Today I leave Melbourne. Destination Bali to write the Bali edition of Travelfish’s travel guides. I don’t plan to return to Melbourne. I was asked the other day if I felt my journey to Bali and therefore the conclusion of my time in Melbourne was symbolic. Symbolic in that it’s the finalisation of the separation from my wife. I responded by saying “no” because it didn’t feel like it… But now it does. I really do feel like today is the end of a chapter and the start of another and the page turns without even a hint of sadness. Sure, we can all talk of what could have been, but I look forward with optimism and renewed passion for the journey ahead.
So what have I learned through the process? Well, the main things that I have done well revolve around positive energy. I’ve tried my hardest to remain optimistic, tried my hardest to get out there and socialise (not always successfully!), did my best to accept the inevtiability of the situation immediately (ie didn’t hang on with false hope), held no grudges or bad feelings, did my best to not revel in the victim role which many many people would have me be in (they felt pity), and most of all, I got on with my life. I see these as contributing to the emotional place that I am in now and I love it.
I’ve tried to think of things that I could have done better but I just can’t find any at the moment. I really do feel fortunate to have had things turn out as they have.
So it all sounds as if everything for me is beautiful and that this journey was easy. It wasn’t. Introspection, which I think this process necessarily involves, requires complete honesty with oneself, the ability to observe your thoughts and the ability to tame ones ego. I’m no messiah when it comes to this stuff, but I did try hard and it was difficult at times.
So on the eve of a new adventure, I urge everyone to: not judge, reject cynicism, live pro-actively and above all, remain optimistic even when every bone in your body tells you not to be.
Everyone has a story to tell about their life. And we’ve all met at least a couple of people that seem to have had lives filled with all sorts of interesting sub-plots. Two mates of mine in particular seem to have accomplished more in a lifetime than I had ever thought possible. And by “accomplished”, I don’t mean it in terms of making their mark on society or completing some great project or having a stellar career. I mean they have just done such a wide variety of things in their lives and have such amazing stories of adventure to tell that one can only dream of perhaps living just half as interesting a life as they have led.
The problem is that the story of their lives, our lives, everybody’s lives has to be written by someone. Most people, me included until a couple of years ago, choose to have their story written by their careers, their family and other random people. Whilst it’s great to have outside participation in our lives and our stories (we are after all social creatures), we can’t let others be the authors. Contributors maybe, but we have to write our own life story!
I think some slip even further than this into the realms of unconscious passive living. That is, the story is just being filled with a bunch of blank pages because the owner is just driving along, asleep at the wheel, not even knowing that there is a story to write! It’s being written, but it’s empty and they don’t even know it. I want to help these people (if they want help).
So, if I’m writing my own life story, don’t I owe it to myself for the story to be interesting, occasionally exciting, full of wonderful characters, romance, adventure, discovery, self exploration and a dash of drama?
Yes, I want my story to be one of those good ones, where my attention is held from start to finish. Boredom begone! To ensure my story is one of those good ones I have to make the effort to write it myself, write it with creativity and passion and learn not to beat myself up when the story takes an unexpected twist. The twist may just end up being the best part!
Now, I don’t usually have the urge to write about the foods I eat day-to-day, but I’m becoming just a little obsessed with the kangaroo sausages I’ve been eating a bit lately. I think the obsession isn’t with the taste despite them being delicious, I think it’s with the amazing nutritional benefits. Most meat eaters stick with a few staples – chicken, beef, lamb, pork. But no one ever gives kangaroo a second thought, even here in Australia. But what’s not to love about kangaroo? It’s tasty, very healthy and very cheap.
Health
According to the Kangaroo Industry, kangaroo meat has less fat than lamb and beef and a similar level to lean pork and chicken and the fat is primarily unsaturated. That means having to chop off all the excess fat in your pork and chicken whereas kangaroo is generally lean from the start. The protein levels of kangaroo are higher than all the stock standard meats meaning it will fill you up a bit more and help build muscle! The cholesterol level is less than beef and lamb but slightly higher than pork and chicken. And the iron level is less than beef, but higher than all the others.
