Embracing the Year of the Wood Dragon: Lunar New Year in Indonesia

Place to stay
The next one on the list is accommodation. It’s recommended for you to stay near the places you want to visit. The proximity of your place to attractions will ease your trips. For those who want to celebrate NYE around Canggu, we’ve got you covered with a list of villa recommendations to spend the night.  Check the list here.

The traffic
The traffic in Bali is inevitable, unfortunately, there is nothing you can do about it. However, you can still adjust your trips by keeping the most crowded places in mind. For instance, Canggu will be heavily crowded due to its location being near the renowned beach clubs –where people hold big events. The heavy traffic will also affect Seminyak, Kuta, and Denpasar (Puputan area).

It is recommended not to bring your car if you wish to visit these areas, you will be stuck for life (a year at max –pun intended). 

To adapt to the terrible traffic and keep your plans going, you can use Gojek. Gojek is a ride-hailing service for motorbikes. If you want to save your energy by not driving your scooter, Gojek is a good alternative. You can download the Gojek app on the Play Store and App Store. Another thing to prepare when using the ride-hailing apps is the e-wallet. You need to top up a certain amount of money. Unless you want to pay in cash, which will be too much of a hassle. Gojek has a payment method called Gopay, so you can link it right away by transferring the money from your bank account.

Be prepared to walk

Worst-case scenario, you will be stuck in crowded places where even your Gojek drivers won’t get through. You will have to walk anyway. Make sure to wear comfortable footwear to keep up with the walking distance. 

To conclude, to have a worry-free New Year’s Eve trip in Bali, these preparations will surely help you achieve that.

That increase correlated heavily with USA Government’s lifting its travel warning back in 2008. Since 2011, however, direct flights from China have played a more important role in Bali tourism than the US’s concern over the safety of its citizen. That year marked the day when for the first time China outranked Japan as the second biggest tourist exporter to Bali after Australia.

In 2013, 57.48% of tourists came from Asia Pacific (excluding those from South East Asia region that has its own category), followed by Europe with 22.19%, South East Asia countries (ASEAN) with 12.11%, and America 4.8% respectively. The rest is shared between African and Middle Eastern countries.

Indeed, statistically, China still has a long way to go before it can dethrone Australia as number one. However, given the increasing globetrotting trend in China, and love-hate relationships Australia has with Indonesia and Bali in particular (Schapelle Corby, anyone?), this is just a matter of “When?”, instead of “How?” Please also note that in 2013 alone, the total number of Chinese tourists is only half of the tourists from European countries combined together.

What Does It Mean to Bali Tourism?
We all need to study Mandarin that’s for sure. According to CNN, no less than 30,000 Chinese tourists came to the island last Lunar New Year (Year of the Whores Horse) and injected no less than 90 Million Dollars to Bali’s economy.
According to the same report, the Indonesia tourism board is currently trying to have reached a target of 1 million Chinese tourists by the end of 2014.
Boom. That’s a potential Bali tourism boom’s Second Coming, right there.
Soon, we may hear a lot of freelance drivers speaking broken Chinese instead of English everywhere in the island. Hotels, restaurants and clubs in Bali will need to carve special plans just to cater to these deep-pocketed, big spending and big-tipping Asians’ needs. Bali will need Mandarin-speaking tour guides and language teachers more than ever.

What Does it Mean to Real Estate Business?
Given that the real estate and property business is always being an offshoot of the Bali tourism industry, everything that happens in the latter will impact the former, sooner or later.

Today, we may not see a lot of Chinese buying property in Bali. However, I can already imagine, the makeshift signs placed by local makelar on electricity poles offering land for sale, villa for sale or villa for rent will have another space that reads 土地出售, 別墅出售 and 別墅出租 respectively. Yes, the day when those big-spender realize that instead of spending their vacation in hotels, they could do it in their own villas and make money off of it (by renting it to another party for example), a fierce property hunt will begin.

Property agencies need to anticipate this market shift before it’s happening. Forget the Australians and Europeans! (Well, not completely) Here comes the Chinese!

The Big Picture
Bali tourism industry could ride this ongoing trend to help build what many believe as a lack of infrastructure distribution.  The challenge is to provide a better service for everyone amid the widening cultural diversities. As a consequence, using the current tourists’ divisions: (Asians in the greater Sanur area, Westerners in the greater Kuta area) won’t suffice anymore. New tourism hubs need to be opened. Speaking of which, would you believe if I tell you that Sanur was once THE ONLY tourist hub/point of entry in Bali?

Cultural exchange, not only with locals, but fellow tourists from another cultural background can also be a great experience one could expect from having a vacation. This can be a key feature to promote Bali tourism further, beyond its natural and cultural beauty.
Of course, there’s still 50% chance that the upward trends of Chinese traveling to Bali are short-lasting. But still, doing nothing about a factor that, for example, was able to generate a staggering $4.04 billion to the Australian economy in 2013, would be a stupid thing to do.
For the Bali tourism industry, the rule of thumb is to ride the tide while it lasts, and while it’s there, make it lasts just a little bit longer.