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This may sound condescending, but when I arrived in Bali, I was amazed by the stylishness of the young people. Coming from New York via the UK I never expected Bali to be such a trendy place.

I’m not sure exactly what I did expect, but it sure wasn’t 1970s New York punk.

I was amazed by the amount of guys sporting shaggy rocker haircuts, black jeans and tattoos. The island had even been touched by the worldwide phenomenon of the faux-hawk (almost Mohawk, but less daring).

On the Kuta surface it may look like everyone is decked out in head-to-toe surf gear, listening to Bob Marley 24 hours a day, but delve a little further into the real Bali and you’ll be surprised to find a bubbling underground music scene and a whole lot of youngins trying to express their identity just like everywhere else in the world.

When I met my husband, Ongky, I had been warned about the various facial piercings he had, but I had no idea he would have the grand selection he does. He is ahead of his time by Bali standards when it comes to extra bodily holes.

He’s always saying he doesn’t like to be just another part of the crowd and for sure he isn’t – one of the many reasons I married him.

Silakarang, the village where I live, seems to be especially under the influence of the rock n’ roll bug. The drummer of just-about-as-famous-as-they-come-from-Bali band Superman Is Dead is from here and has been known to make appearances with the band at charity nights.

These nights usually held in the volleyball court, have been some of the most crazy punk/underground/rock nights I’ve witnessed anywhere in the world.

The last time a big gig was held over a 1,000 people came in their darkest, sharpest, most shredded and chained outfits. There were kids from six or seven years old with Mohawks and studded belts eating sate and nasi at the warungs.

I’d never seen anything like it in my life.

Once upon a time I’d be down there in the mosh pit with them, but the girls seem to hang back; that, and I was about five months pregnant at the time.

One thing that troubles me about the current styles (skinny jeans, lumberjack flannel shirts and Palestinian-style scarves) is that it’s just too damn hot here for all that. I know in the UK – well, in the north at least – the lassies like to show off their outfits, forfeiting coats and scarves in the most icy of weather; but here it’s just far too sweaty.

Are young men not worried about overdressing and therefore smelling not so fresh, ruining any chance of impressing the ladies with their styling?

Although this article is mostly aimed towards man-style, I’ve noticed in the past few years girls’ trends have been changing, too. Shorts are definitely getting shorter, and sleeveless shirts are no longer a village no- no.

Haircuts are also getting shorter and there are more women straightening and dying their naturally gorgeous locks. I’ve even started to notice a few more tattoos about, although mostly secret ones easily hidden from disapproving family members.

I’m sure this evolution has been going on much longer than I’ve been here, and I know things like tattoo and piercing was born in this part of the world, but I’m sure Western influences are helping the kids to break out of their traditional roles.

However, style here seems to be just that. It is not a lifestyle change, purely an aesthetic choice.

One thing I don’t see, nor do I ever expect to, is young people shirking their community and religious responsibilities, something that so often goes hand in hand with rebellious style.

That’s the real reason Bali officially rocks.

After a crazy week leading up to a doubly mad weekend, I’m more worn out than I have been since my days of Thursday to Monday university benders.

Obviously there was very little debauchery involved in last weekend’s party binge (I wouldn’t be writing about it in the newspaper if there had been), but it was excellent in a responsible-adult kind of way.

The weekend kicked off with a high school Valentine’s dance, which had been organized by the students at the school where I teach.

It was held in the school hall, which was hot, sweaty and swimming in high school hormones, but it really was fun and a great, new experience for the kids.

High school dances in the US and discos in the UK are, in hindsight, incredibly lame, but now I realize how very privileged we were to have social events run by the school.

The students here rarely get a chance to dress up, let loose a little and see their friends and teachers in a non-classroom environment.

It was also a very freestyle event, unlike most here in Bali, which are scheduled to fill each seemingly endless minute. There was no sitting listening to painfully long-winded, pointless speeches, and certainly no tables set up with painfully sweet tea and rubbery cakes that no one has any intention of touching.

So after the triumph of Friday night, we moved straight on to preparation for my daughter Lola’s second birthday bash on Saturday afternoon.

With a seriously daunting amount of children invited (invite one cousin and the other 10 have to come too), I was what some might term “demented” from the moment I woke up.

Luckily, my most amazing sister-in-law in the whole world, Kadek, offered to make food for all the kids, and I made Western snacks to feed all my friends.

With Rp200,000 (US$21.40), Kadek managed to make 50 fabulously tasty boxed meals and still have leftovers to feed the family on Sunday as well.

I wonder sometimes where I’m going wrong. Dijon, Bali Deli and The Pantry, I suspect.

With a garden full of kids half an hour before the party was due to start, everything seemed to be far too easy. They were playing nicely, no one was crying and there had been no blood spilled.

To my amazement it stayed that way for two hours. They ate; they played; and when they started to lag, we presented the atomic pink and green cake, complete with dolls, plastic playhouse and random bits of pink plastic decoration and Styrofoam glued with something most likely toxic.

The kids squished in, sang Happy Birthday followed by Panging Umurnya and waited in an orderly fashion for their slice.

