Our Home in Bali

Living on Bali one is no stranger to odd situations, but I recently had the singularly surreal experience of trying to eat warung food while not knowing which fork to use. I had been invited by the Tugu Hotel in Canggu to sample their gourmet Javanese cuisine in their newly-opened “Warung Tugu.” In the noted boutique hotel’s obsessive quest for authenticity, they constructed the “warung” as an open-sided pavilion with wooden tables and bench seating. Unfortunately, “traditional atmosphere” included a near-dousing by a sudden rainstorm just after being seated. Though, in a regular warung, the owner would deploy garishly painted canvas flaps made from recycled movie posters or display ads, the hotel management decided this would be a little too authentic for guests paying hundreds of dollars a night.

We moved to another pavilion, which is generally used for reenactments of the rijstafel banquets of the Dutch era. I stared at my plate, piled high with helpings of pepes udang, botok tahu tempe, and urap-urap taoge, then at the formidable array of forks, spoons, and other utensils of obscure function arranged on either side. In the end, I gave up and dug in with my fingers. After a barely perceptible signal from our host, a waiter placed an ornate silver finger bowl beside me.
While the boutique hotels may overdo things in their quest to make visiting orthodontists and software millionaires feel like colonial administrators or ancient kings, the best, like the Tugu, must be praised for successfully attending to detail while creating a relaxing, homelike atmosphere. In this regard, a high-end bungalow or villa property is — or should be — no different from a mid-range hotel or backpacker homestay.
Much-maligned Kuta actually pioneered the hotel-as-home concept in Bali. During the late colonial era, when Bali was experiencing the first wave of mass tourism engendered popular books and films extolling the incomparable attractions of the “Paradise Isle,” several enterprising foreigners built “Balinese-style” thatch-and-bamboo bungalows on Kuta, then an obscure fishing village. In “Our Hotel in Bali,” Louise Koke relates of how her and her husband Robert’s establishment attracted guests fleeing the stuffy confines of the Dutch-run hotels in Denpasar.
By the time adventurous Australian surfers and road-weary European hippies flocked to Kuta in the 1970s, the bungalow hotels had long vanished. Kuta residents accommodated their new guests by offering spare rooms and later constructing blocks of additional rooms in the family compound. The home-like atmosphere followed automatically, driven by the almost-overwhelming Balinese sense of hospitality.
While the original homestays, now transformed into fully functional small hotels, have largely succeeded in retaining at least a vestige of the former “home-style” ambience, most newer properties are impersonal mass-market establishments. The only exceptions are top-end resorts like the Tugu, who have the resources to attract, select, and train staff possessing a sophisticated understanding of the art of hospitality.
Even then, creating a home-like atmosphere can be an elusive goal. One frequent criticism of boutique hotels is that their exclusivity — a polite expressive for prohibitive room rates — promotes a snobbish attitude in guests and staff alike. The “home-like” atmosphere of such hotels more resembles a royal palace than a cozy bungalow.
Creating a home-like atmosphere is not a product of training as much as promoting an appropriate attitude among staff at all levels. Just as a company will establish a distinctive “corporate culture” which encourages relentless hard work and perfectionism, a hotel of any size can develop a “corporate culture” which rewards genuine warmth and hospitality while insisting on appropriate levels of professional service and attention to detail. The goal for every hotel should be for guests to tell their friends about “Our Home in Bali.” .(Jeremy Allan, author of Jakarta Jive (2002))

Successful “Bali for the World” Concerts

Denpasar – Several concerts held by organizers of the Bali tourism recovery, “Bali for the World” have been successful in attracting domestic tourists to Bali. To celebrate the coming of the new year “Bali for the World” held two large concerts.
The first concert was ‘East West Collaboration in Peace’ held in the Garuda Wishnu Kencana (GWK) Theme Park in Jimbaran on Monday (30/12). This concert featured ‘western’ entertainers such as Phil Perry, Dave Koz, Jeff Lorber and Brenda Russe, along with top Indonesian performers like Ruth Sahanaya accompanied by traditional Balinese dance and music. This event was attended by thousands of spectators and seen by millions of others via a live broadcast on television.
The second concert ‘People’s Party’ was held on Kuta Beach on the 31st of December and was attended by the President Megawati Sukarnoputri and Vice-President Hamzah Haz and their partners. The peak of the concert, which featured top Indonesian performers like Ebeit G. Ade, Gigi, Doel Sumbang and others, was the striking of the ‘World Peace Gong’ by President Megawati to welcome in the new year. In her speech, President Megawati encouraged the public to declare anti-violence and create peace.
Both of these concerts and other events held beforehand organized by the recovery of Bali tourism group ‘Bali for the World’ have been successful in encouraging domestic tourists to celebrate the new year in Bali. Hotels in the Nusa Dua, Sanur and Kuta areas received many domestic tourists over the New Year period.
‘Bali for the World’ has planned various artistic and sporting events for the year 2003, with the aim of showing the world that Bali is safe and is the ideal place for a holiday. From the beginning ‘Bali for the World’ has suffered much criticism from the Balinese community because the events it organizes are seen to be done by and for Jakarta community.
Later on, after the events that they organized were successful in attracting tourists, if only domestic tourists, a positive response has begun to emerge. If later, foreign tourists also begin to come back and are not scared to holiday in Bali, it will largely due to the role and efforts of ‘Bali for the World’ that is headed in Bali by I Gde Wiratha, Chairman of Bali’s Hotel and Restaurant Association.(dap)