Also, kangaroo contains Omega-3 which comes as a bit of a surprise as well as a bunch of other things that are too complex for laymen to understand.
Oh yes, kangaroo meat is a great choice for health-conscious animal eaters!
Taste
Taste is a very personal thing and a new taste can often be confronting and even off-putting especially when it’s strong. Many exotic meats tend to be strong… which makes me think that beef is perhaps just bland. Anyway, kangaroo is only slightly gamy and I can now genuinely eat kangaroo sausages without even noticing the gaminess I once did. It really is not offensive in any way when you first taste it and as with most foods, you learn to love it.
The texture of kangaroo sausages compared to beef sausages is interesting. I find beef sausages to be very oily compared to their kangaroo brethren an a little squidgy whereas kangaroo sausages seem a little more firm and grainy.
I choose to accompany my kangaroo sausages with a nice pungent chilli jam. The combination is an absolute winner!
Cost
The cheapest and nastiest beef sausages contain all sorts of garbage – bovine offcuts, lots of saturated fat and often gluten. The kangaroo variety counter all of this by being gluten-free, very low fat (<2%) and… well I guess it could be any part of the kangaroo which is just a muscle-machine! Despite this, kangaroo sausages are about the same price as the cheapest beef sausages being about AU$8/kg or US$3.2/lb. A real bargain, in my view.
Ethical Considerations
I know eating a kangaroo to many would seem cruel, offensive, disgusting etc. Yes, eating animals is a pretty nasty business and if I was having to slaughter my own food day in, day out, I’d probably turn vegetarian. But I eat animals from a position of ignorance and at this point in time I’m OK with that.
Despite being cute, I think it’s OK to eat kangaroos just as I think it’s OK to eat cute lambs, pigs and cows. What is OK to eat and what is not is something that I have been debating with myself for some time with no clear conclusion being formed! Maybe the line in the sand really is “do not eat animals”. I just don’t know.
So, if you’re a meat-eater and kangaroo is cheap where you live (probably not outside Australia), I heartily recommend you give some Kanga Bangas a try. The stupid supermarkets often stick them next to the pet food section, but they are definitely for human consumption. I just think they don’t want to freak people out.
I had the great privilege of being able to leave the traditional 9-5 lifestyle just over a year ago for horizons unknown. A year on, I still don’t know where I’m headed and I’m OK with that. Some people after leaving the 9-5 have a strong desire to get their teeth stuck into something that gives their life meaning. Me, I’m just happy to cruise along, attacking mini-projects as they cross my path.
So now that I’ve been out of the rat race for a year, what are my observations?
Pros
The total freedom to do whatever you want, when you want (it really is as good as it seems);
Choosing sleeping patterns that suit your body (joy);
The strange fact that project opportunities beg you to go after them (eg Writing a travel guide, exploring photographic opportunties and management consultancy);
A break in the monotony of 9-5 routines;
Everything is as finite as you choose it to be – That is, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel no matter how dire things are (really important for me!);
Being able to go to cafes and supermarkets on non-busy days;
Travelling outside of peak periods;
Above all, little stress.
Cons
The very occasional thought of how sustainable this lifestyle is financially (is this too good to be true?);
The difficulty of meeting people who are travelling along the same path meaning that friendships are harder to make and keep;
Not having a place to call home is sometimes unsettling;
The lack of routine can sometimes be unsettling (I’m getting used to it);
Being self-consciousness of people thinking you are a bum (ego is still important).
So it’s not all sunshine and lollipops. But the main thing that has reminded me of the stress levels of the 9-5 is a cafe I frequent only during the week. Recently I visited it on the weekend and the vibe was not relaxed. It was hectic, people seemed to be enjoying themselves, but everyone was so amped up that the stress transferred right into me. I left the place jittery! I couldn’t cope with it.
