Celebrating Life in Bali

A very close friend, Sarah was engaged, we were all so excited and decided to celebrate this in Bali. Laura and me met at Sarah's place to check on the accommodation in Bali after we booked the flight ticket through Air Asia. We spent hours researching and we finally agreed to stay in a boutique residence instead of a hotel so that we could enjoy some quiet and peaceful environment after our sight-seeing activities during the day time and evening meals.

The day had finally come and we departed happily from LCCT in Kuala Lumpur and reached Denpasar, Bali in the afternoon. We were greeted by the clear blue sky with cotton clouds, it was a beautiful afternoon. Without delayed, we hopped into a cab and headed to Danoya Private Luxury Residence located in Seminyak. Although it was a bit pricey, it was really worth spending in exchange for comfort, excellent service and luxury. We were warmly greeted at the reception and served with cordial drinks while waiting for our villa to be ready.

Our villa came with a beautiful private pool, a powder room, a living room and a pantry on the ground floor and a spacious master room with attached bathroom and a balcony overlooking the pool on the first floor. We made the right choice and felt good about it. Sitting and relaxing by the pool side was such a great indulgence that we would spend time there when we were 'home'. Another service this villa provided was "in-room breakfast". The cook and her assistant came every morning at our requested time to prepare us hearty breakfast with local, American and continental choices. The prepared breakfast with love and we could really "taste" it. How nice when you had someone served you and treated you like a queen and that was how we exactly felt throughout our stay there. Besides the breakfast, we also enjoyed the massage at the comfort and convenience in our villa on the second day, it was really a new experience as we could choose the spot we like the most. Sarah being her spiritual self chose to lie down at the pool side, pampering herself with aroma oil massage while Laura and me lied down in the living room overlooking the pool, pampering ourselves with hot stone massage. The masseurs were very good and professional, and we were very satisfied. The experience was great! we felt refreshing and radiant after the massage as it rejuvenated our bodies.

We discovered quite a number of restaurants serving extra-ordinary good food with Kudeta in Oberoi and Pundi-pundi in Ubud topped my favorite list. I love the ambiance the moment we stepped into Kudeta - a fine dining restaurant, it was next to Oberoi Bali. The colorful lights outside the restaurant created a romantic atmosphere and they were also used as decoration. The dim lighting inside the restaurant created a very relaxed, cosy and friendly ambiance to the patrons. A bar was located at the right side of the restaurant and a walk way at the side of the bar would lead you to an open area where you could continue chatting with friends while enjoying the wet breeze from the sea or you could go down to the beach and stroll along it. This was the best restaurant I had ever dined and it was the most expensive dinner I had ever paid in my life. However it was worth paying for as it was the best and memorable dining experience.

We ordered a few dishes for sharing, that's our tradition as "sharing is caring". We had Crab meat Linguine, Fusion Babi Guling (pork), Grilled Seafood Platter and beautifully medium-done Beef. I could only describe the food in a word - DIVINE! I felt that we were in the world of rapture and it was really a blessing to be able to enjoy this super excellent meal with a great company of my two dearest friends for life. The meal was complimented by the restaurant house wines. After the dinner, we moved to the open area near the beach to continued enjoying our wines and a plate of dessert full of chocolate and sorbet. It was a celebration of love, friendship and most importantly life!

The next day we went to Ubud for sight-seeing and we stopped by at Pundi-Pundi Grill & Asian Cuisine for lunch. We invited our driver who we hired for the few days we were in Bali. He was shy to join us but we insisted that he joined as we would like to treat him for his excellent service. We enjoyed the delicious Pork Spared Ribs and could not get enough of it, we later ordered a second one, it was juicy and the marinated sauce was very special. It was the best of the best! I would go back there in my next trip to have the same dish. We also ordered a large pizza, our driver had his favorite Bebek Pundi (duck). We really enjoyed our lunch and it was one filled with laughter and exchange, another memorable meal!

Other eating places I would also like to recommend includes Casa Gourmet (you would be surprise it served nice fajitas) and Bali Bakery in Seminyak Square, a Japanese restaurant in Nusa Dua - Hanabi (it served authentic Japanese cuisine). I like these places as their settings were simple yet elegant, they were great places for friends and family to get together and catch up while they could enjoy hearty meals. Oh, you could even shop in Casa Gourmet as there was a supermarket. We shopped while waiting for our food to be ready.

Walking along the street full of shops was also a great life experience besides the good food in Bali, the warmth and the courtesy of the Balinese was really heart warming. We were greeted with sincere smile every where we went. I was particular amazed by the arts and the rich Balinese culture and tradition. The Balinese upheld their belief and conducted themselves according to their belief. They believed good action would produce or even multiply good Karma and same went for bad action. They celebrated religious festivals by parading to the destination to pray to their Hindu gods and we were lucky to have chance to see this. Men and Women all dressed in white, paraded through the small streets between the rows of endless shops on both sides of the streets. It was amazing to see the women carried the basket with layers of different fruits cleverly arranged in pyramid on their head and walked in total control of their balance. I saw temples with great architecture and design everywhere I went and this really proved the richness in arts and in spirit of the Balinese society and community. I also felt safe walking in the street even at night.

The next day, we visited a famous Batik outlet and jewelry shop in Celuk on our way to Ubud to shop for souvenirs to bring back home. Sarah bought herself a nice, contemporary batik dress in the batik shop. We bought some unique stones and germs from the jewelry shop and I would like to highlight Laura's Apple pendant, she was really crazy about Apple thanks to Steve job's sophisticated invention. We then headed to Kintamani to taste the world most expensive coffee, Kopi Luwak. To be honest I did not like the idea how the coffee bean was produced and I did not like the taste at all. Anyway I bought a small packet back for my parents to taste. It was still worth visiting for the sake of enriching our life experience and you could choose to drink the ginger tea with lemongrass as it tasted good and it had the healing property to get rid of wind in the stomach. After we had lunch in Ubud, we continued shopping for souvenirs. We went to a few arts and craft shops and I managed to buy a unique simple sculpture of couple holding each other in nudity. Sarah went to her favorite store buying her second Uluwatu dress in Bali, apparently there were more variety of designs than the Uluwatu in Kuala Lumpur. I wished I could stay longer as I could not get enough of shopping along the shops in Oberoi and Ubud, that was a confession of a shopaholic I guessed but only in Bali, could I stay longer please?

Time flied extra-ordinary fast especially when you had great times. On our final day in Bali, we checkout from our villa earlier (I was quite reluctant) so that we could still do some sight-seeing before our departure time in the late afternoon. On the way to Nusa Dua, we chatted about music and the singers or bands we like, when Sarah asked if anyone like Rolling Stones our driver became excited and joined in our conversation. I felt deeply that it did not matter who you were, where did you come from, music transcended border and ethnicity. It was a common language that connected people around the world.

We shopped and had lunch in Nusa Dua before we headed to Uluwatu to see the cliff. We also had coconuts in Nusa Dua, the coconuts there were really big that I could not believe my eyes, they were tasty and refreshing and especially great for hot weather. The sunset from the cliff was particularly breathtaking but unfortunately we got to catch our flight home in the late evening. We had to bid Uluwatu farewell reluctantly, anyway we would be back again, Bali!

Selamat tinggal dan jumpa lagi.