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HECTOR’S DIARY Bali Advertiser, May 16, 2012
His fortnightly diet of worms and other non-religious experiences What Rubbish! When we heard that “the authorities” – the quotation marks are possibly essential – had suddenly demolished a number of rather well known and heavily patronised watering holes favoured by the Bling-and-Bolly and Boys-and-Girls-Behaving-Badly sets on the beach at Batu Belig, a wreck and… Continue reading
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By Jingo, It’s Time for Common Sense
BOAT PEOPLE There’s a streak of jingoism in Australia that irritates many people, including, let it be said, large numbers of Australians. It gets in the way of common sense and stymies the requirement to deal with reality. It’s a political and social phenomenon born of residual colonial cringe, earlier isolation and boastful over-pride, all… Continue reading
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HECTOR’S DIARY Bali Advertiser, May 2, 2012
His fortnightly diet of worms and other non-theological experiences Building for No Future Among the many wondrous things that fix one’s attention in Bali is the question of building permits. It has been raised – again – as a matter of public interest by people who are objecting to the construction of yet another lodging… Continue reading
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Save Us from Visiting Firepersons
Judith Sloan, contributing economics editor at The Australian, is someone who should be read regularly for her insights on matters within her portfolio. She generally makes very good sense. But in a piece in her newspaper on April 17, she breaks a fundamental rule of considered comment. On the basis of “travelling around Asia for… Continue reading
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HECTOR’S DIARY Bali Advertiser, April 18, 2012
That’s the Spirit Meghan Pappenheim, who will now be enjoying some well-earned downtime after the 2012 BaliSpirit Festival held at Ubud – where else? – from March 28 to April 1, tells us her moment of pure joy at this year’s event was taking part in Indra Widjanarko’s yoga class for kids. “Pure happiness for… Continue reading
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A Green Tinge is Common Sense
Bob Brown is the Australian Greens. Whether the present tense can convert smoothly to past, and the statement become “Bob Brown was the Australian Greens”, is a question Christine Milne and others will have to answer in due course. More importantly for the moment, Brown is the most underrated politician in Australia. Others have noted… Continue reading
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HECTOR’S DIARY Bali Advertiser, April 4, 2012
Off With the Pixels Australia Network, the officially funded Asia-Pacific TV satellite channel run by the ABC, is always strapped for cash. It gets its money from the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and is tasked with presenting an Australian image to the near abroad, so to speak. It does a lot of good things… Continue reading
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Bali’s Silent Day: A Time for Contemplating Navels – But Only Your Own
Friday this week (March 23) is Silent Day in Bali – Nyepi, the Balinese Hindu New Year. It is called Silent Day because for 24 hours, from 6am on the nominated day – the date varies, being on a lunar calendar – until 6am the next day, everything stops. Well, not quite everything. Since Bali… Continue reading
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HECTOR’S DIARY Bali Advertiser March 21, 2012
Banking on it Janet DeNeefe, doyenne of dinners and instigator of that annual Ubud fixture, the writers’ and readers’ festival, has been busy lately. That was in Melbourne, where she did a stint demonstrating the cuisine of Bali to residents of that alternatively cold, hot, wet, dry city at the southern extremity of continental Australia.… Continue reading
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HECTOR’S DIARY Bali Advertiser, March 7, 2012
Dolts Rule It’s always fun visiting the Odd Zone; it’s the very best of your diarist’s former domiciles, for all sorts of reasons, most of them a cause for wry smiles or irritated grimaces. There’s the traffic, for one thing. It largely obeys the road rules and even stays in lane; what’s more, at traffic… Continue reading
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8º of latitude 