April/May, 1998
No. 034/VI/98

cover story

Ground Breakers
Bali's top corporate
women

Out of the Frying
Pan
The legacy of widow
burning in modern Bali

beyond
bali

Pedal Power
Cycling around Lombok

regular
features

Sidelines
The cultural value of
Indonesia textiles

Adventure
Off-road trips by Land
Cruiser

Home Grown
Bali's surf hero of
nineties, Rizal Tanjung

Health and Beauty
Mandara's many Bali
spas

Books
The Butterflies of Bali

Food
Four delis that have
survived the crisis

Photo Gallery
F.X. Marit captures nyepi
on film

Jungle Drums

advertising index for
Bali Echo web site

Through the Darv Institute, a private public relations school which she founded in Denpasar, Simatupang is grooming the next generation of high profile public relations managers. As a lecturer, managing director of VCS, a public relations agency, a radio and television broadcaster, wife and mother, she is a dynamic role model for her female students. However an indicative measure of the younger generation’s concept of a woman’s place comes in her response when asked of their ambitions. “Many young girls say they will work until they are married, and then continue to work if their husbands permit.”  

Although many tourists will notice and take for granted the many women working in the service industry now, there was a time when this was highly frowned upon. Parents had a difficulty accepting that their daughters worked in hotels filled with foreigners because in the early stages of tourism development this work carried an automatic stigma of ill repute. “Society  can now accept that tourism is a suitable place for women,” says  Simatupang. “It is not an issue for society at large, but with the parents who come from a different era, there is often a difficulty in accepting their daughters working in this area.”  

For Yanie Mason, growing up in Kuta in the ’70s and ’80s meant increased exposure to foreigners and a burgeoning curiosity for the world beyond Bali. Through working selling drinks to hippies on the beach to working in hotels and opening her own restaurant, Mason recalls that the prevailing sentiment was one that stressed that mixing with foreigners was not what decent girls did. She remembers at one time being forbidden by her superior at a hotel to go out to discos. He told her she was bringing a bad reputation to the hotel after fellow workers spotted her out dancing, the belief being that Balinese women in nightclubs must be loose. Yanie says she resigned. She experienced further struggles when she married an Australian, but 13 years later they are partners in one of the largest adventure businesses on the island, while bringing up two sons and maintaining her links to her Balinese upbringing.    “It’s changing now,” she notes. “A woman can prove to her family and relatives that it is good to explore and find out what she can do. More people can accept now that women have a career and that they can do so and also have a strong family life.”  

Mayke Boestami exudes a calm and confident energy and has an inviting warmth  and instant friendliness. Definitely characteristics that serve as assets for the public relations manager of the Hotel Bali Padma in Legian. Involved in the tourism industry for 10 years she has a fresh enthusiasm for her career. “I enjoy my life and I enjoy my job,” she says. “Public relations is in my blood, I love meeting people and I love entertaining.” But Boestami readily notes that her situation is rather unusual. Married twice, she is now a single mother of two young independent men and is married to her job. She lives on the premises of the hotel, which makes her available for emergency and crisis -solving 24 hours a day. She readily admits that public relations work can be demanding and notes that her live-in situation is not the norm for women working in the field. “It’s not easy for husbands because there are often meetings and events to attend in the evenings,” she says. “It can be a bit of a handicap for her career if a woman does not have her husband’s support.”  

Her advice to young women who want to develop careers in the public relations field is to be outspoken and friendly and have a good sense of people. “It is not an easy job because you need a solid, positive and confident nature,” she says. “It’s hard because women have been brought up to be timid and shy.”  

Wayan Suartini is the director of the Seniwati Gallery of Art by Women in Ubud. When she sits down to tell the narrative of her life, it is obvious that hers was a long journey. Although not an artist herself, Suartini has shared the traumas women artists have overcome, including family disapproval and rejection, to pursue and succeed with their chosen passion. Suartini was born in a remote village in central Bali where her parent’s ambition was that she learn to prepare temple offerings and settle in the village. Early successes in school, and the help of a scholarship, motivated Suartini to pursue her education, and with the encouragement of an older brother, she left home to pursue studies in business administration and English. She supported herself by taking in embroidery work. “At the time I wondered why I was studying these subjects. I didn’t know what I would do with these things, but they brought me here, to this,” she says of her present career. But the path to Seniwati was not glamorous. She worked hard and long hours in losmens and restaurants in Ubud before meeting a visiting woman artist who hired her to help in the studio and befriended her. Through this artists, Suartini met Mary Northmore, the founder of the gallery. Northmore radiates a solid confidence in Suartini’s skills and abilities to run the gallery and says she is gradually removing herself from the administration of the gallery. “She sets the ground rules for our work, how to operate in a way that is acceptable to the Balinese,” says Northmore. “She is my guide, not the other way around.”  

Above:
1. Violetta Simatupang
2. Yanie Mason
3. Wayan Suartini

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