There are strict rules of etiquette for bathing-places; for exsample, sexual parts should be concealed even among persons of the same sex. A man simply covers himself with one hand offend his fellow bathers. It would be unthinkable for a man to look deliberately at a nude woman although she may be bathing within sight of everybody in the irrigation ditch along the road. It is customary to give,some indication of one's presence on approaching a public bath. Women wade into the water raising their skirts to a espectable level, a little above the knee, and after considering the possibility of the sit Suddenly in the water, quickly taking off the skirt. Tie process 'is' reversed in getting out of the water: the skirt which has been lying on a stone or held in one band, is gathered up in: front of the bather and dropped like a curtain as she stands up. She wraps it around her hips and walks off without bothering to dry herself.
Besides the ordinary village bathing-places there are sacred pools and batb-houses, some of which have magic or curative, qualities. There it is customary to leave a small offering for the spirit of the spring before bathing. The most famous of these is the sacred pool of Tirta Empul in Tampaksiring, one of the holiest temples of Bali, where a special compartment has been devised for menstruating women.
The Balinese admire a smooth, clear skin the colour of gold, and pretty girls have a mortal dread of being sunburned, so they do not like to go unnecessarily into the sun. The skin is kept in condition by rubbing and massaging while bathing, afterwards anointing the body with coconut oil and boreh, a yellow paste that refreshes the skin when hot or gives it warmth after exposure to the rain. Boreh is made of mashed leaves, flowers, aromatic roots, cloves, nutmeg, and tumeric (kunyit) for colouring.
In olden times men wore the hair long, but nowadays the younger generation cuts it short like Europeans. The women's hair should be long, thick, and glossy, heavily anointed with perfumed coconut oil. in which flowers are macerated. The hair is kept in condition by washing it in conconctions of herbs.
When a Balinese has nothing to do he squats on the ground and pulls hairs from his face with two coins or with special tweezers, and women remove the hair under the armpits with porous volcanic stones. Some men wear moustaches, which are considered elegant, but only priests wear beards. It is a sign of distinction to wear the fingernails long, often four inches or more, showing that the wearer does not have to do manual work. Priests may wear the nails of both hands long, but the average well-to-do Balinese lets them grow only on the left hand. In Tenganan I have seen young girls wearing naiil-protectors five inches long made of solid gold.
The teeth are ceremoniously filed at puberty to shorten them and make them even. Old-fashioned Balinese blacken them with a sort of lacquer that supposedly protects the teeth from the devastating effects of betel-nut. However, since betel-chewing is losing favors, young people keep their teeth white by polishing them with ashes, although in many cases the molars are blackened, and the front teeth left white. The custom of filing and blackening the teeth, which is widespread throughout Malaysia, has its roots in animistic ritual, to avoid having the long, white teeth of dogs. In Bali today the teeth are filed mainly for oesthetic reasons, since long teeth are ugly.
It is plain that the refined and sensitive Balinese make the most of their daily routine, leading a harmonious and exciting, although simple existence, making an art of the elemental necessities of daily life - dress., food, and shelter.
Men do not wear any ornaments except flowers and perhaps a bracelet of akar bahar, a black sort of coral supposed to prevent rheumatism, but women love jewellery and it is extraordinary that outside of dancers or children the Balinese are one of the rare people in the world that do not wear necklaces. In ancient times men and women wore ear-rings, and ancient statues show that, like the Dayaks of Borneo, they distended their ear-lobes until they hung below the shoulders, weighted down by heavy gold ornaments. Today some men have pierced ears because when children they wore leaf-shaped ear-ornaments (rumbing) of gold set with precious stones.
Little girls distend the holes of their ear-lobes with rolls of dry leaf or with a nutmeg seed until the hole is large enough to receive the large rolls of lontar leaf for everyday or their replicas. of gold (subang) for feasts. The subangs are hollow conical cylinders of beaten gold three inches long by one ih diameteri closed at one end, imitating in shape the palm-leaf subang. Only girls wear them and-after marriage they consider the wearing of subangs a coquetry that is out of place, although married women-, of high caste may wear them at feasts. Rings of gold set with rubies are popular, but the most fashionable today are those set, if with an English gold guinea. Bracelets are in good taste only made of gold and tortoise-shell set with rubies, star sapphires, or little diamonds.
The Balinese are as fastidious in the care of their bodies
as they are about dress, and people of all classes, conditions permit
ting, make almost a cult of cleanliness. They bathe frequency, during
the day, whenever they feel hot or after strenuous work, but two baths
a day are the rule, in the morning and evening " before each meal.
Many villages have formal baths with separate compartmen for men and women,
divided by carved stone walls and provi with water-spouts in the shape
of fantastic animals, or sim natural pools or streams fitted with bamboo
pipes and low Often the favourite bathing-place is a shallow spot in the
river,"' where men on one side, women on the other, squat on the
wat remaining for a long time in animated conversation, scrubbin themselves
with pumice stone that removes superfluous hair a invigorates the skin,
or rubbing their backs with a rough sti. or against a large stone placed
there for the purpose. In, a ri near Cianyar we often saw a group of women
sitting in the water in a circle, their feet radiating from the centre,
gossiping until after dark. 
| Bali Travel | Bali Hotels | Bali Hotels | Bali Villas |Bali Villa | Bali Accommodation|