Ubud was crowded because of the cremation of the King’s wife – wife number 3 that is. I wanted to see some of the ceremony and decided to watch along the parade route rather than at the cremation site itself. I arrived about an hour before the supposed start time. Of course I had forgotten that the event would go off on Balinese time and after about 90 minutes I realized that this might be a long wait. I had decided to take up position on the first floor of the Ubud market looking down on Jl Raya Ubud. From up there I thought that we could get a decent view of events as the procession would be going from the palace to Pura Dalem Puri at the top of Tebesaya, where the cremation would take place. I think I made a mistake. Once I had found a spot, the rapidly growing crowds prevented me from moving and the overhead wires running along the street made photography difficult.
After about an hour, Balinese wearing traditional dress began to appear. I was told that these were people from surrounding villages and that they would be taking part in the procession. It was getting hotter. Bodies were being pressed against me and I began to feel clammy. I wondered if that was my sweat that I could feel on my legs.
Eventually there was movement. A false alarm. Then another false alarm. Until, to cheers from the watching thousands, the procession got under way. Musicians walked down the street, their instruments being carried for them. Women carrying offerings went by. Then a huge bull, carried on a bamboo structure by at least 40 men came by. Then a second bull came by. This one must have been 10 feet high and it dwarfed the first one. The men carrying this one took their opportunity to have some fun by tipping and turning the bull (as much as the narrow streets would allow) and trying to unseat the man riding the bull. Small children who were riding on the platform with the bull were strapped to its legs to stop them from being rolled off the platform. More “floats” were carried by culminating in a tower at least 30 feat high which carried the queen’s body somewhere close to the top. And then they were gone. It was all over in less than 10 minutes. By the time I’d got clear of the market building it was time for a cold beer to celebrate surviving the crush. I downed a cold Anker beer and wished the queen all the best on her journey and wondered how many would attend my funeral.
The next day I walked up Tebesaya and reached the site of the cremation. There was smoke rising from the remains of some of the platforms and there was a huge temporary ramp sitting on the edge of the site. The ramp had been used to lower items (the queen’s body?) from the large tower that had gone by in yesterday’s procession. The cool soft morning breeze blew the smoke around the area. I imagined that there must have been several thousand people crammed into this relatively small space yesterday afternoon to see what would, for many of those watching, surely be the most significant ceremonial event in their lifetime excepting those within their family. All that was left now was a bamboo tower, some charred statues, and small pieces of plastic slipping over the ground in the wind. I asked myself what would happen to that bloody plastic. Oh happy day when we can have a ceremony to celebrate the death of plastic packaging.
