The Swing of it

We're nearing the end of our third week of adventuring, and Ry and I are starting to get into the swing of things. This was our first week volunteering at the International Pilangi school here in Bali. Ryan has led a sporting revolution, ousting the previous reigning tyrant (the dreaded dodge ball; an all day / every day activity) and replacing it with the more awesome games we all know and love. I am, much to my original dismay and embarrassment, RE-learning 6th grade mathematics and grammar. I ask you, who here remembers how to use long division for dividing decimals?? But we're both enjoying the experience and learning a little something ourselves :)

Invaluable to us is Ryan's total badass bravery on the scooter. This is me attempting to upload a videos... so here's hoping it works out. But this is tip of the iceberg, even just from a passenger perspective, the driving here is crazy with every man, woman, child and baby (often all on the same bike together) for themselves.

Having said that, it is an awesome, way too much fun way to get around. And theres something to be said for being able to keep moving forward so long as somewhere on the street is a tiny gap big enough to fit your bike through. I barely even fear for my life anymore... :)

One activity which has pretty much become a Bali weekly special is a trip to the beach. The first beach we went to was the uber busy party time beach called Kudo Beach. The second could not have been more different, with a little trek through the wilderness before coming out on this beautiful, isolated white sand beach. King of the beach was very clearly this tiny little puppy who I snapped a picture of in his ONLY moment of semi stillness all day.

The other thus far weekly staple is a trip to the spa. We honestly can't help ourselves. With an 80 minute massage costing us the equivalent of 10 Canadian dollars... we would be fools to say no. Ever. I have rarely felt so very pampered in my entire life; I have even made a spa convert out of Ryan :)

The last thing I'll talk about this time was our viewing of a "Traditional Indonesian Fire Dance". 100 topless Balinese men provided an on-going musical narration with their voices; a rhythm that was stuck in our heads for days after. They were joined by a small cast of dancers and together they told a story I recognized about Rahma and Rhavannah. If you've seen A Little Princess then you know what I'm talking about. The woman in this picture was our leading lady, and you can see a small chunk of the many singing men who surrounded the dancers behind her.

Arguably even more entertaining, though somewhat less relevant as far as we could tell, was the man who came out after the dance was done. He was wearing a horse outfit made of straw and he.. well.. he just walked through the fire. That's all he did! He just walked back and forth through the fire in his bare feet several times. Weird... but totally impressive.

More to come! Thanks for reading.