This piece was written by SEASP PhD student Leong Kar Yen during his half-year sojourn in the fledgling nation of Timor Leste in 2006. He works on human rights issues in Timor.
I could hardly believe that it was a university. The building was a simple single-storey edifice painted in white and blue. The university was referred to as UNPAZ or the University of Peace. I was curious what the local universities here looked like and I was just following Rogerio to see if the campus had reopened. Rogerio was taking his first degree there in law and we went there after he heard from his friends that his faculty might be conducting classes again.

Rogerio, like many of his generation has spent a good part of his life fighting against the Indonesian occupational forces and because of that, his university education became a casualty of war. Now I think he is trying to reclaim that part of his life lost and universities like these have been acceding to the needs of more mature students such a Rogerio.

We rode cautiously, as he slowly negotiated the road leading to the university from the office. The neighbourhoods that we passed through were some of the most hard hit by he violence in the past few weeks. Some had been burnt down and there were vans which in their previous lives used to be mikrolets over turned and charred beyond recognition.

I had an uneasy feeling passing these barrios. There were always groups of people sitting idly and simply not doing anything. I make it a point so say hello with a smile on the bike as I rally did not know what was going through the head of these people. Violence, I feel, while usually planned, take on a life of its own after someone initiates it. The neighbourhoods I pass through with Rogerio are poor set against a hill. Somehow I thought it was going to rain but it didn’t.

The reluctantly dying sun and the grey clouds made for a dramatic sight. However I was more concerned more with where we were going. Twenty minutes later Rogerio drove into a field with nothing but smallish wooden houses and flanked by a building painted in blue and white and another half completed building waiting patiently to be dressed in a fresh coat of paint.

Later Rogerio begins talking to one of the lecturers at in the library and I browse through what cannot be more than four bookshelves of books. In one shelf, there is a collection of recently completed theses by undergraduates totalling 30 or so and on another was the collection of Mahathir Mohamad’s thoughts given to the University through the good offices of the Malaysian embassy. I was thinking if perhaps they were teaching a course on Mahathir.

I was glad to find that they had an introductory book on anthropology but nearly nothing else. I could count the books and I don’t think they would have any more than between one hundred to two hundred books. In the corner of the library was what would be the only computer in the entire university.

The buildings were empty. There is no one around but I think most of the people attached to the university have yet to return to the university. The situation of the barrios surrounding the university don’t aren’t really conducive to people coming in and out.

Most of us in normal countries take all this for granted. We are so used to the ease in which we run in and around our universities getting all the resources we need that we are unaware that somewhere somehow, it is almost a struggle to for someone to obtain a university.

After one of the lecturers there was done speaking to Rogerio. I began asking him some questions about the university.

“We have about a thousand five hundred students but now because of the situation, they haven’t been coming back but I have been trying to carry on with my teaching load.”Joao, his, name was wistfully looking around. Sad that the university was empty but still glad on the other hand that it had not been destroyed by arsonist and or looters.

“Gosh if you look at what happened to Universities like UnDil (University of Dili) and DIT (Dili Institute of Technology) we are a lot better off than they are. Nobody has taken anything from us not even a broken piece of wood.

“But if you look at what happened at the other universities, people have looted all the chairs, causing damage to the classrooms. In one of these universities I even saw people coming in with bicycles, tying several of these folding chairs around them and then just taking off like that. In that sense we are very lucky.”

I guess in away they have been lucky. But like all other universities in the world, UNPAZ also worries about its funding. Most of the subjects they taught at the university consisted only of economics, management, the social sciences and the arts. Subjects on the sciences or the more technical topics would be an undue burden on their coffers.

“It was crazy, there was this lecturer who has a masters and he requested 15 dollars an hour. Then this other person was asking us to give him 25 dollars an hour. And the locals when they teach only get two dollars an hour. How would this work out? Most of our funding comes from the students but now because of this situation that we are in some people have not been paid for along time. “

I could discern a faint tinge of dissatisfaction. Joao kept harping on the unequal treatment being meted out which placed foreigners on the higher side of the equation. He constantly used the term pribumi to somehow imply how that the Timorese should not be treated this way.

Joao mentioned that while some people have been coming in to teach on a voluntary basis, the volunteer couple later discovered that they needed cash to survive.

