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The village where it started

The first place I stayed for any length of time was [[NEEDS INPUT: the village]]. Not a resort. A family compound off a lane too narrow for a car, with a temple at one end and rice at the other. I rented a room from a family who had never had a foreigner under their roof, and neither of us really knew what we were doing.

Mornings started with the offerings being laid out and the roosters arguing. The grandmother fed me before I was awake enough to say no. Within a week I knew which warung did the good sate and which one to walk past. Within a month I had stopped counting the days.

I want to be clear about what I’m not saying. I’m not saying I found myself. I found a place where people were kind to a stranger for no reason, and I found out I would rather be there than almost anywhere else.

Everything I got wrong in year one

I did the lot. I hired a scooter in my first week with no licence and no idea. I came off it on a wet corner at roughly walking pace, in front of a school, and the only thing hurt was my pride. I have not ridden one since, and nobody on our trips ever has to.

Money. I paid the first price I was told for everything, for months: the airport taxi, a sarong, a special price on a day trip that was special for the other bloke. I changed cash at a booth with a great rate on the sign and walked out short by a third. I felt stupid, and I was.

Food. I ate at the place with the laminated photo menu because it looked safe, and it was not. The family I lived with ate at a warung with no menu at all and were never sick. It took me too long to work out which of those was the lesson.

And the fixer. Early on I trusted a man who said he could sort anything, and he could, for a fee he mentioned only afterwards. I paid it once and learned. The people who actually sorted things for me never called themselves fixers: they were the family, the neighbour with a car, and the driver a friend had vouched for.

The first trip I ran

The first trip I ran was for [[NEEDS INPUT: who the first trip was for]]. They had been saying “we should come and see you” for years, and I had been saying “you should” without ever making it easy for them. Then they booked flights, and I had a few weeks to turn a decade of favourite places into something two people could do without getting hot, lost or ripped off.

So I sat down and wrote a plan. Which temple at what time, so they would have the water at Tirta Empul almost to themselves. Which driver, which warung, and which nights to do nothing at all. I booked ground-floor rooms without being asked, because I knew the stairs.

Two things happened. They had the trip I had wanted them to have for ten years. And every friend of theirs who saw the photos asked the same question: can you do that for us?

That question is the whole business. Not “can you show us Bali”, because anyone can do that. “Can you make it easy, can you keep us safe, and will you be there.” Yes, yes and yes.

What the guides taught me

Everything worth knowing, I learned from the guides. Not from books, and not from other tourists.

I learned that the best time at any temple is the hour before the buses, and the second-best time is the hour after they leave. I learned that a warung is safe when the pots are going and the locals are queuing, and to walk past the empty one with the big sign. I learned what the offerings at the gate mean, and that most visitors never ask.

I also learned how the money moves. Who gets paid when a coach pulls into a craft village, and who does not. That is why our guides are named on this site, with their photos, and paid properly. When you tip a guide on one of our trips, it is on top of a fair wage, not instead of one.

Mostly they taught me patience. Things happen when they happen. A ceremony closes a road, you go the long way, and you see something better. The plan is a starting point. The guides are why it turns out well anyway.

Why I still do it

I could run a bigger operation. More coaches, more people, less of me. The reason I don’t is simple. The thing people thank me for at the end of a trip is never the temples.

It is that they never once had to work out what to do next. Nobody was on their feet for hours. Nobody had to find a doctor on their own. Someone from home was in the seat in front, and that person answered the phone.

I like being that person. I like the moment on day three when a couple who arrived nervous stop asking what is happening and start asking what is for dinner. I like showing people who have thought about Bali for years the version I fell for in that first village.

Twelve people at most, every trip, with me in the car. That is the size where I still know everyone’s name and everyone’s knees. I’m not planning to change it.