Galungan is a Balinese holiday celebrating the victory of dharma over adharma or the triumph of good over evil. Praying at the temple is the climax of Galungan Day. The people put on their finest traditional clothes and go to the temple with their families to pray and bring offerings to share. Early in the morning many Balinese go to the public temples. By the afternoon, they are home celebrating with their families at their private temples and eating together.

The date of Galungan is calculated on the Balinese calendar, which is every 6 months at 35 days per month. This year, Galungan Day was held on June 8th and ended 10 days later on Kuningan Day on June 18th. The 210 day calendar results in one Galungan event in 2022 and two Galungan Days in 2023 on January 4, 2023 & August  2, 2023.

it is not unusual to see offerings brought to the temples balanced on the heads of many devoted Balinese.

The Balinese are very spiritual people. They renew their commitment to make tomorrow a better day, and continually to make themselves better through prayer and offerings. We seldom see angry or unhappy Balinese, as they strive to maintain balance and harmony. Instead of quarreling, they accept it as fate. Balinese are always smiling, as they are taught to accept all stages of their lives, life as well as death. They believe in the co-existence of good and bad spirits working as one in every individual. The golden rule: “Expect the best, prepare for the worst, accept the result stoically.”

At the Penglipuran Village on Galungan Day, we watched a procession led by musicians and a barong (a masked panther-like creature in Balinese mythology). The village has a wonderful display of penjors lining the main street.

At the Penglipuran village, these are some of the people we observed. Some came to bring offerings, others came to pray, and a group of photographers (center-left) came to document the eventful day.

This is a 47 second video of the procession on Galungan day at Penglipuran Village in Bali.