Bali - Spiritual Givings

One of the things that you will notice when you are in Bali (especially around Ubud, where we stayed) are the sheer amount of tiny little baskets made out of something that reminds me of paperbark. These baskets, or boxes lie on large leaves. On the leaves, there's cooked rice, and the inside the baskets are an assortment of other dried leaves and petals from flowers.

These are offered to the Gods first thing EVERY morning. They are placed generally out the front of each abode, or place of business.

The women of Bali spend much of their day, every day, preparing these offerings, ready for the following day. By the end of the day, the offerings have been run over by scooters, kicked by locals and tourists, and they get swept up at the end of each day.

Then fresh offerings get placed once again, the following day. Every day. Every day of the year.

I noticed while I was there that the offerings took various forms.

This one was the most common type we saw.

These offerings were generally larger, and withstood being trodden on and rolled over by scooters a lot more than the ones above.

This shot below shows how delicate each of the offerings are. They are prepared so precisely, day in, day out.

Some Balinese also adorned statues with offerings as well.

Below is a picture of the mother of all offerings. This is usually placed in a significant place of worship or a particularly spiritual area.

The Balinese dont just place them down on the ground and walk away. Each morning, the women place the offerings down on the ground and perform a spiritual ceremony. They are usually dressed in traditional Balinese outfits, incense burns and they have a well prepared prayer that they give the offerings. It was an amazing thing to watch.

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