Busy week. Feel dead on my feet. Should be thanking God it's the weekend.... but nooooo.

Feel like killing some of my coursemates. Brutally. Slowly. Painfully.

But I got things to be thankful about too..... like the glorious, glorious back day (ooh hurts so good). And this Sunday morning I was up at 5.30am to go off for a round of practice shooting. Juuuust got back, and I'm off to work again at the gym at 4pm. But the shoot turned out pretty okay... to be honest I wasn't really feeling sexy today and kinda flopped it. And wardrobe malfunctions... =.= GOD. I really, really wasn't a 100% today and was rather embarassed and ashamed about that.... and fuck, was I cranky and tired..... But thank you Rahul, Danny and Selvan who have been so understanding, patient and kind! And putting up with all my bitching and complaining!! I admit... I wasn't a very easy person to work with this morning. x.x

OKAY moving away from that.... here is the continuation of my Bali pictures. Yay.

Coming down Kintamani... Dewa stopped us at this beautiful coffee + spice farm.

Cocoa trees! They harvest these beans and actually make their own chocolate coffee!



Oh and by the way... did you know Bali also produces the world's most expensive coffee... the kopi luwak??


That's the civet cat sleeping in it's enclosure. Basically kopi luwak is made from coffee beans that have been passed thru the civet cat's digestive tract. So these civets are fed the coffee beans... their droppings are collected.... and....... yeah.

Costs 350,000 rupiah (RM126) for a small cup, man. NO JOKE.


The serene, park-like paths of the farm


More cocoa trees


Coffee beans!! Yummeh.


Coffee beans, cocoa beans, and vanilla pods. Don't they smell delicious!


They roast the coffee beans the traditional way too.


At one of the gazebos for the free coffee tasting session. Had to chance to sample some special Balinese coffee, which does have a very unique and distinct taste. Oh but no kopi luwak la... that expensive shit want give you free meh? Lol.


Another civet that was up and pacing around


After the coffee farm we dropped by Tirtha Empul, or the Holy Water Temple.


That clear water is NOT filtered tap water, for your information. It is clear water fresh from a spring. Amazing how clear and clean it was! You can see right down to the bottom!


What Ernie described as "a perfect shot, except for the flers bathing at the back..."
.....
Well it could've been worse. Least he's not scratching his ass, kan.


One of the temple stuctures


And this is the magnificent source of the holy water.... a crystal clear, bubbling spring. And strangely... there were these little birds all swooping above the water... touching it lightly every now and then.... and they never seem to fly off beyond the spring!


Where the water bubbles out of the earth... forming little "clouds" at the bottom. Quite a sight to behold... photos don't do it justice AT ALL.


And even further on the way is Tegallalang, famous for the paddy terrace sceneries. Unfortunately we were visiting at a wrong time - they were just planting the seedling, so it's not the beautiful lush green as it was during my previous visit.




Ubud Market! Where I did my shopping... got my mom her beaded sandals... and more silk nightrobes for meeee!!!

And one local guy said I reminded him of Manohara (the Indonesian model who married the Malaysian Kelantanese prince)...... LOL.... Like, awwww..... :)

And yes there were more comments about how strong my "husband" is.....


At the end of the day, we treated ourselves to an absolutely generous dinner. This place called Obonk in Kuta, which Shaz recommended, serves up pretty good Western fare for rock bottom prices!!!


This is my half-eaten crispy steak. Lol. And.... it costs only RM3.60!!!! Steak for RM3.60!!! Like wtf!!!


And Ernie's beef ribs... for only RM10. Good stuff too!! You tell where where in Malaysia can find beef RIBS that cheap?? Haha... we were ordering all we wanted!

And on to Day 3....


Breakfast again at our cosy hotel


Taking some pix around the lobby while waiting for Dewa


View of the hotel beach from the lobby.




And the lawn... a live bongo band actually plays there from time to time!


The pool




Ernie reading the papers. Lol.


On Day 3 Dewa brought us to Taman Ayun - the Royal Family's temple. This is the lawn where you have to walk up quite a bit before reaching the temple.



VERY precarious and narrow steps up to the watchtower. Many places of the temple were sealed up, and tourists could only look inside over the walls.






Beautiful structures.... like something out of, I dunno, Indiana Jones?? Lol. XD








Throughout this entire trip..... that pose has been painfully overused. :P


Yep. Sayang and all his posing for the locals.

More pix soon!

Day 2 in Bali......

Oooo picture heavy post. Hang on tight and pray your PC doesn't crash. Lol.

Breakfast at the hotel... The restaurant was gorgeous. Great food, beautiful poolside setting. The weather was in our favour too - it's generally cool and windy in Bali. :)

Oh the sun rises and sets earlier too. We were actually up at 6am to tackle the day!


The buffet spread.


Cereal bar!!!!!


