Bahasa English

"Hello Mister. Where you go ?".
Voilà où s'arrête hélas les connaissances en anglais de la majorité des indonésiens.

Parmi ceux qui en savent un peu plus, peu excellent dans la langue de Shakespeare. Mais ça ne les empêche pas d'avoir le courage d'essayer de parler, laissant de côté leur timidité. Ce qui est fort appréciable quand on ne maîtrise pas suffisamment a langue locale.

On retrouve régulièrement les mêmes fautes, liées essentiellement à de la traduction littérale du Bahasa Indonesia vers l'anglais. L'indonésien étant bien plus pauvre grammaticalement que l'anglais, le résultat est souvent surprenant .... et tellement mignon à entendre, avec en plus l'accent local...

Quelques exemples :

Are you already finiss mister ?
Maybe you want massazz ?
I am really appreciate you…
Can I asking you something?
"Same-same" à la place de "you're welcome".
Thank you in advanced.
So long time no see something like that.
I didn’t saw your misscall.
I go for smoking.
I’m very headache.
He likes you and your do it too... (Confusion masculin/féminin, pas de genre en indonésien)

Et puis des fois aussi, on hallucine en lisant des mails.
Voici le plus bel exemple recensé jusqu'alors, provenant d'un fournisseur d'accès internet... à ses clients :

Dear Customer,

According our Minister Communication and Info Letter No : [...] : about The blockading of the Site and Blog That contained [...], then the site along with this for the time being we were closed until the further notification :

[...]

Was like this information that could be sent by us as information from our backbone internet Excelcomindo, upper the understood we say thank you.

Warm Regards,

--
Thank You,
Customer Service and Technical Support Division.

Jakarta, Indonesia - A sinking giant ?

*JAKARTA, INDONESIA — A SINKING GIANT?*

by Andre Vltchek

Today, high-rises dot the skyline, hundreds of thousands of vehicles belch fumes on congested traffic arteries and super-malls have become the cultural centers of gravity in Jakarta, the fourth largest city in the world. In between towering super-structures, humble kampongs house the majority of the city dwellers, who often have no access to basic sanitation, running water or waste management.

While almost all major capitals in the Southeast Asian region are investing heavily in public transportation, parks, playgrounds, sidewalks and cultural institutions like museums, concert halls and convention centers, Jakarta remains brutally and determinately 'pro-market' — profit-driven and openly indifferent to the plight of a majority of its citizens who are poor.

Most Jakartans have never left Indonesia, so they cannot compare their capital with Kuala Lumpur or Singapore; with Hanoi or Bangkok. Comparative statistics and reports hardly make it into the local media. Despite the fact that the Indonesian capital is for many foreign visitors a 'hell on earth,'the local media describes Jakarta as "modern," "cosmopolitan, " and "a sprawling metropolis." Newcomers are often puzzled by Jakarta's lack of public amenities.

Bangkok, not exactly known as a user-friendly city, still has several beautiful parks. Even cash-strapped Port Moresby, capital of Papua New Guinea, boasts wide promenades, playgrounds, long stretches of beach and sea walks.

Singapore and Kuala Lumpur compete with each other in building wide sidewalks, green areas as well as cultural establishments. Manila, another city without a glowing reputation for its public amenities, has succeeded in constructing an impressive sea promenade dotted with countless cafes and entertainment venues while preserving its World Heritage Site at Intramuros. Hanoi repaved its wide sidewalks and turned a park around Huan-Kiem Lake into an open-air sculpture museum.

But in Jakarta, there is a fee for everything. Many green spaces have been converted to golf courses for the exclusive use of the rich. The approximately one square kilometer of Monas seems to be the only real public area in a city of more than 10 million. Despite being a maritime city, Jakarta has been separated from the sea, with the only focal point being Ancol, with a tiny, mostly decrepit walkway along the dirty beach dotted with private businesses.

Even to take a walk in Ancol, a family of four has to spend approximately $4.50 (40,000 Indonesian Rupiahs) in entrance fees, something unthinkable anywhere else in the world. The few tiny public parks which survived privatization are in desperate condition and mostly unsafe to use.

There are no sidewalks in the entire city, if one applies international standards to the word "sidewalk." Almost anywhere in the world (with the striking exception of some cities in the United States, like Houston and Los Angeles) the cities themselves belong to pedestrians. Cars are increasingly discouraged from traveling in the city centers. Wide sidewalks are understood to be the most ecological, healthy and efficient forms of short-distance public transportation in areas with high concentrations of people.

