Crafting memories

One last Bali blog, written with chilly fingers on the train from Paekakariki to Wellington. On our last day in Bali, we woke grasping for ways to hold on to the Bali experience. We called our wonderful and helpful driver, Made, and asked him to take us to the stonecutting village nearby so that we could pick a statue for our garden. Made (pronounced Mah-day, which all Balinese parents name their second-born children) took us first to the most famous stone cutter in Bali, and we wandered amongst sandstone Buddha heads the size of a Mini Cooper and green marble Ganeshas standing like soldiers along the side of the road. We fell in love with three statues, each too big to bring home in a suitcase. And, once we asked, each too expensive as well—four to eight million rupiahs each (that’s US$400-800) with shipping to NZ another five million rupiahs. Made smiled and we piled back into the car to his uncle’s stone carving shop. There we wandered amongst nearly the same statues (the Buddha heads maybe only the size of a SmartCar) with prices 80% lower. We picked four we liked and began to narrow down, knowing we wanted two for the garden. I went off to make a final distinction, visiting each of them in turn, and came back to find Michael shaking hands with the carver. “Which ones did you decide on?” I asked, somewhat peevishly (he had picked without me!). He smiled sheepishly. “Why choose?” he asked, echoing what Keith calls the Jennifer-philosophy (he had not picked at all!). So in five weeks (allegedly), we’ll get a shipment of four beautiful pieces of Bali—let the holiday continue eternally in the garden.

The second half of that day we spent creating our own art. In Bali, which is famous for all kinds of art work, you can take a class which teaches you to create rudimentary versions of the beautiful things you see: wood carvings, stone carvings, batik, silver jewelery. We picked the silver. The four of us went to the workshop of a silversmith whose work we had admired and spent 3 hours under his vague tutelage creating jewelery which would be our handmade souvenirs of our trip. His personality was perhaps less delicate and beautiful than his jewelery, and he often seemed annoyed that these ignoramuses had wandered into his shop to abuse his silver with his hammers, but we pounded on, merrily and with only occasional swearing. In three hours, we each had come up with an idea (all of us learning that our initial designs were too complex for beginners and pulling back and back and back from those ideas into ultimately very simple forms). We gained serious appreciation for the jeweler, who can take tiny gems and rough-looking silver pieces and craft them into the shiny baubles we love so much. We left the workshop bedazzled at our own artistic prowess (our grouchy teacher notwithstanding), and swapped bracelets and rings all over dinner, showering each other with well-deserved complements. I did not find a passion for silver as I found a (very latent) passion for glassblowing two years ago, but I do have a bracelet around my wrist (made by me) and a ring around my finger (made for me by Michael) in which I take new forms of delight.

That day closed with a frantic wish by Naomi for one last manicure/pedicure before heading home. We found a lovely spa which would paint her nails and also give the other three of us a 30 minute massage in the meantime. They lined up three massage beds in a room meant for two, and we left Naomi lounging in painted luxury while the three of us dipped our feet into bowls of hot water with floating petals. The Balinese everywhere were taken by Aidan’s near-white hair and smiling blue eyes, and this place was no exception. Aidan giggled his way through the foot massage and sighed happily through the back and neck massage, complete with chocolate-scented oil. The three lovely masseuses matched him giggle for giggle, happy sigh for happy sigh, taking at least as much delight in his happiness as he did. At the end, slick and reeking of chocolate, Aidan beamed at us all in delight. “I love Bali!” he said. Amen.

And then it was over. One last morning dip in the pool, one last breakfast in the open-air restaurant, the 90 minute drive through rubbish and beautiful stone carved statues, and we were at the airport, pulling on our socks and pants and stuffing sandals and sarongs into the outside pockets of our heavy suitcases. 20 short hours later we were flying through freezing rain to land at the Wellington airport. But ah, the dawn over the Southern Alps was magnificent, and Rob’s face at the end of the jetway, and Sarah and the two dogs at the doorway of our beautiful seaside house were as welcome as the tang of icy lemongrass lemonade on a hot Balinese afternoon. Aidan blissfully drank glasses of tap water; Naomi set about demolishing and rearranging her room for a new era in her life. Perhaps it’s a new era for all of us, our post-Bali family. We are closer than we were, with memories as shiny as our new silver baubles but less likely to tarnish. I am a convert to long and wandering family holidays in mysterious and beautiful cultures. And to coming home to a life I love.