Sometimes, even with the maximum amount of preparation, things still don't turn out the way you want them.  Taking part in a sprint triathlon in Singapore recently with some friends, I could say with confidence that I prepared for the cycling portion of the relay pretty well. Certainly with a lot more enthusiasm and strategic planning than President Obama did in his presidential debate against contender Mitt Romney. At least, I wanted to be where I was, at the race, and I was desperate to do well.

Out of the three sports, swimming, cycling and running, I had chosen the bike because I did not relish drowning in sea water or snapping my hamstring doing a 5k run. The cycling part is a 20k, quite a distance for a Car Free Sunday biker like me. As newbies we opted for the open relay, which, in terms of physical challenge, comes somewhere below the children's mini triathlon. Still, I'm a firm believer in the saying, anything worth doing is worth doing well. Especially where personal performance is at stake.

So, the first thing I did was to get myself a new bicycle and say goodbye to my faithful little folding bike. I opted for a cool-looking road bike with thin wheels and ten gears that set me back a few pennies, but a must if I wanted to be taken seriously.

The next thing I did was to prepare myself physically. A former athlete friend was kind enough to be my coach and help me put in the hours of training without injuring myself. She taught me that discipline and motivation was important to build strength and endurance. So for two months prior to the race, she created a rigorous schedule for me to follow and meticulously logged my performance after every training in a specially prepared journal. That way I could see where I needed to improve, be it my cardio, my stength or my speed.

My bike, affectionately known as The Green Lantern, for its unique colouring, was a delight. It is light, easy to mount and zippy, but sturdy enought to withstand the occasional bumps and falls. I was confident that together, we would do well.

After much practice, 20km didn't feel like a daunting distance to cover. I was ready for the big race. To put myself in the spirit of things, I splashed on some fancy cycling gear, padded pants, helmet, green goggles and a bright green pair of shoes in honour of The Green Lantern.

The morning of the race, I took The Green Lantern to the bicycle maintenance tent at the race venue for a quick health check. All its ten gears were put properly in place and both wheels were pumped with air to the correct pressure.

The race started. I hung my bike on the rack and waited for my team mate, the swimmer to appear and hand me the Champion Chip to record our performance. She finished at an impressive time, far ahead of the others in our group.

I grabbed The Green Lantern off the rack and ran with it to the mounting point, and started to pedal.

On my first pedalling I knew something was wrong. The gears made a horrible churning noise. I moved them about. The noise turned into a clanking sound. Nevertheless, I kept going. There was no turning back now. Barely a few meters into the race, there was another strange noise. This time it came from the back wheel.  A hideous flapping sound. And then my handle bar had a life of its own. The Green Lantern was conspiring to throw me off the saddle at every bump and minor turn. I had to keep holding on to stop myself from falling. In the meantime, I was conscious that however hard I pedaled, I could never move fast enough. I felt I was riding an uncontrollable monster.

I rode around like this for a good 13km before I had to concede defeat. The Green Lantern had a flat tire.

(Desi Anwar: First published in The Jakarta Globe)
05/10/2012

Nine Lives

Bush the Cat came to the house eleven years ago, during the invasion of Iraq led by his namesake George W Bush. He and his siblings, Uday and Qusay (named after the sons of Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein, all of whom met with a rather tragic ending) and a female kitten, were the products of a promiscuous female stray cat and an anonymous paramour who found my shoe cupboard under the stairs an ideal place to give birth to her litter. She stayed around long enough to nurse her kittens before disappearing once more into the streets, responding to the call of the wild, followed by Uday who was beginning to discover the use of his legs.

Bush however, stayed on with his siblings, regarding my house as his rightful abode, fed by a regular supply of branded cat food as if he were some pedigree. Which of course he isn't. Far from it. In appearance, Bush is just your run of the mill tabby, and compared to his siblings, actually on the ugly side. Nevertheless, in his heyday, with his long, slim torso, glossy fur, extra long tail and the face like a miniature lion from the Masai Mara, Bush was quite the Tom Cat of the neighbourhood and a fierce rival to his brother Qusay. And a miao that was completely devoid of any aesthetic value. Bad tempered, demanding and horribly loud.

And for a few years, he was indeed the king of the little street where I live. During the day, in the heat of the sunshine, he would spend his time stretched out on the cool stone slabs beneath the gazebo. In the evenings, he would prowl the neighbourhood, climbing from roof to roof and tracing the gutters, marking territory wherever he went. During mating season one could hear his miaoing all night long, usually followed by the most horrendous racket of bloodcurdling cat fights that went on until the early hours of the morning. And each mating season he would come home with some wound or another - a bleeding paw, a lopsided ear, bald fur patches on his back - like some war trophies.

