If you are someone who has watched the film "Eat Pray Love" then you can see why Julia Roberts fell in love with/ in Ubud in the canonical and criminally underrated film "Eat, Pray, Love". In that film - or piece of art, as Mads and I prefer to think of it as,  Julia Roberts saves the best for last: Love ... and also Ubud.

In the movie, which , full disclosure I haven't seen - I have watched the trailer and some selected scenes on the internet on this low-resolution slow but free wifi in Amed- but deeply want to, Ubud is made out to be this unblemished wonderland. But in our special trip to Ubud, while it was undeniably beautiful with narrow streets of shrines and streams, it was, like much of Bali that we have seen, also littered with litter. In the movie, they must have really gone to town both in the location scouting and also getting some street sweepers to make Ubud as beautiful as it could be.

Pamper Time

On our first night in Ubud, in our luxurious villa, we welcomed our friend Amelia to our holiday. She had booked the accomodation, so, perhaps she had invited us. Much like Julia Roberts, she wanted to go for a trip by herself. In the movie Julia Roberts, apparently, says "everyone falls in love in Bali". And we all did.

Outside our luxury accomodation, had an infinity pool with
view of tropical plants

In the trailer which I have seen, Julia Roberts cycles through the fields. We didn't do this. She walks past some open market with delectable fruit and Jackfruit, the closest we got to this was this endless calvacade of shops selling Bintang singlets and penis themed bottle openers. She meditated, we snapchatted. She meets some hot Brazilian dude, played by a Spanish actor. At our accomodation we met some English lads who wanted to get "inked". She also hired some sort of Jeep, full disclosure haven't seen a Jeep in the week we have been in Bali.1

Trying hard to act cool around the monkeys, but inside both of
us were screaming.

But most of all we wanted to meet people. Julia Roberts meets the love of her life in Ubud. Unfortunately I was fifty years too late for Mama, this incredible seventy one year old babe we met on our entry into the rice fields of Ubud. We, like Julia Roberts, wanted to see the rice terraces that are dotted through the villages that make up Ubud. In the film, she seems to hire some bourgeois hipster bicycle (most tourists seem to make do with mountain bikes) and then does what is actually impossible to do, which is to ride it past the terraces and through the monkey forest. 2

We went without the bicycles and instead walked into Mama, who was out on the road offering us some coconuts. She was full of life and laughter, delivering her story in a combination of English and Bahasa and lots of giggles. She had five children and twelve grandchildren, and about five teeth with which she beamed with irrepressible glee. She was full of jokes about Amelia, Madeleine and I being in a sexy menage a trois . She loved Madeleine, and was very impressed with her extensive knowledge of Bahasa Indonesian. As we entered her bamboo shack she made us smell her exotic plants, cinnamon, vanilla, lemongrass. We drank coconut under the shade and she laughed and hugged and spoiled us. Grabbing a spoon, she fed Amelia the gelatinous interior of the coconut. She filled our bags with treats like the doting grandmother she was, and we hugged her goodbye and laughed and it was so genuinely nice, it was almost like falling in love.

Hanging with Mama

Bit of Banter with Mama

Mads unimpressed with moustache, frangipani in hair a beautiful gift from Mama

Blurry but beautiful

No need for a caption here, a picture says a thousands words... about friendship.

Not a lot of people think that coffee that has been shat out by civet cats would be a great way to start a conversation, but it was. It really was. There we were, drinking that Luwak coffee which as our driver,  Made, attested the best coffee in the world. Having tasted coffee in the coffee capital of the world - Wellington, I agreed. It was great coffee. Our waitress, whose name was Philemona - or something that sounded really similar, was either going for the hard sell or really enjoyed our company and spent ten minutes with us.

Tropical paradise, but don't look in the bushes. Pretty sure that
near this was this mental cockfight which seemed like a great thing
to do from a tourist perspective, but also I mean blood sports... not cool.

She was intrigued to learn we were 28, unmarried and childless. She insisted we guessed her age, which is always a terrible game. I went low at 20, Mads went slightly higher at 22. She looked aggrieved. We talked about Bali. Mads insists we mostly talked about marriage and children, but that was just like the first minute. She said that if we were Balinese we would have two children by now. After we talked about family, she had two brothers and a boyfriend but no ring yet, she then wanted to know about where we were staying. Jimbaran Beach. Her eyes narrowed. We talked about the massage we had for $10NZD or 100,000 rupiah (one of the magical things about Indonesian currency is how you feel you are the richest man in the room every time you get out $100NZD). She was cruelly dismissive and told us that massages are 50,000 rupiah in Kuta. We talked about going to Ubud, and she gave a weak smile. She said "it's very quiet there". She then tried to sell us some of the best coffee in the world. We gave a weak smile. She made us taste her chocolate. It tasted like the kind of cheap chocolate you can get at Easter if you don't want to splash out on the big branded eggs that have Jaffas inside, our eyes narrowed. Then we paid and left. 

