The Indonesians have an amazing talent for making their vehicles last forever; this makeshift garage is in Sulawesi's Bada Valley
The morning of Tuesday 16th September saw me standing outside the hostel in Kuta, waiting for a bemo (the local bus) while chaos erupted around me. Lining the street were loads of motorbikes, each with an owner hanging round nattering and waiting for something to happen. There was a policeman on hand, and all I could assume was that there had been a little motor accident, and everyone was waiting around, much as they do in the rest of the world, to see if anything juicy was going to happen. The fact that I understood not one word added to the confusion on my part: about three bemos went past before I realised I'd have to stand in the middle of the road to catch one's attention.
Bemos are the staple ingredient of Balinese transport. A bemo can be anything from a minibus to a truck with seats tacked on the back, and luckily in southern Bali they're fairly pleasant (on some of the other islands they tend to be a bit more cobbled together). At least, I thought that would be a good thing: the only problem is that when a minibus is packed to the brim, it's stifling, whereas an open-truck affair has built-in air conditioning.
My first bemo, from the hostel to southern Denpasar, wasn't too bad: wedged between two warbling Indonesians with my backpack crunched under my knees, I got to Denpasar without any major problems. Then I realised I didn't really know how to proceed: I had directions to go to Sanglah, then Kreneng, then Batubulan, and then Ubud, my destination for the day. But changing bemos isn't exactly like changing tube stations: you get out in the middle of a street, and you take it from there.
As it happened, it took me all of five seconds to find the next bemo. A guy came up to me and asked where I was going, I told him Kreneng, and I was bustled into a waiting bemo. This was when the fun started: at official bemo stops the driver waits until he's filled the bemo, and then he sets off; outside of the official stops, you simply hail a bemo, and if there's room, he'll stop and pick you up. The problem comes in the Indonesian definition of 'full': full in the western world means it as many as the regulations will allow, but as with everything to do with Indonesia, regulations are things that happen to someone else, and by the time the driver had filled his bemo and started for Kreneng, the bus was bursting, not helped by the addition of my backpack.
The next station, Kreneng, saw my first experience of paying more for a payload. My first rides had cost 500rp and 700rp respectively (11p and 15p), and the next leg was supposed to be 700rp, but for the grossly inflated sum of 1000rp I got to sit in the front seat, with enough room for me and my bag to breathe. Satisfied, I got out at Batubulan and searched for the bemo to Ubud. Unfortunately the front seat was already taken, and it took 20 minutes to fill up the bus to capacity, but eventually we trundled off, bearing 22 passengers in a shuttle not much bigger than a Renault Espace. I lost feeling in my left foot and circulation in my buttocks, but Ubud, some 20km north of my original starting point, soon came into view, and I got off the bus, immensely proud of myself for managing another milestone in my Asian education. Total cost of trip: 3700rp, or just under 80p. Astounding value, and a cultural experience akin to being holed up in the Black Hole of Calcutta with half the population of Outer Mongolia while the whole world shakes and lurches around you.
Sitting on a street corner and watching the Balinese drive is a bit like going to watch motor racing: you're there to see someone crash. Being actively involved in the whole traffic scene is the difference between watching a bull fight and waving the red cloth yourself, and using public transport is as thrilling as safe heart-rate levels allow. Driving down the right-hand side of the road to overtake isn't unusual, but in the West we normally wait until there's nobody coming the other way before pulling out; red traffic lights mean 'stop' in the West, but here they mean 'grit your teeth, we're going through'; pedestrian crossings here mean 'sound the horn'; as an observer the horn sounds are almost lyrical, providing a sonic backdrop to the traffic scene in much the same way that kookaburras and curlews provide a backdrop to the Australian bush, but when you're in motion, they're a survival trait.
But there is one thing that strikes me about the Balinese driving system: it works. Given the amount of traffic and the random development of the road system – a relief after the orthogonal sterility of Australasia – the traffic's always moving, even if it is to within three millimetres of the oncoming cars. London drivers come in for a knocking, but their automotive audacity is nothing compared to the crazy stunts in Asia, and you can't help wondering if the cabbies couldn't learn a thing or two from their Balinese cousins.
