This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Hidde van Vliet, 37, the cofounder of Entourage in Bali. His words have been edited for length and clarity.
In 2023, the industrial logistics firm I worked for relocated from Amsterdam to Malta, and I was promoted to general manager. On paper, it looked like a step up. In reality, it was the first sign that the way I was structuring my life no longer fit.
I helped lead the company’s move — setting up the office, hiring staff, and building operations from scratch. Malta had what I thought I wanted: sun, ocean, and easy access to the outdoors. Socially, something was missing. Every six weeks, I flew back to Amsterdam just to see friends and family.
Nine months in, I quit. There was no dramatic blow-up — just a steady realization that the life I was building wasn’t right.
Soon after, I went to Cape Town for a university reunion. There, I slipped into a different rhythm: sunrise beach runs, surfing, padel at night, and constant social energy.
When the trip ended, my friends went back to their jobs. I didn’t.
I pushed my flight home twice, and later returned to Cape Town solo on a three-month visa. That’s where I first encountered digital nomads. Their days centered on work, wellness, and connection.
It looked like the dream. It also clarified something for me: A traditional corporate path wasn’t going to give me the life I wanted.
Back in Amsterdam, I took on freelance strategy and finance work to rebuild my savings. Around that time, my friend Joost — now my cofounder — left his job too.
We’d met years earlier at PwC and stayed close. On a weekend trip to Barcelona, over a glass of rosé, he said, “This remote work trend is incredible. We should do something with it.”
That conversation changed everything
Post-COVID, remote workers were clustering in places like Cape Town and Bali. As we spoke to friends living that lifestyle, one pattern kept coming up: Most communities started organically but weren’t built to scale. Events were scattered, inconsistent, or hard to access unless you already knew people.
We wondered what it would look like to build a community intentionally — one centered on health, wellness, and connection, with structured events designed to make meeting people easy. Over two months, that idea took shape into Entourage, a city-based network for digital nomads, built around shared activities and deliberate space for conversation.
Choosing where to launch was the next question. Cape Town felt personal but seasonal. Joost knew Bali well. I’d never been, but its year-round density of nomads made it the obvious choice.
Field research in Bali
In October 2024, we spent three weeks in Bali speaking with dozens of travelers and local businesses — gyms, cafés, padel clubs — to understand what was missing. The opportunity felt real.
We moved to Bali in March 2025 and got started the day we landed. We aimed to build as leanly as possible. Joost and I invested about $17,500 of our own money into the business, excluding living costs. This covered visas, company setup, and some marketing spend.
Within weeks, we were hosting padel games, run clubs, and surf sessions. Not everything worked. Some events flopped. Early runs were small.
The turning point came when Bali Social Club, a padel and wellness space in Canggu, offered to co-host our weekly morning run with ice bath access. We went all in, planning a scenic route, inviting everyone we knew, even printing custom T-shirts.
That first morning, 40, then 50 people showed up. Watching strangers connect afterward, I realized we’d built something bigger than an event.
Building a community
By the end of our first year, we had hosted over 250 events across Bali, and our WhatsApp communities had grown to over 4,000 people. Most gatherings were free or pay-per-event, supported by venue partners.
That was the gap I’d felt moving between Malta, Cape Town, and Amsterdam. I didn’t want backpacker chaos or closed expat circles. I wanted community — people committed to their work and well-being, wherever they landed.
In Bali, I have it all: lifestyle, friendships, and purpose.
Do you have a story to share about living abroad? Contact the editor at [email protected].
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