Feb 23 - Lombok Pottery and back to Bali

On Friday afternoon, Feb 22, we boarded a boat to head out to Gili Island for the night. We stayed at a hotel called the Villa Ombak.

Wendy, Chris and Charlotte are negotiating the dock before clambering into our boat.

Alicia and Amy rode up front on the bow of the boat and reveled in the roller coaster ride provided by the ocean swells.

On Saturday morning we boarded our boat on Gili Island and motored back to Lombok for another day with Lombok Pottery.

We started out the day by visiting the Lombok Pottery office and showroom in Mataram.

  

On our nice blue bus with the Lombok Pottery folks: Novi, Ayu, Rohmi and Mustiah.

We stopped for lunch at Kuta Beach in southern Lombok. Rohmi and Ayu always seem to be in high spirits.

Kuta beach, near our lunch restaurant on Lombok.

After lunch we visited a traditional Sasak Village. Mud brick construction with thatched roofs. The building on the right is for rice storage. The Sasak people are indigenous to Lombok.

Interior of a Sasak house.

This Lombok pot has seen practical usage for a long, long time.

Christina and others in our group got to try their hand at Sasak weaving on one of our stops.

The Lombok Pottery center in Penujak village. They are proud of their World Fair Trade Organization membership and display it prominently at all of their offices and showrooms.

There are 176 potters in the Penujak Lombok Pottery co-op. Kadariah and Sumarni are two of the talented potters.

Kadariah is finishing the frog handle on a lid for a pot she is finishing.

Kadariah's pot is almost finished.

Kadariah's income from pottery making enables her family to send their children to a good school and means that they can improve their house and afford a better lifestyle.

Sumarni is pleased to be a member of the Lombok Pottery co-op in Penujak.

The pottery firing shed in Penujak. Ten Thousand Villages helped fund the building of this shed and 5 others for Lombok Pottery through our Artisan Development Fund.

 

Heaping rice straw on top of pots to be fired in order to keep the heat inside the primitive kiln that fires the pots.

 

Stoking the fire in the kiln.

Nearby, this woman was winnowing her rice in a bamboo tray. 

 

Our friendly and very competent quides while we were on Lombok: Mustiah, Khetut, Rohmi and Ayu of Lombok Pottery Centre and Basar (in back), our bus tour guide. We had a great time on Lombok, made good friends with Lombok Pottery people and we are sad to say goodbye. 

We flew on Garuda Airlines (Indonesian National Airline) from Lombok back to Bali on Saturday evening.