Stuck at a ghost homestay – Small Stories From Bali

I haven’t figured out how to manage my travel schedule well, so my brain has been suffering from a bit of a timezone hopping and lack of sleep. I’ve just arrived to my homestay in Ubud and decided to pass out. Well, decided is an exaggeration – more like my brain decided to get it’s revenge and passed me out. I slept for 17 hours that day with one break for food.

How I was able to get the food was a mystery to me the next day. You see, I found myself in this weird situation where I could not leave my homestay… Google maps said that the center of Ubud is about an hour walk away, which was’t that bad. Walking is good, right? Huh. Walking in Bali is a nightmare. There are no sidewalks and the cars and motorcycles go crazy on the roads. When I tried to walk, squishing myself as close to the edge of the road as possible (where, by the way, was some kind of creepy trench that kept calling for my leg), cars kept honking by, like 30 centimeters away from me. My enthusiasm shrank and I shrank back to the homestay.

I tried going in another direction – it was easier to see the cars and there were some street shops, giving me more space to walk. Not long after I left, a “friendly” street dog greeted me with a few barks and decided to follow me. I knew better than to run or show that I’m scared, but I couldn’t do much – it would bark and chase after me every time I started to walk. Being dumb at handling street dogs, I slowly shifted over to the nearest street shop and asked for help. They kindly distracted the dog while I ran back to my room.

I mean calmly walked back.. Scared? Me? Pff…

I tried to call a taxi, but for some reason, all the Grab drivers kept cancelling on me, and there were very few of them compared to Kuta. I didn’t know it back then, but Grab and the other online taxi apps are banned from Ubud. I also stubbornly didn’t want to rent a motorcycle because I’m still scared to ride one.

So I couldn’t walk, couldn’t get a taxi, couldn’t ride myself.

I had some todo stuff piled up since Thailand, so I decided that it wouldn’t be a waste to stay inside for the day. As I looked around the homestay – it was lovely and clean, with beautiful views, and a small kitchen. What stroke me as odd, though, was that it was completely empty. No staff; no guests. I wondered if there were any ghosts there, or if this entire building was a ghost. This thought did entertain me for the rest of the day.

To be honest, if there was an emergency or I really needed to get somewhere, I could find my way out of there. I just decided to follow the nudges of the day and see where it takes me. And it took me to the abandoned (or so it seemed) homestay.

Staying there was unusual – as if I was in some kind of separate world. The time felt slower and the space – inviting and cheerful. It was like nothing I’ve experienced before. I wandered the halls, enjoyed the great views, studied and watched movies in my room. I also ordered some food (thanks to a pamphlet that I found in my room). The food took a while to get here, which only encouraged my thoughts of ghostly homestay that doesn’t want to be found. That or the restaurant just took a while to cook.

When it got dark, I gathered all my stealthy skills and ninja-d my way to the nearest store to get some necessities – snacks and stuff. The traffic at night was calmer than during the day, so it was easier to get through the crazy street. This explained how I could possibly get to the store while half-asleep the night before. It also helped me plan my escape plan for tomorrow.

The next day I got out of the homestay early (while most of the cars were still sleeping), and walked all the way to Ubud center. Though there were less cars in the morning, it was not a safe walk. I made it though, and made sure to get contact info of a few Ubud taxists, so that I don’t find myself in the same pickle on the consequent days whenever I needed to go to the center. And a few days later I moved out.