Category Archives: Travel

Travel

Nusa Lembongan with the Manta Rays

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The boat ride out to Manta Bay was choppy. The saving grace was the breathtaking scenery, like nothing I have ever seen. Turquoise waters in gradients of blue towards the shore – the canonical form of tropical waves. Massive (like, seriously, truly massive) waves crashing into naturally terraced rock formations, with the water cascading down from them like waterfalls in rapid cycles and large verdant cliffs looming overhead. In the near distance, there were many rock formations that gave me a prehistoric land-before-time type feeling. I was particularly taken by one donut-shaped large hollow rocky formation.

The boat was bouncing up and down, right and left. I hadn’t slept the night before from stomach flu, and I hoped it would all end for me right there very quickly. The hour-long boat ride passed with me getting drenched every other minute as the boat pitched forward, backward, side to side, water splashing me overhead. I wish I had photos, but honestly, it was too harrowing, and my bag was drenched. (Um, why did they tell me it was fine to bring my bag on the boat? Nevermind.) Continue reading Nusa Lembongan with the Manta Rays →

Travel

Traveling alone

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Sunset selfie on Gili Air enjoying my alone time
Sunset selfie on Gili Air enjoying my alone time

The other night in Gili Air, I was looking for wifi to cancel my flight (again). My flight was supposed to take off…in a few hours from now actually. I stomped onto the beaches of multiple restaurants demanding the code and stomped out. In one particular restaurant – Chillout Bungalows – I went for the multiple-entry stomping.

Suddenly, I heard, “Excuse me.” I looked up and saw a laid-back-looking blonde guy. I had noticed him looking at me with bemusement the last few times I had stomped onto the beach to decipher the piece of paper handed to me by the waiter and type in the “username” and “password” fields. Hands up in air! How the F is anyone supposed to understand these instructions????????

“Thank god!” I thought. “This guy knows the wifi password.” Continue reading Traveling alone →

Travel

Gili Air scuba

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Sunrise on Gili Air looking at the volcanos of Lombok
Sunrise on Gili Air looking at the volcanos of Lombok

When the wifi gods are cooperating with me, I’ll have to upload photos. I’m on a tiny little island called Gili Air near Lombok. It is part of an archipelago of three Gili Islands – Gili Trawangan (party island), Gili Meno (fairly deserted), and Gili Air (still very quiet but a bit in the middle).

I had considered coming here at the beginning of my Bali trip, but due to full boats and other considerations, I had crossed it off the list. When I was in Amed, I met a German family, and we snorkeled together. Afterwards, the father, Neil, approached me and told me I should go to Gili Air, to Manta Dive, and complete my open water certification. I really didn’t give it much thought except that I remembered SCUBA being on my 2016 New Year’s resolution list (well, less of a resolution and more of a strong interest). I decided to go for it. My full moon meditation/drinking sessions were wearing on me a bit, and I was ready to move on to a place where I could be fully alone. The next day, I was on a boat to Gili Air.

Gili Air is beautiful. Crystal clear turquoise waters, white beaches, and sandy pathways with directional wooden signs listing lodging and food locations. No cars or scooters – just horses. Several times a day, you will hear the haunting call to prayer in the distance (Bali is Hindu, but the rest of Indonesia is Muslim). While most of the island is populated with tourists – largely Danes, French, and Germans – it maintains a relaxed vibe.

Yo, check out that blue water in the background.

Gili Air island selfie

And those sunsets…hello-o-o-o?!

Continue reading Gili Air scuba →

Life, Travel

Spa day, Amed

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Over the past few weeks, I’ve been defrosting. I’m trying to lead a healthy life, feel real feelings, and be less of a corporate robot. It’s been working, and I finally understand why people have been telling me to take time to heal and not rush into a new job. I know even know what I really want or who I really am without the layers of having spent so much time playing different roles to be with different people and hold different jobs.

It’s almost like I’m letting the valve of my subconscious mind open in spurts to release pent up energy, and every day things get just a little bit clearer. Most notably, I’ve been feeling disappointment and pain a lot more and in a more real way that I had previously. When I was working, you could have told me the world was going to end, and I would have coldly and immediately started asking questions to diagnose the gravity of the situation, drafting up a workplan, and assembling a team to save it. And then having regular and daily check-ins as necessary to make sure we were on track. With only resolve and determination, only affected passion (no real emotion), and no real fear. Dead inside. When you’ve gone through so much shit and calamity and everything is crumbling around you, and you’re the only one doing anything about it, and it is exhausting but effective, it’s pretty easy to get in that mode. War. Survival. Live another day. Fight this battle but know there will be the next one coming up in minutes. Nothing could phase me. I was broken inside and despairing, but on the outside, especially when it came to work, everything was goal-oriented and transactional.

Now it’s all starting to come out. Continue reading Spa day, Amed →

Travel

Full Moon Meditasi

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“During the full moon, not much sleep. The energy is too strong. One day before and one day after too,” my new friend Smiling Buddha had said the day before.

