Black Moon

It occurs to me this evening that I would do well to become more familiar with the Balinese calendar of "special" days so that I might be better prepared to anticipate oncoming traffic jams. I was thinking this, anyway, while I was stuck in one of these jams and had nothing better to think about. 

"Special" days and "ceremonies" go hand in hand, you see. Whatever is being observed on the particular day comes with its own particular ceremony, and the point of most of these seems to be to bring traffic to a standstill.

I encountered one such standstill this evening. The road I would usually take to Sanur was blocked off halfway there. Traffic was detoured to a series of narrow lanes, by which the bulging, steaming stream of cars and motorbikes finally oozed back onto the main highway to join the bulging, steaming stream already crawling down that highway. Inch by inch. 

And then it started raining. 

It was dark by the time I got to Sanur. 

Sepertinya hari ini hari khusus di Bali, I said when I entered the Starbucks. Seems like this is a special day in Bali.

"Yes, it is," the barista said. "Many ceremonies today." 

"What's it about?"

"Oh, it's … uh … how do you say … Black moon." 

"Black moon?" 

"Ya, you know, full moon and black moon."

"No moon." 

"Ya! No moon."

Huh. So they got the full moon ceremony and the no moon ceremony. I wonder if they have a half moon ceremony as well. I suppose I can find the answer to that question either by watching the sky or watching the traffic.