“Tat-wa-masi.” I am you. You are me.

Eight years since I had walked these streets. Everything had changed. The smallness, the peace and tranquility of Ubud had been invaded by high-end stores, throngs of white people, and so. much. traffic. The temples and the offerings were still there. The smell of incense still wafted around. But there was more aggression: stumbling tourists who wouldn’t give up their spot on the sidewalks. Motorbikes, so many of them, speeding up instead of slowing down as you crossed from one side of the road to the other. Sidewalks crumbling under the weight of the crowds. A Starbucks.

The monkeys made their sanctuary in monkey forest and didn’t leave. You no longer saw them hanging roadside, indulging in offerings to the gods. Instead, they were trying, their very hardest, to maintain their own peace and tranquility among herds of voyeuristic humans. I walked through monkey forest and watched as one little boy taunted a small monkey with an injured tail. The end of the monkey’s tail looked raw and painful. He dragged it behind him listlessly as he crawled around. When the monkey realized the little boy was laughing at his misfortune, he temporarily lost his mind. He ran at full speed after the boy, jumping up and tackling the boy from behind. The boy screamed in terror. The parents watched in horror. I was rooting for the monkey.

Just as I was rooting for old Ubud, when the monkeys chilled roadside. When magic instead of motorbikes emanated from the streets. When the temples were quiet and the few stores there were those of local artisans: the woman with the silk scarves, the painter, the wood maker, the sculptor. I remember hiking right out of Ubud to the rice terraces, through villages where I watched art in action. But those rice terraces, at least the ones nearest to downtown, have been razed. They’ve built new hotels to mimic the old. But you can’t fool the feeling they give you. The new hotels – the wood is too shiny, the carvings too sharp.

But, of course, with the bad, comes good: a boom to the local economy, an economic boom to local families.

Despite all the change, I found solace in Hotel Okawati. Nestled down a brick alley, away from the crowds, Okawati was still the quiet, peaceful space it was eight years ago. The same ornate fixtures and statues welcomed you home. There was solitude around the pool, slightly green from the algae at one end. The same cool tile floors welcomed your feet in from the humidity. The sheets were still paper thin. There was no shower curtain and a single bar of the same type of generic soap sat by the tub. The same light green tea cup was turned upside down on the table outside my door. I ate the same breakfast: a fried egg, pineapple and watermelon sprinkled with coconut, and  small bowl of yogurt and honey. The staff came by and set offerings near the statues on my porch each morning, incense blowing into my room and out toward the alleyway. Okawati was still simple. And in its simplicity and aversion to change, I found peace.

On the drive back from Ubud, I learned the Indonesian (Hindu) term for the feeling Okawati gifted me. “Tat-wa-masi.” “I am you. You are me.”

I felt like Okawati understood. In the midst of so much change, some things need to stay the same. This is the grand paradox for the nomad: finding so much peace in

inertia.