“Real estate is booming!” the man on the street will tell you. “The new Hawaii!” money hungry property agents cry. If this is gospel, Bali is on the fast track to becoming the ‘Island of a Thousand Villas’. Forget the culture, tradition and anything else that made Bali distinguishably Bali, and bring on the concrete, glass, minimalist architecture, shopping malls and nightclubs. The dollar is mightier than the rupiah and everyone seems to want their private “piece of paradise”. Short-sightedly, local people are encouraging this, selling off their ancestral land and relocating temples as fast as they you can say ‘maklar’. Gods forbid!
As soon as some naive foreigner buys a property at a price way above the market rate (let’s face it, people here are unashamed opportunists when it comes to selling just about anything), all the properties in the same general vicinity go up in price over night. Big money is to be made in an instant by these middle men who hawk the housing divisions with their 100cc motorbikes, pidgin-English and bulging money belts. Tax is a dirty word for them, and their dirty profits don’t last long at the cockfights and karaoke bars.
What these investors, property agents and opportunists refuse to acknowledge is the negative impact this will have on the future of Bali, its traditions and its people. Reliable news sources such as the Bali Update suggest that future generations of Balinese could become marginalized and have to move to other islands (Bali Real Estate: Boom or Bust, 2/2/2010). After all, on an average wage of IDR 1,000,000 - 1,500,000 per month, how could any local ever afford today’s property prices with the short-term mortgages that banks here offer? We are in for potentially huge social problems if things head in this direction.
There is only so much development, so many water- and power-hungry villas, a fragile island environment can take. We are already stretched to our limits now. What are we really offering and what does the future hold? More in the next edition of Kulture Kid.
Vaughan Hatch has immersed himself with Balinese culture, living with locals in Bali since 1997. He speaks fluent Indonesian and Balinese, and is unashamedly addicted to playing gamelan. A linguistic, archaeology and publishing graduate, he works for indOKiwi ‘linguistic and cultural solutions’ in Sanur. Email him on contact@indokiwibali.com or call (0361) 8427030 for further queries.
