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June/July, 1998
No. 035/VI/98

After The Boom
What future is there for
Bali's modern theatre
scene?

Warung Society
Bali has its own history of
communal philosophising
and coffee-drinking

Renaissance
Twenty years of Bali's
Festival of the Arts

Sumbawa's Secrets
Photographs from
Kuang Amo

Regular

Dangerous Times
Orchestrating a
cremation in Ubud

Home Grown
A preview of
the Quicksilver Pro

Adventure
Getting over a fear
of diving

Health and Beauty
Foreign aid for optic
health

Books
The Painted Alphabet
reviewed

Food
Two boutique hotels,
two top chefs

Fiction
'Our Moon'
by Mas Ruscitadewi

Jungle Drums

advertising index for
Bali Echo web site

Welcome to Bali Echo Visitor's Guide Magazine

In previous years, Bali Echo has celebrated the annual Festival of the Arts by featuring the history of the event and overviews of its highlights for that year. This year, Bali Echo has chosen a different kind of feature. Andre Sjahreza’s cover story on contemporary Balinese theatre and Cok Sawitri and Arif Prasetyo’s piece on Bali’s own ‘cafe-going’ traditions reveal some of the lesser-known corners of Balinese arts and culture.

from editor

Since its establishment twenty years ago, Bali’s Festival of the Arts has primarily showcased the ‘traditional’ performing arts - by which is meant works based on Hindu epics or Balinese folk tales.

full story

Every year, from mid-June to early July, Bali exhibits an imagined past. It all starts with a colossal parade of dancers, musicians and bearers of offerings, men dressed like Majapahit warriors, women like princesses and ladies in waiting, advancing to the slow rhythm of the kendang drums and small cenceng symbals.

Jean Couteau unmasks Bali’s Festival of the Arts, which is to take place for the twentieth time in June-July.

full story

Water with a voice, white water. This is how the people of Sumbawa call two of their most spectacular falls: Ai Beling and Ai Putih. The voice of the Ai Beling can be heard from as far as five kilometres away, and the water of Ai Putih turns as white as milk as it falls from on high.

full story

Only when she took part in a royal cremation ceremony last year did Kadek Susilawati become aware of the countless tiny, yet indispensible rituals that lead up to the main event. These rituals, she found, are fraught with the threat of black magic, and their failure means that of the entire ceremony.

full story

Bill Boyum was several hundred feet above the ground when he discovered it. In 1973, on his way from Bali to Surabaya, he decided to take a peep out the window of the light aircraft in which he was travelling right at the moment it was passing over break so perfect that it would just as aptly be named SFW (Surfers’ Wet Dream) as G–Land.

full story

Bali Living
An invitation to the first hotel in Ubud.

Lombok Living
Lombok, Bali's Eastern neighbor island, is still an unspoiled destination. For all those seeking to break-out of busy Bali, Lombok has it all.

Bali Update

Restaurant News

Bali Echo Next Issue
August - September 1998

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