Bali Tsunami - nearly

Go on, take a good look; this is the tsunami that nearly hit Nusa Dua Bali at 3:00 AM local time on Friday 12th February 2010. The event out of the mainstream news around the world as foreign media and governments pander to Indonesia's government and their selfish big bucks tourism industry.


It is not of Bali, luckily, this time, of course. For one the near miss in Bali happened in the very early hours, so these terrified tourists would not be have been fortunate to have daylight on their side. No the picture is of tourists about to be battered and lose their lives in Thailand, in December 2004. Secondly the preceding earthquake when, not if, it hits Bali, would destroy virtually every building in the tourist south, so there would not be people able to run from the resulting tsunami even if they wanted to.

12 February 2010, 2:43 local time, a large 6.6 on the Richter scale earthquake struck 210 Km off the coast of Nusa Dua, 10 Km below the surface of the water. Had the quake been equal to the one off Aceh in December 2004 which first destroyed North Sumatra and then sent a 24 meter wall of water crashing into Aceh and then beyond, Bali would have been decimated; the loss of life making Boxing Day 2004 look like a dress rehearsal. As the oceanic shock waves sped towards the tourist south of Bali, with an average speed of 750 Km per hour, the resultant tsunami would have hit Bali in under 17 minutes later.

Phew?
Was the Nusa Dua Bali quake a one off? Or the main quake with ever decreasing aftershocks yet to come? Or was it an event which shifted the tension between the Eurasia and Australia tectonic plates; the very same fault line that produced the Aceh 2004 tsunami?


The Famous Tsunami Warning System!
While the very nasty Indonesian Government and tourism industry lords the Tsunami Warning System as the safety net that keeps Bali's tourist wallets safe, while the foreign governments and media play down the risks (recently heightened amidst reports by several scientific bodies) in order to suck up to murderous Jakarta and its paradise island of pedophiles and western criminals on the run, the tourists soundly sleeping in their beds at 3 AM in the morning got a nasty shock, but fortunately for them only a near fatal one.

Understand that no western foreign department is going to issue anything but general earthquake zone warnings for Bali on their travel information pages. Understand cheap trick Balinese travel agents will try and sell you mobile text messaging to warn you of an incoming tidal wave. Understand the Indonesian Government only cares about your foreign currency and that telling the truth, which they are adept at doing the reverse of, would cost them money. So you will be told that beach sirens will warn you and that hotels have trained in mass evacuations.

BS
When, not if, the Bali tsunami comes, there will be no need for beach sirens or text messages to your mobile. The reality is, anyone in Bali will more than feel the massive earthquake 17 minutes before they get pounded and drowned. With the building codes so lax, to say the very least, in Bali, the hotel you are sleeping in would almost certainly come crashing down on top of you. If you were "lucky" enough to escape without serious injury you would only be able to run a few meters with all the wreckage around you; forget neatly dressed smiling staff guiding you to safety, they will be running like hell.

There is increased tectonic activity and risk for Bali right now. If you must travel to the island of thieves, stay away from the Southern coastal areas (Nusa Dua, Sanur, Seminyak, Jimbaran, Kuta, Canggu, Legian, Candi Dasa, etc.); stay in Ubud or on the Northern Coast where the damage from earthquakes and tsunamis is less.

Do not be a stupid mutt. Do not become a victim of greed over good travel advice. And if you are as p'd off as you should be the truth / reality of earthquake / tsunami risks in Bali are not just played down but hidden so as not to deter your wallet's arrival, do what a honest, decent person should do and boycott Bali, Indonesia all together.

Update
It was a 5.7 quake facing Kuta to Canggu
Quake epicentre location map

Timothy Geoffrey Lee - all that is bad and sad about Bali

The Timothy Geoffrey Lee story opens up so many cans of worms, where do we start, how can you give each worm due attention?

Dual British Australian national Timothy Geoffrey Lee has finally been arrested in Bali; it took some doing by the Australian Federal Police, though the AFP in Bali do not generally do much. Timothy Lee is said to be a drug baron, one of the narcotics king pins that Indonesia seems incapable if not reluctant to detain. But Mr. Lee's fate, or maybe not, came because the Aussies wanted their man for doing the nasty deed of putting drugs on Australian streets and having the audacity to flee Australia (clearly having received a tip-off) before they could nab him, a few miles to the western-criminal-on-the-run tropical paradise island of Bali.