So whilst I never say ‘never’, I just can’t see myself travelling down that path anymore.
This is Part 3 of my Bali Travel Overview which started here and was continued here.
I’ve generally encountered two types of people that enjoy Bali. The beach types and the culture types. The beach types predominantly hang out in the South (Kuta, Legian Seminyak and the Bukit) and the culture junkies in the centre – the centre being Ubud. So what does “culture” exactly mean? Well, it’s a catchall for seeing dancing, galleries, doing yoga, eating great food, staying in plush accommodation and wandering through the ricefields. If you like this stuff, you’ll love Ubud because it has it in spades.
On the cultural front, just about everyone visits a traditional dance in one of the main styles: Legong, Barong, Kecak etc. Although in the centre of Ubud these are put on purely for tourists, they still honour the traditional methods and in some cases offer a better experience than what you find in local villages. The main reason being that it costs a lot of money to have a hire a gamelan and train a bunch of dancers to the level that are on display in the centre of town. The other main cultural activity that people partake in is visiting local artists’ galleries and the woodcarving village of Mas or the stonemasons’ village of Batubulan.
Bali: Dancer
Another favourite of visitors to Ubud is visiting a spa. Now for the blokes, this might seem a little girly, but it’s actually a pleasure to roll up and have a massage for an hour or two. Some places charge western prices and some are as cheap as USD$5 for an hour massage. You generally get what you pay for, but at the cheaper end competition is so fierce that with a little shopping around you can get a top massage in clean surrounds for a fraction of the price you’d pay at home.
Accommodation in Ubud ranges from a bare room with cold shower to hotels that rank among the best in the world. Most of the best accommodation options are located so far out of town that you have to use the hotel shuttle to get anywhere and are really only practical for those wanting seclusion. In the centre of town there are any number of cheaper options with common prices being around the USD$15/night and USD$40/night marks. Cheaper than this and you’re likely to get something not very nice.
Bali: Plush Accommodation
For foodies, Ubud has all that you could ask for. World-class dining, great coffee, locally run eateries (rumah makan/warung) and even an organic food market. Most of the top-quality dining is found at the many top-end hotels around town such as Uma Ubud and the Viceroy. But there are also restaurants such as Lamak and Mozaic that are independently run and offer world-class food. The cafe scene in Ubud is also quite developed with Tutmak and Kakiang Bakery serving the best coffee and some good food too! On the local front, everyone visits Ibu Oka for a plate of pig ($3). But there are a bunch of other places that do good local food too like Warung Mendez (mainly for the goat) and Warung Mina. For the health nuts, you cannot go past Kafe or Bali Buddha for a vast menu featuring fresh local produce.
Bali: Lunch at Uma Ubud
The one thing that I find most people don’t do when visiting Ubud is walk. Yeah, people might walk around the big loop that is Monkey Forest Road and Jalan Hanoman, but people rarely get beyond that. But beyond that loop are the endless surrounding ricefields. The Lonely Planet guide has a bunch of walks around the local area and they are generally very good and not too difficult to accomplish despite the oppressive heat. Just take a hat and some water and all is OK. The tranquillity just a 10 minute walk in any direction around Ubud is phenomenal and should not be missed!
Bali: Endless Ricefields
Visted Ubud? How was your experience? Want to visit Ubud? What do you look forward to most?
Before giving up the 9-5 I often thought about how grand life would be if I was a millionaire. I could do absolutely anything I wanted whenever I wanted without a worry in the world. But as I steamrolled towards greater financial independence through saving and a different mindset, this whole notion of money being a great liberator became somewhat diluted.
I now have a level of financial independence that allows me to travel almost anywhere, anytime and without any consideration of other factors. Yet, the world isn’t all roses. Sure, it’s much better than having to roll out of bed every morning to do something that I’m not passionate about, but the question still remains, “What am I going to do now?”
