Collapsing walls!
Next to my house a new villa complex is being built. They have a solid boundary wall to mark their land. Made from brick and about 10 foot tall, it surrounds their construction. Well, it did, until it suddenly collapsed!
It had started leaning off to the side for a day or so, and the builders decided to reinforce it by placing a single bamboo pole against the side of the wall that is over 30 metres long!
It didn’t work! There was a loud noise and I came outside to see the wall had collapsed. Fortunately, there was no-one around at the time. The workers started building it back up (in exactly the same way as it had been built) within a day or two. I wonder how long it will take before it collapses again.
This was a little reminder that building standards in Bali vary dramatically! If you are thinking of building in Bali and want to ensure you don’t have any unpleasant surprises (or much much worse), I definitely recommend getting a copy of our How to Build and Buy in Bali guide. Learn the tricks to avoid the dodgy builders and scammers, and make sure your build your dream home on time and on budget.
Celebrating Galungan
Galungan was just celebrated in Bali. It is one of the biggest ceremonies in Bali. Like many a celebration, it marks the victory of good over evil. The streets are lined with stunning colourful decorated bamboo poles called penjor. I love driving around my local neighbourhood at this time of the year!
Rainy season preparations
When most people think of Bali, they usually think of hot and humid days. And for most of the year, I’m happy to report that image is correct. But in the rainy season, things can be different.
Traditionally, the rainy season ran from around November to February. If all went well, it rained for a couple of hours a day, usually in the late afternoon. There were some times when it could rain almost continuously for 2 weeks, but that was rare. However, last year’s rainy season was extremely mild, so the traditional rainy season seems to be changing.
With that in mind, I decided to start preparations for the next rainy season now, because who knows when it may start.
The major preparation is preparing our villa’s flat roof for the torrential rain that can occur. That flat roof takes in the full sun all year, and we have found that long narrow hairline cracks appear each year.
So we need to strengthen the roof each year and ensure there are no leaks that will eventually run down into the rooms below. We’ve done the same treatment successfully since we built the villa and it seems to be working well.
Step one is to get up on the roof and look for those hairline cracks. Then we hand chisel them to open them up a little more and fill them with concrete. The next step, after the concrete has dried, is to cover it with a special combination of waterproof polymer. After that dries, then the roof is painted with a waterproof exterior paint.
We also have to check our tiled roof regularly. It’s difficult to get up into the triangular roof space, but once you’re there, broken tiles are easy to spot as the sunlight peaks through the cracks and they are easy to see in the usually dark space.
Dengue fever
My husband just got struck down with a case of dengue fever. Fortunately, he didn’t require hospitalisation, but it was an unpleasant 10 days spent in bed.
There seems to be a few more cases than usual these days, so remember to take all the recommended precautions to avoid mosquitoes.
Stay safe out there!
Lots of love, Sheila
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