Gili Trawangan… a paradise lost

Opok or "Dani" – one of Gili Trawangans nastier "beach boys" after a little to much shabu-shabu and Arak. Photo John Le Fevre

Located only 35 kilometres to the east of Bali, the island of Lombok has long had a reputation for being the uncommercialised version of Indonesia’s best known tourism destination.

However while Lombok proudly hangs on to its Lombok – Primitive slogan, the primitive nature of its people, one primarily motivated by greed, dishonesty and jealousy, has seen Lombok’s tourism appeal reduce significantly in recent years.

Of particular notoriety amongst younger travellers and backpackers has been a group of three Gili’s (islands) located off the northwest tip of Lombok.

Named Gili Air, Gili Meno and Gili Trawangan, the three developed a reputation due to their white-sandy beaches, crystal blue waters and low-cost accommodation.

Because of its wild nightly parties, easily obtainable drugs and the absence of police, Gili Trawangan in particular developed a reputation amongst travellers looking for nights of partying and days sleeping on the beaches in preparation for the next party.

Gili Trawangan was first populated by prisoners in 1891 following a failed rebellion against the Raj of Lombok. In the 70’s the government provided prisoners who had completed their sentences with parcels of land on which to grow coconuts.

These days the tradition continues. The difference is that the coconuts the locals harvest today are “white coconuts” – the local terminology for tourists, while not all of the criminals living on the island have ever seen the inside of a jail cell.

Sadly, what was once the epitome of a tropical paradise has degenerated into a grotty little island ruled by a greedy and corrupt group of a dozen intermarried families who live in extraordinary wealth and who treat the Gili Trawangan as their personal fiefdom.

A foreign “mafia” comprising a tight-knit group of English expatriates who own the majority of the Gili Trawangan’s diving schools and larger businesses, each having a member of the ruling families as a business partner, in turn supports them.

While the Gili Trawangan still has the same pure white-sandy beaches and crystal blue waters that attracted the first tourists 20-years ago, little else remains the same.

The once thriving Gili Trawangan reef has been decimated – bleached by the effects of El Nino and ravaged by dynamite fishing – considerably reducing the schools of fish that used to abound.

Accommodation on Gili Trawangan has also changed from what early visitors will remember.

The crudely constructed, rustic bamboo huts with open roofed, squat pan fitted bathrooms common in the early years, have now all but disappeared.

Those that remain are in such poor condition and have so many holes poked in the walls to cater to the voyeuristic tendencies of Gili Trawangan locals, that they are undesirable except to those on the tightest of budgets.

While there are still a few guest houses offering mid-range rooms for around Rp80,000 (US$8.60) per night, the trend in recent years has been toward bungalows and rooms with air conditioning and hot water in resort settings priced at more than Rp3 million (US$323.00) per night.

Early visitors to the island will have fond memories of the famous Gili Trawangan magic mushroom shakes and omelettes readily obtainable at many of the small beachfront café’s. Also the plentiful supply of relatively cheap but poor quality Achenes marijuana.

Unfortunately now the pure mushroom shakes have been replaced by those with Arak and Red Bull additives, as Gili Trawangan locals try to find a more powerful and less enjoyable combination.

The result is tourists who often are unable to walk, while others stumble around in their own world, totally unaware of their actions.

More than a few tourists have had a less than enjoyable time as a result, often finding their wallet missing when the effects of the mushrooms have worn off.

The increasing numbers of tourists flocking to Gili Trawangan for its hedonistic parties also fuelled a demand for harder drugs.

In recent years ecstasy, “shabu-shabu,” or crystal meth, along with heroin has flooded the Gili Trawangan – courtesy of the two younger brothers of a senior Lombok narcotics policeman from the village of Bangsal, the jumping-off point for getting to the island.

It’s at Bangsal where many foreign tourists first come to realise that the paradise they are seeking is not the same as they have read of in their vintage edition tourist guides, or the anecdotal tales told by previous travellers.

The official public fare for the boat journey to Gili Trawangan is Rp3,000 (US$0.32).

However a local group of hoodlums and thugs literally ambush visitors heading for the public ticket office located on the foreshore and on the pretense of being tour guides, extort payments of up to Rp200,000 (US$21.74) out of them for the 45-minute journey.

