Indonesia 10.08.2014 - 23.08.2014

August 10th: Day 1- Jakarta Sightseeing
by Patrick

Our Indonesian adventure officially began with a good breakfast at the Artotel, a nicely situated and modern hotel in centre Jakarta. Then, an organized bus took us to the textile museum which contains lots of beautiful Batiks, weavings and other contemporary textiles. We were even able to experiment a Pelatihan workshop, a simple part of the process used in the making of batiks (painting a design or animal with a sort of wax on the textile in order not to colour it fully). After the paints were dry (or almost), the bus brought us to the old town located in the north of the city, more specifically the Dutch colonial square. Before we visited the area, we decided to have lunch in the “Café Batavia”, which was really tasty ! Nearby the restaurant, we had free time to visit some museums like the Bank museum (history), the Wayang museum (dedicated to Javanese wayang puppetry) or simply just walking around. After that the bus drove us to the old harbour (sunda kelapa) which became the most crowded port, because it often trades commodities of high quality. Before sunset, we jumped in an elevator to go on the top terrace of the bar/lounge called skye. The amazing view we had over the city was the 100000 rupiah beverages worth it. In the evening, we met Andreas Harsono from the Human Rights Watch in “Pisa” restaurant and talk about religious freedom and also the press liberty in West-Papua. We also ate dinner at the same restaurant giving the meeting a more friendly atmosphere.

Dinnertime	Making Batik

Gado-Gado-Lunch	Taman Fatahillah – the old dutch colonial square

August 11th: Day 2 - Meetings & Floods
by Kevin

Today was our main meeting day with 5 meetings on the program. The first one was in the ASEAN Secretariat, where we learnt about how ASEAN works. Its mechanisms are mainly based on mutual consensus and harmony and its integration is not aimed at reaching supranational levels. After, Mr Daniel Derzic from the Swiss Embassy taught us about Indonesia’s development and how Switzerland is giving support. After a lunch break, we enjoyed a long meeting with Mr Kleine-Brockhoff and his colleagues from the Friedrich-Naumann-Foundation. Together we analysed the Indonesian presidential elections and the challenges awaiting the new president. We were so far good in time and looking forward on our next meeting about Indonesia’s foreign policy. Unfortunately, a heavy rainstorm brought sudden floods to the street – not unusual for Jakarta, but normally not happening in August’s dry season. We were stocked in traffic and finally locked in a mall. The meeting could not take place anymore, but at least we got a nice dinner and a relatively quick ride back to our hotel.

August 12th: Day 3 - Jakarta Meetings II
by Laura

Yesterday, we had several meetings. First we were invited by Haris Azhar from KontraS –The Commission for the Disappeared and Victims of Violence. This NGO first priority is to report from the first line – so they do documentaries about hot issues like Papua, and they speak to the people which are directly involved. KontraS wants to bring access to justice and truth for all. It sound pretty easy, but in Indonesia, corruption is still a daily business and military/police power is quite strong, although the Suhartho-Military-regime is over. What I found very interesting, is that KontraS offer courses for students to learn how to do research and write reports and learn more about human rights (visiting Asean and embassy’s etc.). So they do educate their people for a better situation for human rights.

The second meeting was with Imparsial – The Indonesian Human Rights Monitor. Al Araf told us how the power of the military has changed since Suhartho. We learned that today military is only for defense. This means, that the law says that military should not intervene in local problems. But actually there is the opportunity to do so: If the police ask the military to help, they have the right to do it. Also we talk about the actual situation in Papua. Al Araf told us, that the main topic in Papua is, that they have no trust in the government, because of the history. About this, he brought his book Securitization in Papua – The Implication of Security Approach towards Human Rights Condition in Papua, which gives a good overview about the military situation in Papua.

After this, we visited the Zalora office in Jakarta, which is almost the same as Zalando in Europe but for South East Asia. Markus, a friend of Kevin from Switzerland, who works at Zalora explained us, how this agency works. It is an internet seller for clothes, with special brands are for the Asia- and Islamic–market. Zalora is a quite new enterprise, which is doubling every six to twelve month. So it is very representative for the Asia, especially Indonesian market. What I found very positive is, that they try to employ only local people. Also they do trainings to give the knowledge which is needed to work in this quite western-style office (in Asia it is not usual that the boss doesn’t check every step the employer has to do).

