Get Slightly Famous

What I love most about Bali is how its inhabitants ensure that the spirits protect us all. Every morning, Balinese women place sweet-smelling offerings at doorways to greet the friendly spirits. The offerings are prepared with sprinkles of rice, burning incense, flower petals, and jasmine. Even nasty demons are treated to concoctions of blossoms and delicious things to eat. Elaborate shrines and temples adorn all villages, including those no larger than a crossroads. Sacred shrines watch over passersby above dangerous curves on the roads and at busy intersections. In the countryside, stone-carved deities hide in the bushes to ward off evil demons.

Bali occupies a unique place in the global consciousness. Even for those who've never visited the Indonesian island of three million people, Bali evokes images of sun and surf, lush rice paddies, friendly natives and a culture steeped in a distinctly Indonesian-Hindu civilization.

More than half a million visitors arrive on this tiny island each year to experience its tropical paradise. But all this changed last October when Indonesia's premier tourist destination was rocked by a terrorist bombing that killed 202 people, mostly foreign party-goers, in the crowded tourist strip of Kuta.

The terrorist attack dealt a major blow to a tourist industry still struggling from a slowdown following the September 11 attacks, a slow world economy and the recent outbreak of SARS. Many predict that the Balinese economy, hugely dependent on tourist dollars, will never fully recover.

Although Westerners started visiting Bali as early as the 1930s, the tourism boom that drives much of the Balinese economy took off in the 1980s. Tourism is now the largest source of income for Bali and provides a livelihood for 70% of its population.

It's not uncommon for entire families to work in the tourism sector. A father may act as a local tour guide and a son as a driver. The mother might work as a maid at a local hotel while her daughter gives massages at a local spa.

When the tourism industry suffers, so do the majority of Bali's people. I came to appreciate this after visiting Bali in November 2001 in the wake of the September 11 attacks. Hotels, restaurants and businesses stood nearly empty. Street peddlers outnumbered tourists and hounded the few visitors mercilessly.

As the once-agrarian economy shifted to a tourism-based economy, most Balinese enjoyed only a modest improvement in income. They receive subsistence level wages. The gap between rich and poor has widened significantly over the past decade, as a rapid rise in land costs now means that more and more Balinese can no longer afford to buy land or homes. Moreover, the low season always brings a dramatic drop in earnings, contributing to what has become an economic rollercoaster for the majority of Bali's citizens.

Many attribute higher school dropout rates to the fall in income and the fact that primary and secondary education is paid for by parents. Bali's younger generation is finding it increasingly difficult to expect the standard of living enjoyed by previous generations.

Some officials estimate that as much as 80% of all tourist receipts end up outside Bali. This revenue leakage offsets claims that tourism lifts all boats by putting dollars into the pockets of ordinary Balinese citizens and calls into question just how effective tourism has been for the Balinese economy.

Today, Bali tourism has still not returned to normal. In a study issued by the United Nations Development Program, The World Bank and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), 1500 Bali residents reported significant falls in employment, sales and income since the Bali bombing last October.

"We can't reach the same level as it was two or three years ago," said statistics bureau official Rusman Heriawan, who notes that in 2002, close to one and a half million tourists came to Bali. But in the first half of 2003, lass than half a million tourists arrived, down 39.77 percent from the same period last year, according to Indonesia's bureau of statistics.

Bali needs new ways to survive. Unfortunately, much of the broader discussion about ways to revive the economy revolves around yet more initiatives to bring back tourists. It took Bali only two decades to build its economy around tourism, however. Now, Bali must find better ways to generate livelihoods comparable to what those in the developing world take for granted.

"Nine months after the bombing in Kuta, it's clear that there are many helping hands extended toward Bali. It's less clear how many of those hands have Bali's best interests at heart, and what Bali's people really want," states a recent article in the Asia Times. "There is a continued golden opportunity for people to work together but little indication that communication and cooperation are on the agenda for what remains as a unique, enchanting and unfortunately endangered community."

Country: Indonesia
Area: 5620 sq km (2192 sq mi)
Population: 3 million
Capital city: Denpasar (pop 370,000)
People: 95% ethnic Balinese, plus Javanese minority
Language Bahasa Bali, Bahasa Indonesian, plus English in tourist areas
Religion: 95% Balinese Hindu, plus Muslim and Christian minorities