Bali Raw Read online

  Contents

  PROLOGUE

  Surviving the Kuta Carnival

  Turn the Other Cheek

  When the Bell Tolls

  Losing Helmets

  Sour Chocolate

  Smoke and Mirrors

  From Paris with Love

  Girls Just Want to Have Fun

  He is Heavy and He’s not My Brother

  The Demise of an English Rose

  A Soft Touch

  Get Mad and Get Even

  Spatial Awareness

  The Prostitute Girlfriend

  A Lesson from Billy

  Violence in the Street

  Thumbs up

  Mike Tyson with a Machete

  Yank the Yank

  Fallen Angel

  From The Mouths of Babes

  Pool Hi-jinks

  Monkey Tail and the Legend of The Grey Sardine

  Big Berlin Bouncers Date Ladyboys

  Empty Barstool

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT MONSOON BOOKS

  COPYRIGHT

  I ams what I ams … yuk, yuk, yuk

  Popeye the Sailor

  I am a good person but I do bad things sometimes

  I am at best a good and bad person, aren’t we all?

  The author

  Prologue

  Since the early twentieth century and the Golden Age of Hollywood, Bali has been portrayed to the world as the paradise of paradises. But Bali is also violent, ugly and distasteful and living in Bali can be a game of survival.

  This is the Bali that I know and that I have called home for almost a decade, a Bali where the fittest survive and those with the biggest wallet and the greatest connections endure.

  There may be parts of this book where the reader will not like the author or his actions and there are certainly parts that I did not want to include. For better or worse I have decided not to sacrifice candour for likeability, I want this story to be honest and that means sharing actions that I’m not necessarily proud of.

  This is the story of dog-eat-dog Bali, a palm-tree-laden prison where anything goes as long as you can afford it.

  This is Bali Raw.

  Surviving the Kuta Carnival

  Bagus Bar, Kuta

  “Would you like to live in Bali? This isn’t a gift, you’ll have to work and find yourself a role in the company. I’ll pay you a hundred dollars a week for the first year, same as I paid myself. You can rent a room in Kuta and the company will pay for it.”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t answer so fast, this isn’t a tropical holiday. Kuta is a shit hole, it’s a fucking sewer. You can get whatever you want but it comes at a price, a price I’m not willing to pay if things go wrong. I have worked too hard to have you come here and fuck it up for me.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m not joking; if you come here you will be expected to work. I will not accept drugs, I will not accept arguments and I will not accept you fucking up. You fuck up and it’s over, you’re my brother but one fuck up and I’ll send you home. I couldn’t give a shit.”

  “Yes.”

  “Time to take responsibility for yourself. I’m not bringing you out here so I can look after you. I’m here to work and make a go of things. If that’s what you want to come here for then OK, but if you want to come here and party, don’t. I don’t need it.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll get the paperwork sorted. When you get home, go to the Indonesian Embassy and apply for a six-month working visa, I’ll see you in a couple of weeks.”

  “Cheers, and thanks.”

  “Yeah, whatever, don’t fuck up.”

  That’s how the conversation went and I knew my brother meant exactly what he said. The company was going from strength to strength and I wasn’t really needed. I had no skills to offer other than the fact that I was a brother and although that brought with it 100% loyalty and a level of trust that could not be found outside my family it was not a marketable skill elsewhere.

  This may sound like an easy ticket but in my family being one of the brothers comes with its own responsibilities. During my life the respect of my counterparts was earned not gifted.

  This applied to the four of us brothers; we all had to stand alone before we could stand as a group. People often ask why we are so close. For me this is the reason: my brothers and I grew up in a tough environment and we formed a mutual respect built on each other’s solitary struggle. When you are living, working and partying in a place like Bali, being part of a family group like ours can be a very big asset.

  I felt I had been given huge respect when I was offered a position in a company that three of my brothers had built over the last three years, but I knew I would have to earn my keep.

  About two weeks before this meeting took place, I happened to be sitting in a bar in Bali when Billy, my younger brother, came storming in. I could see from Billy’s face that something was wrong. His expression was uncharacteristically serious, and he had a ready-to-take-care-of-business look.

  Billy didn’t mess about. He walked up to my table and said, “Nick’s in trouble, he’s with the cunt that glassed him. The fuck is bringing his Bali boys down to get him.”

  No other words were exchanged, they didn’t need to be. Billy walked out of the bar and hopped onto his motorbike and started the engine. I didn’t bother to pay my bill; I followed and jumped on the back.

  Billy gunned the engine and we took off through the back streets of Bali at a belting pace. This was serious. The person Billy was referring to had tried to murder my brother once before. Sitting on the back of that bike as we flashed through unfamiliar streets, I couldn’t help but wonder if my older brother was already being bashed by a group of Balinese gangsters.

  I have now lived in Bali for many years and the route we took that day is as familiar to me as the back of my hand, but at the time I didn’t know where we were going. All I remember is agonising that we would somehow become lost and not make it in time to help Nick.

  To this day I don’t know how we did make it. Billy drove like a maniac. The motorbike screamed in agony as we shot past cars, through alleyways and in front of trucks. More than once we came perilously close to having an accident.

