Three months ago, with the two kids, we moved to the beautiful island of Bali.
Much of Bali caters to provide indulgence to wealthy foreigners, whether tourists, expatriates, temporary residents. In the busier south of the island, the indulgence for foreigners is heavily integrated to the Balinese way of life rather than the other way around. The integration appears to work coherently and respectfully but not equitably. When I mean wealthy foreigner, by the way, I mean anyone from a wealthier nation and who would not be classed as a migrant. To be honest the terms expat and migrant are blurred, why is an expat not in fact a migrant? I will come back to this, but I think most of you understand how each term is interpreted and in general it has to do with wealth, status and country of origin.
Bali is certainly an evocative destination for foreigners and Indonesians. Balinese in general appear comparatively relaxed, peaceful, confident and seem to have an amazing sense of purpose that is related to their community, religious traditions and ceremonies that western foreigners no doubt find alluring. Balinese ceremonies, customary dress within an incredibly beautiful landscape are mesmerising to observe. The sense of community and kinship that seems to be lacking in much of the world perhaps pulls in disillusioned westerners even more. I’m sure many foreigners, particularly those hoping to live on Bali for greater lengths of time, are impressed with this way of life and are actively trying to pursue a bit of this inner beauty and alternative sense of purpose. Albeit whilst maintaining their own high-quality lifestyle, perhaps with a rice field or sea view from their balcony.
Despite the challenges foreigners face to temporarily live or work in Indonesia, particularly the many bureaucratic processes and restrictions involved in obtaining temporary stay/work permits, it doesn’t stop masses of expats leaving their high pressured, status driven, task orientated lives in search of something different.
I can’t help but feel they bring their high standards of living (and of entitlement), to a land that suffers greater levels of inequality compared to high-income settings, that is perhaps not infra structurally set up for their standards and demands on a large scale. Take mortality trends for example which can reflect standards of healthcare and development between nations. . In 2017, the average age of death for men was 69.6 years in Bali compared to 80.4 years in the UK. Mortality trends for children under 5 years of age in Bali were 18.4 deaths per 1,000 live births compared to 3.8 deaths per 1,000 live births in the UK. And plastic pollution as another example, which is a major issue in Indonesia made significantly worse by the masses of tourists and expats that visit Bali in particular.
Tourists and expats, who pay for healthcare in Bali, may not directly impact on healthcare inequality, but there are important behaviours we need to consider. Vaccination behaviours are an area of controversy and also of increasing global inequality. Vaccine hesitancy and refusal is reported all over the world including in Indonesia, associated with outbreaks of vaccine preventable diseases such as measles, pertussis and haemophilus influenzae B. Vaccine hesitancy is observed in privileged and deprived populations, however a lack of information in understanding the need and potential reactions of certain vaccinations appears to drive poor vaccination rates among deprived communities compared with growing controversy amongst privileged groups.
In the west the anti-vaccination movement has been led by privileged groups, but this challenges global vaccination programmes and consequently all population health.
Bali attracts foreigners interested in alternative health methods to modern medicine evidenced by the high number of ex-pat owned spiritual health, holistic and wellness services. A concern is that some expats may leave their wealthier countries of origin to escape their own country’s mandatory vaccination policy for more ‘holistic’ and alternative health. They would not enter Bali’s vaccination programs as a foreigner; however, will live a higher standard of life and often have the privilege of global health insurance. Bali has a lower quality and standard of healthcare for their own population comparatively to higher income settings. Healthy unvaccinated ex-pats/tourists may influence population infectious disease health for local populations as they mix socially; with local Balinese populations where differing levels of child poverty and malnourishment exist and greater susceptibility to poor vaccine uptake and infectious disease.
However, tourists and expats come in all shapes and sizes and with differing budgets and demands. There are those that welcome and more deeply engage with local communities, learning the language and trying hard to live more harmoniously with the environment as it stands. Others may believe the high prices they pay for the luxury they require is justification enough for living the life they want in a land whose communities live differently. Others understand the possibilities and come for the ride with less concern or knowledge of the environment they landed upon. And why not? Bali is gaining more in financial benefits from tourism and expat living compared to any other Indonesian island, which should theoretically be fed back to develop the island.
