40 kids explore the nature at Jiwa Damai

School visit kidz

helping hands kidz

This Tuesday was busy at Jiwa Damai as 40 students from a local Balinese school visited for a field trip. It was such a pleasure teaching the young children about many of our plants, the importance of organic gardening, and the many different animals and organism we have at Jiwa Damai! The show started with coconut tree climbing, followed by descriptions of different trees and flowers. During the tour the children taste cocao, coconut, and sugarcane while exploring. The children also walked around the Mandala Garden identifying different vegetables, and tasting herbs. We also teach them about the importance of composting and recycling, and end the tour with each child planting a sprout in the earth with their hands!

After the tour the children enjoy lunch made at Jiwa Damai with food from the garden! We served them Taro, a root vegetable, which they see before it’s cooked and also when its in the garden. The children enjoy their lunch by the lake enveloped by nature all around them! Butterflies, fish, frogs, and lizards join the kids at lunchtime!

Building a Water Tower for the Lumbungs

Building the water tower

We are also hard at work building a water tower for the lumbungs. The water tower will stand about 7 meters high. The purpose of the tower is to provide water for the bathrooms, taken from a well about 30 meters below. Water travels from the tower, down into the pipe and up into the showerhead. The tower’s height is necessary to give water pressure for showering.

Inside the tower we install a floating device; if the water goes below a certain level the pump starts. The water tower ensures that in the event we lose electricity, there will be enough water for the lumbungs’ bathrooms. The tower will hold 1,000 liters, or about 400 gallons. This would provide a sufficient amount of water for two or three days.

As pictured, these incredibly strong little women transfer cement bricks for the water tower from where they are stacked outside to inside the compound.

Water tower_Transporting stones

One man slowly and painstakingly straightens each piece of iron for the tower. Lots of time and great care go into the marvelous quality of work done here. We are very excited about the pending completion of the lumbungs.

Water tower_Bending the wires

Bamboo, known for its strength and durability, forms the frame for the water tower and is often used for scaffolding in Bali. This worker diligently separates strands of bamboo.

Water tower_Bamboo scaffolding

Water conservation plays an important role at Jiwa Damai. A large pond surrounds the main buildings and guest rooms. The pond is home to many different fish, microorganisms, and splendid white and purple lilies. Three different pipes drain excess water to separate ponds. Another drains water to our extensive permaculture garden. Our beautiful swimming pool is fed from a spring located underneath the pool.

We employ lots of structural thinking. Every drop of water gets reused!

Cleaning the pool

The pool is one of our key features here at Jiwa Damai.Of course, such a pool requires a lot of dedicated maintenance. It needs to be cleaned daily - its mostly leaves, fallen from the trees,  that have to be fished out of the water.

Pool cleaning

Responsible for this task is Wira, our general coordinator. Looks like he is enjoying his work ;-)

Pool cleaning

The pool is filled with natural water from our spring, located on the grounds of Jiwa Damai. Since we want to keep the water as natural as possible, we only use a minimum amount of chemicals and only when needed.

The pool cleansing takes place early every morning, so that our guest can always enjoy a refreshing swim in a nice clean, blue-shimmering pool.

Have fun!

Tropical fauna on Bali

Experiencing the tropical wildlife in our extensive permaculture garden is quite a spectacle. Jiwa Damai is inhabited by different animals crawling, flying and jumping around in the huge garden. Today we want to introduce you to some of the little creatures.

The Tokes you'll hear as soon as it gets dark. They like to crawl around under the open roofs, looking for insects. They make that nice sounds: tookeeee, tokeeee.....

Toke

Our other noise-makers are the little froggies, quacking and quacking.

At nights, just sit back and listen to the beautiful concert !

Frog

Going for a walk in the garden , right after a heavy rainshower, I noticed some spiders weaving their nets.  - What incredibly talented  artists these creatures are !

Spider

But we have way more cute little animals in the huge garden. Beautiful animals..... butterflies, colorful birds, snails, ... ( it's just so hard to take pictures of the birds and butterflies.... but we'll keep on trying ;-) )

Snail

It is a pleasure walking through the garden and you can be sure not to be bothered by too many mosquitos and flies.  The ponds and water have been exposed to EM-Technology and as a result the breeding of mosquitoes has been significantly reduced.

Come visit us and see for yourself!

Jiwa Damai's team

Today we want to introduce you to our staff here at Jiwa Damai! All our employees live in near-by villages. In this way we want to contribute to the local communities by supplying employment.

Jiwa Damai's Balinese staff, from left to right and from top to bottom :

Wayan, our night guard; Lana, responsible for all maintenance issues; Ketut, our head gardener; Astri, our cook (probably the  best chef on Bali); Wira, our coordinator; Wayan, our second gardener and last but not least Sugik, our junior administration manager.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The team gets complemented by Philippe from Switzerland, our guest relations manager, who is living on Bali for quite a while now and Simone, responsible for Marketing & PR, working from Germany. Watching over all is Margret, Jiwa Damai's caretaker and guardian.