Until one day, I thought it best to put an end to his male shenanigans once and for all, for his safety and the sanity of the household.  And soon, Bush and his siblings displayed a more house friendly temperament. After a few unsuccessful fights, Bush's lack of male drive kept him at home more and more, reducing his territory to the front part of the house and the back garden where he would spend his time eyeing the koi swimming in the pond. The farthest he would venture to was the nextdoor neighbour's rooftop.
Eleven years on, Bush is still around, though his face has become a lot uglier with age, his fur rather scraggy and he has lost a lot of his muscles that were his trademark. Until one day recently, he fell sick. It was just a cold, as his nose was stuffy and had gunk coming out of it. Dr Gustav, the Vet, and the one who gelded him, was called immediately and prescribed him antibiotics and some vitamin shots. But he had difficulty in breathing, lost his appetite and missed out a couple of day's worth of eating and drinking. When he decided to lie down in a corner and had tears coming out of his eyes and green snot oozing from his nose, I knew that it was a lot more serious than just a nasty cold. I took him to Dr Gustav for a thorough check up and a stay at the clinic.

Bush was severely dehydrated and he was losing his consciousness. In only a couple of days he seemed to have lost a lot of weight, had no energy and was unusually quiet. In human terms, Bush would be the equivalent of a seventy-seven year old man. His test results showed that he was not only severely dehydrated but he has a chronic kidney disease. Something that he must have been suffering from for a while now, but undetected, because I don't speak cat language. Perhaps he's been complaining about it for a while, but his ear piercing screeches sounded all the same to me, which I put down as his usual bad tempered self.

But there it is. The cat is dying, there's no doubt about it. Both test results and his USG showed that his kidneys were not only malfunctioning, they seemed to have disappeared altogether. And his liver was swollen to twice its normal size. My relative suggested I put him to sleep and out of his misery, for his sake. The cat was old, for goodness sake. Dr Gustav agreed that prognosis was bad, but he was not into putting animals down. I would have to take him elsewhere.

I asked him what could be done to help Bush, as I wasn't sure whether he would be ready to leave this world. Besides, I wasn't ready to let this ugly, bad tempered cat, out of my life. Apart from injecting him with fluids, treating him with a nebuliser so he could breathe, and giving him antibiotics, there wasn't much to be done. But dr Gustav the vet, had also taken up a course in acupuncture and had began to take in human patients desperate enough to be treated by a vet. He offered to experiment on Bush, by treating him with acupuncture for three minutes a day. He had also just bought himself a new-fangled machine that could feed ion into the skin to help wounds heal quicker. The machine is also good if you want to get rid of wrinkles.

I agreed. After all, what else was there to do?  If the cat had to go, at least it wasn't because he was in pain, dehydrated or not being able to breathe. It would be because his body finally gave up on him, and we had tried everything to make him better.

The first time the vet stuck tiny needles into him, Bush gave one of his ugly sounding miaows. A good sign, I thought. After a few days of treatment, the USG still couldn't make out the shapes of his kidneys, but he didn't show signs of giving up. If he were human, dr Gustav observed, he would be six foot under. As it was, Bush's condition improved considerably. After a week, he was eating and drinking on his own. I decided to take him home. He went straight to the pond, drank a big gulp of water and watched the koi swim. Moreover, he had found his voice - the loud, demanding sound that was ugly as sin but music to my ears, nevertheless.

My cat it seems, really has nine lives.

My driver is rather pleased with himself. He and a friend made a wager on who would be winners in Jakarta's election for a new governor and deputy. He put his money on Jokowi-Ahok pair and came home with two big boxes of cigarettes and fifty thousand rupiah. He himself is a Betawi, a native of Jakarta, and I asked him why he would back a man from Solo.

'I really have no respect for Foke,' he said, of the incumbent governor. 'He said that the Betawis that didn't vote for him, should get out of Jakarta. I mean, who does he think he is? Jakarta doesn't belong to him.'  But why was he so sure that Fauzi Bowo would lose?  'Because the guy is not a nice person.'

I guess that makes a lot of sense.  Alone in the polling booth and faced with a choice between someone you know but  actively dislike and someone whom you don't really know but looks like a nice person, it's probably easier to choose the latter.

Nice seems to carry a lot of weight when choosing a leader these days. A waiter whom I spoke to the night before the capital's election day in a cafe I frequent, made his preference very clear. He would definitely vote for Jokowi-Ahok. Moreover, he had no doubt that the underdog pair would win.

'In my neighbourhood we're given all these flyers,' he said, 'telling us not to vote for Jokowi-Ahok because Ahok is not a Moslem and Chinese. The flyers are really nasty, saying bad things about them and how we must vote for Foke. There's even money being distributed. But I've already made up my mind. I vote according to my conscience, not because of the promise of money or what some awful flyers tell us. These people must think we're stupid or what.'

In between my tuna salad, I asked him what made him so sure that Jokowi-Ahok would win. His calculations were simple. According to him, 45 per cent of people living in Jakarta are Javanese, so naturally they would vote for Solo candidate, Jokowi. Now, say 10 per cent of Jakartans are of Chinese descent and Christians. No doubt they would vote for Ahok. So between them they could easily get 55 per cent. Plus, there's the unhappy Betawi denizens living in burnt slums who, when they asked for help from the governor, were kindly told to go and live in Solo. Those numbers make up more than enough for a clear win. Impressive. Not only is he smart, he also turns out to be right. Jokowi-Ahok emerged as undisputed winners in the Quick Count.

