Ah, Bali.
For generations, it has been the go-to holiday destination for Australians – and, thanks to Instagram hype, is now a hotspot for Europeans and Americans, too.
(Even if some whingeing Poms end up leaving after two days and going to Dubai instead – because the Indonesian island ‘looked better on social media’.)
But there’s more to Bali than just sunburnt tourists.
There is no shortage of Aussies who live there (or claim to), many doing so under the guise of being ‘digital nomads’ – a term for an influencer or business owner who travels frequently, often to glamorous destinations, and works their own hours.
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Wannabe Bali influencer Luke Hemsworth – not to be confused with the actor of the same name – is routinely trashed in his own comments section for his tone-deaf ‘inspirational’ speeches
If you scroll through the social media feeds of these ‘nomads’, it’s easy to assume they live a charmed life. But, as we will demonstrate, they aren’t always the big shots they claim to be.
Also, there’s an amusing little subcategory of failed fashion designers who jet off to Bali after their labels go kaput. We’re looking at you, Alice McCall.
Without further ado, meet the cast of our favourite real-life reality show: Reject Island.
Luke Hemsworth
Not to be confused with the actor of the same name, this Luke Hemsworth is a wannabe influencer who left his two children behind in Australia so he could move to Bali to ‘find his own truth’.
He describes himself as a ‘conscious leader’ online, and frequently posts videos of himself sharing self-help advice.
But his attempts at being inspirational often fall on deaf ears, as his comments are filled with people slamming him for not living in the same country as his daughters.
The tatted-up Aussie recently shared a video of himself walking along a beach in Bali, telling his followers the island is ‘where the heart is at’.
Until recently, sunburnt Luke’s Instagram account was a horrorshow of bizarre life advice and posts trying to justify living apart from his children
His followers frequently slam him in the comments of his self-help videos
Almost all the comments on Luke’s videos – including this bizarre clip in which he preached the benefits of ‘semen retention’ – are negative
‘In all honesty, Bali is where the heart is at. Just got back from Sydney. It’s good to go back and be with my kids,’ he said.
‘But now I’m back here… it makes me remember why I moved here in the first place. It’s the freedom that comes with it all.’
The comments were brutal.
‘Did you just openly admit you chose to leave your kids behind with their mother because you get more freedom in Bali and basically escape the reality of being a reliable parent?’ one follower asked.
‘Yess queen, step into your power as a deadbeat dad,’ another wrote.
‘”I saw my kids but now I’m back doing what I love.” Jesus, mate, you should delete this video before they see it,’ added a third.
There were many more. In fact, almost all the comments on Luke’s videos – including a bizarre clip in which he preached the benefits of ‘semen retention’ – are negative.
Read the room, buddy. Time to give it up.
(Update: He may have done so already. As we prepared this article for publication, Luke nuked his Instagram account and now only has one post about ‘being real’.)
Jessica White
Jessica White is a failed fashion designer who sought refuge in Bali after her label Shakuhachi went under with $1million in debts.
Her once-popular clothing line – worn by the likes of Lana Del Rey and Rihanna – crashed and burned a decade ago. Creditors included manufacturers, modelling agencies and Woollahra Municipal Council in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.
Jessica White is a failed fashion designer who sought refuge in Bali after her label Shakuhachi went under with $1million in debts. She recently got in strife after an argument at the vets
After the company went into voluntary administration in May 2015, Jessica, 50, looked to be living a glamorous life in the resort village of Seminyak.
In 2017, A Current Affair reporter Chris Allen tracked down a carefree Jessica and found her relaxing at Bali beach clubs and socialising with friends.
When Allen approached her at a café to ask about the demise of Shakuhachi, she initially smiled for the camera then left the table and hid in the men’s toilet upstairs.
Originally from the Melbourne bayside suburb of Sandringham, White is the step-sister of The Cat Empire keyboard player Ollie McGill.
After lying low for a while, she reactivated her Instagram in 2023, where she could be found flaunting designer clothes at beach clubs and bars across Bali.