I don’t know if it was the energy, the arak drinks, my neuroses, or the deafening sounds of roosters and other wildlife, but yes, I had tossed and turned all night and was up by 5am. I was plagued by the usual inertia. I really don’t want to do anything, but I’m also going to be miserable doing nothing. And I am certainly not going to plan a thing. Herein lies the basic problem of my general condition.

I managed to get myself up for long enough to half-heartedly check out the (ok, fairly stunning) sunrise.

Sunrise Meditasi

Feeling anti-social, I headed into breakfast and encountered Smiling Buddha, who informed me that we would be eating mackerel together that night and then drinking the champagne he had been saving for 7 months. Continue reading Full Moon Meditasi →

Life, Travel

Healing in Amed

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Yesterday, I woke up wondering why I had canceled my flight back to NYC. I was tired of living out of my suitcase and surfer life immersion. I had racked up $750 in data roaming charges. The weather forecast only looked bleak. Hello, Island of the Gods, were you sending me the wrong signal to stay? Did you mean go?

Now that I’m in Amed, I get it. The spiritual part of my journey is really only beginning. My Uber driver picked me up from McDonalds in Jimbaran, and we began our winding 3-hour drive, mostly in silence, me with my phone in airplane mode, reflective, hurt, and ready to move to the next phase. I had been emailing with a hotel called Meditasi earlier in the morning, and they told me to just show up, and I could see the options. It sounded like a perfect hideaway right on the beach with meditation, yoga, and good snorkeling. “I am on my way,” I wrote them from the McDonald’s parking lot before shutting down my phone connections.

The car passed through villages, mountains, and rice terraces. I started to feel better, a bit more distant.

Rice terraces driving up to Amed

Continue reading Healing in Amed →

Travel

My McDonald’s moment

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McDonalds Jimbaran

One obvious fact about me is that I travel a lot. A lesser known fact about me is that I have McDonald’s cheeseburgers in every country I travel to. It’s something I’m actually pretty embarrassed about, but whatever. I’m normally a pretty healthy eater, but it’s the ultimate comfort food for me in moments when I have to navigate new streets, cultures, itineraries, and plans. Maybe it’s that childhood Happy Meal effect (I mean, the food itself is not that great), but it does have an oddly grounding effect on me.

So now, I’m sitting in McDonald’s in Jimbaran, where I was just dropped off to find an Uber to Amed or some other destination. I met a driver in the parking lot going to Lembongan Island, so I considered that as well. Going with the flow, after all. After a week of being in two villas and living an alternative lifestyle and spending 24/7 with a person I barely know and his friends, I am ready for me time. Meditation time. No more 10-drink nights every night. Coffee when I want it. Wifi when it’s available. Not being overly budget conscious all the time. Continue reading My McDonald’s moment →

Travel

What surfing taught me about myself and life

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Me and Kik getting ready to go out to Padang Padang

One of the things I definitely wanted to do while in Bali was to go surfing. I’ve surfed twice before, once in Costa Rica and once in New York in the Rockaways. Spending the last few days hanging out with surfers, I’ve realized surfing is a mentality and that there is serious self-selection in those who decide to pursue it as a lifestyle. They’re people who’ve tried living other types of lives, maybe even holding “real jobs,” but they can’t live without the ocean and without waves. It’s a kind of religion. Everything is given up for surfing in an almost fatalistic kind of way. Weather conditions and tides are studied scientifically, as is the ocean in all its finer details. There’s a fair bit of partying and a “let it go, come what may” attitude towards life. People help each other out. Major activities other than surfing involve plenty of relaxation, partying, and watching the sunset with beers – a different beach every night. Continue reading What surfing taught me about myself and life →

Travel

Flight canceled

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So…10 hours before my flight, I have decided finally to cancel it for real. I had canceled and booked again earlier today. I am officially untethered. I’m excited by the freedom, but I’m also terrified. Let’s see what the next days bring. I feel like I have unfinished business on the Island of the Gods.

Life, Travel

Before sunrise

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Four year ago, I was traveling on my own for the first time basically ever – my 48-hour trip to Bali. On my second (and last) night on the island, I decided to treat myself to a lovely Italian dinner in Seminyak, a ritzy and now tourist-overrun beach neighborhood of Bali. I was sitting alone at the bar feeling free but also slightly self-conscious.

I felt the air pressure change next to me and felt the shadow of someone sitting down on the stool to my left. Instead of stiffening and staring down or straight ahead, I forced myself to turn and acknowledge this shadow’s presence. He drummed up a conversation and was clearly a bit nervous, which I found disarming and less threatening…almost charming. I felt myself relax a bit as he explained that he was in the back room for someone’s birthday party, he was a surfer and furniture-maker who had split time between Bali and California for the last 15+ years, etc. He was turning 38 the next day. I could tell he was nervous because he kept almost falling off the chair and then complaining about the screws in the chair in some incoherent way that seemed like nerves.

