A Well Manicured Paradise
Nusa Dua and Tanjung Benoa are Bali's modern tourist resorts -
a government-run dreamland of coconut palms, white sand beaches
and pristine waters located near the island's southernmost tip.
Geologically, the area is quite different from the rest of Bali,
and even from the rest of the Bukit peninsula upon which it rests.
Instead of rice fields or limestone cliffs, there is sandy soil
reaching down to a long, sandy beach protected by a reef. Coconut
trees are everywhere - Nusa Dua was once a huge coconut plantation.
The climate here is also drier than the rest of Bali, freshened
by a mild ocean breeze.
Genesis of a beach resort
Once upon a time, the Balinese giant and master builder Kebo Iwa
decided that the Tanjung Benoa marshes should be transformed into
rice fields, so he went to the Bukit and picked up two scoops
of earth. While shouldering them along the coast, his pole broke,
dropping the earth into the sea. Two islets appeared: the "Nusa
Dua."
The marshes were never to become rice fields the bay remained
a bay with a long cape, Tanjung Benoa, jutting into it. Nevertheless,
Kebo Iwa, who created the area, is now engaged in a new venture
- luxury hotel development.
Making Nusa Dua into a tourist paradise was a consciously implemented
government policy, designed with the help of the World Bank. Two
main concepts underlay the project: to develop an up-market tourist
resort, beautiful, secure, easy of access, with the most modern
facilities, while keeping the disruptive impact on the local environment
as low as possible.
Bualu was chosen both for its scenic location as well as for its
relative isolation from densely populated areas. By 1971, the
master plan was ready Construction began in 1973. The first hotel,
the Bualu Club, was completed in 1979, initially as a training
ground for a Tourism and Hotel School (BPLP). Several luxury hotels
with over 4,000 rooms have opened since then.
The early days.
The project did have its teething pain. Tenants would not leave
the land - Balinese custom distinguishes rights over land from
rights over trees! And the trees have soul Fishermen would not
leave the beach. And then there were all the temples.
These questions were all eventually settled - tenants got land,
fishermen take tourists sailing for a fee, and the temple festivals
continue.
The entrance to the complex consists of a tall candi bentar split
gate. Facing it 200 meters away is a modern-style candi dwara
pala pala fountain-gate surmounted by a monstrous kala head. The
outer split gate separates while the inner gate unites. The cosmic
complementarily of Bali and tourism in a nutshell.
The hotels are landmarks of the new Balinese architecture. The
design committee specified that buildings be no higher than the
coconut trees and that their layouts be based oil Balinese macro
and microcosmic models. Thus, the Club Med has its head in a Padmasana
shrine to the northeast and its genitals and bowels in the discotheque
(naturally!), with the kitchen to the southwest.
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