  I was incredibly relieved when Billy finally pulled up at a set of traffic lights and pointed to a restaurant across the road. “He’s in there!” he shouted. I knew Billy would have to get the bike through the lights and across the road but I didn’t need to be told twice. I leapt off the back, kicked off my thongs and sprinted through the oncoming traffic towards the restaurant.

  I had no doubt Billy would follow as soon as he was able; he is one of the staunchest men I have ever met and there would be no stopping him once he could dump the bike. When I reached the restaurant door I yanked it open and charged inside. Nick was seated at a table and across from him sat a guy with a ponytail. “Motherfucker,” I screamed and rushed him.

  Eleven years ago, Nick and Billy started a successful business from scratch in Bali, an environment that is definitely not business friendly. After four years Nick took over the reins of the business and in the ensuing years he has had more things thrown at him than I believe any man or businessman should have to endure. But my brother Nick is a hard man; he never takes a backward step in life, in business or in a confrontation. Bali has done its best to tame Nick and it has failed. Somehow Nick has managed to knock down any obstacle that has been put in his way. Being stabbed in the throat with a broken Bintang beer bottle was one of those obstacles.

  There is a syndrome of Western men wanting to save Indonesian working girls that afflicts far too many expats in Bali. A bloke will go out with an Indonesian prostitute for a while, tell her to get off the game, give her a bundle of cash so she can afford to st
op working and then he will convince himself that she is being faithful. This works sometimes, but in my experience it happens rarely. Too often, the guy chooses the wrong kind of girl—the fact she is on the game to begin with should raise red flags—and he is surprised when the girl ends up back on the game as soon as his back is turned. The bloke that stabbed my brother in the neck happened to be dating an ex-working girl who was playing around and he settled on Nick as the guy she had cheated with. I will call this person Ankle as it sounds like his real name, and being lower than an arsehole it suits him.

  Nick tells me he didn’t have sex with Ankle’s girlfriend, and I have no reason not to believe him, but he’s also said to me, “Even if I did fuck her what would it matter? The girl was a hooker, she probably fucked a thousand blokes before Ankle and she probably fucked a thousand blokes after him.” Having lived in Bali for as long as I now have, I would certainly back this statement.

  Supposedly, Ankle was a gun runner out of Melbourne or Sydney and he considered himself well connected in Australia and in Bali. He had lived in Bali for some time so this was quite possible but it is wise to take any statement an expat makes about himself with a pinch of salt.

  Although I never saw Ankle standing and I would only meet him the one time, I would guess that he was about thirty-five and five ten in height. His build was slim but muscular. The main thing that stood out to me about Ankle was his long ponytail; I would notice this because I used it against him in our one and only encounter.

  One evening at Bounty nightclub, Ankle came up to Nick and accused him of sleeping with his prostitute girlfriend. Nick told Ankle in no short terms that he hadn’t slept with the girl and that Ankle should fuck off and find someone else to accuse. But Ankle wasn’t interested.

  Every time Nick turned around, Ankle was in his face. I know my brother well enough to understand that this is not a good idea. Nick has a quick temper and he doesn’t suffer fools gladly. Apparently Ankle came up to Nick three times before Nick decided he’d had enough.

  Nick asked Ankle to step outside the nightclub and they went down to Legian Street to sort out the problem. I will not go into the full details of the fight—I wasn’t present and fights are at best blurry occasions that most people have a hard time remembering, also the following events take precedent over fisticuffs in the street. Suffice to say, the fight between Nick and Ankle ended with Ankle being knocked down on the road and Nick deciding he had had enough and walking away.

  This is something Nick would later regret, as he tells it he had a chance to finish Ankle off but he took pity on the guy.

  “The guy was in love with a prostitute and I had just put him on his arse in front of her, how could I not feel sorry for him?”

  Ankle must have been deeply in love with this hooker because despite being let off with a few punches in a fair fight, he just wouldn’t let it drop.

  When the crowd had dispersed and Nick had left the scene Ankle picked up a Bintang beer bottle, and, smashing it to make a dangerous weapon, he followed Nick down the street. When Nick turned into an alley to make his way home, Ankle confronted him.

  Nick wanted none of it. To his mind he had beaten Ankle in a fair fight and he had let him off a more severe beating, by now he had walked a distance and he intended to get home and sleep off the incident. Nick didn’t realise Ankle was carrying a smashed bottle but he turned to face him in case he decided to attack.

  Ankle mouthed abuse and when he got too close for comfort Nick asked Ankle if he wanted to go another round. Nick didn’t want to fight but he could not see a way out of the situation; he’d put Ankle down once and he had no doubt he could do it again.

  Even armed, Ankle was afraid to confront Nick face to face. Ankle backed off and apologised. He then walked past Nick, keeping the broken bottle hidden at his side. Nick decided to let sleeping dogs lie; he walked off in another direction and entered another back lane that would take him to his hotel.

  Ankle attacked Nick from behind like a true coward. Nick didn’t hear him coming and was taken completely off guard. Ankle thrust the broken bottle into my brother’s neck when he wasn’t looking, he then ran away leaving my brother to die, abandoned in a Bali alley.

