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Bali Island Province, IndonesiaIncluding Kuta Beach, Denpasar, Benoa HarbourTravel and Tourism, Vacation Guide
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| This page shows my personal view of the Island of Bali in Indonesia. | |
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| I was privileged to visit Bali in 1975 and briefly in 1983. Things were changing rapidly then and the pace has only accelerated since then. I expect that the ocean, beaches and mountains will continue with their central place in local culture. | |
Balinese temples are relatively simple in structure but often magnificent in detail and setting. 
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My first visit was just a couple years after the jumbo jets started to bring mass tourist arrivals. There was just one multi-story hotel. Each restaurant in Kuta Beach had only a single light bulb. Balinese culture remained strong and vibrant. Music, art and religion perfused the daily life rituals of the Balinese people. My first morning I attended a local festival on the beach. There was gambling and ritual cock-fighting. 
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Temples, volcanoes and monkeys. 
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| Almost everyone wore the local dress. Sarongs were more common than pants. Older women still worked bare-breasted in the rice terraces. Many places on this scenic island were rarely visited and rarely seen. |
| This first visit ended with my two month sail to Singapore. When we stopped on the nearby south coast of Lombok we were almost the only tourists on that entire island. |
| At the time of my 1983 return visit there had been many changes. Jeans were more common than sarongs. The main city of Denpasar had doubled in size. The island businesses were being overtaken by Javanese businessmen. Many large hotels had been built or were under construction. |
| By the end of the century parts of the island apparently resemble a big Australian beer garden. Narrow wall-lined pathways are lined with three story stores and bars. I hope that some of the Balinese spirit survives. |
| In the last few years terrorist groups decided to effect social change with bombs. What horrible acts by horrible people. The massive Kuta Beach nightclub bombing was about 200 metres from where I once stayed in $3 per night losmen rooms. It was just a five minute walk from where cremation ashes are traditionally tossed into the Indian Ocean waves. |
| By the end of 2005 there were a number of convictions for the bombing perpetrators. Amazingly enough though, the Jemaah Islamiah group that directed the attackers is still legal in Indonesia. In many South-East Asian countries, justice for drug possession is swift and deadly. Justice for terrorism is much slower and more likely to be suspended. |
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Great people, great art, great scenery. Tourism is the biggest industry. Things will never be the same. 
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| My favourite book about Indonesia is Revolt in Paradise by K'tut Tantri. It is the fascinating story of a Scotswoman who moves to Bali in 1932. She eventually became a anti-Japanese resistance fighter before her capture and imprisonment. |
| A correspondent in West Virginia told me that a book named The Romance of K'tut Tantri and Indonesia by Thomas Lindsey "explores the many inconsistencies of K'tut's life. It suggests that K'tut maybe wasn't the person she made herself out to be. It has a very scholarly writing stance and is therefore, nowhere near as fun to read as Tantri's Revolt in Paradise. But the book does have some very interesting information to do with Indonesia and K'tut Tantri (and a lot of scandal!)." |
| I do appreciate the weekly newsletter that I receive from Bali Discovery Tours, but I suspect that the scary negative news reported at the Bali Bullocks / BS and Fugli Bali web sites are much closer to the truth. Indonesia is famed for its official corruption that extends to both the lowest and very highest levels of society. This is certainly nothing new. During my brief time in Java during in the seventies the military had a fairly good image while fear of the police was common. Every tourist should read of the 'great' Dutch invasions of Bali just over a century ago. European artillery and rifles were used to mow down regal armies armed with swords and knives. The royal Balinese finally used mass ritual suicide as the best form of opposition. |