Bali is a too often ugly and dangerous “paradise” island, as we will reveal for each of the main tourism areas, namely Kuta, Legian, Seminyak, Sanur, Nusa Dua, Tanjung Benoa, Lovina, Jimbaran Bay and Amed. Please understand there are many risks for tourists in Bali, from crime, from terrorism (which the police do little about as they are more interested in making extortion money), natural disasters (Indonesia is a seismically very active area and has appalling or even non-existent building codes to protect people during earthquakes) and health risks (the Indonesian Authorities routinely lie about health risks such as bird flu and also many foreigners return home very sick because of the lack of food hygiene and the habit of Indonesians / Balinese to lie about the freshness of their food). Below are the main risks we see for tourists to Bali in those different areas.

Bali Hotels generally
We believe Balinese hotels, especially those owned or part-owned by major foreign corporations and those which feature in holiday package magazines offer exceptionally bad value. When you compare what you get in Bali with hotels in countries like Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia, it seems you pay twice as much to get half the quality in Bali. Take most of the so called “luxury” beachfront hotels in Bali and compare their room rates, room and food quality with other SE Asian countries and you will probably understand why package holidays, which reflect the true value / cost at these Balinese hotels seem so cheap. If you look you will see the large “luxury” hotels all belong to a special hotel association in Bali; it seems they all agreed to artificially inflate Internet and other visible single guest rates to make their real customers, hoards of package group tourists feel they are getting bargains in true luxury hotels. We do not believe these so called luxury Bali hotels are anything close to a bargain, nor do we think they are luxurious. Too many seem fraudulently marketed because they have tiny rooms, use the cheapest decorations and furnishings, plus provide virtually tasteless mass packed “food” to their guests with lashings of MSG (monosodium glutamate), which affects the human nervous system (be warned) to makes it taste better than it is. Bali BS believes many large and tour group orientated Balinese hotels generally offer the worst value in the entire region, all in the name of monopolistic agreements between hoteliers solely to maximize their profits. If you stay in one of the many excellent hotels in Bangkok before you go to such a hotel in Bali, you will wonder why the later charges so much and you get so little when it should be the other way around given local costs.

Bali travel, hotel & restaurant health problems generally
Bali is malarial, period. The Indonesian Authority spin “doctors” and the tourism industry’s “wobblers” claim Bali is not, but when pushed admit isolated cases have been reported in Denpasar. Of course malaria carrying mosquitoes are decent enough to avoid the tourist areas immediately adjoining Denpasar, namely Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Sanur! The truth is more cases of malaria occur on Bali than are reported as most locals can not afford medical treatment. In addition the authorities suppress details of diseases; they basically lie to keep the tourist dollars coming in. Finally, the reason all reported cases of malaria occur in Denpasar is because that is where the hospital is! Bali wobblers believe claiming only Denpasar ever gets affected does not impact tourism, as holiday makers rarely go there.

Sure Denpasar is a disgusting, refuse strewn hole (just look at the river / water ways around Denpasar including at its border with Sanur alonf the Ngurah Rai Bypass Road), but it is not just non-tourist areas like this. Balinese and Indonesians have a culture of throwing rubbish to the ground where they stand (finish eating or drinking what was in that packaging) and because mosquitoes then breed in the stagnant water which tends to collect in this garbage after some rain (because it is not cleared up), disease carrying mosquitoes are present throughout most if not all of the island. Mosquitoes also carry the dengue fever and encephalitis viruses, neither of which come particularly recommended as holiday souvenirs.

Food items sold in many restaurants, even in those of so called luxury hotels often are beyond fresh and have been handled or stored badly; hence why the words “Bali” and “belly” are too often partnered. It is a frightening fact many kitchen workers in Bali have never been instructed in food hygiene; be warned. In addition, many food items come from suppliers already with their own risks. Rice which has been sprayed with chemicals, fish which is days old, also often has not been refrigerated for all or some of that time, plus has been caught in polluted waters and stuffed with weights by “pay by weight” restaurants so the owners can charge you more and send you home with lead poisoning. Diseased meat which has been knowingly sold for human consumption; be warned, Indonesians including Balinese will take meat they know to be at risk and would not give to their own pets and sell it for human consumption. Until the authorities do their jobs and clamp down on dangerous food providers, stop lying about diseases plus clean up their act and their island, visitors should take maximum precautions at all times.

