Nyepi and Ogoh-Ogoh

Disclaimer: We were distracted by the beauty of Bali and forgot to take any photos of the Ogoh-Ogohs until the last day, so we are using some stock photos. We have added our photos to the bottom of this post. Also, please note that we left Bali March 6 and we're just a little behind on our posts. We have already been to Singapore and now we're sitting on a beach in Thailand. EFG and MEG

Although our flight was not scheduled to leave until 11pm that night we chose to leave our hotel at 5 because of the parades planned for the evening. We had been cautioned all week that many of the roads could be shut down and we would hate to miss the flight on account of that.

The reason for the potential delay is the planned celebration for Nyepi. Nyepi is somewhat like new years to the Balinese, it is a day of complete tranquility where no one, not even tourists, can venture out on to the streets. The night before is marked by great celebrations where across the island giant papier mache effigies called Ogoh-Ogoh are paraded through the streets to great fanfare.



They represent evil spirits, and at the conclusion of the night they are burned to release the spirits in the hope of a fresh beginning to the new year.

All week long we had watched the various villages constructing their Ogoh-Ogoh's, some more elaborate than others...



...depending almost entirely on the financial standing of the village. When we walked around Ubud we saw some giant Ogoh-Ogoh's, while in the countryside they were more modest, but no less spectacular. We really wish we could get our pictures up for you to see, but in the mean time go to the link on the right and you will see at the end of Bali a couple of these creations.

Now it was time to go to Sinagpore and we still hadn't actually taken any pictures of the Ogoh-Ogoh's or had the chance to see them paraded around town, so we devised a way to kill time waiting for the plane and see the parades. Once we checked our luggage we left the airport and flagged down a taxi driver who after a good bit of negotiation agreed to take us to a parade and wait while we checked it out.


We knew we didn't have a lot of time because our taxi wouldn't wait forever and when we arrived the parade hadn't started yet. We squeezed our way through the crowd to get a good spot and within 5 minutes the first Ogoh-Ogoh was paraded past. We could hear someone talking on a loudspeaker most likely annoucing what village was swinging their Ogoh-Ogoh around. They would swing him in the air, towards the crowd, trying to make him dizzy. We saw three groups with their Ogoh-Ogohs and then took our taxi back to the airport to fly to Singapore where a young lad in the foriegn service awaited our arrival.

Here are our photos of the Ogoh-Ogohs: