Between the Folds: Stories of Cloth, Lives, and Travels from Sumba

Chapter 9: On Other Islands

Are there affinities joining these iconic extremes, which themselves suggestively invent a correspondence of creatures and cultures? —James A. Boon, Affinities and Extremes ne evening in 1994, an itinerant textile trader from Sumba stood spellbound on a street in Kuta Beach, Bali. Bending under a backpack stuffed with ikat fabrics, Luka gazed upward. At that moment, a half-naked tourist jumped from a tower constructed on the roof of a disco-pub, then bounced wildly as the bungee cord he was attached to stretched and recoiled. Days before, the spectator transfixed by this event had traveled four hundred miles west from Sumba to Bali, where he entered into the cosmopolitan and often baffling community of locals, traders, and tourists. When he returned home, his travel tales would increase his prestige and enrich the lore regarding foreigners that animates village porches and urban alleys throughout Indonesia. Chapter 9 On Other Islands O Figure 37. Postcard from a boutique/gallery in Bali. Bali Over the past two or three decades, Bali has been the prime destination of the increasing hordes of international tourists traveling to Indonesia . Regions of southern Bali are now globalized bazaars of fashion, food, and arts. Cosmopolitan streetscapes, bustling with international commerce and motorized traffic, are permanent economic and social environments on the island, sometimes eclipsing the palm trees, temples, and village architecture portrayed in tourist brochures.1 Western writers (such as the American novelist Alice Walker) and media stars have promoted a lushly pristine, paradisiacal picture of Bali, emphasizing the artistic creativity and “spirituality” of its unique Hinduanimist culture.2 Some years back, with extensive media attention, British rock star Mick Jagger was married in Bali, setting a trend for Western celebrities to follow. In the late 1980s, a New Age seminar leader from California led a group of spiritual seekers to the island, where they embarked upon a quest to relive their “past lives” as Balinese—within a span of two weeks.3 As an international, postmodern4 holiday resort, Bali has been colonized by leisured, “first world” people, often seeking a primordial authenticity in its culture and natural setting. Such seekers frequently appropriate Balinese cultural elements into their own identities —whether through buying artifacts, studying local dance, reconstructing their personal histories within Bali’s history, or attending local rituals clad in native sarungs. Bali is, in salient ways, a late-twentieth-century depot of orientalism (cf. Said 1978), where disenchanted Westerners might reinvent their worlds.5 While such reinventions are laden with the power relations intended in Said’s term, a more finely nuanced universe of contests is also taking place. As we have seen in previous chapters, Bali has increasingly drawn in people from other Indonesian islands, and an eclectic mix of agents and entrepreneurs enlivens the island’s tourist enclaves. Just as tourists might inhabit “reinvented” worlds within certain eclectic and malleable social settings of the island, locals and people from other Indonesian islands also experience Bali as a kind of social free-zone in which to experiment. In this chapter, we will follow a few foreigners and Sumbanese as they navigate the town of Kuta Beach, Bali’s busiest “tourist ghetto.” First, however, I will describe the crucible environment that attracts them, putting them in the company of millions of others who migrate to Bali annually. Correspondence of Creatures and Cultures The bustling tourist region centered in Kuta Beach occupies a portion of Bali’s southern coast and has spread to engulf the area for several kilometers to the north, south, and east. A wide, white beach bounds the SHUTTLING BETWEEN WORLDS 162 area on the west and is especially popular because of the quality of its Indian Ocean surf. For roughly three decades now Kuta has been frequented by hippies and surfers, and before the most recent growth in tourism to Bali (largely due to an increased number of international airline carriers coming from North America and Europe), the beach town had hosted a mixture of largely young, budget travelers. Most were from Australia (especially the surfing crowd), with Europeans and North Americans also frequenting the makeshift resort.6 Along with this youthful, recreational set, markets developed for T-shirts, shorts, and various handcrafted articles produced by local Balinese entrepreneurs. With the eventual arrival of a larger and more affluent international crowd, however, came demands for more sophisticated and expensive items. The Balinese, whose inventive responses to influences and demands from...