Kuta / Legian (Including Tuban)
Tuban, Kuta and Legian are the mass tourism area of Bali with many backpacker favored low cost small hotels to make sure there is always a ready supply of “legitimate” (young western) terrorist targets; hence it was Kuta that was bombed in 2002. The crime rate in Kuta, Legian and Tuban is also very high, with prostitution and drugs a major problem (be warned, dealers and police officers are known to plant drugs on foreigners); “Kuta Cowboys” are male prostitutes, “Night butterflies” are female prostitutes, both are reckoned to have high HIV infection rates. Health wise, malaria and other nasty mosquito and water born diseases exist no matter what the authorities tell you. Kuta and Legian have probably the highest tsunami risk although building collapse from any earthquake offshore will likely kill you first (see report: Bali Earthquake & Tsunami Risk http://www.balibs.org/news-update/Earthquake_amp_Tsunami_Risk.shtml)

Tuban–Kuta especially is very close to the airport and therefore more susceptible to any terrorist attack involving aircraft. It is a fact Indonesian members of Al Qaeda are known to have taken flight training lessons and that security on domestic Indonesian flights leaves a lot to be desired with cockpit doors routinely left open. Hotels in this area clearly make more logical and easier targets. There are also some potential high profile targets slightly further north along Kuta & Legian Beaches, for example the Hard Rock Hotel & Café; the epitome of young western culture and business, especially as prostitutes are known to ply for business in the café with “wealthy” western hotel guests.

Seminyak (Including Canggu)
Like the mass tourism area of Kuta / Legian just to its south, Seminyak also represents a logical terrorism target with its range of upper market restaurants, villas and hotels; it also has a significant club density. If you do go to the clubs, be careful no-one including the police plants drugs on you as Indonesian prosecutors have been known to ask for the death sentence against foreigners for just possessing US$50 of low class drugs such as marijuana. The area has a pronounced narcotics (drugs) culture amongst many of the expatriates who like to live there; be warned, keep your hands in your pockets if there is a police raid where you are, although this will not stop Bali’s notorious police officers from planting drugs on you of course. Seminyak also would suffer from massive damage from both the earthquake and resulting tsunami in any major localized offshore quake along the Australasian – Asian fault line which runs just south of Bali’s shores. Because of the number of better off western tourists in this area, crime is also a problem on an island with one of the worst true crime rates in the region.

Nusa Dua
Most of the hotels here are part owned by the Suharto family (see: The Suharto Family’s Bali Hotels http://www.fugly-bali.org/hotels.html). If this means nothing to you understand the Suharto family is credited with mass killings and other serious human rights violations, de facto stealing the beach land of Nusa Dua from local land owners using compulsory purchase orders which even these were cheated on, and building their hotels in Nusa Dua from money they stole from International loans and aid. If everything widely reported about Suharto is true, staying in Nusa Dua means rewarding people that murdered the locals and stole from the taxes paid by your parents (as International aid often comes from taxes foreign countries levy on their own citizens). Hotels in Nusa Dua also unlawfully to this day preventing local people from enjoying the beaches there (legally all beaches are public property but see how security staff prevent locals from enjoying their legal rights in Nusa Dua), which means you are condoning and supporting civil rights abuse when you stay at most hotels in Nusa Dua.

The main risk from tsunamis, according to a UN sponsored evaluation by the world’s experts is on the other side of the island from Nusa Dua. But, if an offshore earthquake large enough to generate a tsunami occurred, Nusa Dua would suffer from enormous quake damage. We question how well any building in Bali has been constructed because of lax, unenforced and even non-existent structural building codes, especially regarding earthquake protection. Therefore death or injury from collapsing buildings during a Balinese earthquake is a serious concern.

