Gay Paradise? How has Bali Changed?

[PeterRS]

There are usually a few posts in Gay Guides about Thailand in years gone by with some posters (myself included) writing lovingly of the old days in the 80s and 90s when the boys in the bars were all Thais from upcountry, when nudity was de rigueur in the bars and shows were much more fun. I fully accept these must be quite boring for those whose experience of gay Thailand does not extend that far back. But as one who visited Bali 10 times in the first half of the 1980s, always staying at the same simple guest house just outside Ubud, and was totally seduced by its people, customs, their arts and wonderful friendliness, I often wonder how the mass influx of tourists has changed the island since those days.

I believe it was the gay German artist Walter Spies who settled in Bali in 1927  who helped create the vision of the island being a gay paradise. Indeed, although i did not know it then, my guesthouse had been Spies' home for most of his time in Bali. He threw himself into virtually all the island's many artistic activities and helped develop the particular Balinese naif style of painting. Allegedly he and an Indonesian friend also choreographed the popular all-male Kecak Dance. Tourism at this time was almost totally new. In 1930, there were only about 100 visitors arriving each year. 

During his years on the island he hosted many famous artists, writers, musicians and actors, imparting to each the joys of living on the island and what it offered to Europeans like himself. Yet I wonder if it ever really was that exotic gay paradise. Was it in fact more a result of the increasing anti-homosexual propoganda coming out of Nazi dominated Europe that prompted Spies to stress Bali's freedoms for gay men? Or was it more sinister, for one writer has suggested that Spies was actually concealing the fact that he was a sexual predator seeking relationships with young Balinese boys? However true or otherwise, what is not in dispute, whatever Spies' motives, is that in 1938 he was arrested in a crackdown on homosexuals. Hauled before a judge for committing sodomy with a minor, the boy's father told the trial judge, "He is our best friend, and it was an honour for my son to be in his company. If both are in agreement, why fuss?" But Spies could not escape the law for long. Eventually convicted as a pedophile, he was being transported to Ceylon when his ship was sunk by a Japanese bomb in 1942.

From what I have read, the Balinese obviously had a much more liberal outlook on things like nudity and sex, even though there were I undersand no gay bars as such when i was there. I once visited the studio of a nearby artist Antonio Blanco and all the young women assistants in his house were topless. Yet 30 years earlier the governor of Bali had banned photographs of topless women and young girls as views about western morality started to take hold. Were Balinese women finally shamed into covering up their breasts only because this was happening all over other parts of Indonesia? Even so I recall so vividly seeing men, young and old, going to a stream or water spigot around 5:00 pm after work, stripping off all their clothes and bathing themselves before returing home. One young man who was a regular at a spigot on the grounds of my guesthouse was a particularly glorious sight! I was once even on a DC10 leaving Bali for Hong Kong and seeing a young man strip off and dip into a stream near the runway!

Scholars have written that homosexuality had existed as part of life in Indonesia for at least a thousand years. As in Thailand, there had been no word for homosexuality in Indonesian until the 20th century. Only around the 1970s did it become an accepted term for a certain type of sexual behaviour. There is an interesting book published in the 1970s "Jalan Sempurna" which gives graphic descriptions of the feelings between one 20-year old student for another of the same age. Even though it relates to another part of Indonesia, it is perhaps indicative of the feelings also of some men in Bali. Here is an excerpt –

"I walked by the front of the Regent’s residence, intending to keep going past the railway station. But only a few steps after I passed the Regent’s residence, a young fellow suddenly stepped out of an alley. He looked to be about twenty years old, but was still in school, judging from the schoolbag that he, like me, was carrying. The second our eyes met, my heart started to pound. I felt as if the blood was hissing (berdesir-desir) through my body. 'Hey, why is your heart thudding like that?' I asked myself. Never in my life had it pounded so. And, at that moment, I lowered my head, puzzling over the beating of my heart . . .

“'Why is he like this?' I thought to myself. I was sure that his desire was awakened. But why was I, too, aroused? Unmistakably, it was because his body was really amazing. Wherever I laid my hand, his skin felt so smooth and soft. Even though he was another boy, at whatever part of his body I looked, my desire and passion grew stronger. Especially, if I looked at his face. If I didn’t quickly lower my head, my desire would surely explode. I would surely lay my head by his. I longed to nibble at his lips and kiss them. His body was like silk to my touch. Even this morning when I first met him, my heart was already pounding, as if something was beating inside my chest."

Bali's adherence to its own form of Hinduism is no doubt one reason why it was relatively isolated from the other islands of Indonesia and why it developed differently, including in terms of sexuality. But was it indeed a gay paradise then - or even now? I just do not know.

[Marc in Calif]

21 hours ago, PeterRS said:

Allegedly he and an Indonesian friend also choreographed the popular all-male Kecak Dance. 

Yes, people do "allege" this quasi-historical myth. But like many myths and legends, the actual history of this tourist performance is much more interesting. 😊

[PeterRS]

2 minutes ago, Marc in Calif said:

Yes, people do "allege" this quasi-historical myth. But like many myths and legends, the actual history of this tourist performance is much more interesting. 😊

Not quite sure what you mean. Love to know more about the interesting history. This is from a Bali information website -

"The Kecak Dance is one of Bali’s most prominent cultural showcases, but it isn’t exactly an ‘ancient’ tradition. The dance was created back in the 1930’s, a collaboration between Balinese dancer Wayan Limbak and the German artist Walter Spies.

"The Kecak dance had existed prior to this, but as a trance ritual and far from what it has become today… essentially the two artists adapted the famous story of the Ramayana into a theatric display of Balinese dance, with elements of its original ‘cak’ and other incorporations."

https://www.nowbali.co.id/kecak-fire-dance/

[Marc in Calif]

Well, it's not all-male. Only the rhythmic chanters are male. There are also female and male dancers and singers -- the focus of the tourist performance.

Spies learned that Limbak (his driver) had already integrated dancers with traditional male cak chanters. Spies's only contribution was the suggestion to use the Ramayana epic for the danced story and to present it to tourists. He was in no way a choreographer and left that to Limbak and others. Spies helped publicize the new performance to Europeans and other visitors to the island.

To this day, the kecak is still only for tourists. And the original cak chanters continue taking part in traditional sanghyang rituals and the popular (for the Balinese) secular performance known as janger. 

[macaroni21]

For @vinapu and others into Tawan types:

 

[khaolakguy]

On 2/21/2023 at 4:17 AM, PeterRS said:

But Spies could not escape the law for long. Eventually convicted as a pedophile, he was being transported to Ceylon when his ship was sunk by a Japanese bomb in 1942.

 

 

Sending a convicted paedophile as to Ceylon, with it's record of tolerance of expat paedophiles and their activities, is an interesting punishment!