Then we went to Taman Mini Indonesia, which is a huge open air museum with typical houses from all parts of Indonesia (it is like Ballenberg in Switzerland). There have been some beautiful example of old architecture. Last but not least we could go to Hendy Sentiono home, which is the founder of Kebab Turki Baba Rafi the biggest Kebab Chain in the world. He is a very young entrepreneur, which stared his business with the idea of a new Kebab brand in Asia (like Taco Bell in the US). He is a young man (about 30 years old), which can motivated almost everybody to start his own business in Indonesia. The time is best now, because the market is huge and still growing (240 Mio people and the GPG is still growing). He told us about his career and how he manage business now. Although he cannot cook, he owns also a grill chicken and pizza chain. What I found really impressive is the thing that he started with almost nothing and not in normal way. He sells now Kebab in Malaysia, Vietnam, Singapore and China too and all this without be corrupted.
So our Tuesday was quite hard, but it was worth it for all the information and the nice talks.

With Haris Azhar of KontraS	With Al Araf of Imparsial
With Markus at Zalora office	Taman Mini Outdoor Museum
At Hendy Sentiono's of Kebab Turki Baba Rafi

August 13th: Day 4 - Intercultural Training
by Simon

Today we took the train to move from Jakarta to Jogjakarta. It took about 7 hours but the train was comfortable even though it was a bit old. During the trip we saw great views of Javas endless landscapes with rice fields and buffalos. Arrived in Jogjakarta, we were surprised by the beauty of the traditional hotel, even with a pool (of course I tested it soon!). For dinner we drove to Milos Restaurant, a vegetarian restaurant with a garden like I imagine paradise. Honestly the food was the best I had since the beginning of the journey (maybe the German manager of the restaurant is the reason…). We met there Silke Irmscher, a German woman who does intercultural trainings here. Since she lives here for 14 years now, she had interesting answers to social and cultural questions, still with the perspective of an European. We now better understand certain behavior we had observed before.

On the Train	Culinary Treats at Restaurant Milos; with Silke

August 14th: Day 5 - Yogjakarta Sightseeing
by Caroline

Today it started with the Taman Sari, which is the very big “bathroom” of the Sultan. We were there a bit too early so we began with a private tour through the underground mosque. After that we visited the water palace and bought some batik pictures. Not all of us were equally talented in bargaining, but in the end everybody was happy. The next stop was the Keraton Palast where the Sultan is living. There we had the chance to hear an orchestra playing. Everywhere was gold and the people there were very famous clothed. Our journey continued to the Museum Affandi and it was very interesting to see the influence of his disease in his paintings. After lunch we drove on to the temple Borobudur and we were all excited to see this monumental. We toke a group picture and enjoyed the beautiful view from the top. In the evening we had dinner beneath the temple Prambanan. But the dinner was very well earned because the drive to get there was long and the streets were not as good as before. Luckily we are already used to the style of driving of Indonesians. After dinner we went to the Ramayana Ballet. The figures in the ballet were very special and sometimes a bit scary, my favorite was definitively the bird. Now I’m writing this text with my last power but I’m looking forward to the next days at Malang.

Taman Sari	Art at the Museum Affandi
Borobudur	The Ramayana

August 15th: Day 6 - Roadtrip to Malang
by Kevin

After having enjoyed the Ramayana Ballet at Prambanan temples last night, this day started with a thorough visit of these beautiful temples, the biggest Hindu remains in Java. Then, we got stuck in traffic on the way to Solo, where the Sultan’s palace we wanted to visit was unfortunately closed, but we did a short town stroll and enjoyed lunch. After, the route continued up through lush Javanese rice fields to Candi Sukuh, another small Hindu temple with an amazing location on the slopes of Lawu Mountain. Further up we entered East Java and while arriving down in the plains again on the other side, the night had already arrived. We were lucky enough to find a great dinner spot and then we went through many couples of hours until our final arrival at our host families in Malang in the middle of the night – a 20 hours working day for the poor driver (Indonesia: please build highways).

