I am sitting roadside in a wood carvers village clattering away on my Macbook Pro while Bali rushes by around me. Time to journal yesterday while Donna, Ketut and Aaron shop.

Yesterday was a long roll day. One time lapse of a rice field being harvested, ran for 9 hours and ended in a carefully designed motion move. In between, was a lot of writing and motion picture review, while the 5DM2 snapped a frame every 60 seconds or so.

At 8pm we shut the camera down and headed out for the evening, and what was the last part of three days of ceremony. It was a caste oriented gathering, and Gusti being of upper caste, we needed to all dress in ceremonial garb for  what later proved to be comedic theater. Quite appropriate for a gathering of the Gustis. The man lives his sense of humor.

Stop one was his family home, where Gusti, Aaron and I dressed. We all had hibiscus ginger tea and peanut cakes then grabbed Gusti’s youngest son, 10 year old Wayan, and made the ten minute drive to the temple. By 9 PM we had set up a couple camera positions and rolled a bit of motion for a couple hours.

Laughter translates easily, and in spite of the language barrier we all were appreciative of the warm village welcome. Being the only foreigners is something Donna and I have gotten used to in hanging with Gusti “The Real Bali” Made Merta. Though I have never needed to use his safety net which basically consists of the instructions(paraphrased): “Tell them that you are with me.” It is nice to know that we could.

Two hours of Balinese theater transpired, with the gamelan centric music beating a steady rhythm into the moonlit night under which maybe 300 villagers were gathered laughing: a LOT. I ran two cameras and sound, Aaron one and the village graciously put up with us yet again. I think that I may be becoming rather notorious in the village with my cameras. They have gotten used to me. (A good thing)

Midnight saw us back at the villa preparing a late dinner and having a cocktail. Not really a lot different than work at home, which frequently includes some long days. There just seemed to be a lot more smiles round here.