The Discoveries

Day 6, 22 February 2011
Balinese are inventors
With a full stomach from lunch, the logical thing would be to walk. So we decided to go look for the rice paddy fields trail we walked the last time (some 4-5 years ago). And if we did not have the motorbike, all that walking just looking for the fields would have gotten all our food digested! I did a quick search on the internet (thanks to good ol travelling companion, Huawei) and found that the path to the fields start at the end of Jalan Kajeng, and ends at Campuan. Even with this information, we somehow started from the end part of the trail. But the beauty of it is, it really does not matter where you started. Because either way, you'll be walking through the narrow rice paddy fields.

The last time I was here, I did not enjoy the walk at all. Maybe it was the scorching heat... or perhaps I was too concerned with the mud getting on my Havaianas! That was also the time when I had to travel with a hairdryer and had to pack more clothes than I really ever needed. I have since "grown up". I no longer care about wet hair right after a shower... I think I have learnt to embrace life... if that's what it's called.

So anyway, we made our way to the fields, and then we got distracted even before we got started! A nice lady came up and asked if we wanted coconuts for 15,000rp each (I think?) We were too polite to refuse so we bought 1, and the "entertainment" that followed, was an eye-opener.

he speaks really good English by the way. imagine the # of tourists he's met!

It was so sweet, the juice. We sat there sipping our coconut juice, and looking into the vast greeneries of what Ubud has to offer, pretending there wasn't a care in the world. It was a lot of juice because it was kind of a large coconut... and L had to hurry and remind us we'd better get started with the walk in the fields if we wanted to finish before it gets dark! So sip, sip, sip we did, and then it was down to the white, juicy-looking coconut flesh. L was all ready to ditch the idea of eating the flesh but I was kinda reluctant, so we looked at each other, giving each other the raised eyebrow how-now-brown-cow look. To eat, or not to eat. Annnnnnd to eat it we shall.

you should have seen him handling the parang. it was pure entertainment.

It was obvious he's done this many times over. A chop here, a chop there, and before you know it, the coconut was cracked open. Just as we were wondering what we were going to eat it with (because there wasn't any spoons in sight), the woman digs into a gunny sack, and we figured "Oh great! She's getting us spoons afterall." But hell it wasn't a spoon that she's pulled out. It was this "scraper" that's made from dried coconut husk! Now how innovative is that! She hands it to the man, who uses it to scrape the flesh. He made it look like such an easy feat too! We were totally amazed (and so glad we decided to wanna eat the flesh. Otherwise we would never have been able to witness something like this).

I wonder how he could have thought of something like this!

And this isn't even the best part. We met a Canadian woman who had wanted to fill up her water bottle with the rest of the coconut juice that she couldn't finish, and we thought the Balinese man was being helpful when he took the coconut from her (at this point, we were assuming he was just gonna help hold the coconut and pour it into the bottle)...

But NOOoooo...

adding a spout!

not a drop wasted!

He sliced a piece off the coconut skin, made a slot so he could attach that, and you now have a spout, on your coconut! How ingenious and clever is that! It was just all too exciting for us city folks.

All we had wanted to do, was to walk the rice paddies, but the whole experience we got, just from buying a coconut, was kinda priceless. So if you come across the nice man and his wife, asking if you'll like a coconut, you sure as hell should buy one (even if you're not thirsty!).