Tempting the gods

There was a roar and a great confusion of noise.  Fires leaped up and licked the roof.  The throbbing grew to a great tumult, and the Mountain shook. ... And there upon the dark threshold of the Sammath Naur, high above the plains of Mordor, such wonder and terror came on him that he stood still forgetting all else, and gazed as one turned to stone.

--J. R. R. Tolkien, The Return of the King

Mount Agung, a volcano in eastern Bali, killed between 1,100 and 1,700 people in 1963, when it exploded in two major eruptions.  It then remained quiescent until last month, when alarming sesismic activity -- 844 earthquakes on September 26 alone -- seemed to presage another major eruption.  Over a hundred thousand residents of Bali have been evacuated from a twelve-mile exclusionary zone around the mountain.

Tourists have been assured that they are safe in Bali's famed resort areas, but the threat of eruption has caused cancelation of plans by some.  The threat of eruption remains serious, but the immediate eruption that was feared a couple of weeks ago has not yet occurred.

In the midst of all this concern, two days ago a French citizen posted photos (copy of one appears above) and videos of his ascent to the crater's edge.  Facebook and the internet was filled with expressions of disgust that this guy risked his own life in a dangerous situation in exchange for a little publicity, not to mention showing  callous disregard for Balinese culture or for the sensitivities of the Balinese who had been evacuated from their homes.

Agung is regarded by local Hindus as a replica or fragment of mystical Mt. Meru -- the central axis of the universe -- and is the location of sacred temples.  The government has had problems dealing with Hindu priests returning to the slopes to pray that the mountain not erupt.  The climber entered the exclusionary zone,  not to pray on behalf of the people who lived there, but simply as a publicity stunt.  As one writer posted, angrily, on the climber's Facebook page:

This man is a self serving arrogant jerk. Has he not learned anything about the Balinese culture while living in Bali obviously not because he's only interested in himself. I cannot believe some people are making him out to be some kind of hero. The heroes are those locals and expats helping the evacuees who have had to leave their homes on the slopes of their sacred mountain. He has no credibility because of his lack of respect.

I don't mean to sound flippant when I say that if we do make it to Bali on October 22, as planned, my family and I will certainly give the active volcano all the respect it deserves.

We have been advised by the owner of the villa we are leasing that, at 28 km. from the volcano, and protected by an intervening range of hills, we will be perfectly safe in the event of any eruption.  The only concern would be that the airport at Denpasar might be closed should there be too much ash in the air.  But in that event, flights with Bali as a destination would land on Lompok island, immediately to the east, and we would ferry across the channel to Bali.

So.  That's where our Bali visit stands at present.  Before we fly to Bali, we will be visiting my nephew and his daughter in Thailand.  We will make a final decision on how to proceed once we are in Thailand.

None of us is Hindu, but we all, with great respect, implore Agung to hold off any violent activity, at least until November.