Yve especially gets her share of the action. Everyday, at one point, she is spread out on the carpet with a sweatshirt and book. In fact Yve, the fuzzy carpet connoisseur herself, is here to tell us a bit about her profound love with the Carmel floors.

“I like carpeted floors because it’s like a cloud. Wherever you are the cloud is there, unless you have a hard wood floor somewhere. If you’re aching for a fuzzy blanket, just let your legs loose and fall to ground and the cloud will catch you!” Yve says.

Floor to floor carpeting also has its downsides. The fact that you can just lie down on the floor at any time can be a bad thing. Your laziness level at least doubles. It is almost like gravity is stronger and it’s hard not to drop to your knees and give into the power of the fuzzy carpet gods. Nice to be almost home!

Tuck and Jones spent hours playing with paper dolls they made on the carpets in Carmel!

This is a huge mural painted in the lobby of the hotel!

We visited an uberhip gallery in the W Hotel that represents many Bali artists. Mom and I liked the work of Dodit Artaman who does massive paintings of Barbies with bottles of gin.

The road to the entrance of the W Hotel is enveloped in bamboo.  Mom and I made our way to the sidewalk and began to stroll towards the center of town. Along the way we went into shops and browsed the shelves because we could. Because it was only Mom and me. Tuck and Jones only a distant memory. We found that most of the stores were air-conditioned, so along we went going from one store to the next, trying to escape the heat.

Bamboo arches over the long entrance drive into the hotel.

We stumbled upon a cool art exhibit in a coffee shop displaying dozens of pieces by Yaari Rom.

Seminyak is on the coast of Bali, so it is a super surf hangout with the cool, hip, relaxing vibe of an upscale beachy town. As we were nearing the middle of town,  we noticed this small outdoor marketplace. Unlike the souks of Marrakech, everyone there barely batted an eyelash as we walked through the stalls. With a friendly, non-accosting exchange, we bought a few gifts for cousins and then headed to this trendy restaurant for a light snack.

Cool street art on every corner!

Afterwards we met our driver, who took us back along the narrow roads and past the rice fields to our place in Canggu.  As we turned into the driveway, we noticed that even the contraptions made to keep the birds away from the rice had an artistic flair.

Arusha, Tanzania.  I never knew when these shocking moments would hit. At around ten that morning, I groggily stumbled out of bed and into the bathroom: a crucial part of my daily routine. The shower always represented a place to unwind, relax, and mentally prepare myself for the upcoming day, and in Arusha, Tanzania specifically, the nozzle represented no danger what so ever, however today I was in for a rude awakening. I falsely felt a sense of safety as I took a luxuriously hot shower.  As I thoroughly rinsed the remainder of shampoo from my hair and finished up, I reached down for the metallic lever to switch the shower off.  As soon as my hands made contact:  ZAP!  Volts of galvanizing electricity violently made their way through every fiber of my body.  As you probably know: wet person plus electricity equals not good. I shook up and down with my hair standing on end like a cartoon character.  In the midst of this involuntary spasm, my hand bumped against the lever once again and doubled the pain, and doubled my distrust in showers from now on. Ever since that experience, I now do a little poke test on metallic levers with the tip of my index finger prior to dampening myself. I stepped into that bathroom a tired, naive, and unprepared zombie, but left a shocked piece of toast who couldn’t feel more awake.

Yangshuo, China.  We entered the substantially sized grocery store with an equally big grocery list: eggs, fruit, vegetables, milk, and the other usual items needed to accommodate the maximum impact family.  My mom and I looked around puzzled.  Neither of us could read Chinese, but by first glance everything appeared wrapped in shiny, vivaciously colored, plastic wrappers.  We circled the store while scrutinizing the merchandize; the entire “supermarket” contained nothing more than various packages of gummies, candy bars, and other highly processed goods.  Just to be clear: this isn’t some random candy store, our house manager specifically told us that this is the supermarket.  We walked in to that store expecting to leave with food, but left with a full grocery list and a greater gratefulness for the supermarket a short walk from our house back home that carries dairy, meat, fruit, vegetables, and everything else.

Ubud, Bali. The inconsistency of plugs frustrated me from day one.  Why does everybody insist on using different shapes?  We carry a bag of adaptors with us at all times because you never know if the plugs in the next country will be shaped like a guy with a surprised face (the US plug), a sad face (Australia), a mad face (Tanzania), or any other expression you can think of.  In Bali, the outlets only accept double pronged, cylindrical plugs.  As I fiddled with various adaptors seeing which one would fit into the holes like solving some jigsaw puzzle, my hands frequently made contact with the metal prongs. Sure enough:  ZAP!  I successfully tapped into the electricity, inaccessible with United States plugs, with my hand. Albeit, the shock did not hurt as much as the shower escapade in Arusha, but that is not saying much.  I plugged in with a mild perturbation of using adaptors to charge my iPad, but unplugged my body with a mild fear of using adaptors to charge my iPad.

