I had just finished a Skype-video interview with a major TV channel here in Perth, to warn West Australians that it will be ‘many months before we can sit on the beach in Bali again, and watch the sunset’, when my wife, Katherine challenged me: “But you still have not accepted Jetstar’s penalty-free offer to cancel our own Bali holiday planned for June, so what are you talking about?”
It was confronting. And I had to confess to Katherine that I simply couldn’t bring myself to actually do it. And I may not be alone, as anecdotal evidence suggests many West Australians still have bookings in place in the hope everything will be ‘OK’ in 8-10 weeks. It won’t.
My love affair with Bali goes back to a time when many visitors to our favourite island had not even been born: 1973.
It was a time when our Aussie dollar purchased Singapore $3.14, but only 500 Indonesian Rupiah, yet it was still very cheap. With only three small losmens (guesthouses) in Kuta and none in Legian - where the only way to get there was a long walk along the beach - a bed and ‘mandi’ (a trough-of-water) for the night plus an Indonesian breakfast next morning would cost 33 cents.
These were amazing days of glorious sunsets, magic mushrooms - where hippies could watch two sunsets on the one night, - and with only one real restaurant, appropriately called ‘Poppies’ having just opened in Poppies Lane, in Kuta.
There were very few Australians, as Bali was unknown-of back home; the only way to get to Bali was by an expensive flight from Jakarta on Garuda Indonesia, or like most travellers, a 12-hour bus ride from the East Java capital of Surabaya.
It was also the time when Indonesia stole my heart and has refused to give it back. My love for this crazy, diverse, passionate and religious country, and the island of Bali and its people, changed the life of this then 22 year-old forever.
Since then Bali has reinvented itself and now has become a world-class foodie paradise and a growing centre for wellness retreats. It’s a place where 400,000 West Aussies each year could catch any one of seven flights a day, and in just three hours be swimming with the kids at glorious resorts such as the ever-popular Padma Hotel in Legian.
And it’s an island that in just four weeks has been shattered by Corvid-19, and it’s going to get worse. So am I in personal denial about how bad it really is? Probably.
And perhaps that is why I simply cannot bring myself to press the Jetstar website ‘cancel’ tab.
Ross B. Taylor is the president of the Perth-based Indonesia Institute Inc.
April 2020
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