Fred, your wife is smart.聽 She clearly knows the meaning of the old phrase made common by Ben Franklin鈥︹減enny wise, pound foolish.鈥澛
Some years ago, and in a village not far from ours, there was a European fellow鈥n avid atheist and pragmatist who didn鈥檛 believe one bit about 鈥渘iskala鈥 (the unseen).聽 Looking for a real bargain for land to build his villa, he was able to find 15 are not far from the pura dalem in that village.聽 Every village in Bali has a pura dalem鈥r, temple of the dead.聽
Ignoring the warnings of the villagers as well as several expats (me being one of them) he went ahead anyway, contracting the land and building the 鈥渧illa鈥 of his dreams.聽 He refused to pay for a Melaspas (purification ceremony), or to build house temples within his compound.聽 In other words鈥e just carried on in his most determined, and often arrogant manner.
To make a long story short, he slowly went mad as a hatter.聽 Truly, he went insane.聽 One vivid episode that I saw for myself was late one afternoon while the late Brian Aldinger of the famous Naughty Nuri鈥檚 Warung and I were enjoying each other鈥檚 company, and without the usual crowd that so often would frequent Nuri鈥檚.聽 It was just the two of us sitting at the famed 鈥渆xpat table鈥 right at the front left of Nuri鈥檚.聽
Into Nuri鈥檚 this guy stormed, practically naked aside from his underwear and bearing a large knife.聽 He screamed some words which were totally incomprehensible and proceeded to bury the knife deeply into the wood table top right between Brian and myself.聽 He then turned and ran off, yelling and screaming some more.聽 He was literally 鈥渞unning amuk鈥 although thankfully he never hurt anyone during that episode.
Things only got worse for this poor sod.聽 Eventually the police put him in jail (for his and other鈥檚 well being), and he was deported.聽
I have endless stories, and personal accounts of encounters with niskala over my long years living on Bali.聽 This paranormal phenomena is nothing to either ignore, or to fool around with.聽 While there was a time, early on after moving here, that I was convinced Indonesians are way too absorbed with active imaginations, I took that 鈥渃oat of thought鈥 off a long time ago and have learned how to handle these forces鈥ust as the Balinese do on a regular basis.聽
Without question, and in all truth, virtually every expat in my neck of the woods and that I am close with, and who has been around as long, or longer than me, would say the exact same thing.聽 While this topic is hardly regular in our discussions, it comes up often enough and we all agree that we could never share our stories with family or friends back in our home countries鈥s they would likely think we are in need of a therapist, pills, or a straight jacket.