Post made from: IP=203.206.189.105, User Agent=Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1; .NET CLR 1.1.4322)
Posted by - ® DavidB on September 22, 2005 at 10:14 am:
In Reply to: Opinions on Bali posted by Catherine on September 22, 2005 at 9:39 am:
The Schapelle Corby case is one thing... lots of opinion there, most of it fuelled by the media. It is interesting to hear the Fed Police chief's (Mick Kelty) comments at the time which I read as not supporting the media's views.
There are a lot of things that I dislike about Bali, so I travel there in a way that I avoid them. What don't I like? Well.....
- The Kuta area due to the continual harrassment by time-share, surveys, "I know you from last time" hawkers, Indo style "Goodaaay Mate" hawkers, persistant hawkers in general, U.S. food and coffee chains with U.S. prices, and worst of all, the behaviour exhibited by Australian and NZ tourists
- Petty crime seems to have increased but not only in Kuta, also in Ubud and other places
- The female beggars with children that are seen dotted around Ubud during the day and then seen after dark congregating and waiting for pick up by their mini-bus to take them back to their villages a long way to the East of Ubud - I am told these particular villagers are brought up to beg, doesn't mean I have to like it. Why don't I like it? Because it upsets my wife to see it, especially the children, and if she doesn't want to visit Bali then I won't be able to! I noticed recently that there were a lot of kids about 8 to 10 begging along Monkey Forest Rd.
Not huge problems really, especially when you compare to other places in the world where I would like to holiday. There is a hell of a lot that is fantastic about Bali than there is bad.
Oh, yeah, my last hate about Bali - ill & un informed people saying how bad it is, especially those that have never been or only been to Kuta with a quick day trip on a mini-bus to Ubud.
Cheers,
David
[ ] [ ]