Bagamoyo, Tanzania. I anxiously awaited with my hand under the shower nozzle for the water to turn from freezing cold to an amiable temperature. Thirty seconds went by, then a minute, then three: the water pressure began to dwindle and the temperature stayed at a constant fifty degrees (Fahrenheit). I finally just stepped in and took the excruciatingly cold water like a man, but only for another minute or so, because after that, the water went from a drizzle to a drip-drip-nothing. That was the second worst shower of my entire life. I turned the shower on expecting hot water and the pressure of at least a squirt gun, but the cold stream shortly died out along with my misconception that showers are only warm and soothing.

Koh Tao, Thailand. Fizz stood a favorite restaurant of mine in Koh Tao, Thailand until the third visit. We all fell in love with the cafe ever since the first night: eating healthy, delicious, pomegranate salad and watching the exotic sunset with the tropical Thai beach in the foreground. The second time at Fizz, we lounged in beanbags on the soft sand, sipped on extravagant cocktails (virgin of course), and listened to their DJ lay down some original drumbeats. The third visit to Fizz, I planned on sitting in the corner, eating some fresh lunch, and working on Biology while my family walked around the island… but not everything goes according to plan. I unpacked my bag at the table and plugged in my rubber, white power cord into the outlet nearby  (a US plug, I couldn’t believe it.)  I nonchalantly picked up the end of the charger to begin charging my device and ZAP!  The doohicky that magnetizes itself inside the computer sent a volatile shock throughout my whole body. I somehow plugged the possessed cord in, but my whole body shuttered and a tingle went up and down my spine. I stared at my dad and started stammering, “Dad, DuDad, Dad!”

He stopped walking away, “What’s the matter?”

“The stupid cord shocked me when I picked it up!”

He responded with, “Did you touch the end of it?”

“Yes,” I tentatively replied.

“That happens to me all of the time, it’s fine.” He seemed unconcerned.

I touched my index finger to the smooth, metallic trackpad and ZAP!  Again.  Now, I not only felt scared and shocked, but angry at Dad who convinced me to shock myself again.  I frantically looked up at him and blurted out, “It shocked me again! It really hurt.”  He walked over (at a pretty slow pace I might add) and touched the computer: ZAP!  Sweet revenge. “Let’s find a different cafe,” he suggested with an anxious look in his eye. I walked into Fizz expecting to get a tranquil view, a healthy plate of salad, and a good amount of work done, but left with the bottle of water I ordered and a newfangled cautiousness when handling my power cord.

Zanzibar, Tanzania. Zanzibar opened my eyes in many ways, but perhaps the most significant shocker occurred when my grandfather, dad, brother, and I visited Kingey’s home… our driver from Crazy Mzungos.  We made our way out of a small street market and turned onto a bumpy, dirt road.  Houses, comprised of scrap metal, cardboard, and cement surrounded us, along with a herd of stray cows, palm trees, and a group of local kids playing soccer with a scrappy ball of trash.  Everything looked dirty and exasperated by the oppressive heat.  We parked the car outside of a tiny cement compound with no windows, and walked in through the door frame (there was no door.)  Inside sat three women, one elderly and two middle aged, as well as two small kids who looked three or four years old. They greeted us with big smiles and said hello in Swahilli, “Jambo.”  I scanned the room: no lights, no furniture (besides two plastic stools and palm leaf mats) and nothing to entertain themselves but each other. They had so little, but still seemed so joyous. I walked into Kingey’s home hot, tired, and longing for a cool pool, but I left shocked and grateful for what I already had.

Wiring in Yangshuo, China where we had the best WIFI in Asia!

Here’s a video tour! 

After I had labeled bamboo as cool, to the lesser extent, I didn’t believe that it could climb its way out and stand among the higher ranking (if I even dare try ranking) of sights. Yet, when I stepped foot on the Green School campus located in central Bali, I definitely remember that sensation prominently known as AWE wrapping itself around me, tugging open my already wide eyelids nearly to the breaking point, stuffing my mouth with a sharp piercing breath that suddenly left me breathless, and covering my ears so the rest of the world was muffled and unimportant. Awe has countlessly taken hold of me before and although we already may be acquainted, I never get a notice to when we might meet again. Nothing. Just a silent presence until I’m mentally attacked. And afterwards it was only me… and bamboo.

