Our Manager

Our SHAMBALA RETREAT Center has one MOTO that our manager MADE has made popular: SALING MENGISIH dan MEMBANTU
It means that we complement each other and we help each other out. In other words, even the manager isn't too good to get down on his knees and to polish something if need be, and we all do our best to help each other. And another saying that our manager popularized with me is: We are human and we can all make mistakes, but the mistakes are there for us to learn from them.

With those two sentences we subtly communicate that we don't have a top down attitude.
Naturally when there's a manager, there will be responsibilities that only he can handle. But embedded in how we communicate, we have a feeling of working together as a family, each person pulling their own weight in order to make the whole work together.

And that's what we say we use the Family System. Bali people like using that concept.
It means that we respect each other and communicate from heart to heart. We speak sincerely from our heart and not from a 'position' and really care for each other.Sharing our profit with our staff makes everybody want to work together. The increase in work, when all goes super well, feeds back to each individual as well in shared profits. Instead of just being a cog in the wheel, all of us are needed and all of us are rewarded!We say that it takes all the spokes of a wheel, to make it turn.

Beyond that, all our employees have chosen to share their tips communally. Instead of hoping individually for some personal tip, and competing as is customary in most establishments in the west, they share. Actually we use the metaphor of a CAR often as well. As they say in Bali:
It takes all the parts of the car, the wheels, the nuts and bolts, the steering, as well as the person at the helm, in order to successfully drive a car and get from point A to point B. We work holistically, and we mean it.

When I speak to my team, I always address them as my Angels.
I tell them that we are a team of angels living in Heaven on Earth because that is what SHAMBALA stands for. It's a deep appreciation for each individual that makes all of the employees work together so well. And the beautiful guests that we are blessed with here at SHAMBALA.

Made Arsa

Made has been with us since the very beginning, when we just had a house, which is now next to Shambala. He was the all around manager at our house. He joined Shambala aftern managing Bali Mandala.

He is a humble but a very strong person, with strong ethics and with a big heart. He works quietly in the background, making sure everyone is attended to.

Made can think of a million things simultaneously and get them all done. He has so many talents that we feel utterly blessed by his work and friendship.

He bases his success in his life on good principles. He is especially grateful for the help of a Dutch man who helped finance Made’s schooling, at a time when Made's family no longer could afford it.

Made is forever is grateful that he got the wondrous support of a foreigner and will forever remember him. He is married and has one teenage daughter and one teenage son and a baby daughter from 2012.

Guest Service Manager

SHAMBALA is located on the north shore of Bali far away from big cities. It was a small flourishing fishermen village, and its riches came from farming orange trees. Naturally it was not geared towward tourism decades ago, so when we arrived in Bondalem we didn't find too many people who spoke English fluently.

Since SHAMBALA was built to accommodate groups we needed to find some staff who could communicate well with the group leaders and be a dedicated person to be the liaison between the group leader and our office staff, our kitchen, and housekeeping as well as our freelance drivers.

Additionally since the first impression as one of the most important impressions, we needed to find a person who made the first contact with the group leaders via e-mail. And we need to find someone who speaks fluently English, German and Indonesian.

And as they say if you build a field he will come we were blessed with both EDY and SRI.

Edy

Edy is our Guest service Manager, who is dedicated to principles and service. He loves to help, to be active and inventive. He is always on top of any needs of our group leaders or guests.

His English is excellent and he loves to make our guests feel like family. He is a very active person, organizes our tours, and assists our Group Leaders from A to Z when they hire his help. Also he is our tour organizer from Denpasar to Ubud to Lovina.

Edy will help you set up your dance classes, your dolphin tours, your cooking classes, and accompany you on Temple vistis for a minor charge and create great excursions for you.

He really loves his wife who is also a master Taylor (you can hire her for help if you want a special outfit sewn.) She has her own business and together they have one son and one adopted nephew whom they take care of.

SRI

The universe works in miraculous ways.
I had met SRI long before we build SHAMBALA, when she was still working at another retreat center not too far away It was love at first sight. Every year we came back to visit her just like so many other people do. There's something magical about SRI. She has deep intuition and insight into a person, she listens with her heart, and is a perfect mix between Bali and European woman. You might wonder why?