Visitors of either sex who challenge the high fees or claims that return tickets cannot be purchased on Gili Trawangan are often verbally abused, threatened and physically assaulted.

A separate group of thugs operate as porters in the harbour. The tactic is to seize tourists’ bags, load them onto the boats and then demand payments as high as US$ 5 per bag, compared to the local price of Rp500 to Rp1,000 (US$0.05 – US$0.10) per item.

While once Gili Trawangan was laid back and carefree, the huge number of tourists over the years has seen an ugly sub-culture fuelled by alcohol, drugs and sex develop.

It’s for good reason that mainland Lombokians, as well as those in Bali, warn tourists heading to Gili Trawangan to “be careful of the mosquitoes.”

However the mosquitoes euphemistically referred to are not the flying variety, but rather the long-haired “beach-boy” variety who derive their income from sucking tourists’ finances dry.

The ploy of the Gili Trawangan beach boys is simple. Describing themselves as “guides,” this group of lay-abouts befriend tourists and then guide them to particular bars, restaurants and guesthouses where they receive a commission on every rupiah spent.

The Gili Trawangan beach boys are also the primary distributors of drugs on the island, controlling the sale of everything from marijuana to heroin and crystal meth (ice).

Not all the drugs sold are what they appear to be though. Gili Trawangan is renowned for its “blue garuda” and “pink lady” ecstasy.

However the former is made from rat poison containing strychnine, while the latter comprises two, baby paracetamol fused together with water and an obscure symbol carved into it by the Gili Trawangan ‘beach boys’.

While the sale of drugs and commissions can nett the beach boys up to a million rupiah or more a day in the high season, their main income is derived from targeting unsuspecting female tourists.

The general Lombokian view – and Balinese as well for that matter – is that tourists visit Lombok (or Bali) to take drugs and party.

Western females are held in particularly low regard in both Bali and Lombok, with the general view being that they are all nymphomaniacs visiting to have sex with brown-skinned island boys.

The Gili Trawangan beach boys spend their days scouring the beaches and restaurants in search of female tourists – particularly targeting those who are older, less attractive or fat.

It matters little to them whether the girl is travelling alone, with her boyfriend or in a group.

To overcome obstacles such as this they will work as a team to break up a group of female tourists travelling together with one beach boy targeting each member of the group.

More than a few relationships have ended up on the rocks due of the efforts of the Gili Trawangan’s playboys.

After deciding amongst themselves who will target which girl, at night they go in search of their prey. By this stage they will already know the targets name and where she is staying.

Using a variety of charming, lame, goofy or childish means, or just plain persistence, they soon attach themselves to their intended victim.

Before long she is paying for her new “friends” drinks, food and even drugs, and often those of his friends as well.

Though Gili Trawangan business owners claim crime on the island is virtually non-existent, theft, robbery and sexual assault occur more frequently than those with a vested interest in keeping tourists on the island care to admit.

The increased level of drug dependency among Gili Trawangan locals, coupled with jealousy and greed, has seen many a tourist leave the island minus their mobile phone, digital camera, MP3 player and much more.

Theft is not just limited to expensive items. Even used sandals and cheap bracelets are often stolen from guests’ rooms.

Those items that are not stolen bur desired are simply requested.

When it comes to asking for things tourists quickly discover that Gili Trawangan and Bangsal locals are far from shy, and extremely persistent, in their requests for gifts.

Everything from T-shirts and sports shoes to mobile phones and digital camera’s are requested as “a memento” of having met someone. Foreign currency “for my collection” is by far at the top of the list.

More sinister is the handful or so of women who each month wake up to find themselves sharing their bed with the friendly Gili Trawangan beach boy who had been entertaining them and organising their drinks the night before.

However not all of the women who wake up in this situation are unwilling participants.

Blinded by the apparent genuine affection many, particularly older women, return to the island annually – or more often to be with their tropical boyfriend.

Many send them money in between to ensure their welfare. It also not uncommon for some to sponsor their island lovers on a visit to their home country. Almost inevitably these sponsored visits end disastrously.

This does not stop the beach boys from picking up a new girlfriend almost as soon as the old one has left the island.

Many Gili Trawangan locals have more than a dozen women at a time sending them money and emails each month, each believing they are the only one.

