No Agenda, No Checklist

How can you be like a tree I was thinking as I was reading a book that my brother gave me 'How to be more Tree' ? Or rather, why would you want to? A tree's parts serve the same function across years, decades, a lifetime. We humans are a constant assortment of context switches. One minute I'm driving K to a tennis match, the next I'm on a work call from the car. Time isn't dictated by the body clock anymore — it's the watch, the calendar, the next notification.

Anyway, I hadn't even gotten around to packing my bag till the very last minute. At 9 pm the night before, I chucked in the basics I can't do without and closed the bag. Four am alarms are no fun, especially when it's freezing cold outside and, quite frankly, I love my daily routine. Leaving it for a few days was already making me second-guess the whole thing.

But boy, was I glad I went.

It was a Friday-to-Monday trip to Bali. Four of us. No agenda, no checklist. The only thing booked was accommodation at a villa that looked good on the website — pictures of a pool and a swing. How much I'd end up loving lying on that swing, looking up at the sky while dipping my toes in the pool and sipping gin — I couldn't have guessed even a day before we got there.

I love airports. They feel like transit do-nothing-by-force zones, where the only right things to do are browse through duty free, eat, and read a book. The seats on the flight were dismal — the last row, no option to lean back, right next to the toilet. It stank. A rather large man was crammed next to us making the whole thing deeply unpleasant. S and I were determined to stay positive and made up for it all by talking non-stop for a couple of hours. Then we spotted empty seats in the middle of the aircraft and jumped to take them. I read through most of *Darling Girls* — it was OK.

Landing in warm Bali, vacation vibes hit me right away. I kept tracking K's tennis match score for a few hours and it took some time to shake off the Melbourne state of mind. A was already at the airport, and we all sat down for a meal together. My falafel pastry was fluffy, non-oily, and surprisingly great for airport food. This was already topping my expectations.

The ease of being around your people — where you don't have to overthink or pretend or complicate anything in your head — is one of the greatest gifts in life I am starting to understand.

The taxi drive was remarkably easy. The streets reminded me so much of small towns around Mangalore. Cobblestones. Green everywhere. Low-ceiling shops selling everything from tea to clothes to utensils. Slanting roofs with orange tiles, humid air, carved stone and wood temple-like structures at every corner.

The villa was beautiful and we wasted no time — toes in the pool, snacks ordered in, catching up begun. All of our lives similar but not quite the same. That shared context of life in Wellington from 18 or so years ago, to being mothers, daughters, and women with dreams and hopes and ambition.

We headed to a rooftop bar at Double Six. Easy decisions — someone looked up a place, and we were in a taxi soon after. That became the rhythm for the rest of the trip. The rooftop was something else, more for the view and the vibe than anything on the menu. We got gin cocktails and waited for M. In true vacation spirit, she got a taxi straight to the bar from the airport, and I loved that so much.

Good shared plates, sunset, fireworks, cocktails. Heading home, I realised I'd not packed running tights. We spotted an outlet store near the villa and went late at night. I bought green Adidas tights — a clear deviation from monotone Lululemons.

Late-night conversations about many varied topics, easy and flowing, just like the water in the pool.

Next morning, M and I set out to run on the streets of Bali. Wary of stray dogs and main roads, but determined. It was so hot and humid I stopped at 3-something kilometres. M, to her credit, finished 5K.

The breakfast spread looked unimpressive at first, but I loved the tropical fruit platter. The food turned out good and we ended up eating the same breakfast for the rest of our days there.

Getting a massage was top of the list for all of us, so after some AI-assisted searching, we picked a place offering complimentary pick-up from the villa. Two hours of massage and facial, most of which I slept through blissfully. The other two chatted away and caught up on all things business in addition to the pampering.

We gravitated to Indian food for lunch — tasty! A disaster in the making was averted when A's fold phone dropped onto the street as we climbed out of the cab. Pure luck that no vehicle or person stepped on it in the whole minute it lay on that busy main road.

