Over the week that we spend in Bali, Pak Arwen, the minivan driver, becomes friendly with my father. This happens because they are both Indonesian-Chinese – which is to say that they share a shiver down the spine regarding certain historical dates, political figures and tribalist slurs.
At some point, when it became too difficult to be Chinese in Sumatra, each man's family gambled the present for its future. My father's fled for Singapore and Pak Arwen's for Bali. Decades later, the two men occupy different stations in life: my father plays a tuan to Pak Arwen's supir. But their shared memory of this gamble – and the conditions that forced it – levels the playing field a little.
Both men, being Christian-Chinese, have lived the parable about the pillar of salt. They understand the importance of moving forward, eyes fixed to the line on the horizon.
Is Pak Arwen looking forward or backward when he tells us: This is too much? He says this as we drive past a large banner, stirring in the breeze by the side of the road. The banner is bright red, with a slogan in block capitals: TOLAK REKLAMASI TELUK BENOA. Resist the reclamation of Benoa Bay.
This is one of the first non-English signs that we've seen all day, which makes me think that it's not for tourists. Or perhaps it's for a specific kind of tourist – the kind that's stayed here long enough to perceive that something isn't on offer to them, and want a part in it anyway.
My father asks: What do you mean?
And Pak Arwen responds, one hand circling the steering wheel for eloquence: Nothing is good enough here. Roads, land, water…
The road in front of us is marked by potholes; the banner speaks of land problems. What about water? I sprint through some figures: say there are 5,000 hotels here plus hundreds of unregistered villas, and each one has a pool…
I think about the news stories that I have read, on The Jakarta Post and Al Jazeera. Impossible to describe how much of this island's water goes into making, and maintaining, glamour. Each week, scores of foreign developers reach into Bali's south coast, summoning up yoga studios and restaurants by the dozen. Trump shakes hands with Harry Tanoe and a golfer's empire materialises, sun-bleached and thirsty by the gallon.
But all this diverts water from the poorer North, where most locals live. In this land of glassy infinity pools, more than half the rivers have already run dry. Streams still criss-cross the terraced rice fields of Ubud. But deeper underground, the freshwater banks are pulling back from parched earth. Bali's farmers live the reality that its tourists cannot see – at night, they sleep in their fields with one eye open for irrigation thieves.
Later, I root around online for more stories about Benoa Bay. I learn that Tommy Winata, the Indonesian billionaire, is trying to reclaim land there. He wants to coax hectares of malls, theme parks and an F1 track out of swampland. But this floating world will crush the coral reefs that protect Bali's coastline and keep the sea at bay. Eventually it will flood the island, dragging whole villages into the sea.
In a place like Bali – I tell myself – the supply of pleasure must always meet the demand for it. Even if it costs the future for some people; even if it means death.
After all this is paradise, where nothing ever runs out.
Let me tell you another story about Bali that I know. This one is a creation story, concerning the beginnings of paradise.
Imagine that the year is 1906. Bali is an island divided. Dutch forces have occupied the northern territories, leaving three Hindu kingdoms where once there were six. Today, they begin the march south to complete their reign, winding downwards from Tabanan to Badung to the offshore court of Klungkung.
This story is an old one, whose basic tenets are familiar to many people around the world. At heart, it is a story about mismatched means and ends: guns versus kris, ambition versus ancestral claims.
The Dutch troops begin their journey. Quickly, they pass through the city of Kesiman to reach their first stop, Denpasar. At first, the city streets seem too quiet: where is the resistance that they come ready to meet? But as the soldiers advance, they hear something stirring in the distance, from the direction of Denpasar palace: the faint but unmistakable pulse of drums.
And so they go on. As they near the palace, a procession of silent figures files out from its gates. From a distance, they spy the Raja on his palanquin surrounded by courtiers and priests, wives and guards, and children and servants. There are hundreds of people now, robed in white with dusty feet. Flowers laced into their hair.
Both parties, the Dutch and the Balinese, advance. Now there are 200 paces between them; now, 100. The gap between two worlds is narrowing. Then it closes for the century to come, and possibly forever: a puputan commences. The Raja steps down from his palanquin and gives a signal. Instantly someone lunges forward and knifes him in the chest. Motion erupts across the landscape as men force weapons into their children, then stab themselves. Women fling jewels into the air and then topple, wailing, onto their knives.
Dark liquid starts to fill the ground. A metallic scent rises. But Balinese people keep emerging from the palace in a slow, unstoppable stream. When they're within sight of the Dutch troops, they plunge forward onto their daggers, then collapse into the growing snarl of limbs.
Their bodies cover the ground, both protest and decree.
By this point the Dutch soldiers have opened fire, then ceased fire, then opened fire again. They don't know what to do. Several centuries of colonial rule have left them untrained for situations involving consent – and this seems like more than consent, seems close to an invitation. Eventually, they resort to doing what they know best – which is to seize what isn't on offer, looting the corpses for anything that gleams through the sticky mess of fluids.
There will be two more puputans before Bali falls completely, both of them photographed. Eventually, these pictures will cause a kind of moral backlash in Europe, with the thumping of Bibles and pontifical braying. Desperate to hold on to their empire, the Dutch will announce a new resolution: from now on, they will protect Balinese culture and not gun it down. In fact, they resolve to protect Balinese culture so soundly that it never changes from its present state or experiences the advancements of modern life.
Let the world move slowly here, their edicts declare. Progress is not for the pure of heart. Which is what the Balinese people are, presumably – puputans notwithstanding.
For decades to come, Dutch laws will force the Balinese people to wear Baju Endek and not linen pants – to converse in local dialects and not Malay, the regional code of rebellion. All over the island, atap roofs will sprout over modern innovations in galvanised iron. Whole dances will be invented for the Balinese people to perfect, then unleash upon large groups of tourists.
Soon, these tourists will be everywhere, scouring the island with their notepads at the ready – fresh from the war in Europe, and hungry for visions of innocence. Look at this place, they'll say, pointing at random to rice fields and bare-chested women. What authentic culture; what happy natives! So simple and contented with their lot.
They'll forget about the puputans, the cold carpet of bodies.
Bali becomes a paradise on earth.
Island Paradise, Tjoa Shze Hui
