We learned quickly. It was only a week into our 6-month journey home (I felt that calling it a trip would belittle the experience!) and already we felt like veteran travelers in the way that we bargained, fended off the onslaught of touts, and looked out for each other and our things.
Beth and I had been teaching English (or some lower form of the language) to eager, underachieving Japanese businessmen (yes... men) for almost 3 years. We decided to leave and go back home via a 6-month pit stop in Southeast Asia starting on June 29th, 1997. After only a week, sitting in our spacious bungalow in Ubud, Bali, we felt like we had been gone a long time - and we were having the time of our lives.
We landed in Denpassar, the provincial capital of Bali, on the 29th - a Sunday - at the unfortunate time of 8:00pm. After getting a prepaid taxi ticket we hopped in and were welcomed by an Alanis Morisette tune! We knew we had arrived - after all, for the previous 3 years we'd gotten used to the inundation of such low quality prima donna's as Namie Amuro, SMAP and other Japanese pop idols. Seeing as though we arrived so late, we had little chance but to get a place in Denpassar. We decided that there must not be a sweeter sight for a hotel owner than to see a tired backpacker come wondering in at 10:00 at night. We stayed in a place recommended by our Lonely Planet guide book with a caution to 'Lock your doors' called Adi Yasa for an unbelievable (late night?) price of 20,000 rupiah. The advice about locking your doors was good, but it wasn't enough to keep the 10cm long cockroaches out - 2 huge ones found their way into our bathroom, which was defiantly a thirst quenching experience. Given our experiences with roaches while living in Japan and knowing how much they hate light, we made rule #1 - if in doubt, sleep with the bathroom lights on!
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