Life’s little shocks: Part of being a Bali expat

Life is full of possibilities and sometimes, those possibilities manifest themselves as little shocks to the system. Living in Bali, you had better be ready for them.

There is a book entitled ‘Flow‘, in which the author attempts to understand what makes people happy. One of the things he found was that when operating, and achieving at a high level, people often feel they are ‘flowing’, whether skiing, playing guitar, knocking out emails, whatever. Accordingly, one can only ‘flow’ when one is relaxed enough, to find some sort of rhythm. An expat friend of mine said the other day, that he must of done something bad in a previous life, because life in Bali is a non-stop series of dramas.

I can understand where he’s coming from, what with visa changes, terrorism events, etc. Just the other day, an expat friend chatted with me about his living situation. Having been in the same house for 12 years, the landlord’s son came over to remind him about the rent. ‘No worries’, he thought, until the son said ‘Oh yeah, Ba Pak wants to knock this house down next month.’ No 6-month warning, no ‘sorry for the inconvenience’, or ‘here’s what we’re planning’. Just walk in, and say, ‘house getting knocked down, you’re out of here’. My friend was spitting bullets.

Finding a place to live isn’t too difficult out here, but when you are settled and comfortable, its another stress to have to deal with. Indonesians have told me that Balinese people often make these types of snap decisions, with no warning. Living in Bali, one has to realize our time is somewhat temporary, or at least, time in one place is temporary.