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illions of Balinese Hindu devotees celebrated on Wednesday the victory of dharma (virtues) over adharma (vices) in the joyous religious festival of Galungan. Streets were nearly empty and offices and shops were closed in the island’s capital Denpasar as most of its residents returned to their respective home villages to pray at their ancestral temples and gather with their extended families.

The house of Denpasar couple Putu Agus Darmada and Ni Komang Wiryani had been bustling with activity since dawn. The couple and their two children started their Galungan’s prayer session at the house’s shrines. Then they traveled to Darmada’s home village in Riang Gede, Tabanan.

“There we will pray at Darmada’s family temple, then at the ancestral temple and later on at the village’s Desa temple. In the evening, we will pray at the shrines of my husband’s workplace in Kuta and our last prayer session will be at Jagatnatha,” Wiryani said, referring to the Denpasar municipality’s public temple.

“We use this whole day to pray at different temples so tomorrow we will have a lot of time to gather with our family,” she added.

Galungan, which falls once every 210 days, has always been considered a time for Balinese Hindus to show their devotion to God as well as to show their love to their family and relatives. With the advance of economic development, and the tourism industry in particular, the number of Balinese who have left their home villages and families, to seek their fortunes in cities in southern Bali has continuously grown. Galungan, and the three-day local holiday observed by the provincial administration, provides these Balinese with a precious opportunity to gather with their families and relatives.

For 59-year-old Luh Murtini, the joyful family gathering started on the eve of Galungan, when her son, daughter and grandson arrived at her 400-square-meter house in Banyuasri village, Buleleng. The usually quiet house was immediately turned into a noisy place by the family’s banter.

“Galungan has always been a special time for me because it’s a time for family gathering,” Murtini said.

For over two years, the mother of seven has been living in the five-bedroom house with only her youngest daughter. Her two sons work in Denpasar and Badung while four of her daughters have married and live in other parts of the island.

“When I graduated from a tourism institute, I didn’t think that I could find a job here in Buleleng. That’s why I followed in my oldest sister’s footsteps and looked for a job in the southern part of the island. Thank God, now I have a good job with a good salary,” Murtini’s son, Made Wirajaya Antara, recalled.

Antara now works at a restaurant in Kuta while his younger brother Made Suweca works at a small
enterprise in Denpasar.

Many homes in Buleleng and other rural areas in Bali are now occupied by the elderly members of the family, as the younger ones are mostly working and residing in the major cities in the south. They return home only during religious festivals and public holidays.

“Galungan has become the biggest family gathering for us,” Antara stressed, adding that it also provides a chance for the living to reunite with their dead relatives.

On Galungan, the people of Buleleng have also organized a prayer session at the cemetery to pay homage to their deceased relatives who had not yet been cremated. They would present an offering of rice, cakes and fruits to the deceased and at the end of the ritual they would feast on the offering. “In Galungan we gather with our living and deceased relatives,” he concluded.

Hindu high priest Ida Pedanda Gede Telaga of Sanur said that family gatherings were an important part of Galungan in addition to praying to God. He warned that Galungan was only a symbol of victory and should not be treated as the actual victory itself.

“It means that we have to implement dharma [virtues] in our daily life. Galungan is merely a good moment for introspection, a reminder for us to do good things every day.”