“I had already said to them very clearly that if we could pay we would but if not there is nothing we can do about it. So they taught for a few months or so but when they found out that they we were not able to pay them the money, they decided not to give the students an examination.”

“This made the students so angry that they wanted to beat these particular lecturers up.”

I was also told by a friend who taught at the National University of Timor Leste, that plagiarism was so widespread and this was caused by lecturers who did not care about their students and arbitrarily gave grades without even looking at the papers.

This attitude has given rise to corruption and sometimes even violence. University students during the Indonesian military occupation \ were known to assault their lecturers should they receive a mark which they ‘did not deserve’.

“Another problem we have in Timor is that we started all these universities much too fast and now most of them have folded. They thought it would be easy and good business but evidently not, these people just did not think about the future,” Joao continued.

As it is, there is already so much difficulty gaining well qualified staff. For UNPAZ, there were a staff of around 25-30 for 1500 students and out of the 30 only 5 would have PhD’s. Most of the teaching staff are only armed with a Bachelors degree.

Imagine that you were not able to finish your education for whatever reason, and then wanting to continue later on, you should walk into a classroom with the lecturer teaching being one of your classmates in Uni.

This happens a lot in Timor. Sometimes the students would even know more than the lecturer about a particular topic and the lecturer in turn feels intellectually intimidated. In one instance I was told by another friend from Hak that when his supervisor could not see eye to eye with him on the methodology used, his thesis proposal was thrown across the room and then ripped apart.

“Its all ego,” my friend told me.

Ok, I think its time to go. It was getting dark and everyone gets jittery when it starts to get dark. The five of us, Rogerio, me, his lecturer, his child and the student all hop on our respective bikes and take off. We part ways at a junction further down the road and everyone heads off to their own destinations.

On our way back to my place, Rogerio stops the bike and speaks to a group of ten adolescent males. He asks them, “Is the road down that way safe?” To which they answer almost in unison, “Ya ya its safe but in a little bit we are going to start taking those iraks on,” meaning that this group of teenagers were probably going to start throwing rocks at another group, probably from the country’s eastern part.

As we head off leaving these adolescent males to whatever machinations they had in mind, passing more burnt houses and cars on the way, I thought to myself, universities and education in Timor, they don’t really matter.

The Timorese are so intent on tearing their country, why would the heady ideals of education be worth anything to anyone? Even if you were educated, what would you do with a degree in a country so poverty riddled and chaotic? Well I guess we would have to begin somewhere. Those burning and destroying are somewhat of a minority and there are people who genuinely care and even as they are tired, they carry on doing what they can. And hey, if that’s not a starting point what the hell is?

I put these thoughts out into the wind and let them float away as the bike whizzed past by cars on Rua Comorro. The evening air was cool and comforting. As I headed home for dinner with Rogerio, I looked forward to a good nights sleep and in the morning, a beautiful blue Timorese sky.

by Ermita Soenarto, MA Candidate Southeast Asian Studies Programme, NUS

The post below is taken from my personal blog

1. Roadtripping Java, Indonesia

I set off for Jakarta on 8th June 2007 and returned on 10th July 2007 from Bali. I went with my Ming Da and then a good friend, Iskandar. My objective was to find a focus for my Masters thesis that dealt with Indonesian comic books. Before I went to Indonesia, I had only made contact with a handful of individuals from KomikIndonesia.com in Jakarta and did not have too much hope in terms of being able to find the comic books I needed or networking with the people that could help in my research. Spending a whole month in Indonesia was also initially not in the plan but when I found out that my trip was going to be extended, I decided to tour Java. I wanted to see volcanoes, I wanted to see mountains, I wanted to see Prambanan and Borobudur and most of all I wanted to meet all the people and visit all the locations that I read so much about in history books. When I reached Java, my agenda never went as planned and in these impromptu circumstances, I found myself lost and completely overwhelmed, fortunately, in a good, adventuresome, sorta way. I borrowed the title Java Jiving from this blogger photo journalist because I can’t think of anything else more appropriate

2. City Hopping: What Lonely Planet Doesn’t Tell You

(click on pic to see overall comments on each city/location)

Let me just add that I don’t trust Lonely Planet anymore. They just got me into more problems than helped me navigate my way around Java. Anyway back to my story…

I took the plane to go back and fro from Singapore. Although Jetstar is definitely cheap and reliable, it gets expensive on certain dates and your next best budget option is Garuda Airlines. But to travel across Java, I used budget transportation such as the Indonesian Kereta-Api (railway), coaches, buses and passenger ships. The cheaper it is, the more locals you’ll be sharing the transportation with, the less comfortable it is and the more crazy the experience.