While many of Gili Trawangan’s beach boys are married to locals, this doesn’t prevent them from going so far as marrying visiting foreign women if they think it will earn them more money.

Few of the people who work in the tourism industry on Gili Trawangan actually live full-time on the island and the beach boys are careful to ensure their wives and children stay at home in the village on the mainland.

The intensity and rivalry amongst Gili Trawangans’ playboys when it comes to female tourists is such that fights over women are a regular occurrence at the nightly parties.

Fighting amongst drugged-up or drunken island beach boys is of such magnitude that the two largest party venues collect the identity cards of all locals entering and use uniformed guards, complete with hand-held metal detectors, to curb the number of incidents involving knives.

Liqueur substitution has also become frequent at Gili Trawangan’s plethora of bars.

Declining tourist arrivals have considerably impacted local businesses and watered down or substituted spirits has become commonplace in even some of the larger establishments.

Abuse of tourists is not limited to just the locally run establishments either.

In a classic example of British public schoolboy humour, one English tourist who passed-out at the islands Irish Bar had his 12-year old pony tail snipped off by one of the islands British diving school owners – with the assistance of one of the bars’ English owners.

With the exception of the nightly parties, the only other activities on Gili Trawangan are eating, drinking snorkelling and Scuba diving.

Despite the condition of the reef, diving school operators on the island extol the virtues of diving with the harmless black-tip and reef sharks that inhabit the area, along with the occasional manta ray that occasionally swims through.

The truth is that these shark species are readily found throughout Asia and not unique to Gili Trawangan.

In addition, the price fixing that has been put in place by the English expatriate “mafia” means that all establishments charge the same prices for diving. Tourists usually only discover this after spending half a day so going from one establishment to the other.

The costs have reached such a level that Gili Trawangan is now one of the most expensive locations in Indonesia to undertake a Padi diving course and considerably more expensive than Thailand or even nearby Bali.

A more depressing side to Gili Trawangan is the abject poverty many of the true local inhabitants live in.

The majority of tourists visit and depart the island totally oblivious to the real Gili Trawangan village and permanent island population living behind the ritzy tourist establishments located along the foreshore.

Living in rustic houses slapped together out of wood off-cuts, plastic tarpaulins and cardboard, the majority eke out a subsistence living fishing, raising a few cattle and harvesting coconuts.

Very few tourists are awake when the young children of these residents, dressed in little more than rags, troll through the islands rubbish bins at sunrise collecting empty bottles, aluminium cans and cardboard for reselling.

Not being related to Gili Trawangan’s ruling families, nor involved in the tourism or drug industries, these island residents benefit next to nothing from the millions of dollars that are spent each year on the island.

Rather, they have seen their environment devolve to the point where many of them won’t let their children walk along the foreshore any longer due to the debauched behaviour of drugged-up and drunken tourists and locals.

For them, paradise was lost a long time ago. For tourists the hunt continues for that much sought after island paradise.

ENDS:
© John Le Fevre, 2007

Gili Trawangan; Human rights; Illegal drugs; Indonesia; Lombok; Tourism/travel; Indonesia tourism; Nusa Tengara Barrat; Corruption; Diving; Indonesian travel

Indonesian corruption – immigration officials skimming millions

Government officers at Mataram’s immigration office are systematically skimming hundreds of millions of rupiah every week in tips, or uang terima kasih (thank you money), from issuing passports to Indonesians travelling to work overseas.

The long established and firmly entrenched practice is enabling immigration staff to live lifestyles and purchase assets that even a lifetime of salaries could never pay for on official Indonesian government salaries.

It is so blatant and the lifestyle of Mataram immigration staff so good, that it is impossible that senior employee’s of the Departemen of Hukam dan Hak Asasi Manusia (Department of Law and Human Rights) and the Department’s of Labour and Manpower which are both involved in the operation of regional Indonesian immigration offices, can not be unaware of, if not direct beneficiaries of.

At the Mataram immigration office in Lombok, NTB, the unofficial fees amount to around $US1 million per year. If applied to the plethora of class I and II immigration offices throughout Indonesia this figure could easily multiply to tens of millions of dollars a year from passport applications alone.