.... and not to forget our 3 dogs, Angrek, Salju and Blackie !

Nous souhaitons vous présenter le très sympathique staff de Jiwa Damai !!

De gauche à droite et de haut en bas :

Wayan, notre garde ; Lana, l’homme de la maintenance ; Ketut, notre jardinier ; Astri, notre cuisinière (la meilleure chef de Bali); Wira, notre coordinateur; Wayan, notre jardinier et Sugik, notre responsable administratif.

Coconut harvest on Bali

Do you know how our coconuts are being harvested? Bringing down the nuts is not an easy task! Only few local men know how to climb the coconut tress and harvest the nuts. I've seen them climbing up the high trees, sometimes up to 30 m, without a rope, without a safety net, just the machete in the back of the pant, .....like a little monkey.

Made Sueca is a real acrobat. He is climbing to the top of coconut tree just with his bare feet and hands. It’s impressive !

Made Sueca climbing a coconut tree

His work is to clean the trees - cut the leaves and harvest the coconuts.

When he finally made it to the top, when he reached the crown of the tree,  he is simply 'sitting' there, supposedly very comfortable, cutting off the nuts with his machete.

For me it is amazing how a person can climb up a tree like this and then, without effort 'sit' there for minutes until all the coconuts and dead leaves are cut off. What an incredible strenght is needed for this kind of work! Respect.

Made Sueca est d’une agilité déconcertante. Il grimpe dans les cocotiers à 30 mètres de haut et à l’aide de ses bras et ses jambes, il se retrouve au sommet en moins de deux minutes. C’est impressionnant !

Son travail consiste à élaguer les arbres, en coupant les feuilles un peu trop encombrantes. Et bien sûr à cueillir les noix de coco.

Lumbung construction in Bali

The construction work at our two new Lumbungs is advancing rapidly. Within a matter of 3 weeks a huge progress can be seen!

Lumbung

These new Balinese houses will turn out beautifully.

A wooden staircase is leading to the 'top floor' where our guests will sleep. The 'ground floor' will be the living area, a private bathroom is attached to the back of the house.

Lumbung inside

We only use natural materials to construct the Lumbungs - wood and bamboo. The walls are made out of  braided stripes of bamboo.

Lumbung wall

Our guests will enjoy an authentic sleeping experience in the middle of nature.  You will fall asleep to the sounds of quacking frogs and geckos - a truly calming sound and a deeply relaxing environment.

One Balinese Lumbung will accommodate 2-3 persons.

Cremation ceremony in Bali

This  february 10th in Ubud we witnessed an important cremation ceremony. It was a king’s cremation. The body of each dead Balinese must be burned so that their souls can join the spirit’s world. This kind of event is very important for Balinese people .There are ceremonies for every stage of Balinese life but often the last ceremony-cremation-is the biggest. A Balinese cremation can be an amazing, spectacular, colorful, noisy and exciting event. In fact it often takes so long to organize a cremation that years have passed since the death.

Kings cremation

The funeral ceremony is generally led by a priest and punctuated by a lavish offering of gifts. For the occasion, a large bullock-shaped wooden structure is built . The tower is carried on the shoulders of a group of men, the size of the group depending on the importance of the deceased and hence the size of the tower.

King's cremation

At the cremation ground the body is transferred to a funeral sarcophagus. Finally it all goes up in flames - the funeral tower, sarcophagus, body and the lot.

Cremation king

Apart from being yet another occasion for Balinese noise and confusion it's a fine opportunity to observe the incredible energy the Balinese put into creating real works of art which are totally ephemeral.

Health Room at Jiwa Damai

After some weeks of work,  our Health room is finished and awaiting our guests. It turned out very beautiful.  You enter through a beautifully carved, Balinese wooden door.  This door was carefully refurbished and painted - it looks amazing!

Health room

The Health room features a bathtub, the walls are made out of green shimmering glass stones.

We offer holistic body therapies, individual therapy sessions as well as massages and body care.

Health room_new

Relax and enjoy your massage!

Massage

Health room

After the massage you can take a refreshing swim in our pool.

This is the perfect way to spend your day at Jiwa Damai....

New Lumbungs at Jiwa Damai

We are currently constructing two new Lumbungs in our organic garden. A Lumbung is a traditional Balinese house, made out of bamboo and wood. We build them in an elevated part of our garden, overlooking the pool, right next to the ceremonial garden.

View pool

We  offer these Balinese houses to guests, wanting to experience nature closely. These Lumbungs will  offer rural comfort and can accommodate two or threee people each. They are covered with mosquito nets and will have their own private bathroom.

This is our Lumbung Kunang-Kunang. Isn't that nice?

The two new Lumbungs will look similar to this one......

Lumbung

The construction started - phase one ......

Lumbung construction

Lumbung construction

We will keep you updated on the construction process !