#9 Signs of Similar Life Forms

It’s amazing what opens up when you are forced to try something new. Mostly self-doubt and regrets.

Temporarily leaving the formal education setting and dabbling into homeschooling opened up new circles. Or, more accurately, square pegs. We discovered ‘people’ out there that ‘worldschool’ their kids. 

School-less

Worldschooling is the grand idea that travel itself is the best education - immersing kids in different cultures, histories, and languages instead of confining them to a classroom. It’s about learning through real-world experiences, whether that’s exploring ancient ruins, navigating foreign markets, or confidently butchering a new language in front of locals. 

The goal is to foster adaptability, peak curiosity, and develop a global perspective, making the world the ultimate classroom. 

So, justified truancy.

Worldschooling hubs are scattered across the globe, offering networking and group learning opportunities. My ever enthusiastic wife reached out to the Bali charter -  probably in response to the first parent-teacher interview. Lo and behold, they have meetings arranged at least twice a week. Although I could present plenty of cons to this new experience, she ultimately decided that the kids desperately needed peers to play with. Hell, I needed other people to play with. We committed to tripping in.

Originally, I braced myself for gypsies and street urchins (fondly, of course!).  I was surprised to find the meetup was at a cafe with pronounceable menu items and a playground. My walls lowered. And the people seemed - dare I say it in these hypersensitive times - ‘normal’. 

So the kids went off and played while the adults devoured wedges and pizza. I relished the relish, and the opportunity to have a complete conversation with other humans other than my wife or back chatting pre-pre-teens. 

Until I spoke with them. 

Tales of Woe

These parents were alarmingly optimistic about the continued extended-travel-with-family gig. Unconvinced, I heard them out. Their stories all hit the same notes: stuck in routines, working endlessly without getting ahead, barely seeing their families because of mortgages, loans, and chasing promotions to cover material needs. And their only escape? A single two-week holiday a year, bought with the currency of burnout.

Then they talked about worldschooling—how it let them spend more time with their families, live in places where their money stretched further, and, most annoyingly, how it gave them their lives back.

Frankly, their stories sucked. As a proud ‘routineer’, I was horrified at their blatant blasphemy. 

My wife had found her tribe though. She listened, nodding along like she’d finally found people who spoke her language - one free of alarm clocks, lunchbox preparation and daily school drop offs. I, on the other hand, clung desperately to my belief in structure, stability, and the comforting predictability of knowing exactly what I’d be complaining about in ten years. Thank you very much.

Needless to say, I’ve limited contact opportunities since.

Sidenote: I’ll admit the world probably could offer more learning opportunities than a classroom full of kids. But finding those opportunities daily is neither easy nor relaxing. It’s demanding and occasionally maddening. 

Coming to terms with the idea that unlearning some traditional classroom mindsets might actually be beneficial has been a challenging adjustment. Maybe, with the help of these worldschoolers and their pool of knowledge and resources, there’s a better way to educate the kids.

But honestly? I’m more excitedly hopeful to see how this period detrimentally affects the kids’ learning. It’ll make for a much stronger counterargument when the next travel proposal lands on my desk.

Bring in the Aussies

From ‘normal’ to the more ‘questionable’ humans: Australians. Australians and Bali go together like sunscreen and sand. They’re the bulk of the tourism industry here. For them, Bali is a convenient, low-cost paradise—a luxurious escape just a hop across the ocean. But they’ve earned a reputation for behaving, well, like Australians.

Fueled by low-price Bintangs - the local thirst quencher - their boisterous hordes can disrupt the local Bali flow. Thankfully, they typically keep to the comforts of the tourist areas, so our interactions have been blessedly limited. Until my Australian cousin announced his arrival, along with two mates, for a holiday. To our surprise, they expressed interest in visiting us. We agreed and that evening I experienced two firsts; hosting friends and Bintang.   

Once more, it was great to finally have some more fluid conversations. We learnt a great deal of the Australian holiday experience within their anecdotes. Drinking on the plane over. Drinking on the back of their taxi scooters (while facetime-ing). Drinking at a three-hour-all-you-can-drink-cocktails bar. And then, later on, sharing a bucket to remove some of the excess of drinking. I told you they were fluid conversations!

Night Life-less

Naturally, as their stories flowed, so did the drinks. Seemed only fair! I must say, Bintang is a smooth drop - I could see the allure. At a little past too-many-Bintags later, the boys were keen to visit the local nightlife, hoping for a rager. I had bought into the journey, eagerly boasting a warung down the road that sold a few beers and had, surprisingly, Midori on tap. So we left for greener pastures. 

Reluctant Traveller’s Tip: Bali has green petrol. Quite a few local warungs have petrol pumps with this green liquid clearly visible. Bali does not have Midori on tap (that I know of). While the same outcome might be achieved by both, I do not recommend mistaking one for the other.

We were quick to discover that there is a remarkable shortage of clubs, or even open warungs, in my neighbourhood in the early hours of a weekday morning. There is also a stark contrast between the Australian’s expectations of Bali and my local community. The buzz was wavering. 

After my short lived experience of being an inapt local tour guide, I bid the Australians goodbye, last seeing them persuading a security guard at a bank to share with them what looked suspiciously like moonshine.

I walked quite a while to get home that night. In hindsight, this was a blessing, as it offset the very limited movement the next day.