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SNOWING IN BALI

Numb’ – an omen, perhaps, for a state he’d one day need to get used to.

His life seemed as simple as his signature clothes – a baseball cap, sunglasses, sandals, T-shirt and Capri pants – but at this point Chino was sizzling with ambition. He bought a two-door Honda Civic, rented a house in Kuta, and started a T-shirt business, while covertly moving into ecstasy. When the band split after two years, they lost touch until one day, many years later, Chino rocked up at bassist Putu’s unsophisticated family restaurant in a back street of Denpasar in a shiny new green Porsche.

One day he came to my warung [restaurant] by Porsche and told me, ‘I’m rich now.’ ‘What?’ ‘Yes, I’m rich.’ I hadn’t seen him for a long time, and suddenly he comes here with a fancy car and I’m wondering, ‘Why are you rich now?’

Did you ask him?

Yes. He just smiles, so I didn’t ask deeper. I was just happy to have a rich friend who still remembers me.

But were you surprised?

Yeah, very, very surprised. Basically, I didn’t know for a long time why this guy was rich.

– Putu

Despite the new Porsche, Putu noticed Chino still wore the same simple clothes; the only subtle difference was his sandals were now Louis Vuitton.

Chino invited Putu to bring in his car for a wash at M3. Putu drove a 1977 Toyota Hilux, so he declined, but he did accept invitations to lunch at the M3 café, where Chino would slip him

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