Elizabeth Pisani

We're going to celebrate the holidays this year with friends and family in Bali. Before reading this book, when I pictured Bali, I imagined beautiful beaches, terraced rice fields, maybe Hawaii before it became such a tourist destination. What I didn't realize is that Bali is just one island in the very large Indonesian archipelago and Indonesia is a very complicated country. Indonesia is the 4th most populated country in the world and it consists of more than 17,000 islands. And rather than being a single homogenous society, its population is very diverse with different languages, religions, and customs on the many different islands.

Elizabeth Pisani, a public health consultant who has lived many years in Indonesia, decided to take a year off and travel around the various islands. She didn't have a planned itinerary and traveled by ferry, motorcycle, fishing boat and bikes to learn about life on many of the major islands. She didn't stay in hotels but found accommodations in people's homes. She attended weddings, funerals, and pig roasts. What amazed me the most about this book is the sheer guts it took to take on this journey. The stories she tells are fascinating with snippets of Indonesian history and beautiful descriptions of some of the various cultures in this complicated country. I definitely recommend this book to anyone traveling to Indonesia.… (meer)