Ubud and the Close Call

This was my last weekend in Bali before I go off to Solo for my placement. Jenny (a co-volunteer and world traveler extraordinaire from the Netherlands) and I decided to go to Ubud for the weekend. We packed our bags and Friday headed off for our last adventure together.

Our trip got off to a rocky start as the ‘bus’ we were supposed to catch didn’t really appear to exist. We were given fairly detailed instructions on where and how to catch this phantom bus – these instructions included asking police to help us flag it down, which, as I write it, seems ludicrous, but at the time seemed perfectly normal, and did strike me as typically “Indonesian.” There is no actual bus-stop and if the driver doesn’t notice you standing there he simply whizzes by. The police seemed disinterested in helping us – as they absolutely should have been! We waited at a busy corner where we were told this bus might arrive. After about 10 minutes in the sun, we decided this was a bit much for us and were worn down by the constant offers of “transport? taxi?” by the locals hanging about. We finally managed to bargain a taxi for what we felt was a fair price and off we went to Ubud.

Within 5 minutes we were stuck in a traffic jam that you could see stretched forever. It turns out that the local desa (a village within the city) was celebrating something important as there was a parade of people walking down the bypass road (equivalent to a highway) in full ceremonial costume, with drums, music, and elaborate decorations. There were probably 300 people. This is Bali, so they were given preference over the traffic. The driver simply shrugged; “ceremony” was all he said. We finally managed to get past them and on our way.
We arrived in Ubud about an hour later and went to a homestay (Sania’s guesthouse – I highly recommend it) that had been recommended to us by another volunteer. We paid extra for a room that featured a fan and hot water. Much to our chagrin, however, the hot water only existed in the sink and not the shower. I could write for days about how many things are wrong with that but really just have to get over it. Sania’s does however have a pool, and it’s quite nice, so we were placated.

The next morning, off Jenny and I went to one of Ubud’s most famous landmarks, the Monkey Forest. I dutifully purchased a bunch of bananas (incidentally, a bunch of bananas is called a “comb” of bananas in Indonesian, as they feel that is what it resembles) to feed to the monkeys and went into the forest. Within 5 minutes, an aggressive male macaque had my “comb” of bananas and one of the guides advised me sternly that you don’t mess with an aggressive male macaque – good advice, I decided. I seem to be continually outsmarted by ‘less intelligent’ creatures. The monkeys in the Monkey Forest are somewhat more aggressive than those we encountered at Uluwatu. They have no qualms about climbing up your clothes, going through your pockets, trying to steal your bag (as Jenny soon found out) or just sitting on your shoulder and hanging out. Another monkey eventually got my water bottle as well, though he was much smaller, and I technically ‘let’ him have it.

The next day, Jenny and I decided to rent bicycles to explore the outlying areas of Ubud – and yes, despite the fact that we clearly had 2 large bicycles, the locals still helpfully offered us “transport? taxi?” at every chance they could. Jenny and I toured around the countryside, stopping occasionally to snap a few pics. As Jenny is from Holland, Land of the Bicycle, it was natural for her to lead the way. However at one point, she suggested I lead…

And that is when it happened.

I found a particularly pretty rice paddy off to the left and decided to pull over to take a few pictures. I tried to put my bike on its kickstand, but the space between the road and the canal running alongside it was narrow and at a precarious angle, so I leaned the bike against a tree instead. As I was straightening from leaning over to rest the bike against a tree, I caught a glimpse of spider web, just to my left, probably about 6 inches from my shoulder. I was still in the motion of straightening out and was conscious that this web was a little close, and my nerves took over. I turned my head quickly, searching for the creator of this web, still straightening out, and there it was.

It was the biggest spider I have ever seen outside of a zoo, and it was approximately 4 inches from my face. “OH MY GOD” I gasped and tried to back away, as quickly as I could. Unfortunately, my bike, along with Jenny’s, was directly behind me and I could not maintain balance. Down I went, onto the road, so lucky that there was no traffic at that moment. It was like my life was passing before my eyes; every thought clear and detailed. The whole way down I was thinking how lucky I was that I was not any closer to that thing, and that it hadn’t ended up on my face. I couldn’t have cared less that I was falling, as it just meant I was getting further away from the Spider of Death more quickly.

Jenny still hadn’t spotted it, and was frantically saying, “what? What is it?” I have discovered that we all go to our own dark place when someone around us is scared – Jenny assumed I had seen a snake (her equivalent to the spider I had just encountered) and was looking around the ground in a panic trying to ascertain what had scared me. I finally composed myself and pointed to it, and then I think she got it. No snakes, therefore no danger. I, however, was on the verge of a breakdown. My heart was beating so hard I could feel my pulse in my neck; I could actually hear it!

I managed to get back up, and get a closer look at this spider. I had heard about them, giant orb spiders that spin their webs between telephone poles, trees, and even across rivers. This particular spider’s leg span was about 5 inches, and made those Dock Spiders one encounters in Cottage Country (another of my mortal enemies) look like amoebas. I can only imagine what a spider like this would catch in its web – birds? Those giant Indonesian bats? Perhaps a small Cessna?

Jenny finally managed to calm me down and we attempted to get on our way, at which point I realized that I had knocked the chain off my bike in the fall. There was no way I was putting my back to the thing on the web so we moved across the street to a little driveway to put the chain back on. As Jenny bent down to help me, she knocked her bike and down it went, along with the basket in the front where she had stored her purse and a couple of water bottles. The bike fell in such a way that the contents of the basket spilled out into one of the little canals of water that runs along most Balinese roads. Luckily the only thing that actually went into the canal was a bottle of water; her purse and wallet were OK. As she straightened her bike out, she noticed that her camera was hanging precariously from the basket by its wrist strap; we are not sure how it stuck there, but it did, or it would have gone into the canal too.

Always the optimist, Jenny made note that a few bad things had happened and that we were OK, so the karma for the rest of the day should be good. I simply said, “see what happens when I lead?”

For the remainder of our bike adventure in Ubud, Jenny was in front.