at Prambanam Temple	Delicious Dinner
Driving up Gunung Lawu Pass	Candi Sukuh
With the Locals

August 16th: Day 7
by Alain

Arriving in the middle of the night at our host families, we were given a longer recreation time with the goal to get to know our host families better. We experienced the Indonesian hospitality as very generous: No one of our IFIL group felt ever uncared, for instance everyone was always given car rides if needed which is definitely not to be taken for granted, compared to Switzerland. At noon, we were invited to the home of our tour co-organizer Sekar and we met her family along enjoying a tasty Indonesian lunch. In the afternoon, the group was brought to one of the local universities where Professor Ahmad Erani Yustika gave an interesting speech about the past, current and future (expected) economic development of Indonesia. For example, we learned that two thirds of Indonesia's investments are financed by foreign direct investments. Furthermore, some of the current problems were presented: As Indonesia is reducing its massive oil/fuel subsidies, inflation skyrocketed immediately to 8% p.a. which is definitely one of the challenges the new president Jokowi will have to tackle. Afterwards, we enjoyed the likable, cool weather of Malang to stroll through the city. To close the day, we enjoyed a delicious dinner with our host families at the famous Hotel Tugu, engaging in interesting discussions.

With the host family	Professor Ahmad Erani Yustika

August 17th: Day 8
by Alain

After leaving Malang around 1.00 a.m. to see the sunrise around Bromo Mountain, the IFIL group arrived around 3.00 a.m. in Tosari, the village at the bottom of the volcano mountain range. The bus was exchanged with 4 WD jeeps in order to get up the steep streets. As it was the National Holiday of Indonesia, there was almost no space to drive – a lot of Indonesians were driving up the mountain with their own scooter and blocked the streets. Our skilled drivers were able to bring us safely to the top of Gunung Penanjakan on time. There, we had to get into the incredible dense mass of people to receive a glimpse of the sunrise at roughly 2'500 m ASL. Indonesians were singing proudly their national anthem which was also a touching moment for us as foreigners. After enjoying a breakfast, the next stop was made at the Bromo which we could hike up in a couple of minutes and see the smoke coming out of the crater. As common in Indonesia, many locals wanted to take pictures with us what we enjoyed. After being ridden back to Malang, we had time to relax in our host families.

Gunung Bromo

August 18th: Day 9 – Environment education center Seloliman
by Sask

In the morning, we all said Good-bye to our Host-families in Malang. After that we drove by bus to the Pan-Eco Education Center in Seloliman. In our pre-meeting we already had a short contact with the projects of Pan-Eco by Regina. The drive was very interesting because we saw a lot of rural areas and rice fields. The center itself was lying in a beautiful forest and was very clean and well-organised. Our guide “Selfie” welcomed us and gave us a short introduction. The center was founded in 1990 and the most important project they have is the Mirco-Hydro-Power Plant. Selfie showed us the garden in which the center lies and explained the different kind of plants, like Avocado or Papaya-trees. He also showed us the accommodation which is provided when people attend a training there. He told us that people stay there between one night up to three months. We had a very nice stroll down to the village and around the rice-fields and Selfie showed and explained us the Micor-Hydro-Power Plant. First a lot of local people were against it, because they thought that the plant will disturb the rice fields, but nowadays, everybody is fine with it. We also had a very delicious lunch with local specialities. We left Seloliman and headed to the Ijen-Plateau, which was again a very long drive. We had dinner at a restaurant during the drive.