Which is not what I can say about my friend who picked Fauzi Bowo, convinced that Foke would win. His reasoning was that Jakartans like stability and would prefer the devil they know rather than risk a new face that would disturb the order of things. 'There are still many programs to be implemented,' he said, which in retrospect sounded more like wishful thinking. 'Only Foke could continue the job. It's not easy to get all that bureaucratic machinery going, and having a new leader would mean starting all over again.'

'Moreover, a lot of Indonesians are still primordial in their thinking. Things like religion and ethnicity might seem irrelevant to us, the educated middle class, but matter very much to the masses. They would still be influenced by their religious leaders and frankly, I don't think they're ready to have a Chinese candidate. Besides, Jakarta is the home of the Betawi people, so why should they pick a Mayor from Solo to run their city and a little guy from Bangka Belitung?'

As it transpires, most of the ordinary Jakartans are more than happy to import a Mayor from Solo and a Chinese businessman who is Christian to boot, to entrust their sprawling metropolis to. And contrary to some belief, are not so easily swayed by religious or ethnic considerations. Rather, they go for practical matters. They're fed up, and they want change.

Perhaps it's the image they project. With their fresh, youthful looks and signature checkered shirts, Jokowi-Ahok are the new kids in town and the face of change. Perhaps it's because Jakartans, frustrated with the messy state of the city, have had just about enough with what they've had to put up with in the last five years, including the thick mustache.  They want the city cleaned up, and the mustache shaved off.

What is clear, is that Jakartans, like Kus the waiter, don't want too much politic. A recent march I saw at the HI roundabout consisting of a bunch of simple folk and their children, waved cardboard banners saying 'we need money, not politics.'  Nor do they need politicians with too many promises and who act as if they know a lot better than the people they serve.  They also cannot be hoodwinked and manipulated to further the interests of some parties who cynically use the issues of religion and ethnicity to garner support.

'I voted Jokowi-Ahok because I want change,' says a supporter. 'It's time that things are done differently.'

Whether the victorious pair, now greeted and feted like celebrities, would be able to live up to their expectations and produce change, is difficult to tell.  What is clear is the real change makers are the ordinary Jakartans, the more than 53% that voted for Jokowi-Ahok with confidence and power. The power that comes with the ability to freely choose the leaders they want and get rid of those they don't.

'I like the pair because they're humble and down to earth,' says another Jokowi-Ahok voter. 'And they're not corrupt.' And for this country, that's already a big change.
 
(Desi Anwar:  First published in The Jakarta Globe)
21/09/2012

What we need to teach at school from a young age as a compulsory subject, is ethics. This is important if we, as human beings, want to evolve to the level where we can interact with each other with civility and not constantly come to loggerheads over the slightest provocation nor keep inherited hatred alive for the next thousand years.  Rather than instiling the notion that we are divided by the differences in our beliefs and that the religion that we follow is, by virtue of us embracing it or because we are born into it, is the one most favoured by a supernatural deity and thus guaranteeing us a good life in the hereafter, we should rather refine our understanding of what being human is all about.

We should, as the Dalai Lama says, go beyond religion. We should instead find that essence of what makes us special as a species on this planet: our common humanity. We share the same desire for happiness, security and harmony. We are all vulnerable to the ills and troubles that our flesh is heir to, here on this earth. Thus our basic humanity is the code we should live by.  Rather than teaching a particular belief that becomes the basis of how we interact with others and how we judge other people as well as how we define our identity, better teach at school practical skills that our children can apply in their everyday life and serve them well into the future as socially mature members of the human community.

For example, along with good manners, we can also teach them the importance of adopting good ethics such as treating all fellow humans equally and with respect, and showing compassion, kindness and tolerance for others. Stuff that the holy books already mandate, but without the trappings of the different religious hues that, if anything, often end up distorting the definition of those ethical behaviours, such as picking and choosing whom to practice kindness and tolerance upon. The human history after all, is one of never ending conflicts mainly for religious and territorial dominance. As the Sage Mahatma Gandhi says: if we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children. And the first thing that we need to teach them, again to quote Gandhi, is that 'to give service to a single heart by a single act, is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer.'

The other important thing to teach children from an early age is science and the importance of inquiry. Better to teach them about the 'god particle' than about God, the definition of which and the knowledge of whom is still until now, a matter of belief, heresay and point of contention. For if we teach them of what science has managed to reveal and continues to reveal, that our planet is a minuscule grain of sand in a shore consisting of gazillions of planets, in a zillion galaxies that make up our ever expanding Universe, then perhaps it will help us put things in perspectives and make us realize what is important and not so important about how we conduct our lives, build our societies and treat the planet. It might even instil a real sense of awe and appreciation of the existence of a bigger thing beyond us that is far above our own blinkered convictions and narrow beliefs.

And when we encourage children to inquire on the nature of things and to ask questions, we plant the seeds for knowledge to grow. We allow their minds to develop and mature into enlightened and thinking individual that can see reality for what it is, rather than be stunted by spoonfed dogmas and barely understood convictions that might keep them in the straight and narrow, and yet ill-prepared to face the world in all its variety and diversity. The desire to ask questions, to show doubt and to search for knowledge, far from taking us away from the notion of divinity and the fear of God, probably takes us closer to the ideal that we are created for. That is to realize our full potentials as a human being and to perfect our humanity.

Science and constant inquiry will also teach us humility about our place in the planetary and cosmic order of things. And that contrary to our solipsistic belief that life and the world is all about us and that God's main preoccupation in the Universe is to monitor our moral health and decide who gets to go to heaven or to hell, humanbeing is just one specie out of many on the planet and, by the way we multiply, use and consume our environment, is probably not unsimilar in nature to a virus or a parasite. Moreover, ours may not even be the only living planet in the Universe. For all we know, we could even be an experiment gone wrong.

Art is also another subject that should be mandatory at school. Appreciation of art allows young minds to develop their finer sensibilities, making them aware of the beauty and creativity in Nature and the world about them. It is through the different manifestations of Art that often gives meaning to life and where we can experience at our most individual and soul level, a taste of the Immortal and even, the Divine.

(Desi Anwar:  First Published in The Jakarta Globe)

Lost Words

The other day I went to the HB Jassin library of Indonesian literature located in the complex of the Jakarta Arts Institute, TIM.  HB Jassin was the pope of Indonesian literature.  He was a professor, literary critic, documentarian of literary works and publisher of the once well-known literary magazine ‘Horison.’  He set up the library from his personal collection back in 1976 to document the riches of Indonesian literature.

Here one can find the original manuscripts of novels and poetry written by some of Indonesia’s finest writers, as well as original letters written by writers and playwrights. Something that even the Indonesian National Library doesn’t have.

The thing that catches my eye is the manuscript of one of my favourite novels ‘Atheis‘ by Achdiat Karta Mihardja, published in 1949.  There is the manuscript, typed and bound with the title of the book hand scrawled by the author on the cover of the book, and underlined with curlicues as if some teenager’s exercise book.  It lies amongst other musty looking manuscripts of some of the most important novels to be written in Indonesia’s modern history, displayed in a haphazard way in a rather sorry-looking glass case.  And I am moved.

Actually the whole place moves me.  From the torn and faded sign of the documentation centre at the entrance made of printed plastic that looks like a temporary thing put up there when the centre was built and somehow failed to be replaced, to the iron steps leading into the painted blue building that from outside resembles a large prefabricated shed, the place hardly does justice to the value of its hallowed content.

A paraplegic man in a wheel chair greets the visitor behind a table with a high pitched jovial voice.  Most of the time I cannot fathom what he’s saying. He is the man in charge of the place.  Every day he has to hoist his wheelchair up the metal steps as the building has no wheelchair access. The mind boggles at this feat, for the steps are high and steep.  And I think, here is the living symbol of the place’s neglect and lack of interest.  

Inside, a few wooden tables are scattered about the bare lobby - places for visitors and researchers to sit and read as the public is not allowed into the library itself.  The books are not for loan but only for reference use only.  I was lucky to be given access into the library:  a long room with rows of wooden shelves on either side, dimly lit under energy saving neon lights.  I hear the budget to keep the place going is a mere Rp 11 million rupiah. 

An old typewriter without its casing sits on a table.  At first I thought it’s a display of a nostalgic relic of the days gone by when writers would give birth to their masterpiece by pounding on the keys of an Olivetti or an Olympus.  I am wrong.  A half full coffee cup next to it and a sheet of labels stuck in the roller shows that the typewriter is still fully functional and used to type up the book catalogue labels.  Yes, everything is still painfully catalogued manually.  The world of the digital and the Online has not crossed the threshold of this place of Indonesia’s finest literary oeuvres.

The works themselves are uniquely stored.  They are kept in files or folders inside file boxes labeled and catalogued using what I guess is the Dewey Decimal System.  To find the book the reader looks through the wooden catalogue drawers in the lobby whereupon the library assistant would look through the shelves and in the box files.  I wonder why they keep the books in document files and not simply arrange them on the shelves.  Taking one out of the folder, I understand.  Most of the books are old small paper backs whose pages are thin, fragile and wrinkled, printed as they were in poorer times.  As for the letters and correspondences, they have faded away with age.  They cannot withstand too much handling.

The last time I encountered these books was when I worked as a library assistant at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.  A whole floor of the multi-level library of this university was devoted to South East Asian literature of which Indonesia occupied a large part.  They were all in good condition and students and library members were free to browse and borrow them at will.  The more valuable documentation, such as missionary papers and original manuscripts were kept in a climate controlled room with fridge like temperature. The contents however, were made available to readers on microfiche. These days they’re probably all digitized.

And yet, here in this sorry-looking place is the repository of a history, timeline, thoughts, ideas, ideologies and events that trace the development of this country and help define who we are as a nation.  In these books, some familiar only as titles in school children’s text books, others obscure and unheard of, such as folk tales from the many islands of the archipelago as well as translated stories from local languages that have most likely disappeared, are clues to what it is that makes Indonesia the way it is today.  Hidden, forgotten and eaten away by time.

Soon, no doubt, they will disappear.  Along with our knowledge of our history and the narrative of our own life story. 






31/08/2012

Forgiveness

The end of the fasting month and with it the Idul Fitri celebrations is the time for Moslems to ask for forgiveness from the family, friends, relatives, colleagues, bosses and even complete strangers.  Meeting and greeting each other, they say  ‘Mohon maaf lahir dan batin’ (I beg forgiveness from the depths of my heart and soul, or something like that).

These days those words of asking for forgiveness are also conveyed via technology, through broadcast messages and electronic spams, including from people you barely know but you receive nevertheless, merely because your contact happens to be in somebody’s smart phone or mailing list.

Some of the more elaborate versions of the greetings are often accompanied by Arabic words and poetic verses designed to tug at the heart strings and move you to tears, as they wax lyrical about how after a month of struggle, restraining one’s hunger, thirst, passions and emotions, one emerges triumphant and victorious, and back to a state of grace, purity and a new beginning.  With all sins wiped clean and forgiven. And with it, a sense of righteousness and virtuousness.

I personally feel uncomfortable with these messages, greetings and wishes.  I think there is a hazard in this use and abuse of the idea of forgiveness.  It is easy to forgive those whose wrongs we can’t really think of, but to those whom we harbour genuine ill-feeling and grievances, a few lines of copy pasted text messages sent en masse or as an email attachment, would hardly mend matters.  

Perhaps these words have become mere platitudes through over use, as meaningless as saying ‘good morning’ when there’s a torrential downpour, or ‘have a nice day,‘ when you don’t care a jot about the person.  This is a pity, as to ask and give forgiveness is something not to be trifled with.  If to err is human, as they say, to forgive is our attempt to be divine, and this cannot be achieved by reducing the significance of the word to the level of the trite, the banal and the cliche on some greeting cards.

Also hazardous is the sense of righteousness and virtuousness that being forgiven and cleansed of one’s sins affords, as it makes one morally lax and irresponsible of the long term consequence of one’s actions.  One needs only go through the annual ritual of the fasting month, pay the obligatory alms, shake hands with a bunch of people at family gatherings, the bosses’ and at high government officials’ obligatory ‘open houses’ to feel that one’s sins are thoroughly cleansed and one’s slate wiped clean, ready for more humanly errs.

How easy life is, and how convenient.  Here is a formula to indulge in one’s human deficiencies and still have instant access to that most comforting of all human condition - the feeling of self-righteousness and being on the right path.  Is it any wonder that we cannot get rid of the corruption and moral ineptitude in this country?  When forgiveness becomes a passport to moral licentiousness.

In jail for corruption? Start reading the Koran, don a head scarf, be more diligent in your prayers.  Soon you will feel absolved from all shame and guilt, because forgiveness is always there for you at the asking to make you feel better and to relieve you of your responsibility.  And when you ask for, take or buy favours, it’s understandable. Because we’re only human and humans are weak and half the time they don’t know what they’re doing.


However, I am always chary of anything that smacks of freebies and hyperbolical promises.  Giving somebody my forgiveness and having somebody asks one in return just because the season calls for it, is ridiculous.  As for exchanging messages of congratulations for having triumphed over evil and regained a state of childlike purity and innocence, sounds a lot like wishful thinking. I don’t think you can become a better person just by reciting more prayers and watching religious TV programs for a month.  At least, not if it only leads to self-righteousness and not self-knowledge.

Because the knowledge of our weaknesses and imperfections should in practice make us stronger.  Stronger in our resolve to be good, kind and honest people and stronger in our capability to restrain our greed, ego and selfishness.  While we are still human beings living with other human beings on this planet.

It should not be an annual ritual for a limited amount of time, after which life as we know it continues as usual, except this time with increased complacency, greater unscrupulousness and more unfettered greed, as we are freed from our sense of guilt, shame and wrongdoing, having been so expressibly forgiven and thoroughly purified.

But God should not be a means to excuse all our imperfections nor become the repository of all our iniquities.  After all, humans create the idea of Divinity as a role model to which we should all aspire in all its qualities: the Love, the Just and the Benevolence.  Then there is no need to mouth forgiveness or play at being holy.  Instead, we will strive to ensure that each and every one of our action is beyond reproach to begin with.

(Desi Anwar:  First Published in The Jakarta Globe)

Feeling Charitable

‘Tis the season to be charitable.  To dig deep into your pockets and share some of the wealth you have with those whose lives, unlike yours, have been overlooked by the bountiful gaze of the Goddess of Fortune.  For Muslims, alms giving to the poor and the needy is a must in this month of Ramadan.  It is an act of merit that would count towards securing a heavenly spot in the after life.

There is a rich businessman in Jakarta who makes a habit of bestowing a generous amount of cash to the poor at this time of the year.  The number of hopefuls gathering outside his house in anticipation of the handout can get quite huge and it is not rare that the rush for cash results in crushes that are fatal.

