An initiative to support new creative writing from Asia and the Pacific brings together academics and literati from Australia, Asia, the Pacific islands and beyond. It will launch the Asia Pacific New Writing Partnership at the 2007 Ubud Writers and Readers Festival in Bali this September.
The Partnership supports diversity of cultural expression, and literature that crosses borders. It champions the notion that literature enhances understanding between cultures and seeks to create stronger international interest in new writing from the region.
While the Partnership has had a small presence at literary events in Asia and Australia for the past 18 months, its launch marks the start of a more focused collaborative effort.
Also attending the launch are writers, academics, publishers and literary festival organizers from China, India, Indonesia, Singapore, Sri Lanka and East Timor, as well as representatives from the New South Wales, Northern Territory and Byron Bay writers’ centers.
According to the Partnership’s Australian initiator, Jane Camens, desired outcomes of the inaugural Board meeting include collaborative research projects on writing and identity in the region, mentorship and writing programs, and development of writer centers in the region.
Camens is a former journalist and cofounded Hong Kong’s international literary festival with Chinese-Malaysian writer Shirley Geok-Lin and Sri Lankan writer Nury Vittachi. – JP
The launch of the Asia Pacific New Writing Partnership is at 4 p.m., Thursday Sept. 27, at Indus Restaurant, Ubud. It is a free event for all at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival.
Source: The Jakarta Post
September 24th, 2007
Bel Mooney visits the luxury and affordable hotels that are tragically empty because of a drop off in tourism
Bel Mooney
Here’s the astonishing thing: in Bali even the scruffiest motorbike can be made sacred by hanging religious objects from the handlebars; a car dashboard can become a shrine; and an open drawer in a clothes shop turned into an altar, complete with an offering of food and flowers on a palm-leaf plate.
I have been nowhere else where Hindu shrines in the smartest internationally owned hotels are tended by staff, lighting incense and mouthing ritual prayers. I was prepared to be sceptical about claims that Bali is a special spiritual place. But I left this greenest of islands a convert – and like all born-again zealots, I need to spread the word.
Bali needs its tourists. Wherever we went, in the south and the east of the island, we were painfully aware of how desperate the people are – wanting to drive you, guide you, paint your nails, sell you sarongs, give you massages. Again and again you hear that there are not enough visitors – not since the Balinese faith in a benign, balanced universe was shattered by the 2002 terrorist outrage.
In a boutique in Kuta earlier this year I met Mary Lambe, a 60-year-old Irish woman who visits her beloved Bali twice a year and sells Balinese jewellery on Portobello Road. I thought Kuta was crowded and noisy, but she told me that it was nothing compared with life before October 2002. Lambe was in town when terrorists exploded bombs at Paddy’s Bar and the Sari Club – she heard the blasts, shared the shock and outrage, and is now a returning witness to how the island has changed. “Tourist numbers are down. Lots of people have gone bankrupt. It makes me sad,” she said.
Along the narrow alley, the site of the outrage is marked by an impressive memorial. Tourists stand in silence reading the names, divided into groups according to nationality – the largest number being Australians. “So many Balinese, too,” said the middle-aged woman on the beach selling shell jewellery. I bought some items. You have to. These beach traders pay to be licensed, and some days they make nothing at all.
In a rarefied world of grand hotels it is easy to forget the real Bali, pampered as you are by the best service. We had begun our visit at the new Orient-Express hotel, the Ubud Hanging Gardens, built up one side of a ravine in a wooded area north of Ubud. Considered the artistic centre of the island, Ubud is too spread out to be walker friendly, but local drivers charge little and need the trade.
The Ubud Hanging Gardens is a perfect example of hotel-as-destination, since it’s hard to leave your pavilion and its private plunge pool. You travel up and down the steep site on a little funicular, and the two-level pool is spectacular. We went for a guided morning trek through the village next to the hotel, to the forest and rice fields, where gangs of people worked with covered heads in heat that was already exhausting by 9.30am. Our fellow trekkers were French, Russian and Japanese.
After three days in Ubud, we headed south again to stay at the island’s other Orient-Express hotel, Jimbaran Puri Bali. This is so near the airport it would be ideal for the first couple of nights, the continuous boom of the surf lulling you to sleep. Here the hotel was not a destination in itself; the beach – to dine on, play on, stroll on – is all. We strolled past rows of seafood restaurants to watch the locals pushing out their spidery fishing boats, and generally cavorting on the sand: rich, joyful teeming activity.
A 30-minute taxi ride away is Ulu-watu, the clifftop temple where wild monkeys mug tourists for anything edible they might be carrying, and each evening dancers stage the classic kecakfire dance as the light fades. The huge “choir” of men chants “cak-cak-cak” while the beautiful dancers enact the barely comprehensible story of Rama, Sita and Laksamana, before the thrilling, fiery finale. All you need to know is that it’s the old story of good versus evil, like the black and white of the men’s costumes.
After six days of luxury in hotels we wanted a change. So a driver took us two hours eastwards, to sweet little Candidasa, a small strip of hotels and restaurants along a rocky shore.
We checked into Ida’s Homestay – one of those small places you find all over Bali, with an open-air bathroom, stunning carved wood pavilion and peaceful atmosphere. But the man who looked after the rooms was sad because we were staying only for one night and were the only guests. “No tourists,” he said mournfully.
Next night we moved to the slightly more upmarket Ida’s Beach Village, where one of the staff told me that since 2002 he had worked only one week a month – and he had a family to feed. With such hardship in mind, we hired a driver for a day’s tour of the area, taking in Tenganan, the picturesque village of the Bali Aga, who make traditional double ikat cloth, and (oh, joy) accidentally coming across a temple ceremony in pouring rain. We were invited in like honoured guests.
After three nights in Candidasa (and if you go to Bali, you must travel beyond the south) we went to Kuta for our last two nights – taking pot luck with accommodation once more. And again we were lucky, for Poppies, one of Kuta’s oldest, prettiest hotels, had one room: a lovely “cottage” in the exquisite garden. From there we walked straight out into the land of T-shirts, surfboards and bars, slightly depressed because everybody was selling the same thing.
The famous sunset on Kuta beach didn’t happen for us; the surfers were silhouetted against a melancholy grey sky. But I don’t want to give the impression that Bali left me sad. I pray for it to recover, although with the continued threat of terrorism allied to environmental pressure, it is hard to see that the boom can ever return. Yet the lovely people I met live in one of the most beautiful places on earth – so how can tourists bear to stay away?
Source: http://travel.timesonline.co.uk
September 24th, 2007