  Nick felt a mighty blow then fell to his knees. He watched as Ankle ran down the alley away from him. Nick reached up to his neck and found the wound, hot blood gushed down his arm, down his shirt and into the street. His hand slipped into the massive hole the broken bottle had left in his neck. He felt himself passing out and he thought he would die. He slumped against a wall unsure what had happened, then clutched at his neck and looked down at the ground. At his side he saw the broken Bintang bottle resting in a pool of his own blood.

  Nick told me that he thought it was all over but then suddenly an image of his children back in Australia came to him; he said he could imagine their devastation at hearing their father had died in an alley in Bali.

  That single thought pressed him into action.

  He forced himself to stand. He didn’t want to die, he wanted to make it back to the main street, he wanted to at least try and get himself help, but most of all Nick wanted to see his children again. He found his feet and using a wall to keep himself upright he managed to claw his way back to the lights of Legian Street. Doctors would later tell him that he should have died after the initial blow—his artery had been slashed and he would have endured massive shock. They said it was a miracle that he had survived let alone managed to do all he did after the attack.

  Nick has told me that death wasn’t an option, if only for his children he wasn’t going to allow that to happen. Somehow he made it to Legian Street, and as luck would have it a taxi pulled up and offered him a ride. He ripped open the door and thrust himself inside, screaming at the driver to take him to a hospital.

  The taxi driver saw the blood flooding from Nick’s neck wound and began to protest; he didn’t want Nick’s blood all over his car and he demanded Nick get out of the taxi. Nick screamed blue murder at the driver and he refused to get out. Nick then reached into his pocket and yanked out his wallet, there happened to be a bundle of cash inside, money for a building project.

  Nick threw the cash at the driver. “Get me to a hospital now!” he demanded.

  The driver grabbed the cash, gave it a quick count, then relented; he put his foot down and made his way to the nearest international hospital. The journey would normally take about fifteen minutes but due to the lateness of the hour and the taxi driver’s distress it probably took around ten.

  Nick lay back on the taxi seat, he knew he was in a very bad way. He was losing a lot of blood and he could possibly die, there was no one to help Nick but himself, he knew he had to stop the bleeding. He used the image of his children to keep himself going and with all the strength he could muster he reached for the wound and thrust his fingers into the gaping hole in his neck.

  Nick fumbled around and tried desperately not to pass out. Eventually he found what he believed to be the severed artery. He groped for both sides then clamped down tight on the severed ends, doing his best to stem the bleeding. Then he laid back and tried to relax so that he didn’t bleed out.

  He told me that he lost grip of his artery many times on the journey, each time he would go through the same process of frantically clamping the vessels shut while trying not to pass out.

  This took monumental courage, strength and will on his part and although he rarely talks about it, when it does come up, Nick always reiterates that it was the thought of his children losing their father and the effect it would have on them that pulled him through and kept him conscious despite the pain.

  Nick finally made it to the hospital only to be refused admission; the staff told Nick that his injuries were too severe and they did not have the equipment or expertise to operate.

  The hospital staff did however use their ambulance to rush Nick to Sanglah Public Hospital in Denpasar.

  When they arrived at Sanglah Hospital Nick was immediately w
heeled into the Emergency Department where he underwent surgery. The doctors and nurses at Sanglah did an amazing job; Australian doctors would later look at the surgery they had performed and marvel at their professionalism and ability despite their rudimentary equipment. They told him that he was a very lucky man to have had such people working on him.

  Nick had to endure numerous surgeries, he lost half his body weight and he now carries a twelve-inch jagged triangular scar running across the side of his throat and lower jaw line. He lived but it was a close call. He spent four weeks in an Indonesian hospital before he could fly home to Australia.

  Ankle on the other hand ran like a cockroach. He packed up his things and disappeared the following day. That was until about a year later when Nick had a chance encounter with him in an upmarket Bali restaurant. Nick and his wife had gone there to buy bread and, as they turned to leave, Nick saw Ankle trying to sneak out a back door. Nick grabbed him by his ponytail and forced him into a chair. “You owe me big time, motherfucker,” he said. Nick would not allow Ankle to leave and he told him as much; they could sort out the situation then and there by financial means or Nick would take Ankle into the carpark and injure him to the same level that he himself had been injured. Ankle did not know that Nick had already sent his wife to pay off the restaurant security staff.

  Nick’s wife is as tough and staunch a person as you are likely to meet. Ankle would not have been able to leave even if he’d tried but if he had managed to get past Nick and the security, I have no doubt that Nick’s wife would have tackled him to the ground.

  Nick has never gone into the full details of this first contact and I don’t blame him. Ankle had nearly killed him and it must have taken huge restraint not to attack and try to inflict a similar injury.

  This initial meeting went on for about ten minutes and while they spoke Nick noticed that Ankle was frantically sending out text messages. When he inquired about this, Ankle boasted that he had been in touch with his boys: Indonesian gangsters that doubled as security. He said they would be down at the restaurant to get Nick within ten minutes. Nick could have destroyed Ankle and made good his escape but that isn’t his style. He made a phone call of his own and five minutes later Billy entered the pub where I was drinking and we both jumped on his motorbike.