Hotel K: The Shocking Inside Story of Bali’s Most Notorious Jail

Walking near Monkey Forest I found a small bookstore, so of course I wandered in and bought a book to read by my rice paddy pool. When most people think of Bali they think of sunshine and rainbows, yoga and surfing, a paradise on earth. Hotel K: The Shocking Inside Story of Bali’s Most Notorious Jail is so intriguing as it provides a rare glimpse into the sinister side of Bali; the dark underbelly, what happens when hedonism goes too far. Australian journalist Kathryn Bonella shows us what goes on within the walls of Bali’s infamous prison and the Indonesian criminal justice system. Inside Hotel Kerobokan we meet prostitutes and drug traffickers, rapists and surfers, hapless tourists who ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time. We learn about their sex lives; the babies conceived and aborted in prison, their addictions; fed by a steady stream of drugs circulating around the cells; their crimes; ranging from petty theft to bomb blasts, their escape attempts and suicide attempts, their sentences. Some of the stories are so extreme and Bonella tells them so vividly that it’s hard to believe they’re all true. There are even photos so you can see the bleak conditions in Hotel K and visualize the Australians, Indonesians, Brazilians, Italians and other inmates, all characters playing different roles in this story of Bali’s jail.

 This book sheds light on the some of the deeper-seated issues that Indonesia and its most loved island are struggling with, and provides a startling, eye-opening perspective.