Then, earlier this year, she made headlines again when she begged a panel of judges not to jail her following a meltdown at a Balinese veterinary hospital.
She got into a dispute with two vets at Bali Veterinary Clinic after she was unable to pay for treatment for her cat Rocket after it was attacked by a dog.
The clinic claimed White accepted that Rocket needed to be checked into the clinic and agreed to pay for the stay, but then tried to pick up the cat without settling the bill.
‘F*** you,’ she allegedly told clinic owner Ni Made Restiati and a colleague when told she could not bring Rocket home.
‘You give him away. You steal my cat. F***ing b***h.’
According to the prosecution, those words were ‘said loudly in a public area’ and made both vets feel embarrassed.
When White faced a panel of judges in Denpasar District Court in January, her lawyer Samuel Hanok read a statement on behalf of the single mother-of-two.
Mr Hanok said his client admitted committing the acts alleged by the prosecution in its indictment but described a demand she serve three months in jail as ‘burdensome’.
Instead, Mr Hanok asked that White be placed on probation because she was ‘the backbone of the family’ and her children would have no one to look after them if she was detained.
White was found guilty of trespassing on February 6.
A panel of judges sentenced Jessica to two months’ jail but she was not taken into custody after immediately launching an appeal to the High Court.
Teddy Briggs
Teddy Briggs is a cautionary tale of what not to do with your 15 minutes of fame.
The 31-year-old beefcake shot to minor stardom in 2018 on the first season of Love Island Australia, and later tried to milk his notoriety for all it was worth.
He earned thousands by doing club appearances and brand deals, before delving into the world of e-commerce with his company EcomConnect, which he launched in 2020.
Daily Mail Australia understands he was earning $75,000 to $80,000 a month selling beauty products, timepieces and clothing online and was set to pass $1million by 2021.
Teddy Briggs, 31, lost all his money and had his e-commerce business fall into debt around the time he was flitting between Australia and Bali. Now he’s living it up in Dubai, naturally
However, Briggs’ financial missteps ultimately left him worse off than he had been prior to his reality TV breakthrough.
His e-commerce business went into liquidation in 2023 after several customers complained it had ‘over-promised and under-delivered’.
EcomConnect promised to set up online stores for its clients, sourcing wholesale products that would be shipped directly to customers.
However, per The Australian, multiple unhappy clients took aim at the business, alleging they weren’t making the money they had been promised by Briggs.
These days, he’s living in Dubai and has rebranded himself as the ‘Remote Closer’ – promising his followers he can help them make $10,000 a month by closing deals over the phone
Oracle Insolvency Services said at the time that EcomConnect owed customers, suppliers and the Australian Taxation Office ‘several hundred thousand dollars’.
Briggs was so embarrassed by his financial struggles that he worked at a clothing store because he was too ashamed to go back to his day job in finance.
He even attempted a return to reality TV, appearing on season seven of The Amazing Race Australia alongside his best mate Harry Jowsey of Too Hot to Handle fame.
Briggs spent much of these years splitting his time between Australia and – you guessed it – Bali.
These days, he’s living in Dubai (naturally) and has rebranded himself as the ‘Remote Closer’ – promising his social media followers he can help them make $10,000 a month by closing deals over the phone.
Good luck with that.
Kristen Gray
Kristen Gray was a self-described ‘digital nomad’ who sold her e-book, Our Bali Life Is Yours, promoting the idea of enjoying a luxury lifestyle at minimal cost.
During the Covid pandemic, the American encouraged her followers to move to Bali because it was a cheap and supposedly LGBT-friendly alternative for foreigners.
She and her girlfriend received swift backlash online for their lack of cultural awareness as they promoted their ‘elevated lifestyle’ in conservative Indonesia.
Balinese immigration quickly caught on to her social media posts and Kristen was deported in 2021 after only a year of living there.
American self-described ‘digital nomad’ Kristen Gray annoyed Balinese immigration officials when she promoted the island as an LGBT haven during Covid
Authorities accused her of spreading information that could ‘unsettle’ the public and of working without a business visa.
