Ketut Liyer

I now have time to explain what happened to me on my first full day in Bali. So let me set the scene...

Only one other student had arrived so far, Nina, and she and I were bunking together in our bungalow style guest house which opened up to a luscious green garden full of tropical plants and chirping birds. We were getting to know each other and Nina asked me what I want to do when I "grow up" - which hopefully I never will ;) - and I said, slightly outlandishly that my dream is to be a travel writer. As you all know I enjoy documenting my travel experiences in a hopefully entertaining manner, so doing that for a living would be magical. Nina and I then went about the day's events, not knowing what to expect as we hopped in the car to visit some of the homestays that we would be staying with in Bali.

We're bouncing from house to house, admiring the compound-style architecture of Balinese homes and trying desperately to interpret what our professor Agustini is saying to the families in Indonesian. After seeing a few different houses Nina and I were slightly exasperated because we couldn't follow the conversation and it was so very hot outside like it is everyday in Indonesia when we drive past a sign that reads Ketut Liyer. "Ketut Liyer!" I say excitedly, recognizing the famous medicine man's name from the book Eat, Pray, Love written by Elizabeth Guilbert. The book is a travel memoir detailing the author's journey through Italy, India, and you guessed it, Indonesia, in the year after her divorce. She studies pleasure in Italy (Eat), devotion in India (Pray) and balance between the two in Bali, Indonesia (Love) and she stayed with Ketut Liyer for four months during her stay there! Ketut comes from generations of healers so he knows thousands of alternative healing methods, traditional medicines and spiritual practices such as palm reading. Nina has also read the book so we giggle with excitement at our mutual recognition of Ketut Liyer's name, thinking how cool it is that we passed his house. But we weren't prepared for what happened about an hour later...

After visiting a few more homestays, we stop the van in front of a housing compound none other than the one that belongs to Ketut Liyer! He is going to be one of our homestays! And we were going to meet him!! We fall out of the car, crawling on top of each other to get out first and spill over into the house, which is a complex made up of several small buildings where the family, elders, and extended family lives all together. Then we see him, the wise, old man nimbly walking out of his room with a huge toothless grin. Nina and I gasp in astonishment and then shyly walk over to meet him, the way that a small child might inch towards something expensive and shiny in a department store, asking permission first before touching it. Ketut greets us warmly and his giant smile is contagious. He is exactly like Liz Guilbert described him in her book: small, wrinkly, and in every way resembling the character Yoda from Star Wars. Nina spots a copy of Eat, Pray, Love on his door stoop, and when Ketut leaves to answer a phone call, we let a little more of our excitement show as we freak out knowing we're about to have an encounter with this world renound Balinese medicine man!

He comes back out and seeing that we speak English, he pulls out the dusty copy of the book and asks if we will read him the part about him. He explains that he cannot read English, so even though Liz Guilbert has left him a copy of her book (with the message "To Ketut Liyer, my teacher and friend" scribbled on the front cover) he doesn't know what she's written about him. He turns to the page where he first sees him name in print, and plops the book in my lap, looking at me expectantly. I can't even believe this is happening - I'm so in awe! - yet I get it together and start reading, with Agustini translating my spoken words into Indonesian for Ketut to better understand. Although he speaks some English, he solicits that he wants someone to teach him better English, which is hilarious because he asked the author of this book to do just that! He read her palm when she was first in Bali doing research for an article, and said "You will return to Bali and live with me for 4 months, teach me English" and she did just that. So imagine my delight when her description of him turns out to be so true it's as if I'm living out the story she wrote about in the moment.

As Agustini is tries to explain to Ketut who Yoda is, Ketut stops the reading and takes my hand to read my palm. I have no idea what to expect; I'm not a spiritual person, nor have I ever had my palm read so I'm not sure I believe anything that's about to be said, but I'm here in Bali, with a medicine man, an ancient healer with powers to see your future, and he's about to make some predictions about my life! How could I not be enthralled? And so the palm reading begins...
He takes my hand in his and squeezes it just so, so that the creases in my palm are more defined. He tells me I have a very long life line, and that I will live a long time - until I'm 105! This is off to a great start I think to myself :) and then he proceeds to look at my brain line (which is "very long" he says, "you're very smart") and some other lines which indicate I'm impatient, and emotional. Although these seem like generic assumptions, I take them to heart, noting that as a recent graduate I've been incredibly emotional awaiting the next step in my life to present itself, or dreading it rather, and I am very impatient, for things as small as waiting in line to things as big as waiting for Mr. Right to show up. He says he sees in my palm that I have strong energy, very good Karma and that I'm an influencer. He says I will get married around the age of 31 which makes me very happy, and he says at age 40 I will become very rich! So don't worry about those student loans Dad, I'll make it big when I'm middle aged ;)

I'm following his every prediction avidly, mesmorized by the reading and yet completely perplexed by it at the same time. The next line he reads is my artist line, and he says "You are capable of doing many different things (referring to an occupation) and doing them well" I smile, especially happy to hear that since I'm a recent graduate going into a shaky job market. And then he says "You're very good at writing...I see you as a writer, or you publish, good writer". I cannot believe it. This old medicine man who has only just met me has just predicted that I'm good at what I love and I'll do it for a living. I felt so elated I could float away on a cloud, and a feeling I've rarely ever felt before, of the most serene calm, came over me. It was so serendipitously wonderful, I wanted to stay with that feeling forever. How did this happen to me? I come to Bali and just so happen to be staying in the same town that Liz Guilbert stayed in, just happen to stumble across Ketut Liyer's name on a sign, he somehow is aligned to be one of our homestays, and as it turns out, who had been assigned to stay with him by the guides in Bali? Me and Nina. It was already determined! For a brief moment I felt as though the universe aligned to give me that moment, and I relished every breath of it. I'm going to be a travel writer... :)

Let's all hope Ketut Liyer's prediction is right, it's certainly a push for me to believe in myself enough so that I feel a cosmic calling to do it now. Anxiety about my future - take that! The cosmos have great things in store for me, and whether I believe in the palm reading or not, I do feel that my first day in Bali was perhaps more perfect than I ever could have asked for. <3