They serve their cereal up in those elegant black baskets


Cheese and salad bar... where they are like SUUUUUPER generous with the seafood.


And this is their beef meatloaf that was so, so damn effing good I had to take a picture of it on it's own. XD And I had like second and third helping..... Nyum..... Kimmie you pig.


My sayang... still sleepy... but looking pretty happy about his food.

Oh and you actually can tick stuff on this list to order at the breakfast bar... and they serve you up your eggs with toast and crispy bacon.


Waffles... also fresh from the brekkie bar. :)


Cheeeeeeeese!! *steals the whole lot* nyahahahaha.


And some of the cakes, pastries and other baked goods.

Why we were up so early that morning was cos we had planned to go catch the Barong Dance in the morning. So we had to go grab the tickets. Basically it's like a short cultural play+dance about good versus evil... and also one scene with a comic relief. I went to see it the last time I was in Bali... but thought it would be very interesting and a must-see for Ernie.


A team of 20 men were behind the music.


The Barong... somewhat reminiscent of our own Chinese lions... but minus the acrobatics. It is believed that the people playing the Barong had to be very spiritual as it is one of the major religious icons of Bali.




The graceful Balinese dancers


Further into the play... one of the acts.






The Rangda... a demon in Balinese culture. In the legend and play it repents and goes to heaven in the end.






The final scene of the Barong dance involves a group of young men going into a trance (hence the religious leader in the front burning essence and sprinkling holy water). And this trance would make them fly into a frenzy and begin stabbing themselves with the keris in the chest, stomach and throat... but their bodies become temporarily "immortal" and they are unharmed.


The men stabbing themselves with the keris and screaming. The religious leader and also the Barong at the back help them exit the trance one by one as the performance goes on.


This picture is taken backstage. This stone decoration and the wooden doors also serve as the backdrop of the stage.


After the Barong dance, Dewa brought us to check out some of the gold and silver crafters.


At one of the art galleries... just passing thru on the way to Kintamani


Another one of the places we stopped by on the way to Kintamani - Goa Gajah

The mouth of some holy cave, where people used to meditiate inside


The statue of Ganesha inside


And we were told that these statues are some representation of fertility gods or something like that............


Around the temple grounds.... that huge stone doorway is supposed to lead down to a Buddhist temple.


One of the holy water pools


One of the pics that I really really love..... ^^




Walking thru the paddy fields to get to the Buddhist temple area...

And if you're wondering why there are suddenly so many pics of us... no I have not been harrassing fellow tourists to take couply shots for us. As you know every tourist site has a small entry fee to be paid... around 3000-6000 rupiah... and here we were approached by one local fellow who began explaining stuff around the temple and introduced himself as our temple guide. He even took my cam from me, and kept snapping pics of us and stuff........

Then we realised we were sorta conned and he wasn't part of the temple organisation when he asked us for 50,ooo rupiah =.=


Thru the jungle area after the paddy fields.
And yea thats our "guide"




A long time ago a temple actually collapsed down the cliff due to an earthquake... thats why you see the rocks sticking out there. Looking down the bridge you can still see some bits of the ancient temple too.




Another place we stopped by - Gunung Kawi. This is the road that we had to walk along to get to it.


Climbing Gunung Kawi... the scenery of the paddy terrace and trees below


Staaaaaaairs!!! LOTS of them leading to the temple area... hurray for cardio. Lol.


And here we are at the majestic stone sculptures... hewn out of the mountain itself.




Another section of the mountain. Oh yea at certain temples you are required to wear a sash or belt around your waist also. Hence my pink one and Ernie's blue.


The women preparing offerings




Lol. Even Ernie looks so dwarfed in the face of those huge sculptures!


More of the scenery along the mountain




This is where the locals used to come and pray and meditate... It's another section of the mountain and consists of several small open-air chambers in the rocks. No shoes were allowed also if you wanted to climb up to this section.




The square segments are where people would meditate in




And finally.... Kintamani. Check out the spectacular view of Mt. Batur volcano! It's also very cool and windy at Kintamani... reminiscent of Camerons.




Day 2 was all about the makan it seems....
We had a local buffet lunch at Kintamani. Not that we were being greedy... at Kintamani it's only worth it to go for their buffets. Everywhere else there is seriously either cutthroat or not so nice.


It does look very homely, doesnt it?


Stopping along d highway for pics

And oh my god.... Ernie was so, SO popular with the locals everywhere he went. Everyone wanted to touch him and admire his muscle... everwhere he went people were crowding around and commenting.... ESPECIALLY Kintamani. OMG wei I really, really wished I took a video. He was seriously being mugged by "fans"! XD Yup. Everywhere in the world.... muscle has it's appeal.


A final view of Mt. Batur


and Lake Batur.

More pics to come!!! Yes lol. God I'm gonna kill myself trying to upload them all at once... XD