As you may or may not know her German is miraculous. Her aunt had married an Austrian man and had moved Austria when SRI was still a very young child. Thinking that this young girl would have better schooling growing up in Europe than in Bali, she was sent to live with the aunt and uncle in Austria.

She lived in Austria until she finished high school. She had just fallen in love with the young Austrian but it wasn't meant to be. At age 19 she was made to go back to Bali.

Fast forward to the moment when she came to visit SHAMBALA for a tea one sunny afternoon, four years after she had stopped working at the neighboring retreat center, when my daring wish to the universe was answered. I just simply said to her: "I wish you could work for us!"

We offer her the flexibility and freedom that she dreams of, with the steadiness of having a job. SRI takes care of all the group booking arrangements via e-mail and helps out with some individual guest bookings via e-mail as well.

Her incredibly beautiful communications skills and her ability to manage a zillion little details allow her to manage the very complex job of walking a group leader through the process of bringing the group SHAMBALA from A to Z before they arrive.

After having separated from her husband ,she had to leave her daughter to the hands of her husband's family. But she managed to retain a close bond with her daughter, who was almost grown now. She works part time on site at SHAMBALA, and the other times she works from home which gives her the flexibility that she had wanted.

In her heart and mind she lives internationally which is a great asset.
Sometimes she can be seen taking private clients on excursions around Bali and showing the guests secret hideaways, when she takes them to healers, translates and visits sacred temples!

Reception and Reservation manager

Some places offer job descriptions that are firm, have strict boundaries, where the employee is told what to do and what not to do.
And normally that make sense. Howevr when DEWI joined us, I was given a bundle of talent and her skills were so varied and her nature so bubbly that I could not bear to simply there to keep her in one position. Adding numbers is what she's good at. But then on display she is phenomenal in her way to communicate with people and make everybody feel it home.

Hiring people we looked at their personality, and their skills and their abilities and their desires. In reception you need someone to be loving and kind. In the office we need someone who's meticulous and ethical. And beyond that every center needs a heart.

With DEWI is our angel with that heart, that is magical with numbers and magical with guests.

When she arrives she'll be smiling at you and when you leave she'll be smiling at you wiht a smile and a warm herat that you will remember forever. She truly emanates the love and gratitude which she feels for working together with a fabulous team and a fabulous place.

Dewi

Dewi is our receptionist and accountant with exceptional skills and training. She came to us with international training and brought her experience to Shambala.

Her heart is big, and she is very helpful, always smiling, friendly and works incredibly well with the whole Shambala team.

Mostlikely it was Dewi who chatted with you onliine or replied to your emails and inquiries.

She will also be the one who attends to your accounting needs as she is very detailed and very attentive in her work in the office.

But sometimes you will find her working in the restaurant helping in service as she loves to connect with people. Her English is great! She has one daughter, and is pregnant now.

Our House Keeping Staff

At Shambala we have a special motto: Let us live like in Heaven on Earth and be like angels! I often say, that we are here to co-create a special atmosphere, and that the structures and designs, as beautiful as we can make them. in and of themselves do not create the atmosphere like they can as a team. That is what a team can do, they can make you feel cared for, welcomed, liked, treated kindly, and make small gestures of beauty that will make you remember Shambala forever.

We love our staff and are close to them. We care about their well-being and therefor have a profit sharing principle. 15% of the gross income goes to the staff, which is partly supported by your 5% service fee. This means that the more guests we have the happier we all are. And the motivation to work stays strong with increased work!

We have a staff of 24, over one staff per guest capacity. This will ensure you have a heavenly stay with us, as everyone has time to attend to the many details with their full heart.

We hope you love your stay with us and will come again and again!

Ayu Ningsih

She is a very spiritual woman, vegetarian since childhood, a daughter to a priest and always praying. She believes in KRISHNA and expresses her devotion in her amazing voice. Maybe you will be blessed to hear her sing the devotional Krishna Mantras, as magic comes through her voice when you hear her sing.

Since coming to Shambala she has gotten married to a Krishna devotee and is having her second child now at the end of 2013.

Putu Widayani

She is very gentle in her appearance, cute in her smile, with a very warm heart and a humble nature. She always makes the staff smile and laugh and stands by her friends. She was single when she started working at Shambala, and has taken the lead in housekeeping. She has gotten married since coming to Shambala and now has one child.

