2 months travelling around South-East Asia...

KUTA - BALI

The first and obligatory stop is Kuta, the main destination and a top-level tourist center. Bali is not like the rest of Indonesia, here tourism has considerably developed the economy and standards of the island, but, thanks also to the not too many tourists circulating in these recent troubled times, a wave of relaxation assails me as soon as I settle in. Hotel surrounded by greenery with a pool, silence everywhere, and all for just 8 euros per double room... The road leading to the beach is short but "densely populated" by every kind of "hyena-seller" offering everything and more: from taxis to scooters, from massages to sexual services...

The psychological pressure and the insistence of these characters are the only truly negative note of this otherwise paradisiacal, wonderful island...beaches, palms, sun, white sand and sea......I lose the strength to do anything, I just want to lie down and not think about anything...

UBUD - BALI

Just an hour from Kuta there's Ubud, a little town where the relaxing little market stands out (yes, because even that has an I-don't-know-what of soporific about it...) and where the dense and hot air is cut almost artistically, like slashes on a painted canvas, by little temples scattered just about everywhere, where not a single "famous" god is worshipped, but dozens of faces and bodies with monstrous shapes, so famous in Balinese culture that expresses the Hindu religion in a decidedly particular way, which revitalize, without however disturbing, the slow passing of the minutes during the long days of Ubud...

It must be said that the little market momentarily loses its tranquility as soon as I start a round of haggling bordering on indecency, where I and a small group of round ladies gamble over a couple of ashtrays down to the last cent of a dollar......in the end both sides come out victorious... In the evening I return to Kuta stuffed with food in my stomach, since I've done nothing but walk, haggle and stop practically in all the bars of the town...

...AROUND BALI...

Telling about the long days spent rolling from the hotel pool to the beach is not of great interest, and the only feeling I could spark in those who feel like reading, besides boredom, I believe could be a healthy and understandable envy. A couple of tips for breathing Bali freely, such as renting a scooter and zigzagging through traffic, with left-hand drive I'd like to point out, is one of the best choices to experience this wonderful island in complete freedom. I wandered without a precise destination the whole time I had the scooter and Kuta was my starting base. I saw beaches, bays and little towns. And the "free time" I spent in a rigorously horizontal position in the company of Morpheus and Apollo...

While I write I admire how a little girl places just about everywhere (on the fruit baskets, on the ground in front of the entrances and doors of every building, on the hoods of cars...) little open boxes, made of straw, containing a bit of rice, fruit, flowers and a stick of incense... These are the offerings that daily, with the same simplicity with which we have coffee or buy the newspaper, the Balinese use to ward off evil spirits and thank the good ones. And everything is so well blended with the normal activities of every day, that even for a tourist, seeing these offerings everywhere and dodging them, on foot or by motorbike, becomes normal and routine... In Laos I read a book by an Italian journalist who traveled the world on a Vespa. Before starting his travels he lived in Bali.

And now I realize that only by coming to this island and tasting its many and different fruits can you understand why. Not by chance, even with its attacks, Bali has been voted for 5 consecutive years the most beautiful island in the world. I wonder: if it's discovered that paradise, or at least something that can come close to what in the common imagination represents it, therefore exists, why don't we have the courage to come and live here?!? I'm thinking about it. I think about it every day... So I leave Bali, tanned and regenerated, ready (so to speak...) for another 10, but unfortunately the last, days of sea in Thailand...poor me! Of what Bali offers I've seen and experienced little or nothing. And this is more than enough reason to promise myself to return. And who knows if the next time I set foot here it won't be to stay for a long, very long time...