The Greatsbys’ Bali Finale

We’ve had a wonderful trip these last three weeks. I skiied in South Korea, and in Bali I hiked, surfed, and waterslid at Bali’s WaterBom waterpark on Christmas Day. We didn’t bring cell phones and were delighted to never know what time it was, which sounds nice in theory but may have accounted for why we ate seven meals each day. We head back to Shanghai in a few hours. My wife has enjoyed her vacation but she’s ready to go home since there’s only so many weeks of not waking up at 6:30AM her body can take before she gets cranky. And without Shanghai’s freezing weather and lack of insulation, we find we’ve run out of things to complain about and our relationship is suffering as a result.

The kids have had an amazing vacation full of swimming, surfing, water-sliding, hiking, and pointing out the obvious. If only I had counted the times The Fonz said, “Hey, Dad, do you see that monkey?” while we were at the Monkey Forest Sanctuary. Actually, I didn’t need to count because The Fonz counted for me. “Dad, do you see that monkey? That’s the thirty-third monkey I’ve seen. Dad, do you see that monkey behind the thirty-third monkey? That’s the thirty-fourth monkey I’ve seen.” When we got to the fortieth monkey, I regretted pulling him away from the swimming pool.

Here’s a picture of the kids practicing freezing for when they get back to Shanghai’s arctic weather:

Optimist Prime wanted to take one last breath of Bali air and see if he could hold it until we reached Shanghai:

The kids did fit in some reading by the side of the pool:

It wasn’t all fun. One of my New Year’s resolutions was to learn how to fold clothing as well as they do at clothing stores. One reader posted a video demonstrating how to fold a shirt in two seconds. And it wasn’t just any reader–it was my dad. Stop trying to run my life, Dad! We spent some time watching the video and practicing one morning and I was pretty impressed with the job Optimist Prime did with his suitcase:

That tuxedo t-shirt is usually reserved for special occasions but he did wear it on a hike in Ubud when all his other clothes were dirty, and he was certainly the classiest ten-year-old on the mountain.

The part of the trip I’m most excited about is that when my kids grow up they’ll remember their parents tried to bring them up with some culture as evidenced by all the exotic places they’ve watched TV.

Here are the kids in Seoul, South Korea:

The kids enjoying the beautiful port city, Incheon:

The kids on the electric streets of Seoul:

At our beachfront hotel in Nusa Dua, Bali–the views were amazing:

Our bungalow in the mountains of Ubud, Bali:

Our last hotel on the beach at Seminyak–the sunsets were incredible:

It can be hard to get kids to pause and appreciate the beauty around them, and I finally found a way to make them stop and enjoy the sunset: