faraway

On 27 May 2006, Saturday, we were still in Sanur Bali. We woke up early that day because we, together with Leanna and Jo, were going to Ubud in Bali which took one hour to get there from Sanur.

At 7am I turned my cell phone on and got a text message from my brother in Yogya, Edo. I can not remember what time he sent it to me, but I think around 6 am.
He said “Kak, barusan ono gempa gedhe!” (sister, there were an earthquake this morning).
I replied “kuwi kan lak biasa tho .. ning Yogya kan wis kerep gempa” (that was usual, was not it? Yogya often had earthquakes).
“yang ini gedhe tenan Kak, air kolam kita yang gedhe sampai muncrat ke atas dan tinggal setengah!” (this time, the earthquake was very big, our pond water was lurching up and leaving half) he replied.
Suddently, I thought about my parents and tried to call his cell but could not get through. Then I sent him a message again “kok telpon omah gak urip seh. Piye Bapak Ibu dan adik2 yang lain, lan piye omah?” (Why the phone at home is not working? How is our parents and brothers, how is the house?).
He replied “Listrik mati dan HP juga gak bisa dihubungi. Ortu selamat dan rumah juga gak ada yang rusak cuma bbrp barang terutama koleksi keramiknya ibu yang pecah.” (The electricity was dead include the phone. They are all fine, the house are also fine. Just some stuffs broken but nothing serious).
Whew, I felt released …

Then, I turned on the TV but no news about it yet. We thought maybe because it was very early and no news about the eartquake yet. I tried to call home in Yogya but the line was cut off. Tried to call my parents’s cells were also no network.

We decided to have a breakfast and try to call them again later.

In Ubud, I kept trying to call my house in Yogya and still did not get through. Eventhough I was not very worried about them but I wanted to hear their voices and made sure that they were fine and were not traumatized. Finally at 2pm, I could talk to my Mom and Dad. They were fine, they were happy after talked to Zach (for my parents, a call from their grandson can brighten their life). My Dad told me about the earthquake, which buildings were destroyed, how many victims in Sardjito Hospital. We also talked about the relation between earthquake- tsunami-Merapi Mountain. This earthquake has predicted by the scientists since the tsunami, but ironically, everyone has been watching Mt. Merapi.

I was thinking, how many richter scale was the earthquake. Was it same with tsunami? How many number of people who were affected, whether as many as tsunami? How were my friends and their family in Yogya?

Then, I tried to call my friends in Yogya but nobody picked up their cell. So I decided to send them a text message and waited for their reply.

At night in the hotel, I called Dodok, my friend in Yogya. I asked him about the condition of our friends. He said that everybody was fine, just many of our friends’s relatives were died. I felt very sorry to hear that.

Until now, I do not do anything yet. I really want to go to Yogya but the situation is still unpredictable. The condition is not appropriate for the kids. I felt sad because by my limitation, I could not do much for them yet. I am just helping a few organizations in Yogya to collect the donations.

Yogya is my home, a place where I grew up. A beautiful place! But on 27 May 2006, in early morning, an earthquake with a strength of 5.9 on the richter scale has hit my hometown. The number of people who were died around 6300, injured 46.000 and homes damaged or destroyed 139.000. This numbers are still continuing to rise. Yogya needs our help. I am urging to all of you, wherever you are, to help them by doing whatever you can do ….

Galuh
Thank you for all of you who had called or sent me a text message to find out about my family in Yogya. They are all fine.

Aceh community wants a peace and a normal life. Because of that, the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) had decided to not continue the rebellion with GoI in fighting a freedom for Aceh. (Zaini Abdullah. Prominent Figure of GAM)

Aceh Kids in Cot Jeumpa

Yesterday, 15 August 2005, The Indonesian Government (GoI) and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) signed a peace accord after six months of negotiations, paving the way for an end to three decades of bloodshed that has claimed about 15.000 lives.

There are many debates amongs the politicians about this accord. Many people are happy with it but others are pessimistic with the implementation of this accord and the role of foreigners in monitoring the implementations of the deal. Because of the items that appear on the peace accord have more benefits for GAM than GoI, many people also said that this peace accord was the way how GAM will get their freedom in future.

Personally, I do not know about politic and I do not care about the reactions of Indonesia politicians. I just thought that this is a good step for building a peace in Aceh. I was touched by Aceh community’s reactions when the agreement was signed. They looked very happy, they had been waiting this peace agreement for 30 years. They want to live in a peace, they want to have a normal life. My friend, Bang Afrizal, said “Galuh, we are very happy and after this we will go to the Baiturrahman Mosque for sujud syukur (Thank God)”. From the bottom of my heart, I really hope that this deal will truly bring a peace in Aceh.

Hopefully both GAM and GoI will keep their promise in implementing the items of the deal. And hopefully in near future, we will not see children who lose their fathers, we will not see women who raped by military or GAM, we will not see children who become soldier, we will not see women who cry because she has lost her children or husband, and we will not see any other violences-rebellions-conflicts-disasters in Aceh.