Once I dropped by to this charitable event.  Very few of those who lined up were actually mendicants by profession.  Obviously feeling poor is a subjective thing.  Many came from out of town and this gathering, waiting for the gate to be opened and receiving free cash, was an annual affair for them.  The trip was always worth it as the businessman is quite generous in his gift.  I was told that in the previous year he gave everyone who came a hundred thousand rupiahs.  This time, they were hoping for an increase as things were getting expensive.

At some point, after a few hours of standing in the sun, their patience ran thin. The gate was supposed to be opened by midday, but still there was no sign of them being allowed to enter.  Some started to complain loudly about the delay.  How inconsiderate of the man.  How long were they expected to wait for?  Last year was so much better organized, etc.
I mentioned that since the man was charitable enough to give everyone coming to see him a fistful of money, the least they could do was show a little patience.  After all, he didn’t have to do it.  Upon which I was told, rather reproachfully, that giving was the rich man’s duty and privilege.  He should be grateful to them for taking his money, as they were helping him earn a large amount of merits that would guarantee him a good place in the hereafter.

I thought this reply was interesting.  I hadn’t thought of it like that.  And here I was, thinking that the act of giving is to show compassion and consideration for one’s fellow humans.  They were probably right.  If it was about compassion, I could think of other ways to perform charity without making hundreds of people throng outside your gate and even risking their lives.

I went to a mosque with a friend to make a donation.  At this time of the year, the bigger mosques set up tables to deal with the number of people coming to pay their obligatory ‘zakat’ payment.  There was some kind of calculation involved of which I was not clear. Other than the ‘zakat’, you can also give a donation with the amount left to one’s discretion.  The money is channelled to help those in need in the rural areas and to give the poor access to much needed capital.  So I was told.

I gave a handful of cash and hoped that it would go to where they said it would and felt a minute thrill of pleasure that my little contribution might mean something to someone.  The lady behind the table wrote me a receipt.  She held my hand for a little while and said a prayer.

‘Now your wealth is ‘halal’,’ she kindly informed me.  ‘Charity giving cleanses your earnings.’  I was rather taken aback.  All this time I thought that I had earned my living in an honest and professional way.  But obviously my wealth is tainted.  Still, if I had earned it the shady and corrupt way, it was good to know that there is a way to launder it back to pristine cleanliness.  Now, if only paying taxes gave me the same heavenly guarantee and good feeling.

A couple of days ago I received a text message.  It was from a relative.  The few times I’ve met him were on family gatherings.  He is always hard up.  For some unfortunate reason, luck had not been on his side and he would use the occasion to cadge for some money.  No, hello, how are you and what have you been doing for the last four decades since we saw each other last, but, it was, I need such and such an amount to pay for such and such thing, could I have some money please.  To be honest, I feel sorry for him and on more than a couple of times have given him something.

The text message said: hello, how are you.  Am I going to be lucky this year?  I will be visiting your sister next week so you can give me the money then.

I am ashamed to say the sentiment that I had on reading the message was far from charitable.  I’m still finding it hard to wrap my mind around the idea that to help someone is a privilege for which I should be grateful.  After a few deleted words, the only sensible thing I could muster was: ‘if you’re lucky, then yes, I will give it to my sister to pass on to you.’  The line between feeling sorry and feeling annoyed is getting pretty thin.

And yes, I am giving him some money, not out of fear of being barred from the kingdom of heaven or to cleanse my wealth, but because I choose to.    (Desi Anwar: First Published in The Jakarta Globe)

The Missing Tempeh

The ubiquitous tempeh that accompanies every Indonesian meal has been rather elusive lately, as tempeh makers around the country have stopped production in the last few days to protest the rising price of soybeans.  Prolonged drought in the US has increased the price of the commodity, affecting the local tempeh and tofu makers who rely on imported soybeans for the raw material.  You can be sure, once they start producing them again, the cost for these fried fermented soybean patties, the main staple of the Indonesian diet, will no longer be so humble.

The question of course, is why, given the country’s reliance on soybeans, Indonesia cannot grow and produce enough of it to feed her people and hence less dependent on imports and the vagaries of other country’s weather misfortunes?  The same thing goes with other staples such as rice and sugar. 

Of course, when growing and producing our own crops cost a lot more than importing them from other countries, it’s often easier and cheaper to just buy them, even at the expense of our farmers’ livelihood and, more importantly, at the expense of the country’s ability to develop the skills and technology to grow our own food.

It’s true that these days, with global trade, there is less need for a country to produce everything since you can always buy them from other countries the way they buy stuff from you.  However, when the depth of our globalisation and extent of our global interdependence is such that changing weather patterns in the US and India and consumer patterns in China have a direct effect on the basic food that we have on our dinner plate, then surely something is wrong.

While it’s good to be able to enjoy say, exotic fruits from other countries at a price that a household can afford, however, when it’s more expensive for us to buy locally grown fruit, say mangoes or bananas, than the same fruits imported from a long way abroad, then we have a problem.  Especially when some local indigenous fruits disappear off the shelves altogether to be replaced by foreign varieties because it’s easier and cheaper to get them than the ones from home.   