A million dollars doesn’t solve this problem. In fact, I think having financial independence in many ways brings these life questions to the fore and demands that you tackle them head-on – something which isn’t necessary when burying yourself in the 9-5. The blissful ignorance of the 9-5 allows you to hide from the deeper questions about oneself. Financial independence doesn’t.
So giving up the 9-5 for a life of greater freedom makes you face up to some tough questions whether you are ready for it or not. And boy, they are tough questions to answer.
Has your escape from the 9-5 challenged your notions of what life is all about? Can you even define it?
The conventional view of the world is that weekends are great and weekdays are bad. It’s ingrained in us from an early age that weekends equal freedom and weekdays equal pain and suffering.
I recently visited my favourite cafe on the weekend for the first time ever. What a surprise. It was even more packed than usual with a line out the door and a vibe that was frantic. When you live life in the fast lane, I guess everything becomes frantic and this just becomes the norm. But for me as a person taking a slower pace, this franticness was very uncomfortable. I scoffed my food, slammed back my coffee and just sat there squeezed between the hoards wondering what to do next. This is just not like me. I can ordinarily just hang out for hours doing nothing in particular but watching the crowd and sipping on a coffee.
The realisation for me was that weekends are indeed a good time to retreat to the confines of the house in order to let the masses go about their “leisure” time. When Monday comes around, I can sing “hallelujah” and return to normal life once again.
I’ve noticed the same crowd patterns on the roads, the parks and even the supermarket. What it really means is that one can live in a crowded city and avoid most of the crowds if choosing your movements wisely.
This is Part 2 of my Bali Travel Overview which started here.
For some people, these villages situated along a large stretch of beach in the South of the island represent everything that Bali has to offer. The beach, cheap food, cheap accommodation and most importantly, cheap booze. These elements combine to give Kuta, Legian and Seminyak a distinct party feel.
Kuta
Kuta is the cheaper end of town and consequently has a grungy edge – alleyways with cheap eateries home to local surfer culture, big bars home to Australian football teams on a mid-season break and innumerable shops catering to those shopping on a budget. Large numbers of families visit Kuta on the cheap and there is plenty of accommodation to cater specifically for this demographic. Large sprawling hotels with nice swimming pools, kids’ activities and a bar for Mum and Dad. Catering to the surfer/backpacker market, guesthouses are located in the vast maze of alleyways bounded by Jalan Pantai Kuta (Kuta Beach Road) and Jalan Legian. All of these places are cheap and usually come with a breakfast of fruit and omelette/pancake.
Bali: Kuta Beach at Sunset
Food choices in Kuta can be a bit of a disappointment given the opportunities that must abound for proprietors. Many menus look identical, trying to serve up every option imaginable, both Western and Asian. Sometimes these menus have several hundred items and one must wonder how any chef could do any of the dishes justice and how on Earth any of the food could be fresh! With that said, it’s worth putting some effort into finding places that serve more limited selections and sticking to those places that have good numbers of people in attendance.
Kuta itself does not have a whole lot to offer in terms of tourist activities. There is the beach and there is shopping. That’s about it. You might spot the odd cockfight in a side street, but you’d have to be lucky.
Legian
Bali: Family Style Hotel in Legian
I view Legian as just an extension of Kuta. And in reality, it is. Most people don’t even know where Kuta ends and Legian starts because development merges the two into one big mass. With that said, the eating options tend to get a little better when entering Legian with some more cosidered operators serving up country-specific cuisines. You’ll also find some of the better local Indonesian foods in Legian – Warung Melati on Jalan 66 being just about the best I’ve ever had. Accommodation options tend to start increasing in price and quality as do the shops giving the area an ever-so-slightly more refined vibe.
