling the backwaters of Southeast Asia — I still feel the need to post a little bit about recent events, for posterity sakes if for nothing else.

As I mentioned previously, I’ve made an effort to hunker down in Indonesia for the summer in an attempt to preserve what’s left of my ever-dwindling supply of cash reserves, simply because it’s cheaper here than anywhere else in Asia (except perhaps India … and we all know how I feel about that shithole country).

So I’ve been alternating between here in Bali, and going out to Nusa Tenggara for surfing and to visit friends. I recently was out there surfing, and then took a side trip out to Flores for a little exploration. Although Flores was a bit tumultuous at times, I had a great time.

The down side was that I acquired a bit of a medical problem while there. I’ll explain…

Over the past several years, I’ve built up a lump on my breastbone from where I lay on my surfboard while surfing. It sometimes gets swollen when I surf too much, and it sometimes shrinks when I stay out of the water for a while. But it has, all in all, been steadily growing over the past couple years. In medical terms, it’s an unattached, mobile, subcutaneous, cyst-like … ‘thingy’ that, in itself, poses no harm.

However, for whatever reason, while I was in Flores, it got infected. Maybe an ingrown hair. Maybe just internal bacterium. Don’t know why. It just started to swell, and hurt. I’ve had similar issues both back in University and in Law School (altho on my leg and my lower back, respectively). So I knew what it was, and I knew I had to return to Bali to get it removed by a doctor before the infection spread.

The problem is that, although Bali is the closest place to get competent medical assistance, it’s also extremely expensive to do so, since the hospitals are used to catering to rich tourists with extensive travel insurance. Unfortunately, I am neither rich, nor do I have travel insurance.

So I spent a good 2 days going from hospital to hospital, clinic to clinic, doctor to doctor — spending about US$200.00 in the process on ‘consultation fees’ — just to find someone who would help me without getting financially raped in the process. I found out the hard way that, as a foreigner, this is much harder than it would first appear.

Indeed, at one point, I found myself negotiating for assistance with the surgeon at Kasih Ibu Hospital in Denpasar — like I was buying a car … or a mango.

Beforehand, I wasn’t aware that ‘standard of care’ was negotiable. Now I know better.

Regardless, I finally found a decent, relatively inexpensive, and ultimately competent surgeon at Prima Medika Hospital, also in Denpasar. He opened up a 3 cm hole in the middle of my chest, sucked up the infected material, cut out the scar tissue, and cauterized the cyst-walls. I’ve had the wound left open for 3 days now to let the whole thing continue to drain until the infection is gone.

I return tonite for the doctor to add the new nuclear power cells and stitch the whole thing back up, after which, I should be god to go.

And I’ll be able to fly and shit too, yo.

True. True.

Last week marked the [REDACTED] year anniversary of when I [REDACTED] and left the States to instead begin my inexorable journey down the long road back to the middle. To commemorate the occasion, I purchased an 8 foot Mini-Malibu longboard to replace the one I left in The Philippines last year.

I’ve got a fairly rounded out quiver of surfboards at this stage — appropriate for most types of surf I can get out here in Indo, and indeed, around the world.

True, I still need a nice longer gun for some of the bigger, hollower Indo waves. But the way I see it, I can still barely perform adequately on the boards I’ve got. So let’s not kid ourselves — sure, my skill level has increased dramatically from when I first left my job, and I’m still best riding a longboard, but I’m never going pro on ANY length board. EV-ER.

That being said, I took the new longboard out for a spin today and realized/remembered that I essentially just started surfing last year or so. Before then, I was riding longboards almost exclusively. And while there are a whole slew of skills associated with longboarding, it is in no way, shape or form the same as riding a regular surfboard.

I honestly thought I’d enjoy going back to the longboard again, but to be honest — I found it a bit boring now that I’ve experienced the thrills of riding big hollow tubes, and actually WORKING the wave the way you can only on a shorter board.

My biggest problem in the water is still my ongoing frustration with myself more than anyone else in the water. With all my time in the water, I feel like I should be a far better surfer at this stage in the game. But like I just said — I”ve essentially only just started surfing about 1-2 years ago. I hope I can bring some of that realization with me when I go back out on one of my shorter boards and do a snap off the lip, or get another amazing barrel ride — with that huge ‘whooshing’ sound of the wave closing in behind and atop me.

It’s all good, mate. Semua bagus, dan saya senang sekali.

After a month in Timur Leste (East Timur) and Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia, I’m back in Bali again. I’ll probably be here a month or so, but I’ve got friends visiting from the States, Australia, and Asia for the next couple months, so I may be traveling a bit too.

I’ll keep you guys up to speed, such as it is.

P.S. BTW, no more posts about surf spots — EVER!! And I’m making all prior posts private. I met a bunch of Euro’s who found out about my spots by reading this blog. Talk about shooting yerself in the foot, mate.