Local residents of Bali are mostly Hindu; however, Indonesia is considered the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation and the LGBT community faces discrimination.
For her part, Kristen insisted she had not broken any immigration laws and was being deported because of her sexuality.
Julian Petroulas
High-school dropout Julian Petroulas founded a talent agency in Sydney at the age of 24 and soon began living a jet-setting lifestyle.
Known for flaunting his fleet of Rolls-Royces and Ferraris and his boasts of earning tens of millions through real estate, Petroulas was humbled last year when he was scammed out of $6.2million in a Bali land deal gone wrong.
The investor, 33, bragged about the deal in June last year, telling his social media followers he had made ‘millions’ through his Balinese business empire.
In addition to his multi-storey mansion and popular restaurant, Petroulas took particular pride in a 1.1-hectare plot of land he had bought in Canggu.
High-school-dropout-turned-entrepreneur Julian Petroulas was humbled last year when he was scammed out of $6.2million in a Bali land deal gone wrong
‘It’s f**king nuts how big this is,’ the entrepreneur said at the time.
He even claimed investors and developers were begging him to let them build on the land – but the deal soon proved too good to be true.
In a follow-up YouTube video posted in December, Petroulas alleged he had been duped by the seller, a European national.
‘Soon after this purchase, I started receiving calls and messages from Balinese and the community telling me the man I purchased the land from had not paid them, broke promises, disappeared and was not replying,’ he said.
‘Imagine spending millions on a deal only to discover that other people had been wronged, leaving you to clean up the mess.’
Petroulas then had his visa cancelled and he was banned from re-entering Indonesia because he claimed he had ‘bought’ the land.
In reality, foreigners are prohibited from buying land in Indonesia. They are only allowed to lease land or own shares in a foreign-owned company that can buy land.
Petroulas was subsequently slammed in the Indonesian press, but continued to insist he was being set-up by the seller and an allegedly corrupt military official.
In the end, Petroulas’s lawyers were able to appeal his Bali ban – but it seems unlikely he will recover the millions he lost.
Alice McCall
Alice McCall is another fashion designer whose company ran up debts it couldn’t pay, with her eponymous brand going under in February 2023, owing $1million.
She now lives between Sydney and Bali, spending six months on the Indonesian island with her husband Nicholas Morley and their daughters, Wilde, 17, and Hopi, 12.
Alice McCall is another fashion designer whose company ran up debts it couldn’t pay, with her eponymous brand going under in February 2023, owing $1million
She founded her label in 2004, with her pieces regularly featuring on the red carpet and in high-fashion editorials for Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar and Elle.
But McCall struggled to keep the business afloat during Covid, and it went into liquidation. More than half of the money owed was to the Australian Taxation Office.
McCall attempted a comeback in the world of fashion later that year – but her return fell flat with fans stunned she’d chosen to collaborate with fast-fashion brand Shein.
The once high-end designer explained she had decided to partner with the Chinese company to help make her range more accessible.
But the decision left her loyal customers feeling ’embarrassed’ and ‘devastated’, with many saying the collab went against everything her former company once stood for.
Kiki Morris
Kirralee ‘Kiki’ Morris rose to fame on The Bachelor in 2016, vying for the affections of Richie Strahan – who ultimately sent her packing.
She returned to the franchise for Bachelor in Paradise in 2020, and would later win $100,000 on The Challenge Australia in 2022.
But now the reality TV gravy train has ground to a halt, 37-year-old Morris is earning her coin as an influencer in Bali – where rent is a hell of a lot cheaper than back home.
She has some, er, history with the island. Back in 2016, fresh off The Bachelor, she jetted to Bali – and seemingly brought a paparazzo with her.
Kirralee ‘Kiki’ Morris was an also-ran on The Bachelor almost a decade ago and is now living it up in Bali spruiking the benefits of ‘lymphatic massages’. In her defence, she is very hot
Back in 2016, fresh off The Bachelor, Kiki jetted to Bali for a series of obviously staged pap pics – and then had the gall to suggest they were candid. We’ll let you decide…
A spate of very flattering – and obviously staged – pap sets of her in a bikini at the beach and working out at the gym followed.