In Jakarta, there are hardly any benches for people to sit and relax, and no free drinking water fountains or public toilets. It is these small, but important, 'details' that are symbols of urban life anywhere else in the world.

Most world cities, including those in the region, want to be visited and remembered for their culture. Singapore is managing to change its 'shop-till-you- drop' image to that of the center of Southeast Asian arts. The monumental Esplanade Theatre has reshaped the skyline, offering first-rate international concerts in classical music, opera, ballet, and also featuring performances from some of the leading contemporary artists from the region. Many performances are subsidized and are either free or cheap, relative to the high incomes in the city-state.

Kuala Lumpur spent $100 million on its philharmonic concert hall, which is located right under the Petronas Towers, among the tallest buildings in the world. This impressive and prestigious concert hall hosts local orchestra companies as well top international performers. The city is currently spending further millions to refurbish its museums and galleries, from the National Museum to the National Art Gallery.

Hanoi is proud of its culture and arts, which are promoted as its major attraction — millions of visitors flock into the city to visit countless galleries stocked with canvases, which can be easily described as some of the best in Southeast Asia. Its beautifully restored Opera House regularly offers Western and Asian music treats.

Bangkok's colossal temples and palaces coexist with extremely cosmopolitan fare — international theater and film festivals, countless performances, jazz clubs with local and foreign artists on the bill, as well as authentic culinary delights from all corners of the world. When it comes to music, live performances and nightlife, there is no city in Southeast Asia as vibrant as Manila.

Now back to Jakarta. Those who have ever visited the city's 'public libraries' or National Archives building will know the difference. No wonder; in Indonesia education, culture and arts are not considered to be 'profitable' (with the exception of pop music), and are therefore made absolutely irrelevant. The country spends the third lowest amount in the world on education (according to The Economist, only1.2 percent of its GDP) after Equatorial Guinea and Ecuador (there the situation is now rapidly improving with the new progressive government).

Museums in Jakarta are in appalling condition, offering absolutely no important international exhibitions. They look like they fell on the city from a different era and no wonder — the Dutch built almost all of them. Not only are their collections poorly kept, but they lack elements of modernity — there are no elegant cafes, museum shops, bookstores or even public archives. It appears that the individuals running them are without vision and creativity. However, even if they did have inspired ideas, there would be no funding to carry them out.

It seems that Jakarta has no city planners, only private developers that have no respect for the majority of its inhabitants who are poor (the great majority, no matter what the understated and manipulated government statistics say). The city abandoned itself to the private sector, which now controls almost everything, from residential housing to what were once public areas.

While Singapore decades ago, and Kuala Lumpur recently, managed to fully eradicate poor, unsanitary and depressing kampongs from their urban areas, Jakarta is unable or unwilling to offer its citizens subsidized, affordable housing equipped with running water, electricity, a sewage system, wastewater treatment facilities, playgrounds, parks, sidewalks and a mass public transportation system.

Rich Singapore aside, Kuala Lumpur with only 2 million inhabitants boasts one metro line (Putra Line), one monorail, several efficient Star LRT lines, suburban train links and high-speed rail system connecting the city with its new capital Putrajaya. The "Rapid" system counts on hundreds of modern, clean and air-conditioned buses. Transit is subsidized; a bus ticket on "Rapid" costs only $.60 (2 Malaysian Ringgits) for unlimited day use on the same line. Heavily discounted daily and monthly passes are also available.

Bangkok contracted German firm Siemens to build two long "Sky Train" lines and one metro line. It is also utilizing its river and channels as both public transportation and as a tourist attraction. Despite this enormous progress, the Bangkok city administration claims that it is building an additional 50 miles (80 kilometers) of tracks for these systems in order to convince citizens to leave their cars at home and use public transportation.

Polluting pre-historic buses are being banned from Hanoi, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and gradually from Bangkok. Jakarta, thanks to corruption and phlegmatic officials, is in its own league even in this field.

Mercer Human Resource Consulting, in its reports covering quality of life, places Jakarta repeatedly on the level of poor African and South Asian cities, below metropolises like Nairobi and Medellin.

Considering that it is in the league with some of the poorest capitals of the world, Jakarta is not cheap. According to the Mercer Human Resource Consulting 2006 Survey, Jakarta ranked as the 48th most expensive city in the world for expatriate employees, well above Berlin (72nd), Melbourne (74th) and Washington D.C. (83rd). And if it is expensive for expatriates, how is it for local people with a GDP per capita below $1,000?

