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With regard to the Lion crash, there are some similarities with the CAL crash. The aircraft missed the runway. It was the same type of aircraft (B 737-800) and it appeared the aircraft suffered a similar stress fracture – broken in two though at different locations. The good news, as in the Guyana crash, all the passengers and crew miraculously survived with a few broken limbs unlike in Guyana where only one person suffered a broken leg.
Bali is a lovely tourist island, attracting over a million tourists annually including many Hindus from India and even some Indo-Caribbeans from Trinidad, England and America. People are attracted to its magnificent holy temples similar to how Hindus are attracted to the ancient temples of India.
Bali is a very spiritual island and has very close links with Hinduism (the Garuda bird, the official bird of Indonesia, has important relevance to Hindus as the Gods depended on them to move around) and Bali was at one time a Hindu Kingdom.
It is officially a Hindu island with over 80% of the population subscribing to Hinduism. Almost everyone, including Muslims, knows the epic saga of the Ramayana, and Ramayana plays are commonly staged all over the island (at every hotel) throughout the day.
The adherents of Hinduism are more spiritual than us in Guyana or in India or among Guyanese in America. The people take their worshipping very seriously and at some temples, only well attired Hindus are allowed inside.
As in Guyana, people are beautifully dressed in traditional garb to attend temples. Weddings are conducted in temples and are often open to the public as in Guyana. There are numerous temples all over the island and, as in Guyana, almost every Hindu has a little mandir in front of their home or inside the home. I was rejected entrance at the holiest temple the first time I visited because I did not have on a kurtha. My wife was rejected at another temple because she had on jeans. In subsequent visits, we made sure we had traditional Indian garb.
As Hindus do in Guyana, people perform poojas on the beach regularly with offerings of flowers, cloth, food and prasad.
As we do in Guyana, garlanding officials and using mala for murthis are common. Early in the mornings, there are huge gatherings at various locations on the beach with pandits leading them in prayers and broadcast over speakers. They are similar to Ganga pooja in Guyana with flowers floating in the water.
I attended quite a few of these Ganga poojas in Bali and they are similar to Guyana’s with distribution of Prasad, offerings, burning of incense, camphor, samagri, etc., though performed in ancient Balinese and Sanskrit languages.
As in India, there are holy rivers and holy fountains and lakes. People from India as well as Hindus from England come for holy baths. I had one myself in the chilly water. The Lion crash took me by surprise as I am familiar with the Bali International Airport and I also recently flew on Lion, a low-cost carrier competing with others in the rising Asian aviation market.
I flew to Bali for anthropological field research and vacation a few times with international as well as domestic carriers. Singapore, the world’s best airline, took me there a few times as did Garuda, the national carrier of Indonesia. Garuda used to fly to the U.S. and Europe but was banned because of safety issues as are other Indonesian carriers.
Bali is a safe airport with a huge runway. But it is also a relatively busy airport that handles dozens of flights daily from all over Asia, Australia, New Zealand and Europe and the staff, immigration agents and customs officers at the airport are very warm and friendly, much
friendlier than at any airport in the Caribbean.
It is strange for an aircraft to miss the runway. Although Lion has safety issues and was banned from flying into Europe, I recently flew on Lion from Bali to Jakarta and it was incident- free.
No one (not even the foreigners on board like me) ever complained about safety issues while I was in Bali. The departure to Jakarka, a magnificent city, was delayed because of the late arrival of the aircraft but the service was very good, much better (for a very short flight with unlimited drinks and snacks) than those Caribbean regional carriers. The crew was a lot friendlier than those in the Caribbean.
It is hoped that the owners of the carrier would focus more attention on safety issues for it is difficult to understand how and why a new aircraft missed the runway.
