Bali, a small and beautiful island of Indonesia. The island that resembles a little to a fish.I do not know why I selected Bali for my travel. Even now, after visiting and feeling blessed in Bali, I still do not understand it. But, being there was so blisfull to care about the reasons. I did not know the purpose of my trip, but still the normal itinerary was prepared. Selected few things from the regular tourist list using trip advisor, lonely planet etc. Bali is known for massages, spiritualism and cultural richness; well, beautiful beaches as well. After reading some sites, I selected Ubud as my place to stay. It was especially as I am not much a beach person and also that I felt other places are already “modernised”. Well, it was a perfect selection at the end.
One of the important day in Balinese Calendar is Nyepi “Day of silence”. It was an experience in itself. I did not do anything the whole day, apart from sitting by the pool in my hotel. I realized that it is almost impossible to reach the end of chain of thoughts. Thoughts seems to be connected like the neural structure of brain. For a full day, thoughts kept on moving from one to another. I was expecting that they will slow down at least by the end of day or at least start taking more time to find the next topic. However, the roller coaster ride was the longest and with most twists and turns than I have ever been to. Thoughts did not stop, but still at the end of day, I felt a bit of calmness, a silence inside. It was like time is slowing down. It felt different. I went to sleep with a completely new
experience. Experience that I never had before and would love to have again.
Journey of Bali was beautiful by just being in this wonderful place. It was calming just to walk in the fields, village streets, take some little trek in the natural landscape. But, it was made amazing and unforgettable by the people that I happened to meet. Be it locals or fellow travellers, I felt lucky to meet so many wonderful people. Not sure, if it is Bali that make people so approachable. But, it was as you can just open a chat with anyone by saying a “hello” and before you realize you may be talking for hours. I met many Germans, Canadians, French, Greek, Italians, a Chilean and lots of locals. Some of them became “Bali friends” and we talked a lot on various topics. Some discussions, I may write about separately.
One strong feeling that I had was that this trip, this journey should not end. I was thinking if somehow I can stay for some more time. This place, these people I wanted to spend more time there. This feeling was shared by some of the fellow “travellers” as well. For me this was the 1st time I felt like that on any short or long trip, assignment or on holiday. This made me think that isn’t it the same about the journey that we called “Life”. We come to this world, meet people, visit places and perform certiain activities. We like some things a lot and others not so much. But more or less we all start to love this life to an extent that we always want to be here a little bit longer. At least I do not know anyone, who has said I am really happy with this journey and I am ready to go when “flight to next destination” is here. We always have something to finish, something to visit, someone to meet, even till the last minute. This attachment is stong and magical. We amy not understand it, but we do not want to let it go.
I really felt attached to the place from almost the day I arrived and mostly after the Nyepi. Still, somehow unbelievably, when the day came to leave, I was quite happy that I had the chance to come to this beautiful place and meet some amazing people. I was happy to had a good time and was ready to move on. I was surely not the same person. I gained something from this journey and I think this will also have an impact on my life to come. However, I do not know what has changed and how it will impact my life. I think this is what the Hindu mythology says at a much bigger scale that what we did in our past life change the course of our next lives. Surely, what we do, is not all in our control. e.g. I did not know what i will do in Bali, which people I would meet and how will it all turn out to be. But, one thing that I could still choose was to smile and share the smile with others.So, smile, enjoy and share while you are here and be ready to move on for new journey, new experiences and probably new blogs 🙂
Love
Arundeep