Moreover, it is ironic, as we always refer to Indonesia as our ‘tanah air’ (land-water).  And yet, here we are, acting as if we have neither of these things, preferring instead to focus on GDP growth and the health of our finance and consumer index as indicators of how well the country is doing, instead of focusing on the health of our land and water as our natural and sustainable capital.   

After all, what good is there in having a strong purchasing power if we don’t use it to better the quality of everyone’s life and the condition of the planet that we leave to future generations?  When we don’t invest it to promote research and innovation that can enrich the quality of our lands and the crops so our farmers can thrive and actually grow food for us now and for tomorrow’s children.  When we don’t invest in our water and our seas so that we can research ways on how to keep them clean and the fishes in abundance so that our fishermen can make a sustainable living out of them.  So that there is no longer any need for them to descend into the already congested cities to eke out a living as poor labourers, petty traders, menial workers or without employment.

While we cannot deny the importance and desirability of material growth - be it for comfort, welfare, security, convenience, status and momentary happiness - to pursue it as an end in itself, separate from our needs for social and environmental happiness, can only land us in trouble.  Already we are overwhelmed by the excesses of our materialism in the forms of mountains of waste, polluted air, scarce water, expensive energy use and cities that are unpleasant to live in as they are designed to accommodate buildings rather than people.

Money might enable us to buy tempeh, but when tempeh is no longer available because the soybeans can no longer be grown, then it has no functional or nutritional use.  Actually, money is not a problem in this world.  Currently there is a lot of money around in the world.  However, it is mainly in the pockets of the few and used to generate more money and not to solve global problems.  If anything, poverty is increasing with 2.5 billion people living under $2 a day in a world becoming more vulnerable to climate and environmental upheavals. 

And still we continue living in an Industrial Age vacuum that reduces the meaning of life to one of making, using and throwing things in the most effective, productive and massive way, as if we own Mother Earth.  We might not have meant it, but our activities has left us with our resources depleted, our water and air polluted, our biodiversity diminishing, our industrial, consumer and toxic wastes damaging our health and the environment.

We have significantly impoverished the planet.  It is therefore, time to look at Nature not as a Resource to be exploited but as a Capital whose use comes with a cost and must be returned undamaged and with interest.

27/07/2012

Season to Indulge

What I like about the fasting month, is the amount of indulgence that it promises.  Let's be honest, compared to the other months of the year, the Ramadan month is one of excess, where demand shoots up and prices sky rocket as people consume more meat, more rice, more delicacies and more of everything as if the world's coming to an end.  This is the month when companies and households have to dig deep into their pockets and fork out an extra month of salary to give to each and everyone of their employees, staff, the neighbourhood security, the rubbish collectors and newspaper delivery boys to help pay for the additional expenses.

Not only that, the beginning of this month is invariably marked by an excessive display of emotions and drama as various religious experts come to loggerheads on which day this holy month is actually supposed to start as they try to make sightings of the appearance of the elusive new moon, convinced it seems  that the slightest mistake in calculation would result in the reduction of their heavenly rewards, much to the amusement and bemusement of the public and the Netizens.

It is also the time for verbal superfluity as we are inundated with a deluge of messages mass broadcast via every available electronic devices from people known and unknown asking for forgiveness for wrongs done whether deliberate or not, and words that may have hurt whether intentional or not, in a language so florid and poetic, though with as much sincerity as a cut and pasted text could muster.  This exercise in asking for forgiveness will be repeated later on at a much larger scale towards the end of the fasting month, creating a bonanza for the telecom providers.

But this is also a good month to earn divine merits and excel in good behaviour. Those who wish to ensure a favored place in the afterlife can use this holy month to devote themselves to extra prayers, reading the Koran, restraining their tempers, feeding the orphans, giving alms to the poor and taking a break from their porn browsing.  As one of the biggest surfers of web porn, it would be interesting to see if there is a marked reduction in accessing porn in Indonesia during this month.  However, keeping one's mind pure shouldn't be too difficult as all the TV stations compete in serving righteous programming, while the thugs are quite ready to put you back on the strait and narrow should you find yourself succumbing to the devil's temptations of alcohol and massage parlours.

This is also the season when shopping malls go all out to entice the faithful to part with their hard-earned money so they would succumb to the wordly desire for conspicious consumption, whether in the shape of fine clothes or restaurants and eating places that offer a smorgasbord of irresistible foods to soothe and delight the deprived palates.
Businesses make the most money at this time of the year as new clothings and footwear are a must to celebrate the end of the fasting month, the Idul Fitri.

For the millions who make a modest living in the city, the fasting month is when they prepare themselves to make their annual trip back to their home villages, blowing their savings on new motorbikes or train tickets, bearing gifts and money for the folk at home, not only to share their wealth and also to show that they have made something of themselves in the big city.

While for the better-off, the breaking of the fast moment, at sundown, is an opportunity to eat out with families and friends, hang out and entertain clients over food in ways they can't do during normal days.  That is to say, with a lof of people, a lot of food and for a lot of days.  I know a friend whose social calendar is full for the month as every evening is taken up with a breaking of the fast event somewhere.  Because on a fasting day, every evening's 'buka puasa' is a feast that is looked forward to with great anticipation.

