How the biggest killer of the rain forest saved our lives
Sanne van Oosten
How to save the rapidly receding rain forest of Sumatra? We asked this to a passionate nature preserver at Bukit Lawang. An owner of 80 hectares of rain forest we spoke to, Aca, has some pretty interesting ideas about this. “Make the rain forest profitable instead of dependent on aid.” He works on eco-tourism, showing people the beauties of the rain forest, but he also suggests to bring back the paper factories enabling the rain forest to be used to produce paper. Wait a minute, is this really coming from a passionate nature preserver? Yes it is, and this is the underlying rationale: In order to produce paper, forest have to be planted first. This can lead to the expansion of the rain forest, albeit for the production of paper. That is a much better alternative than what is happening now. Millions of hectares of rain forest are being destroyed to build palm oil plantations, an important ingredients for products such as shampoo, cooking oil, chips, margarine and soap. Meaning that palm oil is a much bigger threat to the rain forest than paper is. Whereas most people feel guilty about printing unnecessary amounts of paper, it makes more sense to feel guilty for squirting out too much shampoo.
History is in the making; political battles will go on – Elections in Taiwan
Cathy Lin
The Taiwanese elections took place on January 14th. These elections were not just a once-every-four-years carnival of democracy; it was a battle between the ongoing discussions on social equality and the relationship between Taiwan and China.
Jakarta on top
Efi Januar
People say the number of skyscrapers in a city’s skyline is a sign of development. The more skyscrapers a region has, the more developed it is. Is it true? I spent almost all of my life in Jakarta, the capital city of Indonesia. I lived in the outskirts of Jakarta. The highest building I see the most is the tip of the mosque in neighborhood, if we put the tower of base transceiver stations aside. Being in my neighborhood is bliss for me. Why? Because we “stay” on the ground, me and my neighbors are equal, we stand on the same ground.
Belgian strike-culture
Moira Wiermans
Approximately half a year ago, I moved from Amsterdam to Brussels. My expectations were that it would involve limited bureaucratic procedures as a result of EU internal market freedoms, and that living in Brussels, living in Belgium would be similar to living in the Netherlands, only with different architecture and French as the main language. How wrong I was! EU mobility is still limited by differences in tax, pension, social security, and insurance systems. But more importantly, every day life is organized differently. Shortly after I arrived I felt like I moved to Cairo, not Brussels. As Belgium is one of the most developed countries in the world my expectations – including those of an efficient public transport system – were high.
When culture relativism can no longer suffice
Sanne van Oosten and Davey Meelker
When visiting other countries one should always be careful in judging practices of this foreign nation. If habits and norms of a certain culture differs from your own, this does not automatically mean that they are wrong. So far we agree with the culture relativists. Still, this does not mean that that judging is forbidden. We should not judge by comparing cultures, but measuring it to the greater morality. What is this greater morality? This is hard explain in one blog, but certain things are universally wrong. The best explanation is through the following example.
Why is eating at McDonalds any less real than walking through rice fields with a tour guide?
Sanne van Oosten
When travelling, I want to experience the “real” Indonesia, thus explaining why I think Couchsurfing is the best way to travel. However, when meeting some Couchsurfers for a bite to eat, two of them (independently from each other) suggested to meet at McDonalds. It felt wrong eat at McDonalds, so instead of fries we ordered rice and we decided to choose the burger unique to Indonesia: the so-called Prosperity Burger. Even though the price level in Indonesia is much lower than what we are used to in Europe, a McDonalds meal in Indonesia costs only slightly less than it would in the West. Good thing the burger is called a prosperity burger.
Will traffic congestion put a brake on Indonesia’s prosperity?
Davey Meelker
If you talk to any Indonesian city dweller, sooner or later, the conversation will reach the subject of traffic. I still have to meet the first urban Indonesian who doesn’t complain about the abundance of cars, scooters and other engine driven objects on wheels that occupy the streets of the big cities. A lot of public and private spaces are used in favour of those means of transport. Changing a building you own to a shed for scooters became a lucrative business, for example. In the near future things need to change, or the cities will become completely jammed.
Doing the governments dirty work – Indonesia’s pioneer in women’s rights
I'm pregnant. I need someone to talk to.
Sanne van Oosten
A quaint house in the middle of a rice field, not really the place where one would expect the headquarters of the Indonesian women’s rights movement to be. But it is. When you walk inside, women’s rights posters from all over the world decorate the house. Samsara is the only organization that counsels women contemplating an abortion in all of Indonesia. If the woman decides to have an abortion, the price is high. If you’re lucky: 2,5 milion rupias, about 250 euros. In a country where the majority of the population only earns 1 euro a day, this price can be an impossible sum to pay. “Some sell everything they have, others just can’t get a safe abortion.”
Why Indonesia needs a new Multatuli – same methods of exploitation, different actors
Sanne van Oosten
As a preparation of my trip to Indonesia I read the Dutch literary classic Max Havelaer by Multatuli. It describes the techniques of exploitation used by the Dutch onto the Indonesian peasants in the middle of the nineteenth century. Now, not much seems to have changed. Workers in the rice fields earn a meager 1 euro a day and need to send their children off to work or marriage from an extremely young age to make ends meet. In the nineteenth century, the Dutch had an extremely efficient way of exploiting the inhabitants of Indonesia. The Dutch government implemented the so-called Cultivation System that forced farmers to grow commercially tradable crops such as coffee, tea and spices. The Dutch themselves didn’t collect the crops from the farmers, they let local leaders to their dirty work
The sexual division of labor on the Indonesian rice fields
Sanne van Oosten
The last few days we have been enjoying the beautiful rice fields of Central Java. The idyllic rice fields give much food for the world and food for thought alike. For instance, the laborers on the rice fields only earn about 1 euro per day, enabling the price of rice to remain low. Therefore, both men and women work to make ends meet. Seeing women and men work side by side was a pleasant surprise to me, but quickly I noticed the character of their work was completely different. Women took care of the sowing of the seeds, replanting of the rice plants and manually weeding the fields. Men, on the other hand, were always seen with equipment; rakes, axes, plows or spray-on fertilizer. Even though men and women work side by side, why are their tasks so different from each other?
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