Falling Out at Naughty Nuri's

The last thing I remember is the weight of my head. As it quickly felt too heavy to bear, I said to Paul, "the sooner we get out of here the better." Not words he wanted to hear, I'm sure, as a rack of ribs, hot from the flames of the open pit grill had just been set before him.

The last thing I saw was a spoofed advert, adapted to fit the existing collection at Nuri's--a renowned expat joint north of Ubud. This one read "Eat, Pay, Leave." Clever copywriting, for sure, as are all the others. This layout of course, an exact replica of the original bookcover for Eat, Pray, Love--about a woman's year-long travels to Italy, India and Bali.

Reawakening, I sat up to a short, round, dark-skinned and doe-eyed waitress who non-chalantly handed me a bottle of cold water. She then placed a bag of ice on the nape of my neck. Ahhh...as I recall, that felt really good. Dumbfounded, I said, or maybe I just thought, What happened? Several people stood over me, as they do a person who has just fainted. One very kind local man, a chef and restaurant owner named Greg who lived in Seminyak offered to drive us back to our guesthouse. Since it was raining and we were on a rented scooter we gladly accepted it.

For Paul, the experience was somewhat harrowing. Especially since earlier in the day he had given me little sympathy and occupied himself with what for me seemed like hours of endless photo editing and retouching for his future show-and-tell Picassa bonanza/extravaganza. All this while I laid on the bed motionless, feeling dizzy, weak and disoriented. In these moments I hated Bali--even the sound of crickets and frogs were unbearable and sounded more like a loud rock band echoing off the stone walls than what one usually loves about being in the jungle of Bali.

So having me nearly fall into his plate of ribs in a daze, my eyes open and expressing no signs of life--unlike the verbally exaggerated and opinionated Bonnie that he knows--freaked him out and made him go into fight or flight mode. He told me later that he had laid me down on the bench and rushed to the counter and requested an ambulance be called. Poor Paul. I hate that it had to come to this, but I am glad that the reality of my illness was now really apparent.

The heat and humidity of Bali is more than I had remembered during my Esalen massage training just three years ago. It is really hard to take when you are not used to it and your immune system is weakened from traveling. Now, almost a week after this episode, and only after seeing Dr Soma, a skilled acupuncturist in Pemuteran, my energy is resurfacing and I am feeling more like myself again.