Warmadewa dynasty ruled
Bali for almost 4 decades from 913 AD until 1345 AD, when
Majapahit kingdom annexed Bali after defeating the last Bali
king named Sri Asta Sura. Writer present Bali king and it's
periodization in a separate writing, and if you would like
to have a glance on Balinese king, can be browsed from this
article index by clicking " See other articles "
Sanur village in the past was known as the stronghold of black magic masters.
All Bali have known this story, that the most feared magician was from Sanur.
The place along the beach was believed to be the playing ground of those
invisible practitioners. Rumors said it was often happened a war among magicians.
The most wide spread Sanur magic war was in 1975. It was said that when
the dark is started along the beach of Sanur can happened that a ball of
light flashing over the trees or even the Bali Beach hotel rolling down
as big and height as one meter, or a ball of light flying over trees diminishing
and disappeared in the darkness, or two balls of light colliding each other
then broken into sparkling peaces of lights like fire explosive art work
during a festival. It was believed that the Sanur magicians was in war with
magicians from Kamasan, in Klungkung, where was also the famous stronghold
of the black magic. This scaring story about Sanur has been so deep in the
mind of Balinese, so in the past whatever the situation was, they would
avoid having dealt with people from Sanur in the sense of making conflict.
According to the common people in Sanur, they did not feel that the magician
was their expert, and they did believe that was belong to only certain people
that was specifically studying or inherited from their mastering parent.
Based on the attribute given to the village of Sanur, a film for entertainment
was made in 1980 describing the behavior of the " leak " ( leak
mean black magic master ). This film was so popular especially in Indonesia
and Australia, since one of the main figure was an Australian lady. This
film is also believed to promote Bali very effectively, so Bali was become
the second home for Australian. The name of Sanur, actually does not refer
only one village, but it denotes at least 4 villages those are Anggarkasih
village in Northern Sanur, Banjar Taman, also North Sanur, Banjar Semawang,
South Sanur, and Bet Ngandang area, the south west of Sanur. All these village
is under Perbekel government called Perbekalan Sanur. According to the tradition
the Perbekel, the head of Perbekel goverment was trusted to a Brahmana cast
which is still until now. The tradition said that the area of Sanur was
trusted to a Brahmana cast to manage. We we see, that the village of Sanur
has many Brahmana families, and now most of the business enterprises in
Sanur belong to Brahmana family. This is a shifting paradigm of traditional
meaning of cast in Bali.
In 1904 the Dutch Colonial Administration claimed that the people of Sanur
had plundered a Chinese wrecked ship of " Sri Kumala". The king
of Badung after organizing a check to their people in Sanur he in contrary
found that the people in Sanur were helping the crew for salvation of the
ship, and refused the claim of the Dutch. But the Dutch was insisting that
according to the Chinese owner of the ship he was plundered. The Dutch got
their point to start attacking Bali. The first army garnizun was dropped
in Sanur, and the army damaged the the village of Sanur, Badung, and Kesiman.
In 1906 after the fierce battle, the king of Badung decided to fight with
the last drop of blood followed by all family and the soldiers. This battle
is famous as the Puputan Badung. Beginning of 1930 the name of Sanur started
to be known by at least world anthropologists, painters and writer who put
special attention to Sanur, or even built their refuge in Sanur. Dr. Jack
Mershon and his anthropologist wife, Jane Bello an American anthropologist,
Ms. Vicki Baum known with Balinese name as Ketut Tantri a writer of the
Revolt in Paradise, Belgian painter Jean Mark Le Mayeur de Bruxelles, followed
by Australian painter and collector Ian Farweather, and Donal Frend. They
have made the name of Sanur become more and more known by people outside
Indonesia, and Sanur was visited by celebrities of the world. We can not
forget also the work of earlier anthropologist and archaeologist who have
dedicated themselves to disclosed the historical and cultural aspects of
Bali, wrote it in a book, and spreaded it to the world, such as Prof. J
Krom, Prof. JL Brandes, Thomas Stanford Raffles, Prof. Van Stein Callenfels,
Prof. Swellengrebel, Dr. Stutterheim, Prof. J. G. de Casparis, Prof. Charles
Damais, Dr. Urs Remseyer and still many others. Sanur, The Traditional Village
and Modern HotelsFrom the village of magicians, an equalizing beach, and
the heritage of Le Mayeur, a Belgian painter married Balinese woman and
a famous dancer. Today Sanur is more a relaxing places than any other resorts,
where business is closed, and hotels have wider space. Sanur hotels have
better image as for higher class travelers, despite the fact that seen from
the quality of hotels compared to other resorts in Bali, Sanur hotels are
almost at the same level. There are simple Sanur hotels, Medium category
Sanur hotels, and deluxe Sanur hotels. It was probably the image is come
from the fact that in Kuta as the most developed tourist resort attracts
various level of society, even the bigger numbers are more or less hippies.
Deluxe Sanur hotels are not many such as Grand Bali Beach, Bali Hyatt, Sanur
Beach, Raddin hotels, and Radisson hotel and Apartment ( now Sanur Plaza
hotels and Apartment ). these Sanur hotels have from the beginning have
been hosting travelers from U.S.A, Japan, and Europe. At the same era with
Grand Bali Beach, there is a popular villa of Tanjung Sari as one of Sanur
hotels collection, which is now already fade un-maintained. The space of
Sanur Hotels is normally wider compared to Kuta, and the development of
Sanur hotels has not as fast as Kuta also, the space can be maintained to
be easier to breath. Around the Sanur hotels there are still high tress,
flowers and open space do not yet developed into concrete construction.
Hopefully Sanur hotels environment could be maintained for decades before
any breakthrough in Bali economy be found, as tourism might not be sustainable.
|