Around the World: Bali

On this sunny afternoon, by the vast blue sea, the plane slowly landed on the island of Bali. Everything was ordinary, yet amidst the ordinary, there was a hint of the unusual.

After getting off the plane, I quickly assembled my bike and rode from the airport to the pre-booked hostel to check in. There, I was told that tomorrow was the Balinese New Year, and everyone had to stay inside the hotel all day—no walking on the streets, no shopping in the stores, and the hotel gate would be completely locked. Upon hearing such an overbearing and arbitrary New Year rule, I felt a surge of resentment and was determined to break this rule.

"Then how do we eat?" I asked.

"The hotel will provide food like noodles."

"And if I go out?"

"You'll be arrested by the police."

That evening, I stayed on the beach until late, almost midnight, when I suddenly realized—there was only half an hour left before curfew. I rode back, bought some food, and prepared to return.

But I wasn't resigned to it. I wanted to see how exactly they would enforce the curfew and arrest people.

I rode to an intersection and was startled to find large crowds gathered in the middle of the street. There were young men in loose pants and white T-shirts with headbands, groups of young girls in red skirts and makeup, and some foreign tourists in jeans. Everyone was bustling and lively in the center of the road. I stepped into the middle and noticed a group of people playing music and beating drums. Another group was carrying a giant statue, twice the height of a person, slowly moving forward.

My curiosity piqued, I approached a young girl and asked, "What are you all doing? Isn't the curfew starting in an hour?"

The girl eagerly began to explain: "Do you know about Nyepi? This is the Balinese New Year, and we're celebrating it." I said, "Oh, I know, it's the Indian New Year." She corrected me: "No, this is the Balinese New Year, the Day of Silence, not the Indian New Year."

What was all this? The Day of Silence, the Balinese New Year, the Indian New Year—what was the relationship between them? And if the curfew was coming, why were these people still gathered here?

The crowd was thick, so I followed along with my questions. Before long, the procession stopped—the giant statue was too tall and got caught on the power lines crossing the street. The group had to disassemble the base to lower its height before continuing the parade.

Taking advantage of the break, I checked Wikipedia to try to understand what was going on. But Wikipedia itself was rather confusing; after some digging, I roughly figured it out.

It turned out that tomorrow was indeed the Indian New Year.

As we all know, the so-called New Year is determined by a calendar—the first day of the calendar is New Year's Day. Tomorrow in Bali was indeed the New Year, based on the calendar they use, which is the Shaka calendar. The Shaka calendar originates from India.

But that doesn't mean that India's New Year is on the same day. India is a hodgepodge, as everyone knows, so their calendars are also diverse. The Shaka calendar is one of them, originating around the 8th century AD, and is used by several Indian states. After India became a nation, the government convened a meeting in 1958 and designated the Shaka calendar as the national calendar. In theory, this meant India should have a unified New Year based on the Shaka calendar. But religion and folk customs are not easily changed by a single decree. So regulations are regulations, but the reality remains as chaotic as ever. Therefore, when people say "Indian New Year," one must not misunderstand—there is no single unified New Year in India. Actually, India has no New Year, or it has countless New Years.

This is quite different from the Chinese tradition. We are too obsessed with superficial, uniform conformity. So for a highly unified nation, it's hard to understand why different regions of other countries have different New Years.

Comparing further, there are even more striking differences. The main activities of the Day of Silence, like making and parading the evil spirit statue, are spontaneously organized and directly participated in by the people. In contrast, the major traditional festivals of our nation—such as Spring Festival, Lantern Festival, Qingming Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Qixi Festival, and Mid-Autumn Festival—as their current main activities suggest, are all family-based. For example, during Spring Festival, everyone goes back to their own homes, visits their own ancestors' graves, eats their own reunion dinners, and sets off their own firecrackers. They don't engage in activities that require group participation. The same goes for Lantern Festival, Qingming, Mid-Autumn, and Qixi. The only slight exception is Dragon Boat Festival, when people hold dragon boat races, which involve direct participation. But even then, dragon boat paddlers need training and have a threshold—ordinary people cannot simply join in. This is one difference I found quite striking. A collective-minded nation, yet its traditional festivals are mostly individual or family-oriented rather than national or collective—this is interesting and worth further reflection.

It took a long time for the people to finally move the so-called evil spirit statue past the power lines and into a large hall. As the crowd began to disperse, I checked the time—it was already 2:30 AM.

But after all my research, I still hadn't figured out what exactly was meant by the Day of Silence: everyone confined to their homes all day. Wasn't it already the Day of Silence? Why were people still on the road? Where were the police? Was it all just a scare?

Puzzled, I returned to the hostel. The door was still open, the lobby empty. Before I could ask anyone, drowsiness overwhelmed me, and I climbed into bed and fell asleep.

The next morning, I went down to the lobby and found the door ajar. A few people were scattered inside, eating and drinking. I went to the front desk and asked when the Day of Silence curfew started and ended. The receptionist was vague, just saying it had already started and that we could go out the next morning. I wasn't satisfied, so I asked other guests; they were equally clueless. I tentatively pushed the door open and stepped outside. All the shops were closed, the streets empty—no people, no cars, not even a single cat. I bravely walked out a hundred meters and suddenly saw a person in white clothes emerge from an alley. "Probably a guard," I muttered. To avoid trouble, I decided I had already seen enough and went back.

I went up to the rooftop terrace, where people were quietly occupied with their own things. I too fell into contemplation.

It wasn't until later in the afternoon that I learned from someone that the Day of Silence actually lasts from 6 AM to 6 AM the next day.