Curiously, Jakartans are silent. They have become inured to appalling air quality just as they have gotten used to the sight of children begging, even selling themselves at the major intersections; to entire communities living under elevated highways and in slums on the shores of canals turned into toxic waste dumps; to the hours-long commutes; to floods and rats.

But if there is to be any hope, the truth has to eventually be told, and the sooner the better. Only a realistic and brutal diagnosis can lead to treatment and a cure. As painful as the truth can be, it is always better than self-deceptions and lies.

Jakarta has fallen decades behind capitals in the neighboring countries — in esthetics, housing, urban planning, standard of living, quality of life, health, education, culture, transportation, food quality and hygiene. It has to swallow its pride and learn from Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Brisbane and even in some instances from its poorer neighbors like Port Moresby, Manila and Hanoi.

Comparative statistics have to be transparent and widely available. Citizens have to learn how to ask questions again, and how to demand answers and accountability. Only if they understand to what depths their city has sunk can there be any hope of change.

"We have to watch out," said a concerned Malaysian filmmaker during New Year's Eve celebrations in Kuala Lumpur. "Malaysia suddenly has too many problems. If we are not careful, Kuala Lumpur could end up in 20 or 30 years like Jakarta!"

Could this statement be reversed? Can Jakarta find the strength and solidarity to mobilize in time catch up with Kuala Lumpur? Can decency overcome greed? Can corruption be eradicated and replaced by creativity? Can private villas shrink in size and green spaces, public housing, playgrounds, libraries, schools and hospitals expand?

An outsider like me can observe, tell the story and ask questions. Only the people of Jakarta can offer the answers and solutions.

Architecture (par CR)

Jakarta n'a aucune cohérence architecturale.

Pour schématiser, les énormes gratte-ciels rivalisent avec les bidonvilles, les petites maisons de quartiers populaires ou les terrains vagues où viennent brouter les vaches...




Pas de "centre-ville", pas de quartier historique préservé, pas d'endroits dédiés spécifiquement à telle ou telle activité, peu d'espaces verts ou d'espaces de loisirs... Mais beaucoup de chantiers de buildings jamais terminés : effet de la corruption et de la crise monétaire asiatique de 1997.

Une ville construite sur le tas, au fur et à mesure, et de manière un peu chaotique.

C'est d'ailleurs la raison pour laquelle les infrastructures routières n'ont pas été pensées à l'avance et que Jakarta connaît aujourd'hui de gros problèmes de circulation.

J'ai filmé un aperçu de cette incohérence architecturale lors d'un récent trajet en ojek (moto-taxi).

Voir la vidéo

En noir sur la carte ci-dessous le trajet effectué en moto.
Pour info en bleu, la route à prendre pour effectuer le même trajet en voiture (Pourquoi faire simple quand on peut faire compliqué ?).

Les "qu'est ce tu preferes" sur l'indonesie

Manger a tous les repas un gado-2 ou a chaque fois que tu veux parler, ya 10 gars qui crient hello mister?

Avoir envie de faire caca au cafe queen ou dormir une semaine avec un Durian dans ton lit?

Faire du camping pendant une semaine a mall Ambassador ou faire un footing a 18h le long de Rasuna Said ?

Nager dans le ruisseau de Rasuna ou Prendre le Viagra vendu dans les tokos de Kota ?

Passer une apres-midi complete au Stadium ou sur la plage d'Ancol ?

Toute ta vie avoir un orang outang accroche a ta jambe, ou toute ta vie tu te balade avec un petit moustachu assis sur ton epaule ?

Devoir monter le Krakatau tous les matins pour prendre ton petit dej' ou devoir passer toutes tes soirees a Bekasi ?

Manger au kaki lima tous les repas ou avoir 5 jambes, ce qui doit pas etre pratique pour trouver des pantalons ?

Faire du jet ski a Ancol ou courir et te jeter contre un arbre ?

Te taper l'orteil contre la porte en allant pisser le matin ou passer la nuit a Pasar Mangis ?

Manger une pizza au My Bar ou boire une Bintang Zero devant Gueugnon – Sedan…en entier avec les prolongations ?

Faire le tour des 13 rivières qui sillonnent Jakarta ou pas prendre de douche pendant 8 ans ?

Manger un kilo de cabe ou boire 4 litres d'Anggur Hitam ?

Devoir habiter dans une maison de 7m2 au bord de la riviere ou conduire tous les jours une voiture decapotable de 15m de long dans les embouteillages sur Gatot Subroto?

