In Reply to: fireworks posted by Mr Kent on Tuesday, 28. July 2009 at 07:44 Bali Time:
15 of us were in Bali in Sept 2007 and having younger members in the family group we decided to give them fireworks display. So with a pocket full of Rupiah off we go in search of shops, street sellers or anyone who can fulfill our pyrotechnics requirements. With plenty of shopping around done, what started off to be a wee exhibition for kddies was now going to rival News eve in Sydney and Skyshow in Perth. Between myself and our good friends the 'Murf' family we had collected something like 4 to 500 fireworks.
Overkill? Yes, fun factor? Immense.
Now my sister the Bali freak 'Kaz' goes into predamage control giving us all the warnings in the world she could offer, your not allowed, police will get ya, you know all the crap that us men are not even going to give a rats about.Yes sis no sis shut up sis, we did this last year but on a smaller scale. No way sis this Machoism at its greatest plus our kids are going worship their fathers 'The Skylighters' forever. So for the next couple of days we planned and planned again all to the constant health warnings from the sister. Then one night at dinner with a 10 and an 8 year old egging Dad(me) on, it was done. Tonite we do it.
Off to Kuta beach we go,15 of us onto the beach in amongst a handful of locals and yes the sister is in tow albeit some way back from the main group. Now we setup two launch pads the Murfs ( father and son ) 30 metres up from myself and my brother in law ( Dino, whom had not purchased a single firework) . So 15 minutes setting up, you right angles, wind factor etc and we launch. A couple of zingers 50 feet in the air heaps of whizzzzzz sound. Murfs follow suit then launch a cracker 40 feet and BOOM, a beauty. Hey we are drawing a crowd, kids are pumped, oohhs and arghs lengendary stuff and sister, at the back still giving it to us, but now with throbbing headache. Now we had these things called bumble bees, around 200 in all, about the size of a match box that had to be lit individually. No fun in that, so we packed them into newspaper and lit the newspaper. Now im not lying it was like a bloody machine gun awesome but problem #1. Problem 2 is about 10 seconds later, Murf and son lit a thing called a candle, mutli launches at about 5 second intervals and their loud, more like mortar shells. All this time my other sister has got the video on.
Now panic sis is losing it she's heading for the road, the locals start to clear when onto the beach comes problem #3. The Tourist police. This fella has rocked up on standard police transport, a pushbike and he has made a bee line for me and bro/in/law. Murfs bent over still flicking the lighter. The crowd parts, like moses and the water and this guys angry. Murf is the oldest of the group and this where age and wisdom go hand in hand, he and son realize whats happening and just morph into the crowd.
Mr Polisi by now has me and dino bailed up demanding passports asking a million questions at warp speed. Now sis is hitting herself in the forehead walking circles on the beach. Mr Polisi decides further questioning is warranted, we dino and I are to follow him on foot while he leads the way on his bike. Still today this day its a humor point for Mrs Murf (jude) to see to 2 blokes 100 metres behind, following a copper, on a bike ,to a police post. Its about now I think ok sis was right, we have an issue. Dino and my wife by now are franticly discussing ways of calling the AUS embassy our kids go hystericsal. I'm in two minds lets make run for it and I'm going to jail for bloody fireworks. We reach the police post, its about 4m x 4m and inside is 7 coppers, we are shi^ing. Seated and questioned, where did ya by em, why you do this etc etc. So we do what any normal loving father would do, blame the kids. 'We were doing it for the kids, make em happy' you know all that stuff. It seems to work, one well built young copper appears to smypathise with us and lectures us about since the bombs fireworks not allowed. Were extremely apologetic, sincerely and he decides to lets us on our way. So leave we do, hurriedly. Its now I realize I have sweated more than marathon runner in the sahara and dino still jibbering about not even buying fireworks. We met up with all the others members a kilometer up the ( great support guys), make peace with the kids. For the remainder of the holiday we wear the crap hung on us and sadly decided on an early retirement from fireworks,
We are heading back in August, but the fireworks, wisely will not be on the programme.