It all seemed far too civilized, but still, as the kids began to drift off with their sugar-filled gift bags, all was unsettlingly calm.

My husband Ongky’s drinking buddies moved in to devour the rest of the cake and all the leftover punch and beer, and ash their cigarettes in every available receptacle.

It’s always a pleasure to clear up after that in the morning.

Although I wished we could have called it quits and spent the whole of Sunday laying around in our pyjamas, a friend decided, very much spur of the moment, to get married on Valentines Day.

I love her dearly and wouldn’t have missed her big day for anything. So with much more effort than it took on Friday night, I made myself presentable and headed down to Legian.

Pretty much all my friends had been having the same weekend, or a version of it, and there were a lot of very hot and tired-looking people to look hot and tired with.

However, it was a lovely party and a very special day (Congratulations, Amy and Puput!).

Back at home on a quiet Sunday evening, I can look back over a very special but very un-Balinese weekend.

My in-laws are awestruck with the amount of partying that we’ve done, and are happy to have their Lola back at home, safe in the compound.

I wish I could have another day off before work again in the morning, but alas, relaxation will have to be put on hold for another week.

I had one quite magical evening last week, an evening when I really felt like I had stepped out of my everyday life and into a rare and fantastic occasion.

I have my neighbours to thank for such a special evening as they had hired a dalung, or shadow puppet-master, to entertain guests and as part of a special ceremony for one of the brothers who had been away for many years.

I’d seen wayang kulit performed briefly before, but never so up-close and personal as it was the other night.

Actually, I was a bit afraid of having it so close as I’d had some pretty crazy dreams in the past thanks to wayang kulit plays. I don’t know if you’ve ever fallen asleep to the rising and falling voice of a shadow puppeteer, but it doesn’t generally set you up for a restful night’s kip.

Watching the wayang kulit in our neighbour’s compound felt cosy, intimate and like we were part of a ritual, which only a relatively small number of people in this world will ever get to experience.

We were also allowed to walk behind the screen and watch the dalung and his assistants at work. I sat with my daughter Lola, both of us captivated by the man sitting in the flickering light, telling a story he’s told thousands of times before.

The atmosphere felt a bit like special nights back in the Isle of Man (where my parents live) like bonfire night, when people wrap up warm and gather for bonfires and fireworks.

Kids get to stay up late and eat sweets they wouldn’t usually be allowed and there is a warm and fuzzy community feeling.

Obviously one of the lovely thing about nights out in Bali is there is no having to wrap-up warm, although saying that, the longer I’m here, the more layers I seem to need at night.

If you haven’t guessed, I’m a night owl (or used to be before I had my daughter), so occasions when I can be out at night taking in the sounds and smells feel special to me.

Before I came to Bali I was a lover of all the noises, smells and happenings of the city at night, and now, even though I’ve left all those special city feelings far behind, I love Bali just as much for all its night charms.

Bali is a quiet place at night and people don’t generally stay up very late – would you if you were getting up at 4am to start the day’s chores?

Daytime is social time and visiting and hanging out with neighbours is usually done in the morning and then again in the late afternoon, and early evening after sleeping during the hottest hours of the day.

The Balinese find nighttime a threatening time, when people are most vulnerable to malevolent spirits as well as tricky spirits who like to pull pranks and confuse people.

I’ve occasionally been told off by my in-laws for being outside the compound around dusk, when I’m told spirits are at their most giddy.

Night ceremonies, dances and plays are some of the few occasions when villagers of every age stay out late.

At my house, just set back from the rest of the family compound, we don’t hear any voices at night, only the sound of the river and nocturnal animals.

It’s a world away from New York traffic and all night revellers in the streets. But wherever I live I like to have some sort of nighttime noise to keep me company.

In the Isle of Man I couldn’t be happier that all the windows are double glazed, but it takes some time to get used to the complete lack of outside noise.

I like to be lulled to sleep by the warbling voices from temples and stories being read out in a language I don’t understand.

The sounds from the shadow play didn’t go on very late into the night, but the chance to watch so closely, breathe in the calm atmosphere and see the kind and gentle face behind the characters’ voices made for a perfectly sound night’s sleep.

While lounging in a fantastically comfy bean bag on the beach in Sanur a few nights ago I decided I really must spend more time at the beach.

Sipping my beer, chatting with friends and watching our kids play in the sand, I felt calm, cool from the sea breeze and extremely happy.

Sanur in the late afternoon is much more a local time than for the tourists. The sunbathers have gone home for showers and naps to prepare themselves for dinner and the Balinese families head down to the water to splash and play and cool off after the heat of the day.

The soft sound of the waves rolling in was so soothing I asked my husband, Ongky, if he didn’t think we should move out of the jungle and closer to the beach.

To many tourists, surfers and Bali beach boys (and girls) the beach is the centre of the world, but for me and a lot of my friends, it has become a place pretty low on the list of places to spend days off.

Living here I generally avoid tourist areas like the plague. As much as I enjoy the beach and swimming in the sea, the pain of being constantly pestered by sellers, drivers and men looking for a Western lady-friend far outweighs the pleasure.

It’s rare to find fantastic places that haven’t been trashed by overdevelopment now; so disappointment is also a factor.

