Pep Talk Required
When Pepito Express opened on Jl Raya Uluwatu near GWK on
the Bukit a couple of years ago, the occupants of The Cage along with many
other nearby residents rushed its doors. Inside there was not only a good range
of products often otherwise unobtainable in Bali shops, but also aisles down
which one could progress without first having to become bulimic to fit. It was
a treat.
Sadly, and no
doubt in search of immediate feet through the door rather than a steady
build-up of high-spending local consumers, things have changed. The place has
become a calling point for huge buses which disgorge crowds of confused and
apparently impecunious Taiwanese and Korean tourists (they never seem to
understand the marked price or have the right money). The aisles have been
stuffed with convenience foods (seaweed snacks seem to loom large) and there is
no longer room to wheel your trolley down them with even the vague hope that
you might find a regular Oreo as well as your normal range of western consumer
products.
One evening
recently when The Diary and Distaff called in on a substantial resupply mission
the place was impossible. The aisles had assumed trade store dimensions (and
the assorted obstacle courses of cardboard cartons that goes with this genre of
shopping); the staff apparently had better things to do than look after
customers; and the salad shelves were full of listlessly limp post-greens.
We may just have
hit them on a particularly bad night, but the result of this un-Pepito-like experience
was that the facilities of our formerly favourite emporium much further away,
Lotus on the bypass at Jimbaran, suddenly looked rather attractive again.
Leap Before You Look
One of the more engaging of the local habits is the practice
of walking out into the traffic and signalling a sort of pelan-pelan
(slowly-slowly) instruction to oncoming drivers and riders. It’s a way of
getting across an otherwise virtually gridlocked road, certainly.
In many ways it
is not dissimilar to the happy habit in Hanoi, Vietnam, where pedestrians
wishing to cross the most frenetic of roads (and worse, intersections) simply
plunge into the mayhem and walk steadily and on a fixed course in their chosen
direction. They are confident the ubiquitous motorcycles will miss them. The
buses sometimes don’t, though that’s another matter.
But (that
essential codicil!) you have to know what you’re doing. It helps, too, to know
where you’re going. If you are unsure of
either of these things, and especially if unsure of both, do not attempt to
tempt the traffic.
Near Ungasan
crossroads the other day there was a lovely little incident. A chap in a
vehicle – a Bule of course; no fists would have been raised otherwise – who was
(un)happily crawling along at 10kmh in the lengthy line of traffic behind yet
another defective and overloaded yellow truck, was horribly surprised when a
passing local gent suddenly leaped from the footpath (sic), put up his hand,
and walked out straight in front of him. The vehicle’s driver slammed on the
anchors: It’s so much easier than finding out the idiot you’ve just nudged
happens to have 5,000 cousins in the immediate vicinity.
In true Bali
fashion, the incident was locally viewed as entirely the fault of the
Bule. After all, if he hadn’t been on
the island, he wouldn’t have been involved.
Jingle Belles
The Diary got a lovely invitation from jewellery designer
Tricia Kim – we go back such a long way, she and we, all the way back to the
2009 Yak awards where we ran into each other upon the steps at the then new
Cocoon and didn’t know each other from a bar of soap, something now pleasantly
rectified – to attend the launch of her 2012 collection on December 7.
It would have
been delightful to be there, for Tricia’s svelte and energetic company through
a relaxing afternoon, the new collection of course, and the afternoon tea
including cupcakes (can’t resist them) and sandwiches along with mojitos. A
complimentary mani-pedi available on a first come, first served basis would
have been good too. The claws could do with a buffing.
And then there
was the venue: Di Astana Villa at Kerobokan (it’s in Jl Batu Belig on the way
down to the beach there).
Unfortunately we
were in Ubud on other duties at the time and couldn’t make it. But we’ll catch
up with the collection later.
No Need to Duck
Sakinah Nauderer, the decorative and delightfully enigmatic
proprietor of Senggigi’s Asmara Restaurant – a place of fine resort when in
Lombok – tells us her Christmas plans this year include no more rubbery local
ducks. Imported turkey will fill that role (and a lot of tummies) this season.
She plans a
Christmas Brunch Buffet on the day itself, starting from 12 noon, and at 1.30pm
the children’s gospel choir from Ampenan will entertain guests with appropriate
vocals. This Christmas treat costs Rp175K for adults and Rp50K for children
aged six to 12. If you’re under six, you don’t pay at all. There’s a lucky draw
after the turkey and the choir.
Here’s the menu:
Welcome drink and bruchetta; creamy lobster soup; stuffed turkey with gravy and
cranberry sauce (prawns are available for non-turkey-eaters); spiced red
cabbage; cauliflower and broccoli cheese; potato croquettes and roast potatoes.
Desserts on offer are cheesecake, apple pie and chocolate cake with whipped
cream. There’s coffee and tea to follow if by then you’re not as stuffed as
your turkey.
Cook Up
Janet DeNeefe’s new book collecting recipes and photos of
Bali and just published by Pan Macmillan Australia has been snapped up by a
keen cook in Australia who – naturally enough – read about it in The Diary. He
tells us he’ll be trying out his personal top choice from the menus when next
he arranges a candlelight dinner.
After our
original item in The Diary last issue, DeNeefe told us copies of her book
(Bali: The Food of my Island Home) were a little scarce hereabouts. They were
“still in Surabaya.” We sympathise. So much that should be cleared through the
wharves and customs in no time flat instead finds itself in limbo as a result
of that pernicious and endemic disease, Surabaya Syndrome.
Hill Town Daze
We took some very special visitors to Ubud recently – The
Diary’s sister and her husband, who spent a week with us just out of the UK via
Bangkok on their way to two months in Australia. The Diary is a Wayan – so is
the Distaff, which occasionally creates problems of precedence – and the Brit
Sis is a Made. All this was made clear over a gin and tonic or three.
Ubud was its usual
self: spiritual, quaint, eclectic and jammed with huge charabancs quite
unsuitable for the little town’s streets. We stayed at Beji Ubud Resort at
Sanggingan, where sadly, this time, the internet connection was rather below
par; we dined one night at Café
des Artistes, refreshed ourselves at The Three Monkeys (de rigueur for diarists
who die for pumpkin ravioli and who are now looking forward to trying out the
new T3M at Sanur) and did a few other eating and musical things, including the
new-look Jazz Café. Oh yes,
and we made sure we walked right past Naughty Nuri’s. We like a little elbow
room with our eating experience rather more than we like the in-crowd.
Sister Made was on
her way to see our other sister (she’s a Nyoman; there’s a Ketut brother who
lives in the USA) who long ago made the chilly choice to reside in Canberra,
the country’s notional capital 600 metres above sea level in the frankly frigid Southern Tablelands.
The Diary worked in that fair city for some years, on a FIFO basis, and was always
glad his office was in Parliament House. It always has a plentiful supply of
hot air.
The travelling
sister’s Australian itinerary does include more sensible parts of the country,
including tropical – and thus truly warm – Queensland.
Merry Christmas
Christmas has long since been a global retail opportunity, a
celebration of consumerism and a far cry indeed from its origins in the
Christian faith and its belief that Jesus Christ was born in a cow byre in
Bethlehem. Nonetheless, amid all the commercial pap, it does serve to remind you
that charity and goodwill, along with forgiveness, are essential elements of
life.
So Merry Christmas
to all.
Hector's Diary appears in the Bali Advertiser print edition published every two weeks and on the newspaper's website www.baliadvertiser.biz
You can follow Hector on Twitter @Scratchings and join him on his Facebook (Hector McSquawky)
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