I was walking in Bali's famous craft town, Ubud, losing patience with the oddly tilting sidewalks. Maybe I should walk in the street and dodge motorbikes instead, I thought. Too late! I felt myself sliding on the steep slope and I took a bad fall. Out of nowhere a young boy on an old Yamaha zoomed up, yelling, "Transport, lady?" As I waved him away, a man stopped to help. Examining my rapidly swelling left foot, he advised me to go to the Mentari clinic. "There's a healer there with magic hands--Dr. Weda," he said. "He did wonders for my back last night."

A healer, I thought skeptically. Should I go? Could II? For hundreds of years the Balinese have relied on healers--the recipients of knowledge passed down through generations--thought to have special spiritual powers. But I grew up in a household dominated by Western medicine, with a father who was a surgeon and a mother who was a nurse. Dinner was often interrupted by calls from the hospital, and family vacation photos always came back with a few of Dad's surgery shots at the end of the roll. On weekends I tagged along on hospital rounds and saw patients, in various stages of healing, placing their trust in modern medicine. I grew up with a deep respect for doctors.

Desperately Seeking a Cure
But wanting immediate relief and having no clue where to find a Western doctor in Bali, I took a chance on the island's healers. First I paid the equivalent of seven dollars for two hours of reflexology treatment on my foot, a full body massage, and the pleasure of losing myself in daydreams and the sound of songbirds in the clinic's courtyard. I felt wonderful--until I walked a block. Then things started to get odd. Several Balinese strangers saw my swollen ankle and scraped leg and stopped me to ask, "What happened?" When I told them, they then asked me, "Why?"

Why? Because the sidewalk sloped. Because I lost my balance. Everyone I met seemed to have a remedy. It sounded strange when a woodcarver told me to soak my foot in arak--a brandy made from fermented coconut juice--and then rub it with pulverized red onions, but I was getting desperate. This was my vacation, and I didn't like being laid up. After the arak and the onions, I smelled pungent but felt no better.

Next, I met Nina, an Indonesian woman who convinced me my cure would be found with Dr. Tumrak, a healer in a nearby village. She guided me to his home, and then translated for us. "He wants to know why you fell," she said. I explained that I had slipped on the tilted sidewalk, but the old man with a face that was a roadmap of wrinkles didn't want to know how I fell, but why, as if there was some cosmic force that had swept me off my feet. I didn't know what to say. I sat with my outstretched leg in Dr. Tumrak's lap and my foot pressed against his bare Buddha-like stomach.

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"When you fall, part of your spirit leaves
your body, and you must make
an offering at the place
where it happened."
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First, he stared at my ankle, foot and lower leg as if he had X-ray vision and could se what the problem was. Through tightly pursed lips he blew on my skin, forcing out slow controlled breaths all over my ankle and foot. From several small brown bottles and plastic bags, he poured holy water and oils onto my injury. Massage, pressure and twisting manipulations followed. For the moment, my foot was the center of the universe, and I was a believer in Dr. Tumrak's power. Before I left he handed me my medicine--a chunk of something that looked like ginger. He called it "kunyit," which I later learned was tumeric, the common Indian cooking spice that turns curries and rice yellow.

"He wants you to grind the kunyit into a paste and spread it on your foot," said Nina. So that night, I prepared and applied the bright yellow goo. Instantly I felt a warming sensation as the substance seeped into my pores. And my foot felt better--for a while.

A few days later in eastern Bali, my taxi driver, Wayan, became the next who saw my swollen--now yellow--foot and asked, "Why?" Finally I asked Wayan a "why" of my own: "Why does everyone want to know why I fell?"

Wayan was quiet for a moment, then answered, "There is a reason you fell--an imbalance between you and your surroundings or an enemy with black magic who caused it. When you fall," he went on, "part of your spirit leaves your body, and you must make an offering at the place where it happened."

Searching for Spirit
And so--with an offering on the dashboard of Wayan's Volkswagen ensuring us a safe ride--we set off on the two-hour drive back to Ubud. In the open-air market there, we bought some woven palm leaf ornaments, which we filled with flowers, rice and banana slices. Hobbling slowly, I led Wayan to the spot where I'd fallen. He, in turn, told me I should pray and showed me the right way to make the offerings. I was to place one on the ground to appease the evil below and put another on top of a stone statue, along with a stick of burning incense to carry my prayer heavenward.

I left Bali the next day, hoping that I'd reconnected with my spirit. On my way home I stopped in California to see my dad. I told him about the clinic, the many "why" questions, the arak and the red onions, the barefoot healer who gave me tumeric and blew on my foot, and the offerings. I half expected Dad to laugh or scrunch up his face in disapproval. Instead he listened attentively, then said, "Tumeric is an anti-inflammatory. Maybe it's a good thing you saw this healer, or it might have been worse." Then, after a pause, he added, "But when you get back to New York, get an X ray."