As If It Was Meant to Be
Maybe it was meant to be this way.
During my last journey through Bali, I came across a remarkable number of cremations and funeral rituals. Sometimes we simply happened to pass them by; at other times, we came to a standstill because an entire procession had taken over the road. Everywhere there were people, flowers, offerings, music and beautifully decorated ceremonial structures.
At the time, I watched mostly with the curiosity of a traveller. Fascinated by the colours, the rituals, and above all by the way the Balinese deal with death. So different from what we are used to in the Netherlands.
What I could not have known then was just how close saying goodbye would come to me during that very same journey.
Perhaps that is why these images have stayed with me so vividly. The processions, the music, the scent of incense, the families gathering together. There was grief, but at the same time there was a sense that death here does not simply mean an ending.
In Bali, dying is part of a much greater journey.
When travelling through Bali, you see life everywhere. Small offerings of flowers and rice outside homes and shops, incense curling in delicate trails above the streets, women in beautiful sarongs carrying offerings on their heads, and ceremonies that sometimes bring an entire village together. But among all that life, death is visible too. It is not dark or hidden away behind closed doors. Death is simply part of life.
You may suddenly find yourself behind a long procession. Traffic comes to a halt, dozens or sometimes hundreds of people fill the street, and traditional music can be heard in the distance. Nobody seems concerned about the delay. This is more important. A person is being accompanied on their journey towards another existence.
One of the things that fascinated me most was discovering that in Bali, death is not always immediately followed by cremation. Within Balinese Hinduism, cremation, known as Ngaben, is one of the most important rituals surrounding death. It is the moment when the soul is helped to free itself from the earthly body. But such a ceremony can be very expensive. Offerings have to be prepared, priests play an important role, food is cooked for family and guests, and sometimes people spend days creating elaborate ceremonial structures. Not every family can afford this straight away, so sometimes the deceased is buried first.
And then the waiting begins. Sometimes for months, sometimes for years, until the family has saved enough money or until the village organises a collective cremation. When that moment finally arrives, the grave may be reopened and the remains exhumed. To us, that may sound strange or even confronting, but within Balinese tradition it carries a very different meaning. The grave was not necessarily the final farewell. It was a temporary resting place until the time had come for the soul to continue its journey.
Because an individual cremation can be so costly, families often organise one together with other families. Several deceased people may then be cremated during the same ceremony. In this way, the costs are shared and the whole community helps. Offerings are prepared, palm leaves are woven, flowers are arranged, food is cooked and ceremonial structures are built. Slowly, a ceremony takes shape that is almost impossible to compare with the quiet and restrained funerals we are familiar with.
On the day itself, the street transforms. You often hear the music before you even see the procession. Men and women walk in traditional ceremonial clothing, children join them and families carry their offerings. Among them, a beautifully decorated structure several metres high may suddenly appear: the bade, or wadah, the cremation tower in which the deceased is ceremonially carried.
Dozens of men carry the tower on their shoulders. It sways high above the crowd, and at crossroads it may even be spun around. According to tradition, this helps to confuse evil spirits so that they cannot follow the soul. Sometimes the ceremony also includes an enormous, richly decorated animal-shaped sarcophagus, often in the form of a bull.
As a traveller, all you can really do is watch. Watch the colours, the people, the energy and the extraordinary involvement of the community. And you realise that you are witnessing something deeply intimate, while at the same time it is taking place right in the middle of everyday public life.
Eventually, the fire comes. The magnificent structure that so many people have worked on disappears into the flames. Where fire may feel like destruction to us, here it represents liberation. The body is temporary. The fire purifies and helps to release the connection between the earthly body and the soul. The soul is free to continue.
After the cremation, the ashes and remaining bone fragments are carefully collected. More rituals follow, and eventually the remains are taken to the sea or to flowing water. And it was there that I witnessed something that touched me deeply.
When the ashes are entrusted to the water and slowly carried away by the current, the family members remain standing on the shore. They watch their loved one drift away and they wave. A final farewell. Such a simple gesture, and yet I found it perhaps one of the most moving moments of the entire ceremony. No grand words. Just people standing at the water's edge, waving as their loved one slowly disappears from sight. As if they are saying: You can go now. It’s all right.
That image has stayed with me. Perhaps because, for us, waving goodbye usually belongs to someone setting off on a journey. We wave to someone who is leaving, often with the knowledge, or at least the hope, that we will see each other again. Here, somehow, it did not feel so very different. It was not only saying goodbye to someone who was no longer there, but seeing someone off as they began another journey.
During that trip, I did not yet understand why all those ceremonies affected me so deeply. Why I kept watching, why I wanted to learn more, and why that one simple gesture at the water touched me more than anything else. Only later did it take on a different meaning.
Sometimes, while travelling, we encounter things that simply seem special in the moment. Only afterwards do we understand why they touched us so deeply. For me, the Balinese cremations will always be connected to that last journey. To the colours and the music, to the scent of incense, to families coming together to say goodbye, and to the people standing at the water's edge, still waving.
Maybe it really was meant to be that, during this particular journey, I encountered so many ceremonies about farewell and letting go. Because not long afterwards, I had to say goodbye myself. And perhaps that is why I now see those people waving at the water's edge differently. Not only as a final farewell, but as seeing someone off as they begin a new journey.
Goodbye. Have a safe journey.
Sometimes it is only afterwards that a journey reveals what it was really about.
VAYA Soulful TravelTravel is more than movement, it’s connection.
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