By Adele Scheele
She came to Bali alone, arriving in time for an annual pilgrimage to a temple. But that was not her intention; in fact, she had no agenda at all except to be there. Upon seeing the traffic jam – thousands of cars and people all thronging up the one main road, she knew that was the last thing she wanted to join.
Instead, she asked the hotel concierge to find her a driver to take her in the opposite direction. When the driver came, she looked into his eyes and then smiled. She needed to trust him. When he opened the back door for her, he asked her where she wanted to go. She said she had read about a lake in a volcano and wondered if going there was possible. He smiled back and turned against the rush of traffic, up to the huge mountain. Along the way, she asked him if the lake was man-made. “Man made?” he questioned incredulously. And now it was her turn to smile at a joke turned on herself.
As they approached the mountain top nearly an hour later, the driver asked her if she would be willing to sit with him to watch the mist roll in and then wait for it to roll out again. It would be worth the two-hour wait, he promised. Having no other plan, she agreed. She bought two bottles of ale while he found a small table, and they sat together just in time for the mist to come bidden like a curtain on a stage as wide as the world, lit beyond any candescence she had ever seen. They did not speak, but she heard the music of the mist play in her ears. Then in what must have been an hour, after the mist blanketed the entire azure lake, it began to blow away in slow motion, if motion could be felt. Her own breathing had slowed in time. Finally, they saw the mist melt back to reveal the clear lake in the top of the volcano. It was resplendent.
Then the driver bent to kiss her hand and escorted her back to the car. He asked if she knew another place to go, but she didn’t. He offered to take her to his favorite -- the elephant cave. Along the way, he stopped to pick up his cousin who sat beside him in the car. She wondered if she were safe, but that thought lifted like the fog.
He parked and walked her down to the cave. She stood in a short line. The space of entry, the cave itself, was exactly her size, her width and height. Had she been an inch taller, she would have had to stoop. Had she weighed a few pounds more, she would have to walk sideways. There was no room for any one else to pass through the tight way. Three steps in and it was suddenly black as night. She panicked. She turned and pushed hard against the incoming people who had to back out.
Once she emerged from the cave, she fainted. Her driver and his cousin ran to help her up on her feet and guided her back to the car. The cousin ran with a cloth to dip in cold water and placed it on her forehead. The driver guided his hand rounding her back, so her head hung down. Then the cousins began to hum in a soothing sound and rhythm. In a while, she felt better. She apologized for her weakness and thanked them for their kindness.
The driver turned around toward her with a confession. When she had first looked into his eyes before requesting going to the lake, early that morning at the hotel, he knew he would be safe to go with her up to the mountaintop. His own terror of heights had never allowed him to drive to the top. But with her, he knew that he could stay and watch the long light show that he had always heard about but had never experienced.
They held each other’s eyes, moist, like the mist, two voyages shared.