By PHIL JARRATT
The Bali dream factory
ONE of the things I’ve loved about Bali since the very early days is that it’s a place where people can reinvent themselves and make their dreams come true.
Always wanted to be a fashion designer? Well now you are. Want to start a magazine or a website? Here you can. Become a furniture importer? Too easy.
Because there aren’t many rules it’s always been a good place for start-ups, and because the Balinese are so creative you’ve got an eager labour force that can make anything, copy anything.
Way back in the last century it was pretty basic, of course, but clothing start-ups like Double Dragon, Om Bali and Little Dogs of Bali, which all began with surfers doing overland runs to Java in dodgy buses to source fabric, then finding a few tailors in the dusty gangs of Kuta who could follow a pattern, created lucrative careers for people who dared to dream.
In recent years I’ve followed with interest and growing admiration the burgeoning careers of two young people who live in Bali and with whom our family has been fortunate enough to have a long association. Wayan Agus Parwita came into our lives as a driver, and not a very good one!
A graduate of Udayana University, Wayan was looking at a good career in hospitality when the bombs went off in Kuta.
As tourism crumbled he was forced to find work on the Carnival cruise line in the Caribbean for $US70 a month plus tips, but love of a girl brought him home and he got a licence and became a driver, taking tourists on day trips, very slowly and nervously to start with.
Our friend Sue liked his quiet authority and easygoing charm and hired him as her driver while she built a villa and looked at other investment opportunities.
That’s where we came in. On loan from his real job, Wayan drove me around Bali while I wrote a book about the place and then made a short film to promote the book.
But he was much more than a driver, he became part of the story, and a very special friend.
Last month he drove us up to Johnny Blundstone’s eco resort in the foothills of Mount Batu Karu for a splendid lunch.
It was a rare driving assignment for Wayan, who is much in demand these days as a project manager on building developments, but on the way he made a detour to show us his latest project, a coconut oil processing plant on the outskirts of a tiny mountain village.
As Wayan proudly demonstrated how the oil is harvested, I reflected on how far this guy has come in a dozen years, not only in terms of his upward mobility (he and wife Made now have two gorgeous kids and the family compound grows apace) but also in where he is investing for his future.
At a time when Bali’s agrarian industries have been decimated by the conversion of forests and rice fields to tourist accommodation, smart cookies are looking at eco-friendly cottage industry start-ups.
Wayan’s journey began with helping create a plant for cold-brewed coffee and now in addition to the coconut oil he is working on a major banana flour project, bringing in his brother, one of Bali’s leading pastry chefs, to head up production.
And then there’s Little Audrey. Audrey Petrelluzzi, from the French territory of Guadalupe in the Caribbean, was a marketing intern (or stagiere) at Quiksilver Europe in France when my friend Jeff Bradburn, then sales manager of Quik Europe, contacted me to see if I could offer her the same deal at the Noosa Festival of Surfing.
Audrey came to Noosa and lived and worked with us for a couple of months and became part of the family.
She moved to Bali five or six years ago to pursue her dream to create an environmentally responsible swimwear brand.
I doubt that she anticipated this would involve a lot of hard work and frequent financial hardships, but at last her Petite Terre brand, popular in Bali for a few years now, is getting some traction internationally. Over a little family soiree at her villa the other night, Audrey proudly announced that Petite Terre was the number one Coup de Coeur selection for this month’s Mode City swimwear and lingerie salon in Paris.
This is big, really big.
Couldn’t be prouder of the girl.
