Bali, Indonesia (Day 1)

Our flight out of Manila was late at night, something like 9pm or something. And since the flight to Jakarta was around 3 hours long, we landed at around 12 midnight. Then our flight to Denpasar wasn’t until 6am, which means we had to wait at the airport for about 6 hours. When we landed at Jakarta, there was a man at the airport looking for a passenger, and he was holding a card up that said: “Dick Wong”. But then he was shouting out the man’s name, last name first, so he was actually shouting: “Wong Dick, Wong Dick! I’m looking for a Wong Dick!” I was SOOO tempted to ask him: “Really? Wouldn’t you prefer the wight one?” Then we had some money exchanged. I was bowled over when we exchanged a hundred dollars and a couple of thousand pesos, and it amounted to a little over a MILLION rupiah! I was an instantly millionaire (so freaking bad).

We had to transfer from the international terminal to the domestic terminal. It was 12 midnight so there were hardly any people outside, it was quite scary, to be frank. And a lone taxi driver approached us, and asked if we needed a taxi. When we said we needed to go to the domestic terminal, he said he’d take us there for only 150,000 rupiah. Not really familiar with the conversion, we thought that was par for course. But instinct told me to investigate further. I saw an information booth and I asked how much would it usually cost, and the guy there said 20,000 rupiah is the average. I swear! I just felt so bad that people like that taxi driver litter the world, waiting to prey on hapless tourists. But since there were hardly any taxis around, we found one willing to take us, but for 50,000. Sigh.

When we finally settled down at the domestic terminal 3, these 2 were my companions: chips and Hachiko. Since we had 6 hours to waste, I decided to finally watch the movie I was dreading. With a bag of Chitatos, I dug deep to watch the depressing movie which ended up a bad idea, because there I was, in the middle of a strange foreign airport, bawling like a little girl, as I watched the scene when Joan Allen sees the old bedraggled Hachiko still waiting at the train station. I was at an airport (close enough to a train station) and I left behind my beloved dogs, so you can imagine how emo I was getting watching this. Wiping my tears away, I decided to take a nap until the counters opened. It eventually opened, we took the quick flight to Denpasar, and we landed in the “Land of the Gods”, Bali. We took a cab from the airport to Nusa Dua, where our resort hotel was, the Grand Hyatt Bali. When we got there, the place was absolutely stunning.

Even just entering the lobby was already quite an experience.

Everywhere you went in the resort, you felt like you were in some lush eden, always filled with foliage and the distinct Bali architecture and flavor. I was already relaxed just walking around the place.

When we got to the room, we were happy to find that it was also very plush. It was quite spacious and I loved that little built-in daybed in one corner, which became our chip-eating place (so we don’t have crumbs on the actual bed).

Very nice digs. If forced to nitpick, The only thing I wasn’t crazy about was the abundant use of marble, which I was never a big fan of. I always found marble to be on the tacky side of the design spectrum. More wood would’ve made the room perfect! But that’s only IF you forced me to nitpick, which wasn’t in the mood for, since I loved the resort! After settling in, and a quick power nap, since we haven’t really had any decent sleep since the day before, we finally checked out the beach!

The beach in front of the resort is called Sanur beach, and we found out that it’s a Jekyll and Hyde kind of beach. When we went the first time, it was low tide, and it couldn’t have been any more different than how it was during high tide (but more on that on Day 2). During low tide, it’s very peaceful, people are more of watching and wading the little pools left by the receded waters, which recede a good half a kilometer or so, which is quite spectacular to see, actually. But where the water starts again, the waves are violently strong, not a good idea to swim in, since that area has already more rocks than sand. Then, as we were walking closer to the water’s edge, what should I see glistening as it’s nestled among the rocks? A ring!

I was having a Smeagol moment! I just found my “preciousss”. I was unmistakeably a wedding ring, and it was made of white gold. I quickly took it, and upon closer inspection, it had this engraved inside:

If I’m not mistaken, that’s the symbol for infinity, and the number 750. It had no names on it, so if for some strange twist of fate, that the owner stumbles on this blog, your wedding ring is with the resort staff lost and found! Of course there was no question that I’d return it…I just thought…maybe I’d wear it for a while…until the time I need to surrender it. But for now…my preciousss…will be with meee…

And as if on cue, the skies got all Mordor on me, ominous clouds started to creep in. The earlier photo of the beach with the clear skies, and the above photo with the clouds, were probably taken just an hour apart. It was so weird! It’s as if my getting the ring was being celebrated by some dark force. And I started feeling the slow but steady slide from being Smeagol…to being Gollum. And the saga begins…

(to be continued)

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