Maybe Philemona - which, lets be honest, is not her real name was right about Jimbaran Bay. What was once a quaint fishing village is in the midst of a grand reimagining, on the far end of the bay are expensive hotels with the longest infinity pools on the island. On our end of the bay are fish processing factories, lots of identical tourist restaurants with beautiful views and, at the end closest to the airport, a fish market. Speeding around the narrow streets is the constant presence of scooters, families with four young children and mum, teenagers insouciantly checking their Facebook, taxi scooters  offering a ride. The Balinese seem to be in a constant rush to be somewhere, at all hours. 

This dog is definitely 100% cuter than any of the other neighbourhood dogs.
100% less mange.

There are lots of sad looking dogs, one on the street next to us has the sad inflated teats of a diseased cow. Yesterday we saw tourists patting the dogs on the beach, they definitely are not the kind of dogs that you want to pat. There is always something to eat in Jimbaran Bay for the dogs. The piles of rubbish can be found behind walls, outside one of the fish factories was a hole in the concrete for rubbish to fall out of. Plastic cups, polystyrene blend together with bleached coral on the beach in a sort of picturesque assemblance. When we found a rubbish bin, it was like some sort of mirage, a real novelty.

Extreme beauty (L), Rot (R).

The beach is all contrast, between the extreme beauty and rot. Swimming in the ocean, and having a plastic bag engulf your leg. The sun setting in amidst the storm clouds. The wooden fishing boats lapping in the turquoise water, and the smell of plastic burning from the fishermen as piles of rubbish were lit to add the appropriate ambience for the evening. Walking along the beach the scent of plastic burning blended with barbecued seafood. In some stretches the beach was draped in Victorian London levels of smoke, in other stretches it was pristine. 

This place is beautiful, but like the votive flower offerings that are left in the street, beauty and decay seem to be one and the same. Every day the Balinese, who have been extremely friendly and gentle, place these delicate palm fronds with frangipane petals, rice, sweets, crackers and cigarettes out onto the road. Near the shrines they pile up, and in the afternoon heat they add to the tropical rot fragrance. Even by the worst piles of rubbish, frangipani flowers fall from the trees. Along the dark thick overgrowth of unused land the rubbish seems to be swallowed up by the land. At the coffee plantation Philemona, our waitress preferred Kuta the party capital where massages are half the price, but we have loved our stay in Jimbaran Bay, even with all the plastic.

Went for a massage, $10, which in our waitress's mind was an
outrage as it is considerably cheaper in Kuta. 

One of the fish factory trucks motived, like so many, by the haters.

Uluwatu temple, luckily we didn't have any belongings stolen by monkeys here.

Temple selfie.

Sexy cart.

Snapper at the Jimbaran fish market. 

Coral and sponge pile, above rubbish. 

Cray cray.

This was a place where you took whatever seafood you bought from the market and they barbecue it for you. 

There were a lot of Chinese tourists on miniature horseback at sunset. Quite a sight.

Not a villa in the traditional sense; in the dark central corridor with small high-ceilinged rooms jutting off and a maidenhair fern pedestaled drawing room in the front for receiving guests, the dim light  heavy lace curtains behind heavier curtains, and a small dimly-lit kitchen with the novelty of running water and maybe some oil lighting I guess. But Haw Par Villa did have a villa on it once, this Art Deco paradise mansion has a bit of a history.

Looking like a cross between any generic art deco villa and Borobudur, this graceful villa did not stand the test of time. 

1. It was made by the Tiger Balm bros. The older one built it for the younger one.

2. Like Pearl Harbour, it was destroyed by the Japanese during the Second World War. Unlike Pearl 

harbour, they have not yet made a blockbuster movie about it starring Josh Hartnett and Kate Beckinsale.

3. In its place is... well to be fair, it is hard to know where its place was. It wasn't exactly clear where the Villa stood to the casual visitor, or the serious Haw Par Villa fan. It definitely wasn't the kind of thoughtful curatorial approach that the Haw Par Villa management (currently the Singapore Government) thought was appropriate, even though there were informative information boards all over the show, mainly about the Chinese folklore tales being depicted.

You won't see this at Disneyland

In its place is now a sprawling, acid nightmare of a theme park. There are no rides here, only hellish visions into your destiny after death and lots of animals doing things that animals shouldn't do. If you want to see an deceitful goose husband being pulled back into his filial responsibilities by his angry goose wife, this is the place.  If you want haunting depictions of mercrabs, lady crabs or crab ladies; that is crabs with a beautiful woman's face, you need to get on the next flight to Singapore.