Eventually, his group of friends showed up from the back of the restaurant – a mixed crew of Indonesians and non-Indonesians, many of them women. Continue reading Before sunrise →

Food, Travel

My cooking class at Moksa

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“Cooking” raw vegan is a labor of love. Many hours pass as you wait for things like coconut crepe sheets (used for spring rolls, wraps, samosas) to be finished in the dehydrator. Some recipes require 36 hours! That’s a lot of time…and electricity. Personally, I’m happy grabbing handfuls of arugula periodically from the fridge. No plate. Straight into mouth. My version of raw vegan.

Nevertheless, I had an unbelievable 5-hour class with the head chef of a raw vegan Ubud restaurant, Moksa. I had such an amazing dinner there that I asked the chef for a lesson, and he agreed. This place makes raw vegan legitimately delicious – gastronomic – not just healthy-tasting, and I want to be able to be able to do the same at home (whenever it is that I’ll get there…and stay there…sigh). I’m thinking of cutting down on meat.

Here’s some stuff Chef Made (pronounced MAH-day) and I made:

  1. Asian Zucchini Noodles (i.e., Heaven)

Asian Zucchini Noodles

Basically, this involves selecting some veggies, massaging them in tamari, onion powder, garlic powder, and lime juice, and then mixing them into “zoodles” (zucchini noodles made from a spiralizer). Top with some spiced cashew crunchiness. La piece de la resistance! (Too lazy to find the accented “e”). Continue reading My cooking class at Moksa →

Life, Travel

Ubud-iful

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My Bali trip has been off and then on and then off and then on again. The first cancellation was to accommodate a job interview in San Francisco. The second booking was avoided due to bad weather. There were a few other mental misfires as well – many Delta search scenarios were run. Finally, the weather looked good, the Skymiles redemption miles looked decent, and it was time to go. Instead of booking to leave immediately, I decided to wait a few days and finish out the week in SF. Such uncharacteristic restraint. I decided to break up the trip with a stopover in Japan. All was set.

The Bali of my memories was beautiful, natural, uninhabited. All 48 hours of it (clearly enough to be an expert). I arrived late at night and was shuttled over to a beautiful resort in Jimbaran Bay. I ventured out a bit to Seminyak and other areas for southern Bali nightlife. The missing pieces in my imagination had been filled with stories from my friends’ past trips, including an over-the-top celebrity Indonesian wedding of a high school friend where the bride and groom had flown some of our friends out to Bali on a private jet from the U.S. I wish I had been invited to that one! Damn. Yes, my view was extremely distorted.

My arrival in Bali this time around was a rude awakening. Continue reading Ubud-iful →

Life, Travel

My happy place

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In February 2012, I visited Bali for the first time. I was visiting a good friend of mine from grad school in Singapore, and I took a few days to visit Bali as a side trip. I didn’t have enough pages left in my passport, so it almost didn’t happen. They wouldn’t let me get on the plane the first time around. But I went to the embassy in Singapore and was able to get on a flight one day later than originally planned. Magic.

I was going through a major transition (well, do we ever really stop that process? So tired, please tell me yes!). I had recently gotten out of an 11-year relationship. I was changing careers and starting a new job the following month. I had moved into an apartment and was living alone for the first time…ever. It was a trip that started a period of independence for me. It was my first solo trip ever, and the first of many since then.

I didn’t know what to expect, and I was completely blown away when I arrived at my palatial suite at the Intercontinental Hotel in the Jimbaran. Seriously, I felt like I was on a honeymoon with myself! From the balcony, I could hear the ocean. It was night, probably around midnight, and I ran down to the beach. I was alone. It was so quiet, and the waves were crashing down. When I think of the happiest moments of my life, this is one of them. Here’s a video:

The thing about recreating memories or returning to places from your past is that it’s often not possible. It was a special time at a special place at a special moment. It is a kind of magic. How do you find magic again? Unfortunately, I don’t think you can. I think it finds you when you’re chilled out and open, not frantically looking for answers.

This trip to Bali has been very different, equally special but certainly different. I’ve experienced the crazy hectic tourism that I missed the first time around. I’m older. My sensibilities have changed. I’m visiting new locations, thinking new thoughts. I haven’t even seen the beach yet. I don’t know why I’m avoiding it.

Travel

Miyajima Island

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Torii Shrine Gates Miyajima

Itsukushima (known as Miyajima) is an island off Japan, approximately an hour from Hiroshima by a combination of train and ferry. To do it justice, I think you need at least a half day there to walk around and go on some mini-hikes. It’s quaint, beautiful, and while there are a fair number of tourists there, it doesn’t feel overrun. It’s best known for the Itsukushima Shrine and the floating shrine gate. It’s actually not floating, but during high tide, it appears like it’s floating in the water. Google image search it. It’s pretty sweet. Alas, I did not make it during high tide or do much hiking. Rushing out the door and trying to look good leads to poor footwear decisions. I saw a ton of deer. Literally, you look around and see deer everywhere. I settled for that and a selfie (I’m the one on the left).

Me at MiyajimaDeer at Miyajima