Paradise, Lost?

We started our first morning in Bali with a breakfast of fruit.

Mangosteen and bananas

It comprised mangosteen and tiny bananas. Despite its name, mangosteen has nothing to do with mango and is known as the queen of fruit in SE Asia, while durian is the king (although still banned on most public transport).

Get your stinking fruit off my bus

The thick purple rind of the mangosteen is inedible, but the white flesh, while small in amount, is succulent and very sweet.

Queen of fruit

Bali. When we told people the list of countries we would be visiting, many alighted on Bali, repeating its name with a wistful tone and a far-away look in their eyes. "Bali's wonderful. You'll love it. It's paradise". A fruit-filled paradise, where every child is a dancer and any farmer an artist.

Hang on. I've heard these words before. In fact, a 20-year-old documentary called "Done Bali" covered the effects of mass tourism on Bali and its carefully constructed image as the "island of the gods", full of peasant artisans.

The documentary-maker claims that the image of Bali as a paradise island is a myth cultivated by the Dutch. This was born of guilt for the suffering they caused through aggressive colonisation in the early 20th century, razing villages and killing people in the Puputan wars, in which the Balinese walked into gunfire and committed ritual suicide (puputan) with their keris (dagger) rather than suffer the indignity of defeat. The Dutch 'ethical policy' that followed in the aftermath aimed to protect Balinese art and culture and opened the gates to tourism.

Traffic on Jalan Imam Bonjol

The documentary features a toothless old man, who claims he used to walk into Denpasar to the cinema. "Now I can spend an hour just waiting to cross the road. I get a headache."

I can empathise with the man. The road noise is relentless. Expecting there to be quiet roads is patently ridiculous, but Bali's roads are busy. Really busy. And chaotic.
This is a place that is heaving under the weight of journeys undertaken by motorbike and car. Coming from George Town, which is a city despite its name, the roads bear no relation to Denpasar's. The roads seem as lawless as Cambodia's and as jammed as Ho Chi Minh City. Many of the bikes are piloted by young children, in plaits and school uniform, although I am sure their driving prowess is far beyond my own.

School's out

Despite being a fraction of the size of Ho Chi Minh City, Denpasar has a population density almost twice that of Vietnam's largest city. Its arteries are clogged. Any attempt to walk from place to place is rendered almost impossible and conversation at the side of the road is futile next to the deafening roar. Incongruously, hand-pushed food carts are still plentiful, but the vendors have to jostle with the heavy traffic.

Bakso, bakso man!

Whether tourism was the catalyst for change, the effects of rapid and unchecked urbanisation are clear. I thought showing Jalan Imam Bonjol at rush hour would be disingenuous and unrepresentative, but the capital city seems to have sprawled over the entire of the south of the country, from tourist hubs Kuta and Seminyek up as far as Ubud.

The result of which is that the entire island seems to be riding around in endless circles, never reaching their destination. This is a fitting realisation of the analogy of samsara, the cycle of suffering, from which one only escapes on reaching moksha (enlightenment).

No through route

The narrow alleyways (called gang, presumably after the Dutch influence) are no less prone to jams as the main jalan. I had to flatten myself against the wall of one particularly popular thoroughfare to allow two-way traffic past.

The pavements, where they exist, are crumbling away (presumably through neglect, rather than overuse), with caved in drain covers leaving holes down to the sewer beneath, through which sulfurous smells emanate.

Trapdoor

Of course, polished and pristine corners of the island exist, where tourists can experience flawless hospitality and shiny, ultra-modern conveniences. But staying in a five-star hotel, one might as well be in one of the beautiful, but entirely artificial oases of Dubai.

Where, we wondered, is the old Bali, shaped over centuries and rich in tradition and culture? Has it been entirely swept aside in the name of progress and buried under too-rapid urban expansion? The answer seems to be that it has been masked by these advances, but still exists down the side streets and behind the traffic.

Statues hidden down a side street

Ornate temples exist seemingly every two steps, their ubiquity causing them to blend into the consumerist environment, much as the daily ritual obligations of the Balinese merge with their work activities into an integrated whole.

Ducking into quieter passageways, we were quickly welcomed into traditional houses, themselves indistinguishable from standalone places of worship, as they often feature Hindu statues as part of the 'family temple'.

I found myself lamenting what I saw as a detrimental change to the natural environment of Bali. However, it is naive to expect any society to remain static, especially when subject to such tidal influences as tourism brings, and selfish to impede or to deny it the features of the developed world.

Change will happen naturally. Consumer goods, cars, motorbikes and electronics have and will continue to come to Bali. Foreign visitors may well want the island to preserve its traditional look and customs but the Balinese crave modern conveniences, as the 'traditional' and 'romantic' life is one of hard agricultural labour.

People aren't to blame for inviting progress. The new generations want western clothes, to shop in the mall and to hang out in bars and cafés. But the tourists aren't entirely to blame for wanting to come and see a different culture - provided they are coming in the spirit of discovery and not just drinking every day in a bar in Kuta.

It is important, however, that the Balinese are in control of the rate of change in their country. Although a lot of decision-making is decentralised to the local authorities (the village banjar), which remain autonomous, I imagine the government must take some responsibility for ensuring that the revenue earned through tourism goes towards improving the infrastructure that tourism burdens, or to reduce the burden. Tourist numbers could be limited to preserve the heritage of the island, such as happens in South America for the Inca trail and Galapagos islands. If traffic is destroying the roads and buildings, not to mention the pollution (noise and otherwise), a car-free day is called for, as well as improvements to public transport. Many countries have started campaigns asking people to consider whether their journey is worth making, or whether it could be made on foot or bicycle. I would not like to see Bali repeat the same mistakes that have despoiled other places of natural beauty, but I fear it may already be too late for parts of the island.

"This is nothing," said our host, "you should see Jakarta". I have no desire to see Jakarta.

Having learned of our vegetarianism, our host was keen to introduce us to local foods. He brought us some nasi gudeg from a local warung.

Gudeg, tofu and lontong

The nasi (rice) was actually lontong - a cylindrical cake of compressed rice wrapped and steamed in a banana leaf then sliced into rounds. Accompanying this was telur pindang - an egg hardboiled in soy sauce and teak leaf, giving it a dark brown colour - in a light yellow coconut curry sauce - and a square of tofu, which had also been simmered in a sweet soy sauce mixture. Finally, there was the gudeg - a delicious stew of young jackfruit in coconut milk and spices that renders the green jackfruit (used here as a vegetable) flaky and chewy.