I tried drinking from a coconut straight out of the shell. It was OK.

Next stop: head massage and manicure/pedicure. We walked and scouted a few places, eventually landing in a near-new head massage parlour. It was blissful. They reached places that haven't been reached before — strong hands working all the muscles and joints on neck and shoulder. We found a cool coffee spot after, took photos, laughed silly, and admired the way our hair and skin felt after hours of pampering.

Then we went to watch Devil Wears Prada 2, despite M's reviews. She'd already watched it but sportily joined in for a second viewing. A pretty low-key mall. Clothing so cheap we had to buy. Dinner for four so cheap I checked twice that they'd charged us correctly. The movie was meh, but the company made up for it.

Reaching home late didn't feel very late. We asked the driver from that morning to take us around Ubud the next day. It felt like a very productive, very slow, very relaxing fun day — just magical how it turned out that way without a plan. We talked late into the night and had one too many gins but still slept alright.

Next morning, repeat breakfast by the pool. Then a day trip to Ubud, a good hour and a bit away.

It was fascinating to watch the districts pass one after another — handicrafts, batik, silver, woodwork, stonework. Skills from ages ago, and whole settlements built around those skills. Women designing and drawing batik prints at an emporium felt similar to watching an Indian artisan work with fabric. So skilled, so deft, so confident in their strokes.

We stopped to taste luwak coffee. I felt sad looking at the two luwak cats they had on display — I hoped the sleepiness really was nocturnal behaviour, as they claimed. There were twenty varieties of coffee and tea to taste. Coconut and avocado were flavours I'd never have guessed could be coffee. The teas ranged from a vivid blue to usual ginger, lemon, and the like. If someone had told me I might like poop coffee, I'd have stopped being friends with them — but I did like the taste of it. Fruity, less acidic. Genuinely good.

Next stop was the famous Bali swing. The drive up to it was an attraction in itself — a stretch lined with massive wooden and metal art and homeware. Admiring them, then nodding off to sleep in between, we reached the rice terraces. The only imagery I'd had of Bali was this — rice terraces. They looked grand. The swing theatrics looked touristy, but also fun. If not there, where else?

M and I decided to play along and go on the swings. A and S sipped on juice, patiently took pictures, and indulged us in the act. The swings go up so high it's almost an adventure activity — especially when the guys, so adept at getting the shot, ask you to let go of the grip and hold the long trail of your dress instead. The photos look dramatic and pretty. The adrenaline rush in doing it is something else entirely.

Lunch was at a good-looking but not-as-tasty place. Then the Ubud markets — so familiar, like alleys of small stores selling similar things, people haggling, so much like India. Earrings, bracelets, necklaces. Lots of them. We ended up in a local designer's store with fixed and reasonable prices and bought more pieces collectively than we could count. I snagged a teak cutting board, all the while quietly worrying about the cabin bag — the only luggage we'd booked for the trip.

One more shot of luwak coffee. Then back into the cab toward Seminyak, where the villa was.

The driver had warned us: after 6 pm, traffic builds up, could take two hours. We assumed he was exaggerating. The minute we got in the cab and checked on maps, reality hit. It did take that long. We ended up in an Indian restaurant, craving comfort food. Walked back to the villa — less than a kilometre on the main road, scared of stray dogs. Talked for hours. Way longer than we thought we would after that long day out.

Last morning. Complimentary 30-minute massage, decent but no match for the day before. Easy, long breakfast. Customary photos. Checked out of the villa at 1 pm and headed to Potato Head Beach Club. Luxurious. Views that will stay with me. Authentic Indonesian food, at last, tasting so good and abundant.

Then a temple — so peaceful inside, multi-coloured frangipani flowers everywhere.

Taking the taxi back to the villa for the last time as a group felt like time's up. We changed, booked a cab for S and I to the airport, and headed back home recounting all the good times and great memories we'd made together.

So glad this happened.