Une blague de SZ ou une tasse de cafe froid?

Avoir un visa sosbud a renouveller tous les mois sans agent ou faire le tour de la ville en ojek derriere un kopaja puant ?

Te faire prendre en photo 10 fois par jour avec des indonesiens ou faire le trajet Kemang-Kota en bajaj ?

Les pourquoi de l'Indonesie

Pourquoi les chats indonesiens ont un moignon a la place de la queue?

Pourquoi les chevaux indonesiens sont plus petits que nos anes mais les rats plus gros que nos lapins?

Pourquoi les gens sont ils si prompts a se revolter ponctuellement (erreurs d'arbitrage pdt un match de foot, querelle entre village, montee du prix de l'essence) mais si apathiques vis-a-vis des injustices pourtant si grandes dans ce pays?

Pourquoi il y a pleins de vaches et si peu de lait frais?

Pourquoi quand on mage un sate kambing on peut pas boire de biere apres?

Pourquoi la chiasse est elle si virulente dans ce pays?

Pourquoi est-ce acceptable de peter et roter en public en Indonesie? Ou plutot pourquoi les occidentaux s'offusquent d'un processus naturel auquel ils sont tous enclins?

Pourquoi personne n'est gene de prendre la derniere par du gateau?

Pourquoi les indos rigolent ils aussi facilement? Pourquoi ils peuvent rigoler 50 fois de la meme blague?

Pourquoi tant de moustaches? c'est pour un rapprochement culturel avec l'allemangne?

Pourquoi les gens pacaran sur des motos ? Pas de bancs publics dans ce pays ?

Pourquoi mettent il en route la chasse d'eau avant d'avoir fini de faire pipi ?

Pourquoi tant de drogues dans un pays ou il y a la peine de mort pour les dealers ?

Pourquoi les tokos concurrents s'installent ils pile les uns a cote des autres ?

Pourquoi il n'y a pas de Boulevard Victor Hugo a Jakarta ?

Pourquoi y a plein de gars qui marchent avec leur T-shirt remonte jusqu'aux aisselles ?

Pourquoi le karaoke ?

Pourquoi Bon Jovi ????

Pourquoi les marches de Borobudur et les trottoirs sont si hauts, alors que les gens sont tout petits ?

Pourquoi il fait si froid dans les bars, restaurants, et malls ? Une conspiration des vendeurs de laines et eleveurs de moutons Neo-Zelandais ?

Pourquoi les numeros des batiments ne suivent aucune logique ? C'est comme pour les numeros de telephone, on paie pour choisir le numero de sa maison ?

Pourquoi dit on en Indonesie que les femmes qui font mal le ménage se marieront avec un moustachu ?

Pourquoi sert-on les bieres dans des tasses pendant le mois de Ramhadan ? Prendrait on les gens pour des cons ?

Pourquoi le puter balik ?

Pourquoi n y a-t-il pas d espace vert a Jakarta ?

Pourquoi ils se jettent dans l ascenceur sans laisser les gens descendre alors qu’on est au RDC et qu ils devront de toutes facons attendre que tout le monde sorte avant que l ascenceur demarre ?

Pourquoi est-ce si mignon d entendre une indonesienne qui parle anglais avec un accent si specifique et tjs les memes fautes ?

Les “T’es plutot”

T'es plutot jablai ou kucing garong?

T'es plutot cafe queen ou dragon fly?

T'es plutot plage d'ancol ou taman menteng?

T'es plutot taman rasuna ou menteng executive?

T'es plutot vin rouge ou anggur hitam?

T'es plutot comics cafe ou sapi-derman?

T'es plutot bintang ou anker?

T'es plutot iwan falls ou unggu?

T’es plutot Stadium ou Mille’s ?

T’es plutot ayam goreng ou ayam bakar ?

T’es plutot Blue Bird ou Express ?

T’es plutot Top Gun ou My Bar?

T’es plutot Bali ou Lombok ?

T’es plutot Kijang ou APV ?

T’es plutot ojek ou bajaj ?

T’es plutot kopaja ou metro mini ?

T’es plutot dangdut ou musique balinaise ?

T’es plutot My Place ou Delta ?

T’es plutot Indonesienne ou Chinoise ?

T’es plutot Durian ou Jack fruit ?

T’es plutot Senayan City ou Ambassador ?

T'es plutot Mentari ou Simpati?