At the time, she claimed a friend had ‘leaked’ information about a magazine shoot she had planned to the photo agency Diimex, hence why she was snapped throughout her trip.
But the photos told a different story. Far from being candid, they showed her wearing full make-up and in flattering poses, sometimes even looking at the camera.
It was all quite embarrassing. These days, she isn’t getting papped in Bali because there isn’t much of a market for her photos. Still, she’s always got her own Instagram – where she is currently spruiking the benefits of ‘lymphatic massages’.
Reece Hawkins
It’s not ideal being famous just for who you used to date – but that’s the reality for Reece Hawkins, the ex-fiancé and 2 x baby daddy of fitness queen Tammy Hembrow.
The former couple share son Wolf, 10, and daughter Saskia, eight, with Tammy also sharing a two-year-old daughter, Posy, with another ex, Matt Poole.
While it’s unclear if he lives there, Reece often spends his free time living it up in Bali and was there as recently as last week, spruiking his streetwear brand Molten.
It’s not ideal being famous just for who you used to date – but that’s the reality for Reece Hawkins, the ex-fiancé and 2 x baby daddy of fitness queen Tammy Hembrow
Bailey Scarlett
Bailey Scarlett is basically Bali expat royalty, but makes our list after being dragged into one of the more unseemly ‘GoFundMe’ controversies that happen every couple of months over there.
A semi-celebrity back home after claiming in 2015 that her drink had been spiked at a party hosted by Justin Bieber – Bieber was not accused of any wrongdoing – the New Zealand-born model went on to have several more brushes with fame.
Firstly, she was linked to a 26-year-old Bachelorette star when she was just 19 – they both later said their Facebook announcement they were ‘in a relationship’ was a joke.
Then, two years later in 2018, she welcomed her first child, a boy named Riley Arlo.
The child’s father is allegedly Olympia Valance’s ex-boyfriend Greg Cannell, but Scarlett and Cannell apparently split up before Riley was born.
Bailey Scarlett is basically Bali expat royalty, but makes our list after being dragged into one of the more unseemly ‘GoFundMe’ controversies that happen every couple of months over there
Now living in Bali, Scarlett is known for helping Aussies in trouble promote their GoFundMe campaigns. And she has quite the reach with 177,000 Instagram followers.
However, her generous spirit landed her in hot water in 2023 when she was caught up in the ‘baby Lucky’ brouhaha.
Lucky captured the nation’s hearts when her parents launched a bid to charter a medical evacuation for their then-seven-week-old daughter to Australia for life-saving care that was not available in Indonesia.
Honey Ahimsa, a wellness influencer and mum-of-two originally from Melbourne, said doctors in Bali had given her daughter a 50 per cent chance of survival.
Almost $200,000 was raised in a matter of days by kind-hearted souls who rallied behind the stranded family as Lucky battled sepsis, severe pneumonia, lung failure and RSV-bronchiolitis.
She was flown to Brisbane on a medevac flight and doctors treated her successfully.
Scarlett played a significant role in helping Honey and her partner raise the money via GoFundMe. But she later distanced herself from the family following revelations they had moved back to Bali to renovate a house just months later.
She released a statement at the time saying she had acted in ‘good faith’ when promoting the family’s fundraiser for their daughter’s medical care.
‘I was never associated with these people prior – I simply rushed down to the hospital to help complete strangers as I felt for them as a mother myself,’ she wrote.
Honey, whose birth name is Rachael Eti, later clarified the family was just renting the Bali property and that no money from the GoFundMe had been misappropriated – and we do not suggest otherwise.
Following that controversy, Scarlett has flown under the radar, living a quiet – yet luxurious – life in Bali. In January, she welcomed another child, a daughter named Gia Scarlett Armstrong, with her partner George Armstrong.