Its long been a vexing question for many people as to how an Indonesian government employee on an income of less than Rp1.5 million per month can afford to pay cash for motor vehicles in the Rp100 – 300 million price range, houses in the tens of billions of rupiah category, or fund children studying at overseas universities.

It’s not a question though that seems to overly disturb Indonesian government ministers, or three successive Indonesian presidents since the era of corruption, cronyism and nepotism (KKK) associated with the Sohartoe regime supposedly came to an end in 1995.

In fact, it is likely the practice of payments on top of officially prescribed fees is somewhat condoned, as it enables the Indonesian government to maintain a public service on what can only be described as minimal salaries.

A quick look in the parking lot of any Indonesian immigration office will see no shortage of expensive, gleaming motor vehicles owned by immigration staff, while very few immigration staff of “gold” ranking live in squalor.

One Indonesian immigration employee who previously worked at Jakarta’s Soekarno Hatta International Airport and now works in Lombok recently purchased a top of the line Australian made Hyundai RV for more than Rp330 million (about $US30,000) and proudly boasted that he paid cash, despite having an official salary of less than Rp1.5 million ($US150.00) per month

The passport scam by Indonesian immigration officials comes on top of one exposed last year by Media Indonesia alleging trillions of rupiah a year are being pilfered by immigration staff at Jakarta’s Soekarno Hatta International Airport who collect the Rp1 million (about $US100) fiscal payment Indonesian and Kitas (working visa’s held by foreign citizens) holders have to pay prior to leaving Indonesia.

Media Indonesia put the amount pilfered by Indonesian immigration staff in Jakarta alone at over Rp1 trillion (about $US10 million) per annum.

The Media Indonesia expose resulted in a swift response by Indonesian President Susillo Bambam Yudohyono (SBY), who ordered an immediate investigation into what was quickly dubbed the “Immigration fiscal mafia”.

The Media Indonesia exposé though is only the tip of the iceberg, as it focused solely on Jakarta and failed to look at other area’s where immigration staff have the opportunity of skimming, or charging in excess of officially prescribed fees.

These include the collection of payments by tourists who overstay their allocated 30 day visitors permits, the renewal of monthly social and business visa’s, and the authorisation and issuing of Kitas’s and retirement visa’s to foreigners.

It also ignored the practices at international airports and immigration offices at Surabaya, Bali and Mataram to name a few, as well as major sea departure points such as Batan in Indonesia’s north-western province of Sumatra, Tanjung Priok in Jakarta and Tanjung Perak in Surabaya.

It’s a well known fact that almost anyone can obtain an Indonesian Kitas if they want. The sponsoring company for the working visa might bare no relationship to the work the holder performs, however once the Kitas is issued very few, if any, questions are asked.

In Bali a new Kitas will cost a foreigner between Rp4 million and Rp6 million, while in Lombok a Kitas can cost up to Rp13 million depending on which agent is used. This is despite the official fee being set at less than Rp2 million.

Most foreigners living in Lombok and Bali use an agent to process their visa extensions. It’s no secret that a Rp50,000 to Rp100,000 “tip” is expected by Indonesian immigration staff in Mataram on top of the official processing fee of Rp200,000 per month.

Corruption in Indonesia involving the issue of Kitas’s is such that in Mataram, as well in other locations, it is often a side-line business of senior Indonesian immigration staff, or seniot staff at the local office of Manpower who are the sponsors.

More than one foreigner has been caught out with submitting monthly applications late and been subjected to greatly inflated fee’s if they want their visa’s extended.

While stories amongst the Lombok expatriate community of exorbitant penalties being levied are numerous, none who claim to have paid these fees are able to produce receipts for the payments, because they say receipts are never issued.

The passport scam by immigration staff in Lombok is a fairly simple and crude one and because it involves only a dozen or so people, is one that is easily controlled and concealed.

One of Indonesia’s largest exports is its people. It’s burgeoning, under-educated, unskilled population is a steady and ready source of cheap labor for nearby Malaysia’s palm oil plantations, construction and illicit sex industries.

Lured by the promise of salaries up to four times what they can earn at home, thousands of Indonesians each day are taken by immigration agents and employment brokers to line up at immigration offices around Indonesia and apply for passports.