The much trumpeted though tin whistle in effect AFP office in Bali, whose officers are charged with finding Australian criminals (drug barons, pedophiles, thieves, etc.) in amongst their unofficial island duties, finally got their man, or did they? And how come it took so long for both the AFP and Bali's narcotic police to do this?

Lee fled Australia for Bali on July 8th, 2006; the Australian Federal Police state this. So how come the AFP Bali only requested the Balinese police arrest Lee on the 9th November 2009? Over 3 years after! Seems the AFP officers in Bali were too worried about getting the final touches to their illegal villas just right!

And then, how come it took the Balinese police so long to arrest Lee? After all, there was an Interpol Red Watch order against Lee with the advisory "Warning: This person may be armed, dangerous and addicted to drugs"! Lee is in Bali on a long term visa! So he registered with the authorities and applied for and received a resident permit despite being on Interpol's most wanted list! How come a drug baron got a residency?

So then finally, after months and years of bumbling around, the AFP, Interpol and the Balinese police, best known for protecting and financially benefiting from narcotics proceeds than shutting them down, they finally caught Lee at his registered residence in Canggu north of the Kuta / Legian / Seminyak tourist strip where, it has to be said, many dubious expats live. I mean, if Lee had not been so good as to register, to get a visa and to stay at his registered home in Bali, how much longer would it have taken the combined forces of Interpol, the AFP and the Keystone Kops (POLDA) to arrest him? Wow, that really gives us confidence they can locate terrorists who are less considerate and "law" abiding!

Ah, but isn't this all a sign that Lee enjoyed Balinese police protection? That only when the AFP and Interpol drove these uniformed clod mafia to Lee's house did they arrest him? No? Well, let us look at a few facts and how the Lee show "must" now go on!

With all the drug barons in Indonesia, all the Interpol data and arrest warrants which exist for them, how come they hardly ever are arrested? Only mules like the Bali Nine (AFP tip off) and questionable mules like Schapelle Corby (probable AFP / Bali police set up) are arrested, along with undesirable Australian union leaders like Rob McJannett get theirs! With so many Bali street pimps / pushers to arrest, only those fingered by the Australians and a token number of set-up tourists dumb enough to buy from the police protected street dealers (who always, amazingly, manage to "run away" from the police) ever get nabbed!

Why? Because the drug barons are part of the Indonesian system of course; they pay bribes and receive immunity, most of the time, maybe all of the time, read on.

So what now of Timothy Geoffrey Lee? On an Interpol Red (the highest) Watch Order, considered extremely dangerous, arrest warrants and extradition proceedings from Australia made? Is Lee on the next (private tax payer funded) plane to Australia? Well, no, not quite. Lee denies being involved in drugs. He has appointed a chief fixer / negotiator "lawyer" (no such thing as a real lawyer in Bali) Erwin Siregar to come to his rescue; Siregar mired in many alleged justice bribery cases. The process will take around a year, going from one court to another, subject always to the inevitable bung of the Indonesian judicial [sic] system before ultimately, maybe, arriving on the desk of the Indonesian president to approve, or not.

All those Aussie tax payer dollars going to try and secure Lee's incarceration (itself tax paid); the failed arrest in Aussie (courtesy some bent police officer who tipped Lee off), the AFP holiday villa in Bali club, and now the legal and not so legal costs to bring Lee to justice. Ripper mate! Let's go to Bali and give those bar stewards some more of our money!

One small drop in the ocean, the ripples heard but unfelt amongst the scores of western criminals in Bali. A circus where the suspect stands accused by perhaps greater social whores; the AFP, the Balinese police, the Australian Government.

Indonesian Jails; chalk and cheese.

Now, if you are nothing but a poor sold out Australian pawn like Schapelle Corby or one of the Bali Nine, Indonesian prison means a cramped cell, where you have to rent your mattress space from the cell boss, where the prison food is not fit for your dog and that is before the prison guards play their favorite game of urinating and spitting on it, where drugs are not just available but participation is required (to ensure loyalty to the thugs that operate certain financial aspects of your incarceration), where dengue and malaria and drug resistant TB are the name of the game (hundreds of inmates dying within their first 6 months of arrival), where you are raped or if even more unlucky sodomized by one of the cell bosses and / or prison guards and / or police who are infected with STD's at best, HIV at worse. You can perhaps start to imagine what an abuse of human rights just being kept in an Indonesian jail is.

