Brave New Eco
People keep asking me what my plan is.
On the positive side, I take this as a nudge that I should have one. I do. On the negative side, the question drags glaring vulnerabilities into light. Lack of income. Logical progression, lack of home, health and finally life — a landslide down the pyramid of human needs. Self-realistion crumbles in a cloud of survival dust.
Maybe Bali accelerates these processes. The island is a trinity of volcanoes. Under the ground, liquid rock swirls about, dragging Google Maps and energy bodies this way and that.
Many seem immune to these shifts. The frantic construction and busi-ness goes on. Only the rain can put a dent in those plans. It did for two weeks. Roads became rivers. Villages were flooded. Riverbanks remain wrapped in wreaths of old plastic. Then the sun came out, and the relentless racket of scooters, cars and building sites started up again.
But come on, this is Bali, isle of the gods, Shangri La! Of course, there is plenty to be grateful for. The sun (now), the low cost of living (for now), the absence of Suella Braverman or Keir Starmer. There are no speed cameras or petty regulations. Need to get around? Put the cash down to hire a scooter and drive it away same day. No insurance. No license check. No “No.” That’s why everyone’s here. It’s a Yes place.
It’s also Yes to tearing up protected zones and building concrete box villas as fast as humanly possible. It’s Yes to Honda, Toyota and Yamaha who flood the island with mediochre two and four-wheeled vehicles. It’s Yes to restaurants and 6 star hotels. It’s Yes to the G8. It’s Yes to latter day capitalism. It’s Yes to the gods but also Yes to the demons.
God knows (maybe the demons do) what the top-tier mangkus (Balinese priests) make of it all. To hazard a guess, some are worried while others are in on it. Spirituality is big business here. Every new construction has to have a shrine, activated by an expensive ceremony. But is there a longer look into the future? Is there plan? Or are the moving parts moving too fast? Is it all quids in and out again and head for the hills?
I’m not sure where I fit in. I have been offered land several times. Renting a plot for 25 years, building a villa and banging it out on Air B’n’B is the standard expat route to skin in the game. I would probably do it if it had the money.
I used to own a flat in London. I sold it in 2004 and used the money to travel South America and Asia for five years, scramble through a few intiations, and write a book that nearly got published. I was in Bali back then. I was mostly alone. Afterwards, things took a turn for the better. I was done with paddling solo.
And yet here I am again in Bali. If I’m not entirely alone, it is just me paddling the canoe. Everyone else is busy paddling theirs.
What does it take for us to paddle together? Here in Bali there are two answers. One is family, in the old-fashioned, genetic sense. Kids are expensive, which requires doing business. Like everything else in Bali , business is frantic.
The other route is proper money. “Ecovillages” are springing up all over Indonesia. Yesterday I spoke to a sales rep for the Mandala Ecovillage in Lombok. By western standards, it’s cheap. A 1-bed goes for $175K, a 3-bed for about twice that. A year on year ROI projection is available on request. I should move fast. The community is already forming, only 9 of the 100 units remaining.
With my Natural Wisdom hat on, I asked how the community was formed, what principles it would adhere to, and how it would be governed or steered or sustained. I was referred to MJB Hoteliers, the company managing the ecovillage. They also manage the Kempinski Hotel in Nusa Dua. The rep glowed with pride on that one.
A quick look at the Kempinski and Mandala websites reveals professional branding and design…and a similar ethos. The two projects come from the same place. The company behind Mandala are planning a “6-star” hotel behind the ecovillage.
Both websites splice white people enjoying the facilities with scenes from traditional Balinese culture. This is standard fare for Bali tourism. Being neither white nor Balinese, I wonder where I fit in. The new Chinese, Indian and Arab elites probably don’t wonder where they fit in —forget the ethnicity of the model, the setting is eminently familiar. The Kempinski is currently booking at about £300 per night. Posh for Bali but not the most expensive. Maybe I’d give it a shot if I had the money.
Or maybe I wouldn’t. I have, on rare occasions, been gifted a stay at a luxury hotel. I have great memories of mopping a puddle of potently aromatic plant medicine off the floor at the Marriott Cusco, after the plastic bottle exploded. People ate dinner a few feet away, remarkably uninterested in the flurry of activity. Perhaps my friend, an Andean shaman, or the potent aromas had put them in a trance.
Or perhaps what I saw — and on that occasion benefited from — was the Trance of Poshness. There is, if nothing else, a code of dignity in posh establishments. It mandates minding your own business, best acheived by pretending there is nobody else there.
I find this unnatural. Maybe it’s self-importance, race or class insecurity. Regulars of posh hotels can smell your bank balance from yards away. Sour grapes? A chip on my shoulder? Maybe. But it’s less about having less wonga than a problem with the trance of money and privilege. There is little eye contact or curiosity. There is little humanity.
The Nuanu project in Tabanan recently hosted the Suara Festival, which was well produced and generally well received. The homepage declares Nuanu (the name refers to a traditional temple portal) to be “a home for leaders, creators and makers.” Sprawling across 44 hectares, it boasts 9 “re-creation” areas including an education centre offering “brave new models of learning” to foster “a human-centric and sustainable technological future”, “a “neo-food court”, biomimicry architecture, agri-tech showcases, a self-discovery park and a health and wellness complex. The “Soul” pavillion sports four floors of event venues, shops, cafes and rooftop bars. A charitable arm raises funds by website donations to support local children’s education. The artistic side is fronted by Studio Roosegaarde, a Dutch project headed by Dan Roosegaarde, an artist deploying light installations to “make the world glow.”
I have yet to visit Nuanu, Manadala or the Kempinski Hotel. Their websites leave a similar impression. While each project mentions connections with locals and make efforts to consume resources and dispose of waste sustainably if not regeneratively — they come across as elitist.
Whom will these kinds of project serve? The staff might be local but residents and visitors are likely to come from global elites — those who can afford multinational ‘nomadic’ lifestyles or, in the near future, simply international travel. Are we to hope that something will trickle down to the rest of us?
I don’t want to be a naysayer but if Bali is Yes Island, what is it saying yes to here? In Nuanu’s words, it’s a brave new world. If it can sort out Bali’s plastic waste problems, Yes to that.
Do please clap/subscribe/comment here! Your support is much appreciated. The plan is to focus writing on Medium to shorter pieces and migrate longer articles and essays to my new Substack (free for now!) There, I will be serialising my novel L I G H T, which will be available on Amazon later this year. Meanwhile you can catch glimpses at my website or by following NIZAMIXIII on Facebook or Instagram.