The story that left the deepest emotion in both of our hearts was one concrete depiction of the tale of two boys. Deep in the forest they meet a bear. One friend runs away from a marauding bear leaving his other friend to be eaten by the bear, however this friend plays dead and the bear eats the runner. It was this sort of poignant moral lesson that the Tiger Balm bros hoped to leave for the people of Singapore, and we are glad they did.

It was quite a sad experience as there were no postcards. The woman in the giftshop did try and sell us Tiger Balm, as we no longer do any sport Tiger Balm has become superfluous. She also was playing a hard rock version of Mariah Carey "Always Be My Baby" and as we left the plaintive melody of that precious song rang out through the ferro concrete jungle of Haw Par Villa

Needless to say we have found our dream wedding venue. To get there you do have to walk through the ten stages of hell; but it will be worth it, both figuratively and literally.

If I had been turned into a crab, I would be as happy too.

Like an even sadder version of Watership Down, including a stagnant pool of water.

In hell for cheating on his exams.

When you die remember that somewhere in the ten stages of hell this guy is putting that pole
somewhere that is not very nice. 

It seriously got more and more inventive the further you went along, as if they were playing a game. Except this game is possibly deadly serious for some people. 

If you play your cards right, you might also be thrown onto a hill of knives.

When you got out of the cave you made it to this paradisical garden, except even the paradisical garden managed to be really confronting. At least this poignant scene was a welcome respite from the ten stages of hell.

And if all else fails, appeal to the Australian crowd.

It doesn't matter how much juice you have in Singapore, you will still find yourself thirsty. The nights were stormy, rolling sheet lightening and dense rain. Our hotel room was very small, I mean we had read reviews about the Hotel  Boss before going and they basically said it was small, and it definitely was.

It was selfie season at the Marina, I mean of course Maddie and I 

got in on the action but has definitely been an intriguing part

of the trip, the ubiquity of the smartphone. From kids on scooters on 

their way to school in Bali, to these champs in this snap. Not making

a judgement on it, just seems like a real sea change.

Mads and I after walking for ten minutes to the Botanic gardens,

it was a sweaty but special time. Hot Singapore times are always hotter 

with a selfie (see previous photograph/babes in the previous photograph).

Food in Singapore was A+++ , especially this breakfast which we stumbled 

on and stumbled out real fat.

During our humid days in Singapore, drinking juice is basically all we did. Between strip mall and overhead skypath to the next strip mall, to underground exchanges lined with shops where you could seamlessly transition between one air conditioned strip mill to the next hyper mall, we drank juice. You could probably walk a great distance without ever breathing non conditioned air in Singapore, I know this because we have walked the distance. 

Sultry times at the Hotel Boss.

It wasn’t endless but it definitely was absurd how far you could travel without touching a street. You could definitely not walk this distance without drinking. We passed a towel carrying elderly western man melting through an underground mall. Madeleine and I, however, made our way purposefully with a constant supply of liquid.

Having a Singapore Sling. Was possibly not worth the $18 dollars.

You may think you can come to Singapore, and you can. But you cannot travel in this place without different juices, bottled iced teas, condensed milk teas, expensive cocktails, desalinated tap water, pineapple and guava, watermelon and mango. We went atop this vulgar monstrosity of a building, up to the 56th floor which looks like someone has crudely attached a vast silvery inflatable boat to the top of three towers. We sat and we tried to get a drink. We couldn’t get a drink. We left. When we returned to the hotel suite, temperature 23 degrees, I went to to the toilet and my urine was a vivid yellow despite all the liquid. Science has no answer for that.

Say what you like about the Hotel Boss, the views were exquisite.

Hot Travel Tips for the potential Northland traveller

1. There are two pizza places in Kerikeri, where my parents now live, of the two Pizza Hut is definitely the lesser option. The real travel tip here is on Sunday if you are hoping for an affordable meal definitely don;t think that pizza is going to be that meal, unless you really love the worst tasting pizza of your life.
2. Puhoi is a neat place to stop, beautiful hillsides of native bush and quaint tearooms, however be aware that the gorgonzola will stink out your mother in law's car for the rest of the journey.
3. The flame trees are a real highlight.
4. If you want to see parrots, and not that we got to see the parrots, but if you were potentially of a mindset where spending top dollar to see parrots was in the itinerary, and hadn't seen parrots in captivity within someone's section that has been transformed into a potential top tourist tip, and by "someone", I am naturally referring to a Northland businessman/policeman, then Kerikeri can complete all these dreams. Truly.
5. The Treaty Grounds are bloody pricey. Not that that they were not worth the big dollars, they are pristine.
6. Don't buy heels from Aliexpress, unless you have two left feet. A lesson Maxine Phillips learned the hard way.
7.  You get Fudge on the Kerikeri to Auckland flight; but, disappointingly, not on the Nelson to Auckland leg of the journey. Not that the fudge got eaten,