ANDY

has joined the staff in 2013 and has been becoming a very versatile member of our housekeeping staff. All our staff loves to call on him for help. Luckily his Gemini nature can handle the many calls from all directions. The girls like having a guy in housekeeping as he can dare to climb the ladders and help with the heavier things. He loves to speak English with our guests,, so take him up on some friendly conversations.

Together they work well as a team and from their hearts want to make sure that all guests at Shambala feel speical and welcomed.

Mahardika

MAHADRIKA or also called MAHA for short, originally joined our staff to help out with our pregnant Putu Widayani.

At first we were only looking for someone to help out for 6 months, and he was willing to do what it takes.
We found out that we were blessed with a gem of a young man. He proved to be very mature, responsible and very motivated to be the best he can be. We are so grateful o be working with Maha. He keeps the communications going on WhatsApp when we are away!

Our Gardener Team

We take pride in the fact that all our staff participates in trash separation, which is rather unheard of in the most parts of Bali. We all participate in making compost, in the kitchen we separate the compostable kitchenscraps from the paper and the plastic, and in the garden we save all the garden clippings, grass to mix in with the kitchen scraps and shred the branches for mulch.

Our staff is teaching everyone at home as well, as they see how great clean beauty feels to the welbeing of the soul.

We have grown our garden from bare soil in 2009 to a full lush blooming, and fruitbaring garden in 2013 by using composting bins that produce soil in 3 weeks! All we use is organic compost for fertilzation, a fairly new concept in Bali.

Bees are hanging in the trees to help polination of all our fruit trees and to provide honey.

We have: mango, papaya, coconut, breadfruit and advocado trees, as well as tapioca plants, Bali spinach, lemnon grass, hibiscus, and healing plants.

We believe that to help the bees is to help humanity to survive!

Komang Poliana

He can climb coconut trees and takes care of our organic composting together with Putu Ardana. He has completely transformed the garden around RAJINDER and turned it into a paradise. He added a lot of eddible trees and plants to Shambala. He is kind, smiling and will speak English if you ask.

Putu Ardana

He is hard working staff, creative and has turned the main section around the Temple into a flowering paradisical garden. He has worked as a gardener since the beginning at ShagriLa. He is very humble and funny with the staff, and is like a hidden gem. He makes our staff laugh when they sometimes sit together and talk, and never is too proude to help with anything. Feel free to appreciate the daily effort and attention that our gardeners give to the gardens of Shambala.

Gede Widnyana

His eyes are like stars and shine like a man who knows a lot more that he shows. His heart shines through his eyes. He takes his life here on Earth as a path of service and conscientiousness.

He is a quite type and really kind. We found him working as a finishing builder while Shambala was being built, doing all his work with love and attentiveness . We loved his style, his care with details, his persistence and dedication to excellence., whicih is why we asked him to join our team. You will be walking on and touching the many walls and floors he helped to build.

Our SPA Team

It is our SPA team along with our Housekeeping staff take care of receiving guests with flowers and showering you with flowers and blessings when you leave.

Kadek Lastu

She our head Massage Therapist in Shambala and has taught the other entire therapist crew at Shambala SPA. She has brought with her many years of experience from her work at the retreat center Bali Mandala and other places before she joined us at Shambala. She knows about the powerful effect of a focused mind in the process of healing and in giving massage. You can certainly feel her presence.
She is married and has 2 sons and is currently in 2013 pregnant with her thrid son.

Komang Arpeni

She is married to one of our neighboring fishermen and brings warmth and strength with her big smile. She is a very good therapist and can give strong massages as well loves to give great Manicures and Pedicures. She is very kind, humble and supportine. You will feel her love. She is married and has now two daughters.

Sukerti

She has a very soft heart and is a very polite woman. She has worked as an assistant to a midwife prior to joining us at Shambala and brings with her a keens sense of energy and healing. She is a very good therapist. Although small in stature, her hands are strong, and she is very focused in her mind. You will be able to feel her focus and presence as she will take you to Heaven during your massage. She is married and has one daughter.