Galuh, 16 August 2005
1 (one) day after Aceh Peace Pact was signed

This is certainly very interesting question.

This morning, I got an email from my boss which tittled the question above. He mentioned that his email was a brainstorming and an invitation to have internal discussion about programming angles should the Helsinky-talks peace arrangement materialized in Aceh. Of course, those brainstormings and discussions should be related with our current and potential future programmes in Aceh.

One of the impacts if the Helsinky-talks provide an successfully agreement between GAM (Freedom Aceh Movement) and GoI (Government of Indonesia) with whatever requirements that agreed by both sides, then there is going to be a return or reintegration of GAM (Freedom Aceh Movement) members into their original communities. Personally, I thought that reintegrating ex-GAM in communities could have two possibilities, create a peace or create another forms of disputes in Aceh. Of course, we hope that it will create a peace in Aceh. But as my collegue said (and I agreed with him), there are certainly many cases (in other parts of the world) where fighters returning to their previous communities after the formal cessation of conflict had a hard time reintegrating into the community. There have been bad disputes over land and livelihoods, and conflicts related to desired for revenge and lack-of-education among the fighters, etc. For Aceh that still has to face the impacts of tsunami disaster on 26 December 2004, those matters could be even more difficult to address where land and livelihood issues are already problematic and the social fabric is already torn.

For all NGOs in Aceh, specifically us, should start to think how we will anticipate those situations from now, how is our position to respond or be prepared better. A lot of questions came up from my collegues and me : What will happen at the communities if the return and reintegration happens? How will that effect our programs? Our strategies/methodologies certainly has to be adapted so that we can be inclusive and can accommodate the participation of ex-GAM members in whatever ways we do? Do we have a realistic sense of how many GAM members are living outside their communities and may return? Mostly GAM members are young men, if it is correct, how much will this add to the gender imbalance created by the tsunami?What impact will any change in systems/processes of local governance have on our projects? And so on .. so on … still so many questions that I can not write it down in this blog.

We (my colleagues and I) do not know all the answers yet, but at least we are aware with all those questions and should keep this kind of dialogues continue. We need to respond and adapt.

And for all of you who read this posting, welcome if you have any inputs/comments/questions to respond the question as tittled of this posting. I am excitedly waiting for all your responds.

Food for thought …..

Galuh, 3 August 2005 at 12.00
During my lunch time

When we flied to Lombok on 2nd of July 2005, I read about teachers, schools, ‘failing students’ in Jakarta Post on the plane. This news about the failure of students in the national examinations. This year, the Government of Indonesia (GoI) conducted a national examinations for the first time. One of the purpose was to measure the students’ competency through centralized national examinations. Most of failure students were surpraised for their result, even they cried.

My first expression was “what a crazy and stupid government”. Jerome said “Why are you very emotional about that?” I am sorry to say that I feel very disappointed with GoI now. My personal opinion was the GoI could start to set higher standards after all conditions are met. The conditions are including the competent and quality teachers, sufficient infrastructure and contextuality to local conditions.

Two days before we flied to Lombok, I read many news about how expensive the education costs in Indonesia now. Money is everything to get higher education. I thought this is crazy because only rich people can get higher education. I believe that poor people can not afford it, even for my father who is a civil servant will be not able to afford it (but fortunately his last kid was already in university now). I know that the higher education fee is one of the impact of regional decentralization. I know that regional decentralization is part of our democratization process but I feel why the poor people get more bad impacts on this process. The health problems (polio outbreaks, malnutritions), unemployments, poverty, and education problems are totally getting worse and drastically the rate is increase.

The government had promised that by increasing the price of gasoline, they will allocate the subsidize for health and education. In other word the GoI had commitment to the poor. But until now, our GoI can not prove its commitment.

I was more upset when I watched news in TV about the long queue in many gas stations in all provinces in Indonesia. Indonesia had no enough gasoline stocks. Wow its crazy! Indonesia has so many gasoline resources, how come we have no more stocks! I thought it must be “corruption!”. Then a question came up in my mind, Will Indonesia in worse crisis economic situation again like in 1965 and 1997? Should we do demonstration and provide our GoI with other Tritura like in 1965?

TRITURA or Tiga Tuntutan Rakyat (three community demands?) happened in 1965 which were concist of (1) disperse PKI or Indonesia Communist Association, (2) decrease the price of community necessities, and (3) return to UUD 1945 or the constitution 1945.

Well I can not write anymore to describe it. The last but not least, I can not see more poor-people suffering because of bad politics and corruptions. I am hoping that the situation will be better soon and the GoI can prove its commitment to the poor-people. GoI has to start in realizing their promises to its citizens. I am hoping that I will find the way how I can help those poor-people.

Galuh, 12 July 2005 at 23.00 PM
I still want to write more but I could not describe my feeling in words especially in English. I believe that if all of you often read or watch news about Indonesia, you can understand my feeling.