It’s one thing to be on a beautiful tropical island. It’s another thing to be there for work. I recently spent 8 days at a beach resort on Bali. I recently spent 8 days wearing a suit running around from dawn to dusk in a conference center. The two together do not compute.
My hotel, the Ayodya, was fronted by multi-tiered ponds framed by giant Hindu dieties. The lobby was constructed of forests of tropical wood, burnished to a fine shine in the evening lights. The Hyatt hotel, where I spent much of my time preparing for the upcoming conference, featured a giant water slide and a majestic view from the lobby to the sparkling ocean. As I hurried along bent over my blackberry trading emails with my colleagues, I quickly passed by German men in mankinis and Russian women in little at all. Japanese kids squealed as they splashed in the pool, while Chinese couples sipped iced drinks in the shade. I loosened my tie and shuffled my papers. Good times, good times.
Due to the wonders of jet lag, however, I awoke every morning early enough to run or walk on the beach at sunrise. Prior the sun’s full ignition, I only had to battle high humidity as I jogged along the path running between Nusa Dua’s high end resorts and the wide, sandy beach. Tourists began to congregate by the water’s edge to snap photos of the day’s beginning (I did too on my final day). Five minutes after the sun popped over the horizon, the heat jumped and it was soon time to end exercise and begin to focus on memo drafting.
By mid-morning, while scurrying from meeting to meeting, I periodically glanced at the ocean. Beautiful, clear blue with blindingly bright white foam on the beating surf. The Hyatt grounds, flush with red, purple and pink flowers and bright green foliage, sparkled in the bright sunshine. The conference center, on the other hand, was sterile and over-air conditioned.
A note about Nusa Dua – It is in Indonesia, but not in Indonesia. An area with dozens of high-end international hotels, golf courses, with an outdoor shopping center straight out of American suburbia. I don’t think the Hyatt had an Indonesian restaurant, though it did have Japanese and Italian. Other than pseudo-Indonesian architecture and Indonesian servers, there wasn’t much to differentiate the group of resorts from similar groups in places like the Caribbean. Reminded me a bit of stopping in the Hoffbrau House in Munich as a backpacker after college. I don’t think there was a single German customer. But, I remember having a great time drinking beer with a group of Finns. Nusa Dua is something like that. Plastic, full of Europeans and North Asians, but an interesting juxtaposition, nonetheless.
Anyway, I protest too much, as I got to enjoy several nice dinners. Twice, we went to a seafood place on Jimbaran beach named Ganesha. The breeze picked up nicely as the sun set making Bali evenings quite comfortable. On the beach, with a drink and some freshly grilled garupa or snapper, things didn’t seem so bad. When four locals with guitars stopped by to serenade us with their takes on Western pop (large selection, limited range), it made for a very pleasurable evening. Once the conference wrapped up, I joined a small group heading to the stylish Potato Head on Semanyak beach. Yes, I did not mean stylish ironically. The Bali branch of a hip Jakarta spot, Potato Head seemed more like something on South Beach, with a sleek bar and beach scene. We sat on a large bed overlooking the ocean. 3 forty-something guys surrounded by what appeared to be a group of Scandinavian high school students on break from the nearest international school. Blended right in.
Following the conference, I had a free afternoon and drove into Kuta. On the way, if I looked up, I could see dozens of kites soaring in the strong breeze. Many shaped like catfish, they seemed to swim rather than to fly. Once outside of Nusa Dua, the infrastructure slipped a bit, the stores began to cluster by the road and more and more motorbikes joined us as we drove. We passed several Hindu temples (Bali is the only Hindu-majority island in largely Muslim Indonesia). We also passed a few Dunkin’ Donuts and McDonalds. We ended in the crowded Kuta strip favored by Australian surfers and European backpackers. Our friend Annika Linden was killed there in 2002 in a terrorist bomb and I stopped by to visit the memorial. Crammed in on the site of one of the bars destroyed in the blast, the memorial attracted many visitors. Incongruous in this bustling neighborhood of bars and souvenir stalls, it attracted a combination of serious-minded visitors, assorted gawkers, and camera toting spectators, smiling while photographed each other. Not to be all preachy, but I couldn’t see how the spot on which over 200 people were murdered less than a decade ago should be snapped as a fun afternoon stop on a vacation, but not much I could do about it.
