This should be a sequel to Gilbert's "Eat, Pray, Love". A book which tells the journey the writer had to go through before deciding to get married to her husband, Felipe. It was a non-fiction piece of writing so it was as if I was reading a sociology journal. She was the first person who did an extensive academic research on wedding before tying the knot eventually, for the second time. And I could not believe I finished reading this book. My motto: You bought it, you better finish reading it. It should be a good read for people who are still not sure what marriage is actually about.
When I asked our guide,Pak Dwi, whether he knew anybody by the name of Pak Ketut, he quickly told us about the star of Bali Island. Pak Ketut Liyer was one of the significant characters in Elizabeth Gilbert's book "Eat, Pray, Love". One thing Pak Ketut is capable of doing is to predict your future by looking at your palms.
The book was later made into a movie starring Julia Roberts and Pak Ketut was said to make a real life appearance in the movie. I MUST get the DVD soon.
Read my book review HERE.
I was there just to have a look at the house but we must be lucky as Pak Ketut was there at the verandah talking to a village man. I braved myself to approach him and asked for his permission to take pictures of us with him. SURPRISINGLY, he agreed if it was "for a good cause," he told us. And he was such a FRIENDLY and WARM person, and was asking us to show him the images captured on the camera screen and then said, " I old, you young", proving him to be a humourous person. And he spoke in English with us, not in Indonesian. The moral of the story: You can be very famous but still humble and likeable. No wonder he is loved by many.
There was a group of people coming when we were talking so had to make our move. Pak Ketut has become extremely famous and people come to see him to see their fortune (or misfortune) at a price that I could not remember how much. Pak Dwi told us the queue could sometimes get very long that people have to come early in the morning to get their numbers for the appointment with Pak Ketut.
If I were to ask him to see my future, I was quite sure he would say: "You will record songs and sing in your own concerts - and become very famous, like me."
Read an interesting piece of writing of a blogger visiting him HERE.
Pak Ketut also has a FB account just in case you want to befriend him.
If you love travel and comedy, this is the book that must not be missed. Basically it tells about the life of the author who had just divorced and facing the misery and was trying to overcome her depression by travelling to three countries: Italy, India and Indonesia; accidentally all the three names start with "I". So it was half travelogue, half autobiography and that has made it complete. She was in Italy to learn Italian, India to do yoga and Indonesia to stay with an old Balinese medicine man, Pak Ketut Liyer. During her journey, she then discovered her true self and found what she wanted in life, I suppose. Two words that I can use to describe this novel: HONEST and COMICAL. This book reminds me of the poem by Muhammad Hj. Salleh studied in school last time by form four students, "Si Tenggang Homecoming" which starts off with "The physical journey that I traverse, is the journey of the soul".
And after reading this novel, I can feel the urge to travel more and see the world. Or at least, a little of the world. But I need to get the movie made from this book on DVD first.
