The front side of the shop is so plain and unadorned -- white walls and ordinary glass windows -- that it could easily be overlooked by passing tourists who take a stroll along narrow Jl. Dewi Sita in Ubud.

It has no carved tables or grand wooden cabinets to display its merchandise. Overall, it exudes that friendly atmosphere one usually feels when entering the house of a friend.

On the east side of the seven by eight-meter shop, decorative headdresses and brass armbands are neatly arranged atop metal displays. In the middle, a locked glass cabinet houses antique Chinese and colonial coins.

On the north side, various old leather and wooden puppets gaze at visitors with their weary eyes. Several old typewriters, including a foldaway one, lie on the floor next to the aquatic steel helmet of an ancient deep-sea diver.

Ethnic clothes hang and decorate the west wall, providing a somewhat hectic background to the intricately-designed headdresses arranged before them.

In the middle of the store is another glass panel housing rows of small tusuk konde (a two-pronged metal object used to fasten a woman's hair bun) made of brass and silver.

Behind the panel is the store's owner, 48-year-old Husen, who, as it turns out, is just as friendly as the atmosphere of the store itself.

The shop is quiet this particular Friday afternoon: A Japanese couple enters the shop and observes a rustic headdress and leaves without purchasing anything. Yet, it doesn't erase the smile on Husen's face.

"Well, that's what happens in this business. You rarely get a customer, the one that actually buys something," he says with a grin.

"But, when you do, then it usually means a huge sale -- the customer purchases a lot of stuff or a single, very expensive item," he adds.

The business Husen is referring to is the antique shop business. He says he doesn't sell historic items more than 100 years old.

"I believe the oldest item I have here is from 60 years ago," he says.

This doesn't mean his merchandise is ordinary. In fact, it is anything but ordinary. Almost 28 years in the business has made Husen an expert in recognizing valuable items as well as cunning negotiators. Most of the items displayed in his store once belonged to rich families in Java and Sumatra.

"The items displayed here are mostly from East Java, Solo, Yogya, Aceh and Palembang, and Batak. That rustic headdress is from Madura," he says, pointing to the piece that attracted the Japanese's couple attention.

Husen travels four times a year to various cities in Java to obtain merchandise for his store in Ubud, which he opened ten years ago.

"Ubud is a place that people from all over the world come to. That's the reason I moved from Surabaya to here in 1997."

Husen sells his merchandise within a price range he claims to be affordable. Headdresses are sold from Rp 2.5 million to 3.5 million, old clothing items can reach Rp 5 million, while the wooden puppets are sold at Rp 450,000 each.

"And you can buy this beautiful tusuk konde for a decent price of Rp 200,000," he says.

Business has been quite good for Husen: He now operates two stores in Ubud, and his second store is located in the Sanggingan area. Both shops share the same name: Ali Art Shop.

"Whether it be a good day or a quiet day, I still close my stores at 5 p.m. I want to spend more time with my children at home."

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