Foule en transe, fait culturel

Mass trance afflicts Indonesian women, factory workers

Sun Feb 24, 2008 8:24pm EST

By Sunanda Creagh

JAKARTA (Reuters) - Lina, a former worker at a cigarette factory in Indonesia, says she was 17-years-old the first time she was possessed by an evil spirit.

"My older sister went down first. She was screaming and her body went rigid and she couldn't move. Then the spirit came into my body too," said Lina, who like many Indonesians has one name.

Reports of schoolchildren, young women and factory workers going into mass trances or speaking in tongues are common across Indonesia's vast archipelago of 226 million people.

The phenomenon may provide an outlet for stress, some experts say. In many cultures, it is part of a religious or spiritual experience, whether in the voodoo trances of Haiti, the mass hysteria of Europe's witch trials, or Christianity's exorcisms.

Earlier this month, local news station Metro TV broadcast footage of 11 students and five teachers in a mass trance at a school in the central island of Sumbawa.

Around 50 female workers at a garment factory in Tangerang, near Jakarta, went into a collective trance last June, weeping and jerking their bodies around, according to Tempo magazine.

"Every society has some kind of culturally appropriate place for trance experiences, usually in religious settings," said Tanya Luhrmann, a Stamford University anthropologist who studies witchcraft and evangelical Christianity, where such group faintings are common.

"There appears to be a contagion element to trance, but it really requires some kind of willingness on the part of the individual," she said in an emailed reply to questions, adding that this was the case even if it seemed unconscious or unwilled.

In trance, people can do and say things for which they are unlikely to be held responsible, which can be cathartic, particularly for weaker members of society, she said.

BALINESE TRANCE

Religion, education and development have done little to budge widespread acceptance of the supernatural among Indonesia's diverse ethnic and religious groups.

"In Indonesia, trance is tied up with culture," said Lidia Laksana Hidajat, research coordinator in the psychology faculty of Jakarta's Atma Jaya University.

"We know that there are traditional trance dances in Bali but this is already a modern world. Indonesia is developing very fast but it still happens all the time," said Hidajat, who has been researching mass trance in Indonesia.

Few Indonesians are comfortable discussing their trance experiences, but Lina, now 23, said she had been possessed many times in the past six years, always by the same djinn.

"Its face is exactly the same face as my older sister but the body is hard to make out. It calls my name but if I follow it, it disappears," she said.

Lina said that mass trances were so common at the cigarette factory in Malang where she worked that she eventually quit.

Indonesian media reported a group trance among workers at Bentoel's cigarette factory in Malang, Java, in March 2006. Hidajat interviewed 30 of the affected women for her research.

"They told me that when it happened, they were sitting in a very long hall, working together in rows, rolling the cigarettes by hand," she said.

"They were working in silence. That's one of the requirements of a trance to happen -- it's usually quiet and when they are engaged in monotonous activity."

Suddenly, one of the workers started screaming and her body went stiff. The one next to her started crying and went stiff too. Others tried to help but soon they started too in a kind of domino effect.

A local Muslim leader was summoned, but his prayers had no effect. Eventually, the exhausted women fell asleep and when they awoke they remembered nothing.

VULNERABLE PERSONALITY

Hidajat concluded that the mass trance had more to do with exhaustion and stress than evil spirits.

She says that there were many common factors between the trance victims she interviewed.

"Often they are people who are very religious or under pressure. They were also from low socio-economic backgrounds and many said they didn't have happy childhoods," she said.

"All the trance dancers I met in Bali had similar vulnerable personalities."

Eko Susanto Marsoeki, director of Malang's Lawang Psychiatric Hospital, said overwork was closely linked to mass trance incidents in factories.

"Usually this happens to people who had problems in their childhood and to people who are working too hard. It's a form of dissociation, a kind of hysteria," he said.

"They can't protest, but they can protest via a mass trance. So often it is a form of protest that will not be dealt with too harshly," he said.

When more than 30 high school students at Kalimantan's Pahandut Palangka Raya High School fell into a trance in November, they blamed a spirit living in a nearby tree.

During the morning flag-raising ceremony, one of the girls suddenly started screaming and couldn't move. Soon her friends joined in until more than 30 of them were screaming and fainting, the deputy principal Friskila told Reuters.

Some of the girls woke from the trance after a student played a Muslim prayer ring tone on her mobile phone. Others were taken by their parents to local witch doctors.

Friskila, however, favors a less superstitious explanation.

"They are bored, tired and then this happened, she said. They all got a day off school."

(Editing by Sara Webb and Megan Goldin)