The last time I went to Dreamland Beach I vowed never to go back, even though it was one of my favourite places in Bali at one time. The busloads of tourists, hawkers and the brazen pushing of the “New Kuta” development made me sick to my stomach.

The risk of skin damage and even cancer is also a major concern that keeps me away from the beach. Living here I must be exposed to far more dangerous rays than I would be in the UK just being out doing chores and errands. So I rarely feel the need for a skin-frying trip to the beach.

A glowing tan from small daily doses of sun is one thing; ending up looking like a handbag after years of sunning oneself is another.

It’s not just the beach that I’ve neglected to visit lately. Every time I go somewhere wonderful like Bedugul, Kintamani or Tampak Siring I am reminded of all the places available to me.

I know how lucky I am to live in Bali, but it sometimes slips to the back of my mind and is overshadowed by my daily routine of work and motherhood.

My Balinese family seem to savour the times they can go out and be tourists for a day. They take a trip during their Galungan holidays and on other holy days. A couple of times a year they drive up to the mountains, or more often take the kids to the beach for a swim.

Kuta is a once- or twice-a-year affair (as it should be), but the rarity of the trip makes it especially exciting for the kids.

I suppose it’s all about choosing the right times to go places. Sanur on a Saturday evening: Yes. Kuta on a Sunday afternoon: No. With some local smarts, avoiding the hottest and busiest times of the day isn’t too hard.

Perhaps it doesn’t matter that I don’t take advantage of everything the island has to offer; maybe it’s the little daily things that make me feel so appreciative of Bali.

Many mornings when I’m driving to work, the sun is just beginning to heat up and the light colours everything a gorgeous shade of pinky-orange.

Sometimes the sun is a blazing orange ball in the sky and the ricefields are the greenest green possible. In those moments I have the feeling I’m the luckiest person in the whole world.

Still, I guess it might be time to reconnect with why I’m really here and become a bit more adventurous with the places I go in my free time – before it’s all concreted over and built into luxurious white boxes.

By Hannah Black

A couple of days ago I was talking to a friend about the KungFu yoga class (yes, you read that correctly) I’d just joined, and I realised I was talking about how strong the energy in the room was. “Hold on a minute,” my brain screamed at me. “Brakes on, rewind, forget I just said that,” I pleaded to my friend.

I’d joined the class hoping for some chopping and kicking action, but found it was mostly about meditation and using “energy” to build strength. I was a bit disappointed (I’m a bit of a 70s Kung Fu film fan); but I also found the class refreshing.

After almost five years of living in or close to Ubud and fighting the dreaded hippy-dippy vibes, I’ve realised somehow it’s been creeping up on me all along.

Perhaps chuckling at the fishermen-panted, dreadlocked “yoga tourists” in Ubud’s cafés has been my subconscious way of hiding the hippy bubbling under my much-too-cool-for-all-that surface.

I’ll fully admit my life has changed a lot over the past few years, but never did I suspect I might be becoming a New-Ager!

I’ll lay out the scary evidence I have to support my theory that I am indeed morphing into a bead wearer: a) I gave up dairy, wheat and gluten; b) I go to yoga twice and sometimes three times a week; c) I have more than a few books on natural remedies, birth and child rearing; and d) my current favourite lunch spot in Ubud is Kafe.

The most damning evidence is obviously speaking in public about “energy,” but other factors have clearly been building over some time.

Being in Bali, and especially where I live, looking out over the jungle and a river, it’s tough not to catch a bit of getting-in-touch-with-nature fever, but I never thought I would be infected with the getting-in-touch-with-yourself strain.

It’s very easy to be spiritual and start to believe in things I didn’t even have time to think about before because my whole family here is so dedicated to their religion.

Although I’m still not sure exactly what I believe in, I consider the possibilities much more often now.

It’s also hard to ignore how people glow here. Balinese people have a natural draw; perhaps it’s their smiles, or their beautiful skin and twinkling eyes.

Is it partly because their absolute belief in their God and the path He has chosen for them? I believe it might be. I don’t know what it is exactly, but like many people who come to Bali, I can’t help but want some of what they have naturally.

Of course, religion and spirituality are not always one and the same, but they can easily go hand in hand, especially here in Bali.

If it takes a healthy diet, yoga and natural remedies so be it, but my big question is why foreigners in Bali feel the need to talk about their spirituality constantly, when the most spiritual of people don’t.

Can you imagine a group of sadhus sitting around drinking chai and talking about how their chakras felt after a meditation? They’re quite obviously way past talking about it.

Perhaps I’m not too far-gone to reverse the effects of hippydom. I still fully believe in regular hair removal; I don’t even pretend to like spirulina; and I still buy readymade soap. I’ll also be keeping my yoga class analysis in check from now on.

I want to be able to feel good and positive about my lifestyle, but not have to pick it apart piece by piece.

I want to make a point that I know tons and tons of great people who live or have passed through Ubud, many of whom are what my friends and I might call New-Agers. It’s just that there seem to be so many people that have inexhaustible amounts of energy and time to hang around talking about themselves.

Well, now I’ve totally over analysed the situation, I think I’ll eat some granola and do some power yoga.