At the Mataram immigration office in Lombok no fewer than a dozen employment brokers and immigration agents, as well as their staff. set up shop to facilitate the processing of their clients.

The relationship between the brokers and immigration staff is so incestuous that the immigration office even provides the agents, brokers and their staff with an area in which to work.

For many Indonesians the income and lifestyle in nearby Malaysia is so good that they don’t want to return home when their 12 month working visa’s have expired.

During an amnesty ahead of stringent new punishment laws for illegal aliens in 2004, more than 120,000 Indonesians flocked to the Indonesian embassy in Kuala Lumpur seeking travel documents to return home.

The number of illegal Indonesians fearful of prison terms and caning was so great that the Indonesian government was forced to twice ask Malaysia to extend the deadline of the amnesty, while the number of people returning wanting to return home was such that the Indonesian navy needed to be deployed.

At Mataram’s immigration office staff regularly process between 300 and 500 passport applications a day.

During periods of peak demand this figure can easily swell to almost 800, with the majority of applications made by people brought from rural villages to the immigration office by employment brokers and immigration agents.

The official fee set by the Indonesian Government for a passport is Rp120,000 (about $US12.00), however, employment brokers and immigration agents in Mataram say they pay an additional Rp65,000 per passport as a “tip” for ensuring applications are processed promptly.

At between 300 and 500 passports per day this equates to a “tip” to the tune of between Rp507 million to Rp845 million (around $US52,000 – $US86,666) per month or over Rp10 billion (US1 million) per year at just the Mataram immigration office.

With a staff of only 44, the Mataram immigration office is typical of others around Indonesia.

With one international airport to service and up to 500 passport applications a day to process on top of visa extensions and new visa applications, it’s human and technological resources are stretched to the limit.

It’s not uncommon for staff to report for work at 8.00am in the morning and still be processing passport applications at 8.00pm at night.

More senior officials, or those working in other sections, regularly go home at 4.00pm and return at 8.00pm and work untill the early hours of the morning approving applications and issuing passports.

It’s also not unusual for billions of rupiah in cash to be removed from the office late at night or on Sunday’s when the office is technically closed. Equally common is the practice of labour brokers and immigration agents collecting passports and submitting passport applications late at night.

At Rp65,000 bonus per passport, the unofficial overtime rates, especially for more senior staff, is well worth the extra hours. For junior staff the tips are not so good as they claim they only receive an additional Rp200,000 per month on top of their official salaries.

Just prior to the office closing for the main midday Friday prayers, a staff member will walk around the office and drop a Rp50,000 note on each workers desk.

The shortage of staff also means that applications are not thoroughly examined prior to being approved. On more than one occasion a single individual was seen to put his fingerprints on up to 20 sets of fingerprint cards, which were then placed in the passport applications for 20 different people.

Photo’s that accompany passport applications are easily interchangeable between applications and its not uncommon for the same person to apply for multiple passports in different names.

Employment brokers candidly acknowledge that many of the people applying for passports on a daily basis will never leave the country, while others will leave Indonesia with two or three passports in different names.

Each passport application also requires a medical certificate, though the brokers claim many of the checks are not as thorough as they could be and more than a few medically unfit people manage to obtain passports and overseas employment as a result.

Until the beginning of 2006 the minimum salary for Indonesia’s public service staff (PNS) was a paltry Rp700,000 per month, rising to a little over Rp1,000,000 ($US 71.00 – $US102.00) per month for a mid level officer with perhaps 12-years service and less than Rp2 million a month for all but the most senior of public servants.

Due to a spiraling inflation rate of more than 10 per cent per annum (15.65 per cent in October 206) which has seen the price of benzine (gasoline) alone increase by more than 220 per cent in the last 10 months, minimum PNS salaries were increased by 42 per cent to Rp1 million per month at the start of 2006.

On a salary of Rp1 million per month, a 12-hour day, five and a half days per week equates to an hourly rate of Rp3,788 (about $US0.38) or less. A junior level immigration officer would therefore need to work more than 1.5 hours to buy a 12 stick packet of Indonesian cigarettes, or more than 6.5 hours to pay for a Big Mac, medium serve of french fries and a medium coke.

