Dr. Sukma MeratiPersonal website of Dr. Sukma Merati, Anatomical Pathologist

I just came back from Bali for a wedding procession of my nephew. I spent like four days enjoying Bali and its culture, and by a coincidence those days were the holy days for the Balinese which is called Galungan.

Galungan will return in every other 210 days or six Balinese-months. In that very special day, the Balinese believe that the day was a victory day against the devils and other bad habits and bad human characters that we have to avoid from.

People in Bali have a philosophy of : ‘see no evil, speak no evil and hear no evil’ and the sculptors in Ubud have made the statue of the three monkeys that acting those three forbidden bad habits that people used to do. I love to see the funny statue made from ebony wood. And lots of tourists from all over the world enjoy everything made in Bali.

Tourists flooding to Bali, especially this month of August, this is the peak season for tourism in Bali. Hotel rooms were all fully booked and fully occupied, so that I could not get a single room for myself. Fortunately, I have relatives where  I could stay for a while.

I’ve met one Italian gentleman said that he has been to Bali for twenty times, in more than three years. He almost visit in every other two months time to the island. I was stunned and asked, why ? And the answer was because everything in Bali so cheap, comparing to any other tourist destination in the whole world.

Cheaper than the prices in so many places such as Bangkok, Hongkong, Macau, Taiwan, China, Malaysia, Singapore, Tahiti  you name it…

Many souvenirs from and made in Bali like : bed covers, pillow sheaths, paintings, statues, accessories, garments, bags, shoes, handicrafts, home appliances and even furnitures and gates or parts of the house made in woodcarving do really very cheap.

Because of that reason, tourism in Bali hardly lifting the socio-economic status of its people. Balinese still struggle for their lives, earning not enough money from tourism for their family… It is time for the Indonesian government to re-evaluate the policy made for developing tourist industry especially in Bali. 

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