Following breakfast, we would head back to the hotel for a while before setting out on a day-trip somewhere. Unlike my first visit to Bali, this wasn’t a holiday spent lying on the beach. Amongst the places we visited was Ubud, where we went to see the Puri Sareng Agung, a large palace used and owned by the last monarch of Ubud. Ubud itself is the creative and artistic hub of Bali. Previously a totally remote and undiscovered location, it first became popular in the 1930s due to its seclusion and breathtaking beauty. Early visitors to Ubud included such luminaries as Rudolf Bonnet, Noël Coward, Charlie Chaplain and H.G. Wells. Nowadays it is still a relatively quiet and peaceful place, with only a few cafés and simple boarding houses. It is still considered somewhat of a retreat for artists and those wishing to spend time away and rediscover themselves. Indeed, it provided the backdrop for the Balinese section of the book Eat, Pray, Love and the film of the same name.
Well, although I probably didn’t do as much praying as I should have, Yossy and I certainly did our fair share of eating and loving during that week. We spent time cycling in the mountains during the day, and making love during the evenings.
They were the purest, simplest, sweetest, happiest of days.
We were blessed.
When we first got married, Yossy worked at the airport for Mandala Airlines, a local company. It was a good job and rather a prestigious one in local circles. To be accepted one had to undergo a rigorous selection process and then a lengthy training programme. She was often as tired as I was, but still she found time for me.
She worked in the office and at the check-in counter and it was a job she did for about three years and, although she seemed to enjoy it, she began to get a small case of itchy feet. Although I was no doubt somewhat biased, I did believe Yossy had the intelligence and work ethic to do pretty much whatever she wanted in life, and the world of Mandala Airlines didn’t really seem to offer up that much in the way of long-term possibilities.
After applying for several new jobs, she procured an interview at a company called PT. Bali Party.
Yossy’s interview went well and she was offered the position of trainee sales executive at PT. Bali Party. She started work there and, following a week’s training in Jakarta, spent some time finding her feet in the regional office in Surabaya.
As far as I could tell, it was a kind of timeshare company, selling holidays to customers for a fixed period of time each year. As the name of the business suggested, the properties being rented out were all in Bali, and so having fallen in love with the island, it seemed natural for her to want to have some sort of connection with the place. An additional attraction was the fact that amongst the perks of the job was the opportunity to have an annual, all-expenses paid stay at one of the company’s properties in Bali
It was, of course, somewhat different from her job at the airlines, but she soon got into the swing of things and started enjoying it. It was good to see her full of life again after having become a bit down in her last few months at Mandala Airlines. The colour was back in her cheeks once more, and she was soon bubbling away and in a state of seemingly permanent hyperactivity.
I remember one slight worry I had about her taking on a new job was the selfish one that it might take up more of her time and she might start to leave me behind in life, so to speak. However, I needn’t have worried as if anything her new job and her new zest for life brought us even closer together.
Barely an hour went by without her calling me wherever I happened to be teaching so she could give me an update on what she was up to and what was happening in the intricate world of timeshare selling. It was great to see her so happy and that happiness just rubbed off on me and the two of us as a couple.
I remember after a month or so of working at Bali Party she phoned me at work one day and asked for my permission to go out with her friends that night. How about that? Asked for my permission. Although times are changing, in Indonesia the woman still somewhat defers to the man in a marriage and ‘permission’ has to be sought for pretty much even the slightest deviance from the daily routine.
Needless to say, permission was duly granted.
That night, as it happened, I managed to finish work at a reasonable hour and I called Yossy. She was, as usual, delighted at this turn of events and asked me to accompany her and her new friends. Not being the most naturally gregarious of people, I was a bit reluctant at first but she soon talked me round and so I reluctantly agreed to tag along.
As things turned out it was quite an enjoyable evening in the end. We all met up at Yossy’s office and I found myself being subjected to a long round of introductions to her friends; a group of perhaps ten or so people, all in their early to mid twenties, and evenly split gender wise. They all seemed genuinely pleased to meet me and the look in Yossy’s eye told me she was more than happy at this coming together. That was the wonderful thing about her: she always seemed to really be proud of me and to want to ‘show me off’ to people. At first I found it all a bit disconcerting and even a bit patronizing at times to tell the truth, as being an insecure sort I used to suspect ulterior motives of some kind. Quite what I was worried
