no worry be happy

"no worry be happy".. the saying every bali person suggests to us. after set of questions how are you? whats your name? where are you from? im thinking of changing my name or location everytime.. but for some reason the truth always comes out. jenna and i have moved our sleeping place to kuta.. its the happening location let me tell you! its like tourist central.. and we couldtn find a room anywhere cuz of school holidays.. then this one guy who was selling transport (like 45282094 other people on the road) called his friends to help us.. and he walked us to a few places cuz we made it clear we werent going to pay anymore for transport and we both wouldnt fit on his tiny motorbike with our backpacks on.. so we found a little place down an alley and its perfect. none of the roads are straight..they all turn and go different ways and i dont understand how they rarely intersect. its strange. from what ive seen, theres not too much free land in bali.. teh 230 million people i was told live here seem to cover this island pretty well.. ive now identified balis smell.. its the smell of burning leaves used to make the little baskets or trays for the offerings they burn three times a day.. they are little things of flowers, sometimes rice and such outside every store and restarant and little trolley beach cart. its a weird smell that i wont ever get used to.. writing about it makes me think of the smell.. ick. so anyway.. on first arriving in kuta, after we threw down our bags we were hot and starving so we headed across the street to the famous beach in search of food. we decided to try out the local deal.. and the lady told us to sit at the cart.. and we ate rice and chicken that was the best meal yet.. it was 50 cents! and we met a friend there.. he convinced me to eat this pepper.. i knew it was going to be spicy but somehow he convinced me otherwise.. and so i bit it and he laughed and i almost died. so johannas said he could take us around on motorbikes for three days as long as we pay for them and buy him lunch. duh! the bikes are 5 bucks a day... and he got his friend, ozzie, to drive the other one, so jenna and i have a much cheaper personal shuttle these days. the first day they took us back to ubud where our first dude took us, but this time we went to the monkey forest and through the actual town of ubud, where we flew by the artworkand got to intake all the lovely aromas of bali... we also were able to walk on the rice fields which are sooo awesome looking..and we kinda sorta learned their whole deal.. but it was hard with the language barrier..then we went up to mt. batur and had a huge buffet lunch overlooking the volcano and the lake.. pretty sweet view.. and then later we went down to the lake to touch it.. bright blue nad warm water! everywhere we stop so the boys can smoke a cigarette or take a break or watever.. we are SWARMED by the sarong ladies and souvienier ppl.. o gosh its pretty stressful. theres no hiding with our white skin and light hair. ive taken probably 5 or 6 pictures with random ppl basically as a celebrity.. haha. why not.

today was an awesome day too... we got to sleep in a bit before meeting johannas and ozzie down at the circle k for our ride today.. first we went to nusa dua to go snorkeling and to turtle island.. and we decided to try out the flying fish while we were at it. why not. the flying fish was still not worth the bartered down price of 15 usd for "15 mins" of laying against an inflatable raft almost parasailing but really just floating in the air for 2 turns.. totaling a min id say. o well. snorkeling we saw lots of really cool fish.. angel fish, parrot fish, the zerba striped ones that are half yellow.. and ones with pokes on thier foreheads.. that was an hour too..but probably really like 30 mins.. thennn was turtle island where we found out they had build a cage and had 25 turtles in teh bamboo entrapment on the water :( jenna volunteered my single status to the turtle man who greeted us... and he told me if i married him i could have all the turtles i want. o boy how could i turn down that offer?! he was funny and really excited about taking picutres with all the other animals on turtle island.. the 10 ft snake, the bat, the iguana, komodo dragon and such... nothing is what you expect in bali.. better to not have any expectations really.

we then went to 'dreamland' where we had our favorite plate.. nasi goreng.. meat and an egg over flavored rice with some veggies.. yummY! i think dreamland was the name of hte resort or the place we ate it or something.. but watever.. the beach was AMAZING> hugggge surf and lots of good surfers and crystal clear beautiful teal water. nice view. :) then it was off to uluwatu temple for some more monkey fun and the sunset! a monkey stole my hair thing right out of my hair and laughed at me when i tried to get it back :( when he couldnt eat it i laughed at him... but it was still broken. i took too many pictures of monkeys for sure.. and the sunset was sooo nice and relaxing. and then it was another adventure riding home on our bikes of course!

everyone in bali is very concerned that you have a good time and they always volunteer to take pictures for you. they are all very trustworthy.. i never feel threatened in anyway.. jus bothered that they try to make u buy crap every second you stop to scratch ur nose. tomorow is another adventure to another volcano and temple and hot springs! whooo!

well hopefully that paints a better picture for you! more adventures in the last few days are still to come! take care!!!