Ah but then, if you are one of the lucky, chosen few, whose trials and convictions are all arranged with your consent in order to "show" Indonesian justice applies to all, a sham affair where you are guaranteed to be released upon appeal, then your time in an Indonesian jail is slightly different; it is a life of luxury and even freedom. For example bribery convict Artalita Suryani currently serving time at the Pondok Bambu Penitentiary, East Jakarta. Plus corruption convict Aulia Pohan, former deputy governor of the central bank and the father-in-law of President Yudhoyono’s eldest son, serving time at the Kelapa Dua Penitentiary in Depok, West Java.

These "special" inmates as they are termed by the Indonesian prison service have large well decorated rooms to themselves with wide screens, en suite bathrooms, special food privileges and even private entrances / exits to........., you've got it, the street outside. Why, lucky Artalita Suryani even has her own adjacent karaoke room! How lovely!

But do not bank on your luck turning up trumps if you end up in trouble with one of the most corrupt, human rights abusing police in the world, oh no! These luxury "Tommy Suites", so called because they are where Tommy Suharto spent his short amount of time after arranging and paying to have a judge murdered; these are reserved for Jakarta's elite [sic]. Corrupt members of the corrupt society that afflicts everyday Indonesians who get publicly caught out and with that need to be punished without being so; so Indonesia can claim it is fighting draft, etc. The fact is the whole Indonesian state system is corrupt from the top down, so they can not really convict these crooks unless they defrauded the state without consent, without being a part of the corruption pyramid scheme. If they convicted someone from within the ranks they might squeal, so they do a deal, and that deal involves spending time in a Tommy Suite until your appeal is guaranteed to acquit you.

Remember Marwoto Komar, the Garuda pilot who crashed his plane in 2007 crash at Yogyakarta airport killing 21 people. Remember how his legal fees were paid, almost certainly by Garuda. Remember how he wore his Garuda pilot's uniform to court even though Garuda said they had suspended and fired him? Remember how he left court having been convicted smiling, boasting he would soon be free. Marwoto Komar enjoyed a few months in a Tommy Suite and now he is free, acquitted as he predicted. Not only that, we learn he is to be allowed to fly again! So why did Marwoto Komar get the special treatment? Why, because state airline Garuda had a pilot's bonus scheme that caused the crash, that's why! Pilots were paid a bonus if they did not go round on landing a second time, because this saved fuel. About $20 is what Marwoto Komar is believed to have killed 21 people for. But Indonesia could not admit the truth so he had a sham trial and became a special inmate.

Of course first, in the morning of the 11th January 2010, Untung Sugiyono the Indonesian penitentiary director general denied any such luxury prioson cells existed. But as the news and evidence was already in the public domain, it was mearly minutes before both the Indonesian president and Justice and Human Rights Minister Patrialis Akbar admitted there were luxury suites at most if not all the main Javanese prisons, so as not to be caught lying themselves. But this is a road to nowhere because it is every bent official's insurance policy, and as every Indonesian official is bent the practice is hardly likely to change. The "We will do everything possible (with BS)" now starting with Patrialis Akbar stating there will be an investigation "But firstly we will review the level of violation"; ah, the good old Indonesian "review".

Remember this when you go to Bali / Indonesia. Remember what these scum bags get up to, often against foreigners like yourself. Give a thought to all those not so special inmates because their lives are hell. And boycott Indonesia, that includes Bali as well. You stop spending your tourist dollars there; you watch the changes!

Missing Australian federal travel warnings to Bali

Following the debacle of the terror warnings for Bali on New Years Eve, given out by the Bali Tourism Board of all people (what they know about terrorism can be written with a water based felt tip pen on a plastic Australian five dollar bill) in the name of Made somehow now Mangu Pastika, Bali governor, former police chief, as bent as they come and who denies he made such a warning. We decided to look at the Australian Government's "Smart Traveller" advisory page for Indonesia (yes folks, that include Bali) and sure enough, the Australian federal mutts had repeated this unsubstantiated piffle from a bunch of drunken hoteliers on their site. It is not that we disagree a pronounced terrorist threat exists for Bali, it is just "What the hell are the Australian Government doing? Is this the extent of their expertise in assessing terrorist threats against their citizens?" It hardly gives you any confidence in their "system" does it? Especially as the garbage remained on their site until January 5th!

