Uluwatu, Bali

place to start what motivated you to make this film

oh cool uh hey jeff thank you so much for having me on uh i think with magic island i just like think for me it's been a way to sort of showcase how i'm feeling about everything that's happened around where i'm growing up and and the best way for me to sort of speak out in a way i thought was to tell the stories of the people who i thought were the most respected and most influential people who actually whose stories that i thought were like really special i thought the best way for me to in a way speak out about how I've been feeling without sounding like I'm like it's a hard thing because you know I'm not Balinese and I don't ever want to tell the Balinese people how to live or what they should do so I think my inspiration behind the film was to get the best people I could to tell their story and try to preserve what I can that I still find special in Uluwatu before it becomes something that it may not be anymore

tell us a bit about a few of the people that you interviewed some of your favorite characters and what they had to say

i think honestly like wayan triani she's a super og padang padang local her family has been in padang for like hundreds of years and i just think she's an incredible woman being able to talk to her go to her family home see her dad her dad on her like grandma who's like over 100 and speak to her about what the boot kit really used to be like was really amazing to me that was cool and then to have her like actually talk to us and get emotional and really like really i really appreciate her her part in the film it was super special also i really really love talking to gary benjikip i think he's doing incredible things in in bali not just bali but indonesia and get his perspective was really good he's someone that i really think can make a difference and i'm really like i think i'm really like inspired by him as as somebody who's a foreigner who's grown up in bali to actually go and and try to make a difference at like a federal level is incredible i think that's amazing so that was really cool

And I think that is your as you said, it's such a pure, incredible way to travel.

And yeah, like That's definitely one of the biggest things.

The biggest issue I think now in Uluwatu is that it's like people are going there now with money that just wanted to make more money.

They have no root connection.

I went to an event.

I met probably six or seven wonderful people at a social event here in Uluwatu, Bali.

And I made plans with all of them to kind of just connect and see who they were.

And over the course of this week, probably I made seven plans, I would guess, and all of them, literally all of them flaked.

I went to an event.

I met probably six or seven wonderful people at a social event here in Uluwatu, Bali.

And I made plans with all of them to kind of just connect and see who they were.

And over the course of this week, probably I made seven plans, I would guess, and all of them, literally all of them flaked.

Bali's provincial government says it has held discussions with eight major online travel agencies, including Airbnb, Agoda, and Booking.com, and that the platforms agreed to stop marketing unlicensed accommodation in Badung, Denpasar, Ginya, and Tabernan.

These areas encompass many of Bali's principal accommodation markets, including Canggu, Seminyak, Uluwatu, Jimbaran, Nusadur, Sanur, Ubud, and parts of Bali's developing Western Corridor.

The government also says approximately 5,000 businesses applied for licenses during 2025 and 2026.

These are government-reported developments, and the consistency and speed of implementation still need to be monitored.

Can the location actually support the investment? A recent discussion in Badung offers a useful way to think about that.

Badung is a local government area covering many of Bali's best non-tourism destinations, from Canggu, Seminyak and Kuta to Jimbran, Nusa Dua and Uluwatu.

It also extends further inland and north where new tourism destinations are being considered.

At a tourism forum on 16 September, Badung's government set out a shift towards quality, sustainable tourism.

It was, like, some random Wednesday.

And I go, I just really feel like I'm supposed to be down in Uluwatu.

And for context, I currently am living in Bali.

I live in a place called Canggu.

And Uluwatu is about two hours down south.

It's more like the cliff beach side of Bali.

Like, if you want to go hang out on the beach, you go down there.

You don't really hang out on the beaches up here.

I'm actually lying because what I've actually seen it do a really good job is, uh, I've seen someone trying to book one of our sort of hero flash deals and some of our deals, they sell out pretty quickly or the dates go.

So what the, and somebody wants to travel to Seminyak and Usta and Uber.

And what was able to do was Say, I want to book three of great luxury scapes deals.

I want to go sometime in August.

They're really on it.

Like, sometimes, too, like, I've noticed a lot when I'm just on the streets riding around or doing my thing or even around my Uluwatu surf fellas or anything, I notice, like, I'll be like, oh, these guys, there's a lot of older elders, you know, and I've noticed, okay, this guy might... not know too much of surfing.

You know, he sure doesn't know who I am.

Like, who knows? But I'm like, does he know, like, who, like, sometimes I'll think, do these old school guys know, like, Jerry Lopez? Like, if Jerry just walked up or, like, Whoa, so he is talking about the OGs.

Well, this is what was reported in the Weekend Australian national newspaper, uh, just last weekend.

When five prominent Australian businessmen, two of them celebrated surfers, invested $5 million in a Rip Curl venture at Bali's surf mecca of Uluwatu, it seemed like a smart idea.

Like Gold Dust, the surf brand wove its magic drawing thongs to a lifestyle hub housing a restaurant, surfboard store, and Rip Curl memorabilia shop when it opened last year on the South Bukit Peninsula.

The Dharma experience, the venue that includes Rip Curl Uluwatu is hailed by trip.com as a, quote, "Sacred space, a temple of surfing where wave riders from all over the globe make their pilgrimage." But for the dream team of major shareholders, the magic has faded, turning into bitter legal disputes with claims of extortion, disappointment and disappearance of company funds.

Weathering the storm are Doug "Claude" Warbrick, 83-year-old founder of the now global empire Rip Curl, Paul Birkelaur, managing director of Birkelaur Books, David Cullen, founder and CEO of development group Oakstand, Peter Grant, founder of Domain Projects, salesandrealestateprojects.au, and Dean Morrison, professional surfer.

Together they have assets of at least a billion dollars, Mr.

"When we said we wanted to do an audit on the business she cut off all accounting.

She hasn't given us our books back and it's been a clusterfuck ever since." Mr.