I’m in Dili, East Timor getting a new Indonesian tourist visa. After a 12 hour bus ride from Kupang to Dili, it looks like I’m gonna be here a few days. I waited at the Indo Embassy this morning for a couple hours, and now I need to wait another couple days before they issue the visa itself (which I’m told is fairly quick, all things considered).

There’s pretty much NOTHING here but UN and NGO personnel mucking up the place. But apparently, there’s some good diving spots in the area — which I plan on checking out if any places take me despite the fact I left my dive card back in Bali. We’ll see how it plays out.

Other than that, it really is kind of a bizzare little world here. It’s your typical 3d world shit-hole (excuse my Euro-centric judging), but the cost of everything is absolutely through the ROOF. Whereas I can get a pretty nice room in Bali (of all places) for about US$8 per nite, here in Dili, the cheapest I could find was for US$23 — and I’m sleeping in a converted shipping container (no joke — it’s actually kinda cool[ish]). It’s like being back in Hong Kong — only without the style, nightlife, and well … civilization.

On top of that, they’ve got the second biggest Jesus statute in the world here (let’s here it for the Portugese — the first biggest Jesus statue is in Brazil, ANOTHER former Portugese refugee camp).

It’s another one of those places with a really strange vibe going on — the locals still have a kinda ‘subservient mentality’ from the many years of Portuse and Indonesian abuses here, and from what I’ve heard, now the UN people have kinda continued with that tradition a bit.

It’s kinda sad to see almost everyone FROM here look away and down, instead of smiling and waving — or even trying to sell you stuff like they do everywhere else in Asia. It’s kinda sad.

I’m still getting my bearings, but I don’t think I’ll be here too long this time for it to make a deeper impression. I plan on heading back to Indo first thing after getting my visa on Wednesday — I don’t think I could afford to stay here much longer.

With an area of just over 5,600 square kilometers (just over 2,170 square miles), the island of Bali is fairly large — nearly 10 times as large as Manhattan. And three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based.

But now, tourism is the largest single industry. And tourist season is in full swing.

So, in addition to the 3.1 million or so natives, the 1 million or so other domestic workers (from Java and other islands), there are about 2 gazillion tourists roaming the streets, clogging the roadways, and otherwise kooking up the surf. And while it’s good for the locals (they need the tourism money) and it’s nice to see the new faces (sorta), it’s also still getting just a bit much for me.

After one of my good friends broke her leg in 2 places this week when she got hit by some kook on a motorbike, and after I went surfing out at Uluwatu’s a couple days ago with about 100 (no joke) of my closest ‘friends and family’, I remembered my initial plan when first moving to Bali — I wanted to use this island ONLY as a supply point and a ‘stepping stone’ to those other spots in Indonesia I TRULY love.

So I’m going someplace a bit calmer for a while.

First, I’m heading to Dili (East Timur) for a visa run, then I’m going back to Pulau Rote — about 1200 square kilometers, with an estimated total population of 100,000.

The village where I’m going (pictured above), there’s no internet, no running water, and the electricity is turned on for about 6-8 hours per day. The tourist population is limited to other silly foreigners looking for surf and quiet. And there’s not much to do besides surfing, sleeping, and the occasional jalan-jalan to the next village.

Hold all my calls, I’m gonna be off the grid for a while.

Today epitomizes one of the many ways Asia is so different to the States.

Today — or rather, this evening — the electricity in the entire towns of Legion and Seminyak — two of the biggest tourist and/or expat locales here on Bali — lost electricity for most of the afternoon and evening. Indeed, it is now about 8:30 at night, I’m at at a coffee shop working off a generator, and the electricity is still not on back in my house.

Chances are, nobody in a position of power (no pun intended) has even been alerted yet to the fact the electricity is, in fact, not working. Granted, the electricity goes out here on a fairly regular basis, but only for 15-20 minutes at a time — most likely due to overloads in the power grid. But the last time something like this happened for an extended period of time (a power pole went down on my street), it took most of 1.5 days for anyone to even START working on repairing the problem (and another 2 days for the power to eventually return — by which time, I was already gone to Bangkok).

Yes, California is also now prone to ‘revolving power outages’. But the outpouring of righteous indignation and immediate demands for assistance I’ve witness there whenever THAT happens is absolutely ridiculous — even by California standards.

In contrast, here in Bali, nobody even seems to notice. Or care all that much … besides us Westerners. To wit, while the local family from whom I rent my villa took the outage as a call to make it an early evening, I simply had to get to a coffee shop and the internet, lest I be bored to death by the presence of candles and silence.

Sure, I like to play Asian, and I may raise my voice in defiance every once in a while, but as soon as the electricity goes down, my true colours come out. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to get back to my iced late and the latest episode of The Daily Show — who knows if I’ll have my HBO back on when I get back home.