Anyway, we noticed many of the threats to Australian citizen's health and safety were not even mentioned on the Australian government's travel site. I mean we are talking about well documented factual risks here, not perceptions or wacko reports by Bali's hoteliers. So we decided to email the Australian Consulate in Bali to ask why their warnings were short on the risks faced by Aussie passport holders going to Bali. Of course we knew they would not answer and didn't, or rather haven't yet. Suspecting the reason for omitting these areas of risk was due to politics being more important then their own citizen's lives. Playing the Javanese game of silence, not responding to questions which show them to be frauds. Not able to deny the nasty facts regarding risks while in Bali. Only able to keep quiet, like thieves caught in the act.

We have put our questions below. Please, email the Australian Consulate yourselves and see if you can get them to reply! Their email address is Bali.congen@dfat.gov.au

Here is our unanswered email;

Hello
http://www.smartraveller.gov.au/zw-cgi/view/Advice/Indonesia
You do not warn Australian citizens about corruption.
You do not warn Australian citizens about having narcotics planted on them by police protected dealers and customs officials.
You do not warn Australians that Bali is a UN pedophile black spot and even luxury hotel crèches (where Australian children have previously been raped and infected with STD's) are not to be trusted.
You do not warn Australians that they should pay bribes to police or risk going to jail.
You do not warn Australians about the visa scam operated by immigration officers.
You do not warn Australians they could be jailed for complaining under Indonesia's criminal libel laws.
You do not warn male Australians that while homosexuality is legal in Indonesia, somehow sodomy is not, and they should only practice oral sex or face arrest.
You do not warn Australians that the UN has stated Bali's police commit torture including beatings, rapes and shootings.
You do not warn Australians that "policing" in villages is delegated by the POLDA to vigilantes and to be careful of ex-judicial problems.
You do not warn Australians about villa scams, where people try to sell them villas / land they can never own under Indonesian law.
You do not warn Australians that most of the luxury hotels in Bali, especially Nusa Dua, are owned by criminals (e.g. certain members of the Suharto family) and are thereby funding crime.
You do not warn Australians that you will sell them out like pawns if they get into trouble with the police / justices, even when these "officers of the law" act outside it.

There's plenty more of course.

You know, all the things the Indonesians do not want you to say.
Are you taking bungs?
Would like to know why you do not warn Australians fully.
R.S.V.P.
Mr. Bollocks

Bali Terror Threats

If I can be accused (by the self-serving supporters of abuse in Bali) of talking bollocks, what then of the Bali Tourism Board's "well" timed New Year's Eve message; “The Governor of Bali Mr. Mangku Pastika wishes to share a message with all of us: ‘There is an indication of an attack to Bali tonight, but please don’t panic, but put your security system to full alert.”

I have some questions.
1) How come Pastika no longer calls himself Made Pastika like he used to?
2) How come Pastika's office denies he made this statement? Did someone make it all up or is Made Pastika mentally ill; he has been looking a little gaunt lately!
3) How come the Bali Tourism Board are now responsible for issuing terror threat warnings to the Australian Government, who repeated these warnings on their Smart [sic] Traveller web site?
4) Why would the governor of Bali issue terror warnings anyway, surely it should be the job of the Bali mafia police?
5) Isn't this 11th hour or rather 59th minute warning like Bali's tsunami warning system, a little too late to protect anyone?!
6) Where do you get one of these security systems the Bali Tourism Board speak of, so we can all turn them to full alert?
7) What confidence does this give you about the security in Bali if there is not so much as a credible warning system in place? The Australian authorities taking notice of a bunch of drunken hoteliers! The Balinese police being unaware of and predictably not responding to the threat?

Sounds like comedy central to me. Trouble is, it is your lives you entrust to these clowns when you go to Bali.

Kuta Bali, just another sex holiday destination

Bali continues to show it is far from the tropical island paradise portrayed by the self-serving tourism industry, that it is just another tacky cheap thrill, cheap sleazy sex destination like Patong in Phuket, from which many parallels can be made.

