Landing in Bali

Travel Story by Naomi Arnold

Bali, Indonesia

"This passport photo, it is not good."

It isn't good. I had glandular fever that day, and my eyes were glassy, my hair a wild dark nest.

"No, it's crap," I agree.

"Naomi," he says, squinting at my passport. "It's Japanese name, yes?"

"I think it's Hebrew," I say.

"Japanese," he says decisively, handing it back to me. "Ah! You're from New Zealand! Kia ora!"
His white teeth flash and I can't help grinning back. Welcome to Bali.

The customs officer waves my pack through with a languid 'nothing to declare' and we emerge into the soupy 26 degree heat to calls of "taxi, boss!"

"What did the Lonely Planet say a taxi should cost?" I hiss to Darren, fumbling with large notes, desperate to look nonchalant and not like the inexperienced tourists we so obviously are.

"I don't know - no, no taxi," he rumbles, waving away a lean, grinning man trying to haul our packs into his cab.

"Cheap taxi boss!"

"Good price!"

"Kuta fifty thousand rupee!"

"Bugger this," I say, and walk off toward the carpark. We approach a small, balding taxi driver in a short-sleeved white shirt, crouching on the kerb smoking a cigarette.

"Cheap!" he says and leaps up as we lug our bags towards him. He reaches to shake our hands. "My name is Amet. Thirty thousand rupee."

Darren nods approvingly. "That's cheap."

Amet grabs our bags, promising to take us to a good backpackers'. "Very good, very cheap!" Of course it is.

Amet speeds us the thirteen kilometres into Kuta with wide sweeps of his steering wheel. I grip the door handle and lurch across the seat at every turn. After Korea, driving on the left feels suicidal. As we swing through the streets I can't believe the differences between the country I've just left and the one in which I've suddenly arrived. Bali's roads, far from being the gray, staid concrete jungle of a wintering Korea, are hung with soft coloured lights and lush green vegetation. They seem cosily cluttered, a jungle of glimpse and murmur. The heat spreads all around, seeping into my winter-dry skin. Soon I am relaxed, heavy-lidded and smiling as readily as the Balinese people... until Amet swings across two lanes and almost takes out a motorbike–

We have no travel plans here, both of us just wanting to sit on the beach for as long as it takes to forget screaming students. We ask Amet for suggestions about getting out of Kuta.

"I will drive you north to Lovina Beach," he offers, pulling up at a set of wooden buildings half-hidden by trees and turning around to smile at us. We exchange glances.

"What's in Lovina?"

"Traditional Bali, dolphins, good for relax, very cheap," Amet says, patting the steering wheel. He knows the buzzwords.

"Dolphins?" I say.

"Cheap?" says Darren.

Surprisingly, it just so happens that he can take us there tomorrow, for a very good price.

We go to sleep watching the geckos creep across the ceiling, thrilled to be in a place where the outside blends so seamlessly with the inside, where there are gauzy curtains, verandahs and windows that open onto languid air. The sun has warmed the terracotta tiles outside our room, and there's thick, sweet watermelon juice for breakfast. I dodge the gecko droppings on the floor, push my snow-pale feet into sandals and head outside to explore.

Illustration by Bob Veon
(Bob Veon's Website)

Read more about the author of this story:
Naomi Arnold