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History
of Bali
Bali in the Global Village
After the New Order
government rose to power in 1965, the Western world again
became entranced with Bali. But these new foreigners who
flocked to Bali’s mythic shores were of a different breed
than the cultivated, culture-crazed crew of the 1920s and
30s. It was the turn of the 1970s, and the hippies had
landed. With their long, flowing hair, their free-spirited
ways, and their feathered and beaded finery stuffed into
backpacks, these counter-cultural types found Bali the
perfect place to enact their ideas of an alternative
lifestyle. Resurrecting the old images of Bali as a center
of peace, harmony, ancient wisdom and the infamous love
magic, they swarmed the beaches of Kuta and began creating
their own society, centered around the worship of sea, sun,
spiritual communion and limitless libido. Those were the
days when Kuta was still a sleepy-eyed village, dotted with
small homestays and simple food stalls, where for only a few
dollars a day one could find all the nourishment needed in
the form of tropical fruit, tofu, magic mushrooms and
hallucinogenic sunsets. As word of Bali’s blissful
beachfront bounty spread, other adventurers followed,
especially surfers drawn to Bali’s coral-strewn coastline,
which soon gained worldwide fame as the wildest place in the
East to catch a wave.
But the Balinese themselves
greeted this new tribe of travellers with mixed feelings.
For many of the kids of Kuta and neighboring Denpasar, the
arrival of the foreign freaks was the most exciting thing to
happen to Bali since Arjuna and his gang sent those Kurawa
boys crying for mercy back in the days of the Mahabarata. At
the time, one of the favorite sports of Bali’s teens was
to hop on a bike and pedal down to Kuta to gawk at the pale
parade of naked flesh stretched out on the sands. And some
of the more adventurous youth even dared to join the party,
growing their hair long, mastering some guitar chords and a
few choice English words, and adopting Jimi Hendrix and the
Rolling Stones as new members of the pantheon of gods. But
for other Balinese, this new riptide of tourism signaled
danger. While the economic potential of playing host to
these hordes hungry for Bali’s temptations could not be
denied, many Balinese felt that this new prosperity might
come at the cost of Bali’s cultural heritage. Concern
about the Westernization of Bali’s youth and the decline
of traditional morality in face of the lures of free sex and
easy money, coupled with an increasing annoyance at those
tourists who disrupted temple ceremonies and cremations with
their flashing cameras and their skimpy clothing, led to the
creation of a new plan for tourist development.
In 1971, the Indonesian
government, with the help of the World Bank, drew up the
first Master Plan for the Development of Tourism in Bali. To
control and organize tourism, which was beginning to rampage
haphazardly across the island, the government proposed
developing Nusa Dua, an arid and infertile expanse of land
on the southern tip of Bali, as a center for luxury tourism.
From this beachfront base, the tourists could be bussed to
the temples and the art shops and the dance performances and
be back in time to drink a cool cocktail and watch the sun
slip down over the edge of the ocean. The Nusa Dua concept,
it was argued, would accomplish several ends. It would keep
tourism at a respectable distance from the everyday life of
the Balinese, enabling culture to remain preserved from any
negative outside influence. It would control the
proliferation of informal industries that had sprung up
around the hippie enclaves of places like Kuta, ensuring
that only licensed guides, drivers, hotels and vendors had
access to the visitors. And, by pricing Bali far out of the
range of the average backpacker, it would help bring both
needed foreign exchange and a type of traveller more in
keeping with the image the authorities wished to project of
Bali as part of a modern, prosperous nation.
But for many tourists, Nusa
Dua was not enough to satisfy their cravings for authentic
Balinese culture. For those who came seeking the ultimate in
rest and relaxation, Nusa Dua’s fabulous five star
facilities were sure to please even the most jaded
jetsetter. But for those who wanted to see and experience
more of Balinese life, the wider world of Bali beckoned. And
the Balinese as well were determined to cut for themselves a
bigger slice of the tourism pie than the controlled
corporate environment of Nusa Dua would allow. To address
these concerns, a group of Balinese came up with their own
agenda: to make Bali into a showcase for cultural tourism.
This new kind of tourism, it was hoped, would let the
Balinese preserve their traditions while still turning a
profit. It would bring Bali into the global era while still
preserving its village feel - a position dubbed by its
developers as “glocalisation.” And, according to most
Balinese, the idea has worked. Fueled by an influx of funds
from the tourist business, today’s Balinese hold rituals
and festivals more elaborate than ever before, and dancers,
painters, musicians and craftsmen have become respected
members of an expanding Balinese middle class. Cultural
tourism has also led to an increasing sense of local
identity and pride, a certainty that “Balineseness” is
something valuable not only within the borders of one tiny
island but on the wider world market. Of course, this is not
to say that there have been no bumps on the road to peaceful
coexistence between the Balinese and their guests. Not all
tourists are interested in culture, and the swinging singles
scene of Kuta still sends shivers down the spines of the
more conservative members of Bali’s traditional
establishment. And with the centers of tourism concentrated
in the south of the island, access to this new wealth
remains unevenly distributed, with many of those living off
the beaten track in East and North Bali still living in
quite tenuous financial circumstances. Under the New Order
government of President Suharto, many Balinese complained
that they were marginalized from the benefits that tourism
brought, for many of the hotels and tourist businesses were
owned by a select circle of Suharto’s family and friends.
And the Balinese are still working to find a balance between
culture and tourism that is sustainable and acceptable to
all segments of society. Complaints still arise over cases
deemed to be “cultural harassment,” when tourism
transgresses the boundaries of traditional values. A project
to build a temple near the sacred temple of Tanah Lot was
vehemently opposed by both conservative Hindus and local
non-governmental organizations. A hotel advertisement that
featured a golf ball perched atop a canang offering
to the gods led to a protracted debate over the need to
protect religious values from commercial desecration. The
use of sacred Barong and Rangda figures as decorations for a
disco and karaoke bar provoked the same kind of outcry,
while the well-publicized plans of Mick Jagger and Jerry
Hall, both non-Hindus, to marry on Bali in a Hindu ceremony
had Balinese debating the extent to which holy traditions
could be shared with non-Balinese. And many Balinese have
become suspicious of the outsiders who have come to the
island seeking a share of the wealth that these Balinese
feel properly belongs to them. Some have taken these kinds
of tensions as signs of cultural disintegration, as signals
that Bali is becoming “destroyed,” “lost” or torn
apart. But one could also cast these conflicts in a
different light: as crucial conversations about the meaning
of traditional culture in the modern world. By discussing
their heritage in the pages of the mass media and in local
cultural organizations, Balinese have become vitally aware
of the importance that their history plays in determining
their future. By discussing and debating their culture, the
Balinese are making essential preparations for entering the
next millennium and facing the challenges it is sure to
bring.
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