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| After reading the menu at this quaint restaurant on the beach in Lovina, it made us wish the drive wasn’t quite so far from the villa. For us, a meal doesn’t warrant a four hour round trip. |
“Sightings on the Beach in Bali”
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| A large fishing boat from quite a distance. |
As it turned out there was an issue with the villa’s printer. We’d completed the online visa application for Vietnam, converted it into a PDF and tried to print the required two copies on the older Epson printer.
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| A quiet, pristine beach in the town of Lovina, a two hour drive from the villa. |
The black ink had run out. The two Ketuts had no idea what to do. With the language barrier they ran to get Ribud, the lawn guy who’s also a “master of all trades” who was working at Egon’s house next door.
Looking over the old printer, Ribud, who also speaks little English took off to return 10 minutes later with another guy who’s name I didn’t know and didn’t ask.
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| More views of the beach in Lovina. |
As far from a bigger city as we are (the four hour harrowing drive), I didn’t expect a resolution. We assumed we’d have to wait until arriving in Singapore to print the entire litany of documents we’ll need for the visas. We dreaded the idea of taking even more time when we’d already have to accomplish getting the three visas during the one week stay.
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| Another interesting looking restaurant on the beach in Lovina. |
The two guys left the house for about 10 minutes, returning with a wide mouth bottle of black printer ink. We were impressed they had this on hand. But, how in the world would they pour from this wide mouth bottle into the tiny opening in the printer’s black ink reservoir?
Leave it to these resourceful Balinese workers. They made a funnel from a piece of cardboard and gingerly poured the required amount of ink into the printer. I’d gone rummaging through the kitchen cupboards looking for a funnel with no success.
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| Many small boats dock at the harbor in Lovina. |
They left after we expressed considerable gratitude in both words and the traditional Balinese “hands held together with a gentle bow”. In no time at all we had both sets of visa applications for Vietnam printed and ready for the new photos we had taken weeks ago to be attached to the forms. One done, three more to go.
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| A short pier in Lovina. |
Why three more when in yesterday’s post and above, I said we only needed to do three visas? I failed to mention we’ve yet to apply for a fourth visa for Cambodia which we’ll do through a US visa service online over the next few days.
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| The shoreline at the beach. |
Why stretch this process over days as opposed to completing it all in one day? The WiFi is slow, making the process painstaking. In our minds, it’s less confusing and cumbersome doing one such task each day when we still have plenty of time at this point.
This morning at 9 am I went to Negara with Gede, without Tom. Wanting to purchase cheese for an after dinner snack and a few other grocery items there was no reason for Tom to make the harrowing 30 minute drive (each way) when Gede and I did fine on our own. Tom enjoyed having the villa to himself for a few hours.
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| Fishing boats in the harbor in Lovina. |
Making today’s post short enabled me to get it uploaded quickly upon my return. I leave you with more photos from our recent trip to Lovina and look forward to “seeing” you with more tomorrow.
Happy day to all!
Photo from one year ago today, June 2, 2015:
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| We were in Tahiti one year ago today, overlooking the sea from a bridge. We toured the city of Papeete with our new friends Rene and Geoff with whom we’ve stayed in touch over this past year. For more Tahiti photos, please click here. |