Iluh

Iluh's husband works on a ship and is gone many months at at time. Here at Shambala she has found a family and friends that care for her while she is taking care of her child. Iluh is our Reflexology Massage Therapist, but also gives all other oil massages as wel. She works slowly, and puts you into a deep state of relaxation. She cares and has a very kind heart. She lives with her inlaws and has one son.

Our Restaurant Team

Living in Heaven on Earth, which to me is embedded in the name SHAMBALA, implies the fact that we eat healthy food, food made with love, and of course vegetarian food, food where we did not have to kill another creature . As part of our mission we have dedicated ourselves to promote vegetarianism . When guests stay with us sometimes up to four weeks they are often surprised to discover, that they can live quite well without eating meat.

When we started to build Shambala back in 2008 the RAW or VEGAN movement was not yet in vogue as it is now. However we have learned many recipes and can cater to clients who request RAW or VEGAN food. We offer a milk substitutes such as coconut or soy milk, and if you let us know of any allergies, we can cater to your needs as well.

Furthermore you will find that we do not offer any food with garlic.
The reason for this is that we discovered that garlic may not be conducive to higher state of consciousness through the research done Dr. Bob Beck. Back in the seventies. While he was training C.I.A. agents in Remote Viewing (the ability to read documents remotely, without looking at them) decades ago.

What they found was startling:
What he discovered in these training sessions was that whenever his Remote Viewing students ate foods which contained garlic, they could no longer perform the Remote Viewing tasks, which they have been able to well before eating food with garlic .

After further research they discovered that it was the active ingredient of sulphone hydroxyl, which actually passes the blood barrier which is supposed to keep everyting out of the brain, that caused this effect.
Garlic usually desynchronises brain waves, he found. (And see article here http://www.healingcancernaturally.com/garlic-brain-toxin.html)
He also mentions that it reduces the brain speed reaction time.

In India It is also well known fact. Most monasteries and Ashrams do not allow their monks or students to eat any food that contains garlic, including onions and leeks, in order to ensure better meditation and focusing abilities.

Garlic also as many beneficial qualities as we know, and can be used as a medicine. But who wants to eat medicine all the time? If the monks in India don't eat it, why should we, especially in a place called Shambala!

BREAD BAKING:
Over the years we've been blessed with amazing people, who taught us their favorite recipes. There was for example Merlin from Germany who showed our staff how to bake bread, also Focaccia bread! If you smell that great waft of fresh baked bread floating through the air, you now know it is our kitchen faries. We even bake gluten free breads as well as gluten free sweet treats for our guest!

You may also be delighted to know but we don't use cheap oils for cooking and frying.
We splurge our budget on olive oil and for deep frying we use coconut oil!

CLEAN WATER:
All are salads and vegetables are washed with triple purified water, which in the end is also treated with UV light. This allows us to offer you raw food and salads.

We give away all the food in the evening to our staff if we have leftovers, and none of our food gets reused. We prefer to cook from scratch every single day to ensure your health and safety.

Besides the amazingly heartfelt staff working in the kitchen, seen or unseen, sometimes busy behind the counter and sometimes bringing you food, we offer the most amazing seating right by the ocean. We have covered outdoor seating for 22 people, where you can enjoy our signature coffee WHITE DOG, which is a fair trade coffee, made from selected beans, grown in Indonesia, while sitting on rustic wooden furniture hand made and carved by Bali people, and enjoy your Heaven on Earth with us gazing over the ocean.

Komang Mudasih

She is our Head Chef in Shambala and has brought with her years of experience from having worked as a cook in Candi Dasa. She can coordinate our entire kitchen, produce outrageous buffet menus, and will work diligently to make sure our groups are very happy. She knows to cook healthily and is very clean in all her work in the kitchen. She understands the western stomach!

She loves to create new cakes and will be delighted bake a cake for your special occasion as well.

She loves to meditate and works on her emotions to improve herself, pays attention to her dreams and thoughts, and knows that she is the creator of her outer life. She teaches YOGA daily in our Meditation Hall for our guests. She is married to Wayan, our gardener, and has two beautiful daughters.

Putu Mawar

She is a great team member and cook, esspecialy Balinese Cuisine. She pours out love and gratitude, and will untiringly help to make the kitchen a success. She is very friendly and a good team member. She is married and has 2 sons.