In comparison, the average salary for an Indonesian travelling to work in Malaysia is Rp900,000 (about $US91.00) per month. In addition they receive their meals and accommodation.

For many of those heading to Malaysia this is many times what they could ever expect to earn in Indonesia and many think that after a year or two of overseas work they will return home set for life.

For the employment brokers the thank you money is just another business cost and most accept the requirement to pay a little extra in return for speedy processing of their applications.

The brokers and agents themselves work in one of two ways. Some charge their clients a flat Rp1 million for all of the documents and processing of their passports and receive a commission of up to a further Rp1 million for each worker they send overseas, while the second method sees the local Indonesian agent pay for the medical examination (between Rp32,500 and Rp160,000), photocopying of necessary documents (Rp5,000), the passport (Rp185,000 including tip) and the fiscal fee on departure (Rp1 million). They then receive up to Rp1 million commission from the foreign employer once the worker commences employment.

A few Mataram employment agents spoken to while researching this story candidly admitted that like everything else in Indonesia, the fiscal payment was somewhat negotiable. More than one agent or broker admitted that only about 50 to 60 per cent of the payments were receipted and in exchange for non-receipting the payments were cut from Rp1 million per person to between Rp600,000 and Rp700,000.

In either case the additional Rp65,000 demanded by immigration officials to provide a fast service is small change compared to the profits derived from sending 20 or 30 people a day to Malaysia.

While most Indonesian’s, including Mataram immigration office staff dislike the word korupsi (corruption) and prefer to use words such uang persenen (tip), oleh–oleh (gift or present) or uang terima kasih (thank you money) for money received outside of official channels or in excess of prescribed fee’s, when the tip becomes obligatory and not discretionary then the line between gratefulness and corruption would appear to have been well and truly crossed.

If Indonesian President SBY is serious about cleaning house, the immigration department as a whole and the office in Mataram in particular would be a good place to start.

As too would be a requirement for all PNS staff and their spouses to compulsorily provide an annual statement of assets and there values.

One can’t help to think though that even SBY, with all of his talk of corruption busting, is not prepared to tackle the powerful Department of Immigration, or the PNS as a whole in this matter.

ENDS:
© John Le Fevre, 2007

Corruption; Indonesia; Indonesian Immigration; Lombok; Mataram; Mataram Immigration; Indonesian corruption; Indonesian workers; Nusa Tenggara Barat

Lombok vet takes conservation lead

Animal conservation is not something usually associated with Asian countries. However the forward looking views of a Lombok veterinarian almost five years ago has seen the turtle population around the northwest gilis (island in Bhasa Indonesia) of Air, Meno and Trawangan increase to the levels they are now.

Over the years Dr Gde Sudiana, head of the department of Animal Services for West Lombok, estimates he has helped in the incubation and release of more than 3,000 turtles.

According to Dr Gde, in 1995 there was very few turtles in the waters around the three gili’s and after reading reports on the plight of the turtles he and an English biologist friend started a small-scale breeding program.

“We bought 50 eggs and buried them in sand and left them alone. It was very much a matter of trial and error and only about 30 per cent hatched. These we kept for six months feeding them a special diet based on fish and then released them at a quiet beach on Lombok opposite Gili Air.”

Subsequent attempts saw more turtles being released, but a lack of funding has seen the program end.

“The turtles must be kept for six months before being released and it costs around Rp30,000 (about US$3.00) per day in food for every 100 hatchings,” Dr Gde said.

While the turtle hatching program ended several years ago, the results are enjoyed by all visitors to the three islands with snorkelers able to swim with turtles on all three islands almost every day.

Though not able to fund the program from his own pocket, Dr Gde then turned his attention to the Timorenses deer that once were common throughout Lombok.

Using some land he owned just outside of Mataram, Dr. Gde commenced a conservation reserve with the aim of breeding and one day releasing into the wild the endangered species.

“Different people gave me deer that they found injured, or young deer who had no parents. From nine deer around four years ago, Dr. Gde today has 23.

In the near future he plans to release a pair of the deer on Gili Trawangan with the hopes that the two will start to establish a small herd of the species on the island.

Again, no funding is available for the project and Dr Gde is seeking interest from people establishing a trust to develop a larger scale breeding and release program.

Ends:
© John Le Fevre, 2006