Although Nusa Dua has been spared terrorist attacks up to now (written June 2006) and has security to give tourists the perception of feeling safe, large Nusa Dua hotels could well be particularly vulnerable from the Indonesian terrorist group JI (Jemaah Islamiyah), linked to Osama Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda and which amazingly the Indonesian Government refuses to outlaw giving credence to reports that they actually support JI’s activities generally and so indicates that hatred for westerners in Indonesia emanates from the top. Security for Nusa Dua we believe is not as strict as was for the Marriott Jakarta which was successfully bombed by JI in 2003. Also speculation that terrorists could shoot down or high-jack and then crash a plane given the inbound or outbound (depending on wind direction) flight path of aircraft takes them over mangroves with pronounced lax security issues. Be aware Stinger shoulder fired surface to air missiles manufactured by the USA and given to the Afghanistan mujahidin to fight the occupying Russians in the early 1990’s, have been smuggled out and used in other countries by Al Qaeda backed groups raises issues regarding possible collateral damage on the ground in Nusa Dua and Tanjung Benoa from a resulting aircraft disaster.

Nasty crime wise, it is reported that a 3 year old girl was recently raped and given a sexually transmitted disease by hotel workers at a “luxury” Nusa Dua resort’s crèche, while other allegations that a 5 year old boy was forced to perform oral sex on another male hotel worker in yet another crèche in a different Nusa Dua resort hotel does nothing to support the luxury hotel owners’ assertions that their hotels are family friendly, to say the least. Unfortunately, despite Bali’s reputation as a child friendly island this is not supported in fact with evidence that Indonesian child sexual abuse is endemic (see report: Bali Rape Culture).

Tanjung Benoa
Tanjung Benoa runs off up a peninsula from Nusa Dua; many of the comments for Nusa Dua can therefore be applied to Tanjung Benoa. Tanjung Benoa is unfortunately very close to the mangroves where a lot of illegal human effluence dumping occurs, with all the associated water, air and insect borne risks thereof. This is why we know the mangroves are a significant security risk for aircraft using Bali International Airport, because if illegal fly dumping goes on unabated, so can terrorism.

Jimbaran Bay
Jimbaran Bay’s beachfront seafood restaurants were the subject of the October 2005 terrorist attack. Like Tuban it is very close to the airport and has some high profile and large structural buildings.

Sanur
Sanur is not as at risk from a tsunami as the Kuta area according to experts, but of course any nearby substantial subterranean earthquake likely would cause a massive amount of structural damage and collapse, and with it kill many tourists. Sanur makes a logical ground based terrorist target as it has busy public roads with easy access to roadside restaurants, bars, etc. as did Kuta and Jimbaran which have already been hit. Sanur also has a very visible prostitute problem (including the use of child prostitutes) as they are openly rented out along the southern beach section (between the Sanur Beach and Puri Santrian Hotels) to passing foreign men. However this beach section has very few retail outlets plus Sanur generally suffers from aggressive hawkers (beach salespeople which deter many tourists from actually walking along the beach) so the trade is not seen by many regular tourists.

Ubud
Ubud’s public Monkey Forest Road and market / central road area with parking all along and many young western tourists about makes it a logical terrorist target which has thus far (written June 2006) escaped JI’s nastiness. The drug culture, especially amongst foreign expatriates and many backpackers is pronounced; be careful. Crime, especially robbery is rife in this area.

Lovina
The northern backpacker / budget independent traveler favored beach resort area has a vulnerable (to terrorist attack) central restaurant section along a busy narrow public road. Beach hawkers are exceptionally aggressive here, therefore making use of or even proximity to the beach in most areas is very unpleasant for tourists and the resulting crime rate is very high (do not leave anything remotely valuable in hotel rooms with easy access from the beach). If you want to know how good the fish generally is in Bali, just look out for the fish stalls along Lovina’s main road and see how the food is kept; it is laid out in the heat on wooden pallets. The worse thing is, this fish comes directly from the fishermen, just imagine what many restaurants actually sell!

Amed
Although the sparser number of tourists at any given location, more widespread nature of Amed, distance from Java and more aware community make Amed a lower terrorist risk, until the Balinese police stop turning up for work to extort money and start protecting the island instead, Amed becoming the next target for the regular terrorism attacks can not be ruled out. The Amed area is credited by many with higher than average “snatch and run” robbery risks.
.
If you think your own government will tell you about the risks of going to Bali / Indonesia, they most likely will not because they do not want to be blacklisted from Indonesia's massive mineral wealth while the Indonesian authorites do everything to keep what really goes on quiet. For more details, visit our information page Boycott Bali and report on Bali's Silence Over Crime.