Koowee to Bali

WAITING for former Koowe-erup Secondary College teacher Peter Muir, at McDonald’s at the heart of Sanur, a village 45 minutes east of Kuta Beach, I look outside and watch as six Balinese locals tug vigorously at a fallen tree on the nature strip.
They wrestle it out of the ground and dispatch it onto their truck, all sweaty and soiled.
The clock ticks over 4.15pm and it’s knock-off time – for schools, anyway.
On the main street, it’s organised chaos. Cars, vans and scooters are whizzing by in a blur and every two seconds someone is using their horn.
Draped in polo short and shorts, the former PE teacher shoots into the fast food restaurant car park on his motorbike, parks and runs inside.
Mr Muir is out of breath for the moment and immediately tells me how his football team – The Bali Geckos – play in the Asian Championships each year, a tournament considered one of the largest outside Australia and the AFL.
After 12 years in Bali teaching at private schools, he’s moving to Hong Kong for another challenge, another teaching post later this year.
But it was in Kooweerup that his teaching career began.
“I taught there for two years, fresh out of Ballarat University and have fond memories there,” he said. “Some kids may not have been good at their academics, but good at sports, so being a PE teacher, that’s when you see if they have that drive.”
But, in 1999, his dream of living on an island, surfing and teaching took hold. He answered an ad for a teaching post in The Age and hasn’t looked back. “I had been to Bali a few times before then on surfing trips, so that’s where that dream of spending a long time in Indonesia spurred from,” he said.
“I had also started learning the Balinese language which was a strong point in me getting the private school post.”
During his time in Bali Mr Muir has accomplished quite a bit: coach and player for the Bali Geckos Football Club, winner of numerous Asian Championship football awards, published a sports magazine for a few years, played football in nine different countries around Asia, met former Prime Minister John Howard, married a girl from Java and converted to Islam in order to marry his wife.
Mr Muir’s most notable award was the Medal of the Order of Australia he received during the 2002 Bali bombings when he worked in the morgue identifying bodies of Australians.
“I was a bit embarrassed about getting that award to be honest just because there were so many other people doing their bit – it just so happened somebody nominated me,” he said. “ As a few have said since, ‘you’re receiving that award for us’.”
Life in Sanur has been an experience Mr Muir will look back on with fondness.
“I came here as a pretty naïve country Victorian, not necessarily having a narrow mindset, but my experiences with the world were pretty narrow,” he said.
“I’m totally different now, living here has really opened up my mindset and it’s going to be really sad to leave.”