In Reply to: Busy Bali posted by lance_longthorne on Thursday, 7. February 2008 at 19:51 Bali Time:
for the questions....seems a strange one to ask on here.
However....if "80% of the economy is based on tourism" (Richard would know far more than I on this), how much of this income actually remains on the island anyway??
Although the "face" of Bali to many is locals squeezing out a living from tourists, remember that the majority of the islands population still lives in non tourist areas, pretty much getting by using traditional means based on the community living system.
There have been obvious downsides to tourism.
Stretched infrastructure and rubbish / pollution issues are just a couple, not to mention issues of personal exploitations.
Has it been good for Bali??.....probably the ultimate rhetorical question.
One thing is for sure, the "idylic island life" was never going to last forever, and that goes back to the days of colonisation,so rather loud and sometimes rather obnoxious Aussies (Or elderly Euros with young indos)cannot be blamed for that.
We are already having to apologise to one ethnic group for perceived problems of the past and I wouldn't want to have to apologise to another!!