Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
TRADITIONAL DRESS
It is customary for Balinese men and women to wear traditional dress to attend temple
festivals, cremations, weddings, birth rites and other important rituals; men also wear
temple dress if playing in a gamelan orchestra and occasionally for banjar (neighbourhood)
meetings too.
Many women wear a vividly coloured bustier under the kebaya (blouse), and some don
flamboyant hair accessories as well. For big festivals, women from the same community
will all wear the same-coloured kebaya to give their group a recognizable identity.
Men also wear a type of sarong ( kamben sarung ), a knee-length hip-cloth ( saput ) and a
formal, collared shirt (generally white but sometimes batik) or a starched jacket-like shirt.
The distinctive headcloth ( udeng ) can be tied according to personal taste, but generally
with a triangular crest on top (shops sell ready-tied udeng ). As with the sash, the udeng
symbolically concentrates the mental energies and directs the thoughts heavenwards via
the perky cockscomb at the front.
When to go
Located in the tropics , just eight degrees south of the equator, Bali and Lombok enjoy fairly
constant year-round temperatures, averaging 27°C in Bali's coastal areas and the hills around
Ubud and 22°C in the central volcanoes around Kintamani. Both islands are hit by an annu-
al monsoon , which brings rain, wind and a sometimes unbearable 97 percent humidity from
October through to March.
The best time to visit is outside the monsoon season, from May to September, though mon-
soons are, like many other events in Indonesia, notoriously unpunctual, and you should be
prepared to get rained on in Ubud at any time of year. However, the prospect of a daily
rainstorm shouldn't put you off: you're far more likely to get an hour-long downpour than
day-long drizzle; mountain-climbing, though, is both unrewarding and dangerous at monsoon
time.
You should also be aware of the peak tourist seasons : resorts on both islands get packed
out between mid-June and mid-September and again over the Christmas-New Year period,
when prices rocket and rooms can be fully booked for weeks in advance.
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