Bali Sunrise Trekking and Tours

Review by Zoray Kraemer

Eka Purnama Cottages is a true gem in East Bali. With basic comfortable rooms, and a location that makes excellent use of any available breeze, I’m certain you won’t find anything better for the price.

The restaurant is lovely, and the food is excellent. I would highly recommend any of their fresh fish dishes! They keep a nice collection of well maintained masks and fins, so you can walk out the front door, cross the street, and explore the sunken Japanese vessel.  Swim a little further around the rocks for impressive anemone action.

Snorkeling in Amed is always a little touch and go, however. While you may get lucky and have a fantastic crystal clear view of a gorgeous reef teeming with life, it can also be a little choppy and murky. If snorkeling isn’t the absolute best when you arrive, you may consider a boat ride, or just relax and enjoy the laid back village atmosphere.

Internet and cell phone connectivity are kind of no go, which is part of the appeal for many! If you absolutely must connect, a hike up the hill will get you a few bars, and short motorbike ride will get you to a wireless hot spot.

Run with warmth and hospitality by George and Iluh, this is exactly the kind of place that dreams of running away to beach are made of.

Telephone: +62-828-372-2642
Website: http://www.eka-purnama.com

A Movie Review by Dewald Haynes

Oscar Wilde said it best: “A man’s face is his biography. A woman’s face is her work of fiction.”

In hindsight every letter I in the countries (Italy, India, and an Island In Indonesia) traveled in “Eat, Pray, Love.” should have been a cryptic clue that this is a story about “me, myself, and especially I!” As we travel across the globe from America to Bali the real itinerary remains within Liz Gilbert’s head. Fortunately, she does have a beautiful and entertaining mind, hence the popularity and success of her book.

American sweetheart, Julia Roberts, long matured from her evergreen “Pretty Woman” image, convincingly portrays a “Lonely Lady” reevaluating her life after a divorce. As she leaves New York and arrives in Italy, she opens her mouth and eats, while the rest of her remains pretty much closed. At an Ashram in India she gets her mind, and spirit chiseled opened with the help of a tortured male soul from Texas. Finally she arrives in Bali to open her heart and, ultimately, behind a closed doors, to a charming Brazilian gentleman, a few other parts as well!

Oops! I just told you the story. However, it’s neither the plot nor the geography that makes this movie exceptional. It was the bravery of Elizabeth Gilbert to spiritually strip naked and write HER story, leaving herself wide open to public scrutiny and exploitation. The raw emotionally voyeuristic nature of this movie is the entertainment factor and journey that we are invited to embark upon. It inspires perceptions and opinions from the audience, who is looking from the outside intimately into her life, personally experiencing empathy, joy and, at, times irritation. Common responses to the genre classically referred to as a “Chick Flick” or as a “Self Indulgent Memoir.”

I arrived in Bali at the time when they were busy filming “Eat, Pray, Love.” The hype of catching a glimpse of Julia, and the inconvenience of having roads blocked off, as well as the pleasure of seeing the big hole on the main road finally filled in and the streets cleaned, was all part of the buildup for me to see this movie. I have never even read the book!

The grapevine opinions, both positive and negative, about the book prohibited me, and so I decided to wait for Hollywood to produce the film. After all, I will never be a middle aged divorced American woman, so I thought I would not relate to the subject matter at all.

A poster, in a certain restaurant here in Bali, saying “Eat, Pay, Leave” and advertisements, in the print media from animal welfare organizations, with slogans such as “Feed, Spay, Love” have been comic but also cult forming. Just being in Bali nobody escaped the immense impact of the overnight success and popularity of this book.

Hotels are offering packages, spiritual healers are doing the same, and people mentioned in the book flaunt that fact on their signs and business cards. More people are benefiting from this story than ever would from a charity event. “Thank you” is actually the appropriate response to the phenomenon that “Eat, Pray, Love,” has sparked, which has somehow managed to overshadow the bad publicity after the bombings of the past. Bravo!

While Liz, in the movie, found her “word” I found a letter. It is the letter “I.” I prayed to get to the cinema on time, as I battled through traffic. I got my ticket and I ate my popcorn while comfortably seated in the cinema at the Bali Galeria Shopping Mall. Now I shamelessly confess that I loved this movie and want to read the book.

Seeing Mt. Agung, Lake Batur, and the hiking scenes around the volcano crater was sentimental, because I have been there! The cinematography truly romanticized the beauty of Bali as Liz cycles past rice paddies and walks around the market. Hopefully, YOU too would want to experience this amazing Balinese paradise for yourself, all you have to open is your wallet and buy a plane ticket, the rest is as easy as “Eat, Pray, Love.”