Chinese entrepreneur An Yanshi is convinced he has found the key ingredient to produce the world’s most expensive tea – panda poo. The former calligraphy teacher has purchased 11 tonnes of excrement from a panda breeding centre to fertilise a tea crop in the mountains of Sichuan province in southwestern China, home to the black [...]

When 30 Afghan prison guards took a break from warden duties to try yoga, they lunged sideways in unison to meditate on pursuing a more peaceful existence in Afghanistan. The unusual scene was orchestrated by French yoga enthusiast Amandine Roche, on a personal quest to promote the idea that for fighting to end and battle [...]

People right across Asia are becoming deathly obsessed with internet-based gadgets, writes Philip Lim A baby girl starves to death as her parents raise a virtual child online; a boy scolded for excessive gaming kills his mother then commits suicide – technology addiction is taking a toll in Asia. With more 100 million “smartphones” now [...]

A simple flower is improving the lives of Bali’s poorest, writes Karin Vogt Just three years ago, it was one man’s vision to bring the extremely dry, desert-like mountain slopes of Muntigunung in northeast Bali to life by growing wild hibiscus. The idea was to provide the very poor local farmers in the area with [...]

Being a Hindu yogi once meant renouncing worldly pleasures for a life of solitary meditation and wandering the jungle in search of union with god, but today’s new-age yogis wander the globe from one retreat to another, stay in luxury hotels and preach to the converted masses through a headset microphone, writes Angela Dewan At [...]

  The country’s self-proclaimed “King of Luwak” is having a hard time keeping up with demand around the world for the beans excreted by his stable of pampered civet cats, writes Alvin Soedarjo Demand for coffee brewed with beans plucked from the dung of the furry, weasel-like creatures – known locally as luwaks – is [...]

Providence smiled on Balinese seer Ketut Liyer the day American tourist Elizabeth Gilbert came to visit – her memoir, Eat, Pray, Love, would make him richer than he ever dreamed, writes Sandra Lacut The fortune teller said to be aged in his 90s – no one knows exactly – was a poor man when he [...]

The ambitious property established by a Bali expatriate who was soon after claimed by brain cancer has overcome near bankruptcy to emerge as a solid business, as one of its directors tells The Bali Times It is not yet five years old — still an infant in the world of long-established businesses — but two [...]

  Javanese villagers who survived the violent eruptions of Mt Merapi last year are tapping into the macabre market for disaster tourism to help rebuild their shattered lives, reports Alvin Soedarjo Suwarni lost her house and father-in-law when Mt Merapi in Central Java burst into life in October and November, killing more than 350 people [...]

Around 7,000 Indonesians currently live in the French territory of New Caledonia in the southwest Pacific as a result of a relatively little-known chapter in the history of Indonesia, writes University of Tasmania Indonesian culture and language lecturer Pam Allen Aged 65 and still working as an engineer in Noumea, the capital of New Caledonia, [...]

     The spirit of Bali is celebrated in a new exhibition of evocative photographs soon to go on show at Ganesha Gallery, at the Four Seasons Jimbaran. Internationally acclaimed photojournalist John Stanmeyer is showing a collection of black and white photographs in the exhibition, which opens on December 9. Stanmeyer’s work has appeared in [...]

The Bali Times looks at frantic efforts to care for animals affected by Mt Merapi’s deadly activity Three animal-welfare groups are scrambling to protect the lives of wildlife and domestic animals living on the slopes of erupting Mt Merapi just outside Yogyakarta in Central Java. Lava and super-hot pyroclastic flows of gas and ash have [...]