In Reply to: Great idea posted by quirky artist on Wednesday, 27. March 2013 at 15:34 Bali Time:
If your visit is during school holidays, I'm guessing your sponsored child will be one of the only ones there - maybe another if other sponsors are visiting that day.
Without the chaos of a full school, it will be a lot quicker for them to show you around.
I definitely rely on my driver friend to translate for me on visits. I speak some Indonesian, which is helpful, but often the kids are shy or they revert to Balinese - or they just speak too fast for me, lol.
Sobangan is close to Mengwi, so there's no reason not to combine other places to your visit. You could see Margarana which is not on the regular tourist lists. It's a memorial for the battle with the Dutch. A small but interesting museum there, lovely gardens and grave markers for the fallen. Your driver will again come in handy for translation - there is a guide at the museum but we found his english to be very limited the day we went.
Also the Taman Ayun temple is gorgeous and well worth a visit.
If it would help, I can give you my driver's number. He's familiar with the schools at Sobangan as he has taken me there for about 10 years now. His english is very good too, and I'm sure he'd have no problem picking you up from Ubud for your day trip.