On August 17th, I visited a village called Penarungan. I had colleagues who had a program that aim to introduce the Balinese life to tourists.
They showed how people live, their homes, food, and daily tasks like farming and praying. They also shared music and dancing from Bali.
When visitors come, they first wore sarongs with help from locals. It is very common for a Balinese to wear sarong in every day life especially for communities or religious activities. The we walked along the village road to my colleague house, where they would continue the program.
Arriving in the house, Dharma and Ika, showed them the family temple in the yard and also buildings around the house. Next, they taught the group how the Balinese prepared offering for the gods and ancestors.
Ika explains how to make the Balinese offerings.
The offering was made from young coconut leaves, flowers, fruits, cakes and other food. When there is a temple festival, every body would make offerings and present them to the temple. Usually the Balinese women carry the offerings on top of their heads. Some of the travelers even tried to carry the offerings on their heads.
When the offerings making was finish, a cooking session was started. My friends invited all the participants to cook Balinese dish.
Not all the dishes were cooked that day. Some were made before since it was not possible to cook and prepare for lunch at once. While we were waiting for the dish to be ready, the Dharma and Ika took the participants to a rice field nearby. Helped by the locals some of them even tried to plough the field and plant the rice plants.
Twenty minutes went by and the farming was concluded. Next, Dharma's family had finished preparing the Balinese lunch for all the participants. The lunch was served on wooden plate. It was a rice, betutu chicken, Tempe, tofu, spicy shredded papaya and sambal. It was delicious.
While everybody enjoyed their lunch a beautiful girl came, and started dancing a Balinese dance. She invited some participants to join the dance. All enjoyed the dance, including Melodi, the little girl, Ika's daughter. Well, I escaped quietly since I am not good at dancing.
Melodi enjoyed the dance.