One of the things I truly love about Bali is how often the unexpected and unplanned occurs. Our Christmas dinner did not disappoint! Our annual Christmas dinner this year attracted more than its fair share of the unexpected and unplanned.

BUYING THE TURKEY
As we do every year, we went off in search of a turkey. Would you believe frozen Norbest turkeys in Bali? What I already expected would be expensive shocked me. How about a 13.5 pound turkey at US$33.00? As the Balinese are prone to say in less than perfect moments, ‘That is life”, so the turkey went home with us.

THE STUFFING
My plan was to make a very simple old family stuffing…French bread, garlic, onions, butter, salt and pepper…very plain. The staff chopped up the onions and garlic and also a collection of other stacks of stuff I never thought to question, thinking these other ingredients would end up in the sambal, a spicy side dish. (The women at my house are fabulous cooks.) As I melted the butter to sauté the onions and garlic, the staff was busily puttering…doing something. By the time I turned around, the entire collection of stuff was combined with the stuffing ingredients. Included was a LOT of very spicy chilies, daun salam, a green leaf that is impossible to chew even when cooked forever, and who knows what else! Again, that is life. It was POTENT, but, in the end, divine!

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Besides the dim history on the carnage of PKI – Partai Komunis Indonesia (Indonesia Communist Party) in Jembrana regency there is another story of love and tolerance inside. This is on religions in Jembrana where Hindu, Muslim, Catholic, and Protestant live together in harmony. They have created the villages of tolerance for them selves especially and for Bali generally.

Penjor. flickr.com/photos/kaiconragan/

On this Chritmas Day there are two Christian communities who are celebrating it. They are the Protestant of Abyasari Village and the Catholic of Palasari Village. Albeit they are not Hindu, they celebrate Christmas in Hindu’s way by killing pigs for the Christmas meal two days before the D-day (like the Hindu on Penampahan Galungan). They also make penjor (highly decorated bamboo poles) and using the Hindu traditional clothes (kebaya, belt, and sarong — for women and udeng hat, double sarongs – for men) when going to church.

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