Seminyak
Seminyak is the place you go if you like the beach, partying, hedonism and have a bit more money. Plenty of expats live here and life can be one big blur of parties, social engagements and living it up. So it goes without saying that this is where all the best hotels are located. Names such as the Oberoi, The Legian and a selection of some of the best villas in the world are all here. THE BEST. I mean it.
With the party scene so dominant in this area, there is of course a range of upmarket bars to be seen at, serving imaginative cocktails and mean beats. The atmosphere in some of these places can be intoxicating but for the uninitiated, intimidating. Without some measure of self-confidence, you will feel like everyone is just too cool for school.
Bali: Just a Taste of the Food Seminyak has to Offer
Eating options in this area and further North in Kerobokan change frequently due to the cut throat nature of the business and the price of rent. There are some mainstays that never fail to serve up world-class fare at prices that are almost always less than what you would pay in the West – usually about half the price. If you’re in the Kuta, Legian, Seminyak area and you are a foodie, this is the lace to get world-class food at half the price you’d pay anywhere else. Bliss!
Again, the sights in Seminyak are few and far between. The beach and the bars – and maybe a massage. That’s not to say it isn’t a great place to relax, but tourist activities all lie further afield and will require some form of transport.
Summary
So why go to this area if there is nothing to see? Well, some people love the beach, eating and drinking. And if that is you, at least just for a few days, this is the place to go. Your budget will determine the area you stay in and the people you socialise with as is the case in the West. Just choose your place and go for gold. There is much fun to be had!
In recent times I’ve been seeing plenty of chatter on the tubes about personal branding and a whole heap of people buying into the whole personal business card thing. More specifically, everyone has been talking about Moo Business Cards and their smaller brothers, Moo MiniCards.
I’ve had personal mini-cards before and had them printed from a traditional bricks and mortar printer. The cost was phenomenal because the size I chose was non-standard and I had to do a run of 250 cards! Now, I like to hand out cards as much as the next person, but I’m no master-networker so I really have never needed that many cards. Enter moo.com
Moo MiniCards
Moo.com allows you to design your own double-sided cards from scratch with the main premise being that you place a photo/image on one side and a text component on the other. In practice, you can customise these cards further by placing images on both sides which essentially allows the keen designer to place mixtures of text and images on both sides of the card in a completely bespoke manner.
Me, I stuck to the recommended method of designing cards and uploaded 100 different photos cropped to their specifications and placed my contact details on the back. The result? An impressive display of all my photos with my contact details on the back. I couldn’t be more chuffed! Next time I might get a bit more creative with the text side of the card and pre-design it in a graphics program and then upload it as an image instead of using their inhouse feature. Their text feature is good, but it is limited in fonts and positioning. Not a big deal for most.
Moo MiniCards
The last point of note is that the packaging is so brilliant that you cannot help but fall in love with them. Everything is so slick and doesn’t attempt to cut any corners. The whole thing makes you feel like you’re getting a premium product at a discounted price. You feel special!
The first time we travel it is exhilirating. The second, exciting. The third, less exciting. And so it goes. I don’t know how it works for everyone else, but for me, the thrill of travel has been extinguished. I no longer find it exciting and no longer bother to plan for it. I do, however, still find it “interesting”. What I mean by this is that there now must be another purpose aside from just flitting around and seeing a bunch of stuff. There now has to be a purpose which must be linked to my interests or sense of curiosity. My recent trip to Myanmar (Burma) is a case in point. I wanted to go there to get the inside scoop on the polictical situation and how the people were living under these circumstances. A totally worthwhile excursion.
So many people have asked me if I “loved” Burma or if I had a great time. So when I answer “no”, people are shocked. Just because it wasn’t fun fun fun all the time, it doesn’t mean it wasn’t worthwhile. I’m just not going to get all giddy like a schoolgirl over travel any more.
In some ways, this is a little sad. I wish I still got excited by travel. Now, travel simply serves a purpose and I’m OK with that. What about you? Have you become a little numb to travel excitement?