Here now the case of 41-year-old female Japanese "tourist" Hiromi Shimada, brutally murdered in her holiday home in Moral Cesspit and Cheap Tackville on the Sea, Kuta. Two Indonesian male suspects arrested. A knife and a used condom taken as evidence; thank you Bali POLDA (police), we all wanted to know that! The Balinese police also allowing unlawful disclosures about "confessions" made by one of the two men to be released to the media; "I did not kill her! My friend was with her in the bathroom and then she come out covered in blood!" Was Ms. Shimada having a threesome? I doubt the Balinese tourist police (actually tourism industry police) will disclose this as it would be bad for business. The term "Kuta Cowboys" saved for the dribblings of Australian tourism blogs.

Just like the so called "Jewel of the Andaman Sea" Patong, a byword for prostitutes, garb, transvestites and dumb tourists, Kuta is a Balinese public toilet; cheap tropical destination for foreign men and women mostly past their sell by date looking for orgasm rather than organic. Surrounded by drones of "party" minded red necks and substance fuelled youngsters all somehow seeing the Kuta area as an experience to be enjoyed time and time again.

Perhaps it is the malarial mosquito infested water ditches around the outskirts of Kuta, Legian and Seminyak that attracts them? Or the police protected drug and prostitute peddlers that adorn every main tourist walk-by route in Kuta that makes it so charming? Or the polluted ocean where fishing is illegal because of the severe bacterial contamination courtesy of untreated sewerage? Or the rip-off, fake garbage sold in virtually every shop?

The police story about poor Hiromi Shimada now suddenly having changed. Gone from many Indonesian newspaper sites are the statements about a used condom being taken as evidence. Now the official line is the evidence points to her having been robbed and raped. Either way, it does not work, does it? If Hiromi was nothing more than the victim of a crime, what an awful yet typical Balinese investigation and police statement regarding a used condom being taken as evidence. On the other side, the statement having been made and documented, are we to somehow believe the rapists were so caring as to use condoms yet then go on to murder her? The truth for the sake of the tourism industry will likely never be known.

Where did you go for holiday?
Kuta Bali!
Urgh, good bye!

Addendum
Bali's mafia (police) are now saying Hiromi Shimada was a resident of Bali for 10 years, though it seems she was more a frequent visitor. Additionally, reports in the likes of the Bali Post are stating nothing of hers was actually taken, so the robbery modus operandi for the murder statement by the police seems to be very much in question, like most of what the POLDA say and do.

Indonesian prison deaths

According to the Indonesian directorate general of penitentiaries, Untung Sugiyono admitted on Thursday that an incredible 778 prisoners died in Indonesian jails in 2009; mostly from "illness" (disease). 509 of these died within their first 6 months of prison life!

Indonesian jails are infested with malaria, dengue, drug immune TB, HIV / AIDS. Indonesian jails are overfull, packed to the seams against people's basic human rights. Crime in Indonesian jails is endemic; you have to rent the space on the floor to place your matress from the cell boss. Homosexuality and sexual abuse is above the world average in Indonesia; their jails are even worse. Prison food is designed to be inedible, infested, contaminated with prison guards urinating and deficating on it; not that it is wholesome to start off with. So prisoners need to buy food as well. The UN representative for torture has stated that beatings, rapes and shootings are frequently carried out in Indonesian jails by police, including Bali.

The Indonesian justice [sic] system is one of the most corrupt in the world where the guilty of Indonesia imprison the innocent. Indonesian police can and do fabricate reasons to arrest people where they can imprison them for 90 days (60 days with a virtually automatic extension of 30 days) without charge; 90 days to extract a false confession from a person which the police are renowned for attempting.

Remember this when you go to Bali. Think of the poor souls your own governments have sold out on like common whores (the Bali Nine and Schapelle Corby for example). Remember drug dealers are the friends and sponsors of Bali's corrupt police; so called officers of the law who run and protect brothels. Remember drugs can be planted on you. Remember false criminal charges for just saying what you believe can be brought against you.

Is it worth taking such risks to go to Bali? Is it right to engratiate the Indonesian dogs of Bali with your tourist dollars? Remember who actually owns all the big hotels in Bali. When you go to Bali you afflict the Balinese and sell out to the devil.