Ketut Warta

He is a great cook in the kitchen and also works as a waiter in the restaurant, where he will serve your meals, coffees and healthy juices and will always look lovingly into your eyes as he makes his presentation.

Make sure you look into his eyes as he serves you, as his presence will make your meal all the more delightful. He is very refined in his service, and is attentive to your smallest thought. He is very polite and refined. He is married and has two daughters.

Kadek Wijaya

He has recently joined our staff in th esummer of 2015 as he replaced Komang Widih, who wanted to help his wife at home with their new llittle shop.

Kadek is the nephew of our oldes cook, and he is sure to keep the family tradition alive. He has been admiring Komang Adi and his aunti Komang Mudasih, learning fast, and being very polite, attentive and very helpful.

Wayan

She has recently join our service and HK team and has made the kitchen and the restaurant her sole domain. Every one loves her diligent attention to cleanliness, to keeping the restaurant humming and the best of all, she speaks English very well. Do try to talk to her when you have a juice at our ocean side restaurant.

Komang ADI

Komang Adi has worked on a cruise ship as a chef and made great amounts of money. BUT when his very own son asked his mother, wife of Komang Adi, who this UNCLE was, Adi decided to look for work closer to home. We are very blessed to have his expertise on our kitchen, the blessings of his many years of cooking gourmet food! His wife is a very gifted hairdresser and if you wish to try her gifts out, we will gladly arrange a meeting with her.Komang Adi glows in his eyes and heart!

Our Security Team

After the sunsets and the star as rise, the guests at Shambala go to sleep. What they may not know is, that two angels are watching over them. From sunset and sunrise our security team is available to you, if you ever have a special need.

Of course some guests arrive late at night and it is again our angels that will greet them.
And then there are the Dolphin excursions, which require that somebody wakes you up early in the morning and shows you to the dolphin boats. Again our security comes to help our guests in the wee hours of the mornings.

And we're blessed to say that in the north of Bali far away from any major roads we're nestled into a safe little haven.

Kadek Joly Adnyama

MADE our security angel, whom you also will see playing guitar at the restaurant or at the beach at night had prayed for compatible security mate!

His prayer was answered. Kadek Joly Adnyana is equally responsible, sensitive to camaraderie, and taking his job seriously.
Kadek (for short) is the kind of man you can count on. We feel very blessed that in a small village like Bondalem we got two gems for our Security team Kadek is married and has two children!

Made Sucahaya

Test is good for him. His name means: Sacred Light, and he carries a deep sense of responsibiity with him. He comes from a fisherman familiy, and knows everyone here around us at Shambala. His demeanor is solid, and dependable. and you can try your English out on him.
His wife was raising their son of 6 months all alone with her husband having to work in Denpasar as is most often the case. For years they lived like this, until we finally had an opening at Shambala while one staff member retired.

You will find him patroling the beach or the quiet walk ways. If anything needs attention, he can help you at nigth.

Our Maintenance Genie

Our maintenance team as a one man show. We are so very blessed to have our super gifted AGUS ARIES, who works incessantly to keep up the many things that corrodes due to the salty ocean air. In the beginning I thought we would it get by with calling a person whenever we need it someone for maintenance. Did I have to learn in a hurry that there is always something to be fixed at a retreat center, especially living this close to the ocean.

When you're not watching he takes care of the computers, cleans the pool, fixes pumps, make sure the water towers are filled with water, changes the light bulbs, repairs the cables that have been eaten by termites, make sure the sound systems, to the projector the fans and the AC all work.
And when he has an extra moment he makes sure that he lacquers the tables after he sends them down.

It is unbelievable with the power of nature can do. Saltwater this close to the ocean penetrates almost everything, corrodes things and for example makes it necessary that we change the door handles almost every here if not every other year.

Agus Aries

We were so glad when Agus joined our team. He has a fulltime job making sure everything runs well. From lightbulbs to the swimming pool, from waterpipes to solar panels, he can repair and install anything.

His quiet ways make him look like a dear as he patrols the grounds of Shambala. He fixes everything at our Resort from the electric system to water pipes and loves to be on call and preform his miraculous tricks.

He is very intelligent, has a very soft heart, is always smiling and is very friendly to staff and guests alike. Be sure you talk to him as well.

He is married and has one daughter and two sons.