Temples and Rice Fields

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Temples

Bali is full of temples. They are every where and they are all surprisingly similar in some respects. They are black, grey and reddish made of brick and cement, sometimes stone or lava rock. There are often umbrellas in white, yellow, red and black. There are stone or cement statues of gods and demons. Here are some temples we have seen.

This temple is probably from the 11th century. It is in honor of Shiva and Ganesha.

Goa Gajah or The Elephant Cave

Gunung Kawi 

 This temple is also thought to date to the 11th century. It is the only temple we have visited where we got a spiritual feeling. That may be because many people where there preparing for a ceremony. Or we just might not be in tune with what is spiritual here.

Women preparing offerings for the ceremony. Men do this too but they make different ones. Younger women were in another group making yet another type of offering.

Offerings

The scared spring at Tirta Empul

This temple honors a magical spring that was first found in AD 962. The temple gate above leads to Pura Tirta Empul the water temple at the spring. People come to bath in the water and take it home for other ceremonies. Many big temples have a gate like this called a split gate.

The temple below is Besakih  temple, the mother temple, the most important temple is Bali. It is on a mountain side with fantastic views to the coast on a clear day. I found it disappointing despite the scenery and many temples (its actually a group of over 60 temples). What bothered me was the aggressive local people asking for donations, offering to be guides and selling things. It was constant and made it hard for me to connect to the place.

Many big temples have a doorway like this in addition to the split gate.

This is a priest performing a ceremony.

The three of us in front of the split gate.

One of the temple towers and a wind toy.

Rice fields

Another thing that says Bali like temples are rice fields or terraces. The sad thing is these are disappearing due to tourist development. The work is hard, back breaking, doesn't pay well and the young people would rather drive a taxi or work in some form of tourism if possible. I can't blame them. Many fields are bought up to build villas like the one we have rented. Bali used to produce all its own rice and now it is beginning to depend on imports. Rice also was more of a luxury in the past but now people expect to eat it with every meal. If they do not protect the rice fields they will lose a valuable tourist attraction and the power to control their own food supply. Although they are disappearing we have seen some beautiful rice growing areas.