But let's get back to the sweet indulgence of the fasting month.  Yes, it is the time for picky eaters like me to let down my hair and really revel in the cornucopia of sweets, puddings and all types of desserts that are cloying, sticky and preferably drowned in a pool of liquid palm sugar and a generous swirl of coconut milk.  Come sundown, regardless whether I'm fasting or not, my sweet tooth become vampiric fangs and I join the hunt with the more devout devotees for a glass or bowl of 'tajil', the dessert consumed to break the fast as a sugar kick before moving on to the main meal.

My favorites are the 'cendol', the green jelly drink with slices of jack fruit served in a tall glass of palm syrup and coconut milk; 'bubur sumsum,' a sort of white pudding that you spoon in dollops and serve with palm syrup and coconut milk; the 'candil', sweet potato balls swimming in a bowl of, you've guessed it, liquid palm sugar and served with a spoonfull of what else if not coconut milk; black glutinous rice and mung bean porridge plus a whole bunch of desserts whose tastes are made the more divine with a good helping of palm syrup and coconut milk.. Never mind the afterlife, a bowl of any one of these sweets, puts me in heaven already.

(Desi Anwar:  First Published in The Jakarta Globe)
22/07/2012

Sixth Sense Technology

These days, a common view at a dinner table is no longer lively conversations but each person becoming absorbed in their own gadgets, communicating their innermost and heartfelt thoughts to everybody and nobody in particular, through Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and other social network platforms, while ignoring the person next to them.

Because we live in a world where technology dictates our behaviour.

This is why one of my favourite TED talk lectures is Pranav Mistry’s The Thrilling Potential of Sixth Sense Technology.  It was actually delivered back in 2009, a year before the iPad came to market, and yet his invention, called SixthSense is well ahead of its time, even for today.  SixthSense is a wearable device that enables new interactions between the real world and the world of data.   

Wearing the device that has a camera and having a couple of sensors on the fingertips, for example, you can take photos just by framing the object with your fingers and thumbs, dial phone numbers on the back of your hand, while placing a chip on a piece of paper you can turn the piece of paper into any digital device, whether to watch a video, play games, a touch-based computer screen and anything that today’s tablet computer can do plus more. 

The finger can also be used to make 3D digital drawings anywhere, create a watch on your wrist to tell the time and bring books, magazines and newspapers to life by linking what you see with the information available in the digital world. 

The implication of this innovation is enormous, especially the advantages it can bring for the disabled and the elderly where everyday task can be done with just a movement of the fingers or the sound of a word.  Of course, it must be developed so it can be mass produced and easy to use, but all digital technology should, I think, be steered in this direction.  To adapt to human behaviour and not the other way round. 

WhatI find exciting about Mistry’s invention is the potential for digitizing our world in a way which is human and intuitive.  While current technology and the digital world is sucking us into a life that requires us to interact with gadgets (whether the computer, the smart phones, the tablets), making us into individuals who feel more connected in a virtual world as opposed to the real world, and turning us into socially withdrawn beings who find more comfort spending time interfacing with our computer screen than engaging in face to face conversations, what Mistry offers is the opposite.  It is to turn the world around us into a digital device even as we interact like normal human beings, using our entire bodies, not hunched over our mobile devices.

Wearing the device, we become the computer, capable of browsing the Internet by moving our fingers, performing cut and paste by merely pinching our fingers and transferring it onto an ordinary piece of paper, turning any wall or surface into a digital screen where we can find information, download a map to search for a particular restaurant, check the weather and even talk to our friends.  And we can do all this while going out for a walk in the fresh air, hanging out with friends and being active.

Nowadays, a lot of the time, friends and families gather only to be close physically, while mentally everybody is elsewhere, and often finding conversing and interacting with the invisible world more rewarding, honest and authentic than the strained verbal exchanges that real life conversations demand. 

It’s getting to the point that people are finding it easier to speak their mind and have a productive conversation through their gadgets even as they are in the same room.  Certainly, in offices, the real discussions and even arguments are easier done through the digital exchanges in a Blackberry group, rather than in meeting rooms.  That is, using the thumbs rather than the mouth.

A SixthSense technology on the contrary, is where we are in control of the technology and not the other way round.  Imagine a technology that actually increases our curiosity about the people that we meet, the places that we visit and the things that we see around us, without making us addicted to our gadgets and trapping us into a life of staring and interacting with a screen. 

Instead, the technology becomes another part of our senses, but one that allows us to connect with the mine of information that the world wide web provides whenever we wish.  A technology that is digital in the real sense of the word, that is using our fingers. 

When we travel, touching our boarding pass can tell us at a glance where to go at the airport and whether our flight is delayed or not.  When we order our food, we can immediately get information on the amount of calories and nutrients it contains.  Meeting people, we can get information about their profession, hobbies and musical taste. All the stuff that we can find Online without having to go Online. 

Then our real world will no doubt be a lot more fascinating than our virtual world.

(Desi Anwar:  First Published in The Jakarta Globe)

22/06/2012