The running joke in our car while we sit in traffic on I-5 is “wonder what non-accident is delaying us this time” Inevitably, on any large scale traffic jam, we reach the point on the asphalt where the delay seemingly occurred and miraculously the source that was impeding our progress down the super highway is no where to be found.
Phantom delays of sorts, mysterious gridlock that we scratch our heads in wonderment about. Where is the source of this 30 min delay we just experienced?
Well here in Bali those question never arise when gridlock raises it’s ugly head. More often that not, ceremonial celebration is the order of the day, and that my friends takes precedence over just about everything else.
Anytime I venture away from our house I build into my already pretty loose schedule a little bit of ceremonial gridlock time. No radio traffic news reporters blaring the blow by blow here, but more likely the rhythmic sounds of tiny finger cymbals and deep round metal gongs sounding out warnings to the potential delays ahead.
Such was the case as I drove to pick up Teri yesterday….. and most everyday as you traverse this spiritually awash island where the opportunity to gather, march, chant and offer blessing is second to none.
This small moving celebration in the video was just the case… complete with woven baskets filled with offerings of eggs, small bills, incense, and flowers. When they had finished with my intersection the entire procession pick themselves up off the street and continued the procession down the avenue to another stopping point somewhere just beyond my view.
Traffic that had stopped slowly started to move again and people who had abandoned their cars to walk forward and see the display leisurely return to once again begin their journey. No feathers ruffled, no tempers to flair, just quite acceptance to a fact of life that is six millennium unchanged and almost future certain.
OK I understand it is a matter of scale to compare the two experiences of I-5 and a random corner in Saya, but the contrast of experience is worth the examination and one that is certainly not lost on me.
So rather than getting out of my car and tapping my foot imagining the answers to the why and when questions of I-5 gridlock …. I instead witness a beautiful, and from my point of view spontaneous ceremony from the seat atop an idle motorbike.
At home I just want an answer to the question. Here.. I never even question. The answers to most everything I might think are right before me wrapped in a wonderful package….waiting around the next corner to be unwrapped by the eyes of the casual observer.
