i’m not wanting a return to the past – i want to grow with bali.

wayan

i hope your prognosis is right, tho i have my fears. fine speeches, promises of rosy futures….how many times have we heard it before?

do a simple mathematic – look at the % increase in hotel beds from 1992 – 2002 (chosen to avoid the effects of the 1st bombing). compare this with the % increase in tourist numbers – the bed numbers were impossible to sustain.

you know what’s crazy? after 2 bombings the rate of development hasn’t changed.

my point re rice/land conversion is this – bali used to feed itself and earn income from sales to other parts of ri. drops in tourist numbers don’t affect yield per are. that other parts of ri import rice is immaterial.

we’ve got a slogan, we’ve got plan…..

from where i sit it’s what we think is the problem and the solution without any reference or research to the real underlying problems.

give it a funky slogan and a nebulous completion date……the old political ‘be seen to be doing something’

finally, no i don’t want to visit 10,000 uninhabited islands. i want to visit and tell people of bali saya where
my local friends can at the live productive, fulfilling and sustsainable lifestyles.

we know the major problems and some of the solutions. remember the famous artist – GOYA – get off your arse. stop talking about it, do it.

wayan

You do make some pertinent points.

The Bali Times has been talking about regulations on buildings in Bali as part of the Bali #1 Destination 2011 drive. There’s also a new organization launching next year in conjunction with the government desire to curb sewage pollution over at http://www.KeepBaliGreen.org

I’m not sure that self-sufficiency of rice is a localized issue. I’ve been reading plenty of press lately about how the government is forced to import rice from abroad throughout the country (http://www.oryza.com/topic22.html), but point taken, though I wouldn’t call it blindness as much as short-sightedness.
In general, there is a natural aversion to change and modernization in once rural areas, esp when it happens as fast as it does in Bali, and without regulation. But I think Bali will always be special, but just not the same ‘special’ as it was before. It will be a modern, organized, and hopefully cleaner ‘special’.

Otherwise, there’s still 10,000 unihabited islands to choose from for that real raw experience.

how about some civic pride – clean the place up!! remember a couple of years ago there was the regency competition for ‘tidy towns’. the grounds of the Novotel might be great, but if jln. pratama looks like a rubbish heap…………

extend the voa to 60 days. i used to come over twice a year for 6 weeks a time. now it’s 4 weeks.

maybe a 2 tier voa – us$30 for 30 days, $50 for 60 days?

a development freeze on hotels, villas, apartments..you’re creating a boom/bust real estate mentality. bali wasn’t, and isn’t about the lifestyles of the rich and fatuous.

i live in sydney. the greatest contributor to our tourist economy are backpackers. i’m sure if study was done of bali it would be similar – backpackers and entry level package holidays. this has an important corollary – the pondoks/homestays/hotels tend to be locally owned. the profits are not being repatriated off shore.

there is a blindness in the tourism pursuit. not so long ago bali was a self sufficient food producer. now you import rice/food. this has been brought about by development of agricultural land, and village youth leaving farming.

i could mention the weaving, clothing industries that used to exist…………

these things helped make bali special.

you’re heading down the track of my favorite tourism joke..

a man is sitting at the bar of the nusa dua hilton. he’s overhearing 2 blokes bragging about the countries they’ve visited. after a while he reaises they’re listing the hiltons they’ve stayed in, not the countries they’ve visited.

But with two levels of airstrip – one on top of the other (about 20m high) – I just worry about training some new pilots to be able to fly into the bottom airstrip, I’d imagine it would be tricky at first. Or what if two plans are taking off at the same time from the top & bottom airstrip? …things to think about.