And it’s not like Western expats are not living like this all over the world. Whether Addis Ababa, Kigali, Delhi, Port Moresby or Bali, pool parties and card games over expensive whiskey is a common occurrence, and somehow, somewhere even in the middle of nowhere an expat mum will find a bouncy castle for her kid’s birthday party.
Enabling inequality?
In today’s world we appear to be moving further away from finding similarities between ourselves and people living in different countries with differing cultures and religions. And even between people living in the same country and community but of a different race, religion etc. In this ever-evolving digital world, my view is that social media heightens these differences. The information overload environment allows us to easily disregard hardships, climate catastrophes, war, mass violence as they ‘pop’ up on the web. It enables us to be less empathetic and perhaps believe we are different from those people and environments that are suffering. When we are not. The perfection and well-chosen beautiful imagery of individual lives posted on social media makes it easy on the eye but distances folk from really relating to each other in any meaningful way.
I don’t think travel or moving overseas necessarily helps to alleviate those perceptions of difference. Wealthy travellers tend to travel taking their standards of life with them and forming their own communities not so unlike the ones they originated from. But are welcomed because they are feeding money in to a productive, catered system. Within the western industrialised world, migrants are expected to ‘fit in’, contribute to society and often take naturalisation exams. Whereas this doesn’t apply to wealthier expat foreigners who come to live in low or middle-income settings, often places with far greater traditional and cultural standards than their western home of origin.
Expat vs Migrant
The definition of a migrant is “a person who moves from one place to another, especially in order to find work or better living conditions”. Many expats move to Bali for better living conditions. A warmer climate, nature, surf, fresh fruit, cheaper staff, a ‘safer’ education and environment for their children who can find trees to climb; rather than for security, a roof over their heads and simply the option of a basic education for their children that motivate migrants. The intent is the same. The journey, privileges, opportunities and transfer of cash, completely different.
Migrants also appear to get a tough deal if they do become productive. The rise in right-wing populism in Europe, America, Brazil are often associated to a nationalist feeling of discontent and anger towards a view that migrants (with differing traditional or religious values) are taking opportunities away from communities who have rights to the land by birth (this is over simplified). Evidence suggesting that any success built from hard work and dedication to the host nation (despite less opportunity), to social and development systems such as the health service, construction, education, hospitality, may be overlooked (perhaps that is the time migrants should migrate again as expats!).
I am currently living an expat life, my kids are going to an international school, and I live in a westernised property. I am hence being as scathing to myself as I am of expats in general. I have the great privilege of working on Bali as a UK researcher funded within an international collaboration on a priority issue, that is rightly demanding a fair and equitable relationship between the two host nations. Whether it is a historically fair partnership, I’m not entirely sure. Many such international relationships originate from a colonial history or at least a political one that is marred with complexities.
I wonder if there are more equitable mediums that we should aspire to as privileged, foreign settlers, that allow local people and resident foreigners to understand each other as more similar and related. An observation is that often families coming to live on Bali have successful career backgrounds, often selling up to live a less pressured, status driven life and seeking a more open natural but safe landscape for their children. Successful career and development experience between expat and local communities could be sensitively applied that goes beyond building villas, cool bars, vegan restaurants and yoga studios that cater for wealthy foreigners. However, such employed exchanges need to be looked upon favourably by the Indonesian Government, prohibitive regulations restrict much foreign employment, but this may change. I do think fair, non-exploitative exchanges that are not only financial, and service related could exist more equitably and, importantly, productively for Indonesia. I know there are existing great examples of these, I have come across a small number and would hope to know of more especially as regulations lighten.
Language is one barrier. Learning a new foreign language at my age is particularly challenging to me which would be essential to build fairer relationships. I would rather dissect a gecko than learn a new language, because I don’t believe I have the patience. But I am trying.
I guess the unsettled feeling I have on expat life here comes from my own confusion on how I should live and use my privilege and teach my children to live and the bigger issue of how societies in the rich and less rich countries have evolved and what motivates their populations to survive and thrive. True equitable relationships and living may need to be deconstructed and de-conditioned which is kind of impossible without slow, progressive decades of change and changes within the balance of power between the East and West following hundreds of years of colonial rule. If we could start communicating and living more equitably in our everyday lives now, perhaps there would be less bitterness and anger about the domination and control from the West regardless of what our Governments are doing.
We are always told to live by example when bringing up children, should we be trying harder to live by example for a more equal world in the lands we ‘migrate’ to.