Alistair G. Speirs

You may have heard of, or possibly even seen, tourists behaving badly here in beautiful Bali. It’s kind of hard to understand why because everything is pretty good here (well, except for maybe the traffic…). There really is no reason to misbehave or be disrespectful. But it does happen and seems even to be on

I set out 8 years ago now to embrace the concept of sustainability and try to bring it to as many people as possible, first of all by education, though a series of very well-attended seminars and conferences, covering important subjects like Sustainable Fashion, Sustainable Buildings and Architecture, and How to Create Smart Cities. Then

Do you know how Google Maps works? It is absolutely brilliant, but I have absolutely no idea how it operates! I imagine that there is GPS positioning that somehow tells my phone where I am, which also  somehow knows when I tell my phone where I am and somehow when I tell it to go

I perhaps should not tell you this, but I didn’t really want to start NOW! Bali. I was perfectly happy publishing two marvellous magazines called Jakarta Java Kini (JJK) and Hello Bali, but my partner at the time had other ideas and took over the company, leaving me with a bit of a dilemma since

Sustainability is, thankfully, all the rage these days, as people finally get to grips with their personal and corporate responsibilities to the planet and to the communities in which they live. Some people measure their personal carbon footprint to try to limit the damage they do to the environment through travelling by plane, train or

Sounds like a food processing factory, doesn’t it? But that’s not what I’m talking about; it all refers to our much loved, but not much cared for, destinations, here in Indonesia, and to a great extent, all over the world.  I used to be in the insurance business and we spent a lot of time

Do you instinctively know if something is right or possibly more easily feel it when something is wrong? Do you stop and go “hmmm, that ain’t quite right”. Or are you a “shrugger” and just say it’s really not your business? I’m afraid I am very much one of the former. I spend a lot

This article is available as a Podcast episode. Listen here: 2022 was an important year of recovery for Bali and, with a sigh of relief, we can see that the economy has bounced back and that the business, communities and individuals are not only surviving, but thriving! How far we have come from the desperate

Every day we make choices in our lives that affect the environment, the climate and other species that we share in this amazing world with. But there’s actually a lot more that we can do to reduce our environmental footprint to leave more room – and better conditions – for wild animals and plants. Of course,

We are now beginning to see a few good initiatives taking place for the reopening of Bali. There are flights coming in — thanks to Garuda Indonesia, as well as Singapore Airlines, who have been huge supporters over the years which most will not remember, but they gave away 1000 seats after the Bali bombings