But in between, Nora and I will be meeting up with Nate and Maya for a bit of playtime at Morden Hall Park, and then we have to return our library books (as I have a fine to pay!).

I’m so unbelievably excited about this trip and I think Nora is mirroring my excitement! With both of us so excited, it’s a wonder we haven’t exploded!

Yesterday I booked Jules and my mini holiday to Jakarta. Waiting for the response from Take’s Mansions for our room.

I’ve asked mom for murtabak (meaty pancake dish) for dinner when I get home

This weekend, I’m going to start getting things together… not that I have much to pack as Nora and I will do massive shopping when we’re there!

I really can’t wait. I miss Malaysia and my family so much!

I will start counting the days no… and it is 93 days to go!!

I’m taking a chunk of my annual leave for this trip! Can’t wait!!!

But this morning Nora managed to get me to sing a new Christmas song. And I actually do like the song. It uses the tune of ‘Are you Sleeping Brother John’ and it goes something like this

Father Christmas, Father Christmas
He got stuck!
He got stuck
Coming down the chimney
Coming down the chimney
What bad luck
What bad luck!

And now… I have ankles to match Laura’s! With Lumpy in this heat, my body has ballooned!! I can’t really grip my hands and my ankles has swollen to the size of a tree trunk! I can’t really fit in any of my shoes and just about fit into my Birkenstock… which I wear daily even though it’s against office rules. Well… the office rule is that you can’t wear anything that flip and flop… my Birkenstock does not flip or flop so I’m OK.

So the past few months I’ve been doing absolutely nothing apart from trying to mend my hand, breath properly and keep cool. The only thing I like to do at the moment when I get home is either stand in front of the fan in the living room… or in front of the airconditioning unit in the bedroom.

Lucky me, Jules has been really patient with me. I’m not sure how many husbands would put up with such a lazy wife! Jules is a very active person and at the moment… activeness is just not in my dictionary! Poor guy. I promise I would change… soon. Hey! at least in my inactiveness I’ve picked up the brush and started painting again… even if it’s just in my little moleskin sketchbook.

Anyway… thanks to Jules foot rub wonders, my feet looked almost normal this morning! I had less problems fitting into my Birkenstock… and hopefully it will last for a while the weather is set to cool down over the weekend. One can only hope…

As you gathered from Jules’s posts, the trip was amazing. Was it worth the 16 hours flight to get there? I think so. Just wish that we had a bit more space to stretch when we were on our flight there but that’s fine… one day I’ll win the lottery and we’ll be flying first class all the way.

I timed it that we get to Bali mid afternoon. I find arriving around that time is good at combating jet lag as I tend to stay up as it’s still light and when it does get dark, I get tired and fall asleep around bedtime and get up in the morning ready to go.

The heat just blasted on us when we got off the plane and we’re walking towards immigration, Jules commented on the architecture of the airport. I have to agree that not many airport go for the traditional temple look. Most airport are modern looking building of concrete, glass and metal… so was Ngurah Rai… but every now and again you see the red stone brick walls of temple like gates. All through the corridor there were statues of Hindu gods and figures.

When we got the immigration, for once, it’s Jules who has to queue. Since I hold a passport of an ASEAN country, I don’t need to pay for a visa and just had to go through the ASEAN queue which took a couple of minutes. Bali is a very touristy place… and the queue of Mat Salehs trying to get in was pretty huge. I bet most of them are Australians.

Once we picked up our bags, we found Gusti waiting for us to take us to our hotel in Ubud. He will appear again on future posts.

I chose Ubud because the last time I was there, I really liked it. I remember it being the art centre of Bali. We stayed at Nyuh Kuning (yellow coconut) just at the outskirts of Ubud. Although I do love Ubud, I wasn’t sure how much further it has developed and I didn’t want to be in the middle of a busy town.

As you may have noticed from J’s blog, we stayed at Alam Shanti for the first three nights.

Alam Shanti is part of of the Alam family which owned Alam Indah, Alam Jiwa, Kebun Indah and also Alam Gili on Gili Trawangan. I came upon it by chance when the original hotel I want to stay at was fully booked. I have to admit that Alam Shanti is a tad more expensive than the other hotel but it was our honeymoon… and it was wonderful!

We were greeted with smiles and refreshing fruit drink to cool us down. We sat at the open reception area and just admired the view. All the staff just let us be until we’re ready go get off our but again and actually make our way to the hotel… don’t rush… just relax… is the attitude there.

Alam Shanti is the fourth and newest build of Pak Ketut in Ubud so the garden is still growing… but it’s still a marvelous garden. Walking on the paths to our room we passed many fruit plants, flower bushes and little fish ponds. It made the whole place feel so peaceful.

And I was totally blown away by our room! It over looks the paddy fields with farmers working on the field… and a duck shepherd herding his ducks for morning swim and off to the duck pen in the evening.

If we had booked the Gangga room together with our Yamuna room, we would have the pool to ourselves! Our own private pool. There’s another pool for all other guests to use but ours was almost just outside our door. It did feel so private… it did feel that there’s no one else around us… apart from the staff, farmers and the ducks… It was perfect.

Yes, there was just the two of us… but I am sure that our bed is bigger than the smallest bedroom in our flat! And then there a daybed in the room and two daybeds in the balcony. I kept jumping from one bed to another… because I can.

Did I say that the staff are amazing? Actually, you have to be a ninja to be staff member!

We stepped out to find out about how to go to town and when we got back to the room, the curtains were drawn and they’ve placed insect coils by the door.

We went for breakfast at the reception area the next day and when we got back 20 minutes later… the whole room has been cleaned and our laundry taken away… and it returned neatly in a bag on our bed when came back in the evening.

You don’t really see the staff… but they are there when you need them.

Like when Jules got a really bad tummy bug on our third day… they left us alone but went out of their way to find medicine for him and one of them kept telling me to get rice porridge for Jules as this would calm his tummy… but Jules won’t eat but he was grateful for the medicine.

To tell you the truth… we didn’t really bump into many guest either. I know that they are fully booked but they lay out of the place just give you the feel of total privacy!

Alam Shanti is just so beautiful… was it worth the money paid? Yes! Yes! Yes!

You can follow whats going on there in the section “Bali / Gili Trawangan Trip on JulesD’s blog” in the left hand column on this page

^^^ I was writing this in the net Kiosk at KL airport, and the credit ran out…. Recovered the draft, but it doesn’t seem like there is any more to add, purely because we are now home