Micro-Hydropower	A giant Spider
At the Environment Education Center	Walking through the lush Fields

August 19th: Day 10 – Ijen crater hike
by Eleonore

Today’s probably been the most physical and exhausting day of the trip. Yes indeed! First of all we arrived at destination yesterday night after a quite tiring bus journey. Then we were informed that we will have to wake up at 5 AM the next morning for the ascension of the Ijen crater. First shock. Having accepted the difficult reality of an early birdy wake up, we all went to bed in a freezing hotel room where the expectation of a hot water shower was an illusion. Second shock. Anyway, we all went to bed quite tired by the day we had to be joyfully woken up by the imam calling at 4 AM. Yes, we have to deal with the religious custom with patience and smile don’t we ?

After this rather cold night we were on the path to the crater at 6 AM. The hike wasn’t that long, but the steepness of the footpath made it a bit hard to walk to the top fresh and sensational. But who were we to complain when we were walking next to the miners of the sulphur mines who bring on their shoulders between 60 and 100 kilos of stones ?! In the end, the hike was worth it. The view we had from the top was breathtaking and hypnotizing even.

In the afternoon we left Java island by ferry to come to Bali, the final destination of our trip. We are at the moment in a nice little hotel in Jubawa where we had a chill out afternoon at the pool / beach.

I will leave you here because sleep is calling me.

Ijen Caldera	Ijen Crater Lake
A Sulphur Worker	On the Ferry to Bali

August 20th: Day 11 – Snorkling Pulau Menjangan
by Lukas

Luckily this time we just had to leave the hotel at 9 am. After a delicious balinese breakfast (fried noodels - what else), we drove to a small harbor located about 15 minutes from our hotel. There we started our snorkeling trip. Splitted into two boats, we drove to one of the really small island around Bali. What expected us there surprised everyone, a reef directly from the catalogues. There were so many diffrent fishes, corals and colors. After about an hour snorkeling we where exshausted but for sure not yet finished. So we continued our trip, took a short break for lunch on the boat and went for a second time into the water. Same as on the first spot, Bali's unterwater world made us stunning. After the snorkeling trip we visited "Proyek Penyu", a turtle hatchery located 5 minuted from our hotel. We learned a lot about the difficulties turtels have to face in Bali nowadays and how they try to help them. To our surprise they had babyturtles who just hatched. They were so cute, some of our group wanted to adopt few of them. To make the day even more perfect, we finished it in a local restaurand with excellent balinese meals.

On the way to Menjangan Island	Pemuteran Beach
Snorkeling Menjangan Island	At the Turtle Hatchery

August 21th: Day 12 – Over the Bali Mountains
by Niklaus

The early bird gets the worm. So we woke up early in the mornig to visit a far waterfall in the region of Munduk. Which was at least 30 meters high. Two brave men of our group took the chance to have a swim under it.
On our way to the Danau bratan tempel we stopped at a coffee house to enjoy a self brewed coffee made of the local beans of Munduk.
We spoted a lot of monkys in the forest and on the streets.
The Danau bratan tempel is famous for its beauty and even appears on the 50000 Rupia bill. After lunch our group splited up in two teams. While some of us visited the Tanah Lot Tempel the others went for a hike in the mountains. At the end we arrived in our Hotel in Kuta near the beach. Today we have seen a lot of cultural attractions of Bali but we all know there is still a lot more to explore on this small island.

Waterfall at Munduk	Batur Volcano Hike
Coffey Break	Danau Batur Temple

August 22th: Day 13 – Ubud & Jimbaran dinner
by Melanie

On the last day of our trip we went to Ubud, the cultural and artistic center of Bali. Once more we were able to witness the traffic chaos in Indonesia. In Ubud we visited the monkey forest, where you can watch many monkeys play, hang around or eat the bananas the tourists buy for them. These monkeys are not shy at all. They steal plastic bags right out of your hand and some of them even climb on people and try to open their bags.

Afterwards we had some time to stroll around Ubud, have lunch and go souvenir shopping, before leaving for Jimbaran. We arrived just in time for a beautiful sunset at the beach. Right there on the beach, with our bare feet in the sand, we enjoyed our last dinner together with a big platter of seafood. Later back in Kuta we experienced the bustling nightlife when we went out for a goodbye drink.

Thanks to Sekar and Kevin for organizing this great trip! It was a great experience for all of us. Terima kasih banyak!