You can search Green School Bali and see the images yourself. I was looking at them earlier and could almost feel the slight cold warmth of wonderment creeping up to lock hands with me. I had seen bamboo used in plenty of ways, but this surpassed anything I might’ve imagined. Shaping the center of the school is three-stories of thick bamboo crisscrossing in a dizzying pattern. The building is famously named The Heart of School. It is so outrageous and despite the sheer massiveness, it fit perfectly with ease into the background and coalesced with the nature surrounding the area. This stripped away all of my preconceived notions I had about bamboo and while I had never actually made an attempt to deepen my knowledge about it, now I was bursting with all sorts of questions (for starters, bamboo isn’t even a tree ­– it’s a grass?). To see giant buildings made entirely out of that single material was unbelievable and I became quietly infatuated with this whole other world of construction.

Three-story, Heart of School Building in the background.

Closer up, you can see the spiral roof of the Heart of School!

We would then go to three other buildings in Bali, all of which were completely bamboo from head to toe and all of which were unprecedentedly unique, beyond the limitations of our own, my own, perceivings of what’s possible. A chocolate factory, a shared workspace, a restaurant, a school, all reinventing what exactly the standard building should be like. And feel like for that matter.  I’m now looking with new eyes, seeing all it can be and knowing it to be more than what I can see, because bamboo architecture is simply awesome.

Mom inside Five Elements, an uber-hip raw restaurant outside Ubud.

We were lucky enough to get to do a tour of Big Tree Farms, a cocoa factory in Bali made entirely of Bamboo!

This is a gigantic bamboo bridge on the Green School campus.

At Hubud, all the kitchen cabinets are made of bamboo in addition to the entire workspace!

We do have a pretty awesome garden at home, I’ll admit, but it’s not all that unique once you take a plane on over to Bali and examine the first garden you encounter. And it just so happens that my mom and dad had both been to Bali several times before they started to plan out our garden on Mercer Island.  So I guess my parents loved the island of Bali and its gardens so much, they wanted to be reminded of them every time they walked outside.

Now, it’s not like you can make a trip over to Home Depot and buy a couple of Buddhas and some wooden dragons in the USA, so when my mom and dad visit Bali, they are ready to get into action and start collecting more stuff.  This is particularly scary considering you can go 10 minutes out of Ubud, where we are staying, and find every type of stone and wood carving known to mankind.  If you’ve ever visited our house you’ll definitely know what I’m talking about when I say we might be the biggest buyers in the stone carving village.  I don’t think my mom or dad would buy any wood or stone carving that wasn’t crafted at least a couple thousand miles away from our house.  Now, I know you’re thinking, and yes, we’ve bought a few more stone carvings already on this trip

But when my mom and dad were planning out our garden in Mercer Island originally, they weren’t planning on buying a couple of carvings and calling it quits, oh no, they also needed Balinese-type plants. They did their research and found every plant that could possibly be grown in Seattle’s climate that was grown in a Bali garden. They were committed; they even bought a palm tree to go in our front yard.  And not to mention the fact that they build shelters around each and every banana plant for every winter.

Okay, we’re going a little overboard here….houses for banana plants? I used to think they were completely insane, but now I understand why my parents ship all the Buddhas home; I understand why they build shelters for our banana plants. It’s simply because Bali has it down!  And it is not surprising when you learn that Bali has more artists per capita than anywhere else in the world.  This means amazing art and design everywhere you look…even the garden.

I have actually tried to join the art craze and taken a wood carving class and I must say, that now, I really appreciate those wood carvers because they are super talented! (I sucked….but that is a different blog post  )

Picture of our garden at home!

Dad at the stone village looking for a giant Buddha head to ship home.

The garden in our Ubud neighborhood that made my parents obsessed with giant Buddha heads

Us picking out a small Buddha for Cannon Beach

Here’s an awesome video that Ryan showed me of two guys climbing the 2^nd tallest building in Shanghai. Watch, but continue reading my blog post cause I haven’t even got to the point of this entry yet

One building stands out the most out of all, even more mind blowing and eye-catching than the tallest buildings in Shanghai.

The Oriental Pearl Tower

As iconic as our beloved Seattle Space Needle, you can see the Oriental Pearl Tower is distinct within the landscape!

As you can see, this thing is pretty dang cool. I don’t even have any similes for this building so I’m just going to leave it at this: Shanghai Pearl Tower = Awesome!

A pedestrian walk high above the traffic allows you to walk around and see the Pearl Tower from many angles!

At night, it looks like something out of an Austin Powers movie.