Bali III

Awoke today to a brilliant fierce rain storm...now everything in this luxuriant garden where I live is glistening, the humidity such that I think I am growing ferns on my forehead....

Some (typically pontifical?) reflections about Bali....really random:

Coffee: the very best I have ever tasted....ultra-rich, aromatic, seemingly able to stand by itself without a cup....yet prepared in the Italian rather than Turkish fashion...a reason for coming here.

The food: so very suitable to the climate...most cuisines are (the dutch excepted)...macerates bits of chicken, fish, shellfish, lamb, beef or pork (remember in the largest of all Islamic nations Bali is hindu of a sort) served with rice and bits of very good veggies...spinach and scallions are wonderful...no local wines but a decent local beer....also arak....not a GREAT cuisine in terms of Malayan or Vietnamese but pleasing enough.

The people: here I go being Alfred Rosenberg again: agile, good looking, smiling, quick......seemingly very good natured (I still can't fathom the genocide of the local Chinese in the 60s).

The countryside: yes, possessed by artistic touches in almost everything...ugly hindu stuff - little totems all about...hard to judge age as everything weathers quickly in the humidity. the abundance of flowers everywhere...the one I could not identify in this magnificent hotel garden is the frangipani....may 500,00 blossoms hereabouts....the smell is floral and sandlewood.

The hotels: Bali probably has more A+ boutique hotels than anyplace else, even more than London or Paris...many of them are spectacular.

The tourists: mostly Dutch, Japanese, Australian, Italian and Singaporean.....and yet in this little computer room (3 computers) a guy came in earlier, said hello, introduced himself...ask where I was from...turns out he has just bought a pied de terre condominium next to my building!! I remember my mother's adomintion to always wear clean underwear.

I leave for Singapore tomorrow AM and then to Istanbul for parts of E Turkey unknown....