For most part my train rides were comfortable, though I don’t wish to comment on sharing the toilets with 100 other passengers and with toilet bowls that lead to the running railway tracks. You also need to watch out for the white collar crowd coming into the Express Train in Bogor. If you don’t react fast enough and find the exit, you going to get elbowed, kicked and trampled on like this poor girl on the Pakuan Express. She fell down 3 times and laughed- it seems knocking down the person next to you to get to your train seat is a common everyday affair.

The only gripe I had is the Yogyakarta>Probolinggo>Bromo>Probolinggo>Denpasar TORTURE bus-ride because: 1) our agent said it was only 3 hours- it was 20 HOURS, and I was stupid enough not to ask for a second opinion, 2) we had daredevil drivers who got us into too many near-death experiences and because Indonesian roads are double-laned, our driver had to takeover every single vehicle that got in his way (which occurs like every 2 minutes), 3) our driver who drove us to Mt Bromo at night (in the DARK mind you, and around the mountain which had NO barriers whatsoever) dozed off for a few moments while driving and it was the first time, I actually prayed to God in a very long time because I was scared our van was going to fall over the HIGH cliff (I think my constant OHMYGODs exclamation kept waking him up) and lastly 4) On the ride from Probolinggo to Denpasar which was about 12 hours, I sat next to a guy who insisted on sitting on the innermost seat. That’s not the problem. The problem was, he kept getting up and down, making us move ourselves and our huge bags each time he wanted to get out and then later, back to his seat. (He repeated this at least 5 times).

3. “Neng, Kalapa! Kalapa!”: Figuring Out Cheap Transportation Systems

Getting around within each location is another challenge. It requires initiative to approach locals and request them to share the “secret” of angkot (minibuses) and bus routes that are rarely published anywhere. Because I got cheated on several occasions, I made it a habit to ask a taxi driver if he is charging extra ongkos (fee) for parkir (parking), if he takes the toll (sometimes they take the highway without telling you and they make you pay) and if they use argo (the metre). If they say no, no, yes, then its safe. NEVER TAKE A TAXI WITHOUT METER. NEVER TAKE TAXIS PARKED AT RAILWAY STATIONS. Just travel a block away from the railway station for cheaper taxis. Also when it comes to paying the taxi driver, you must learn how to take out your cash fast because the meter would not stop jumping until you hand the driver the payment (taking out cash fast is difficult because of the nature of the currency where 10,000 looks like 100,000). Drivers do not have much loose change, so always carry small notes and always round up the fare to the next 1,000 if you don’t have the exact amount. Some drivers conveniently “forget” to turn on the meter- a kind, polite reminder would help jog his memory.

Common transportation in Jakarta is the Bluebird taxi (they never fail to use meter without being asked and known throughout Indonesia for reliability and safety) but if you are travelling within central Jakarta where most of the supermalls are, you can learn how to take the busway. For short distances, its possible to take the bajaj (motorised vehicles like the tuk tuk)- but it requires you to haggle like crazy.

In Bandung and Bogor, there is also Bluebird taxi. But a more cheaper form of travelling around is the angkot. You know angkot routes from the words written on the van and by its colour but for a first time traveller, this will all be a mystery until someone explains it to you. Angkot tends to stop in front of you when you walking by the pavement- they seem to think everyone wants to go in their direction. NEVER ASK AN ANGKOT DRIVER IF HE IS GOING YOUR WAY, HE WILL ALWAYS SAY YES, and you might end up miles away from your intended stop. Be prepared to squeeze with 20 other people when taking an angkot because they earn money by squeezing as many passengers as they can (an 8 seater miraculously transforms into a 20 seater). When an angkot stops at a red traffic light, you will get some street entertainment from youths and children. In fact, I loved a song so much from this particular street entertainer, I wanted to buy the album of the group (Peter Pan) that produced the song (Menghapus Jejakmu).

(Click on photos to see video)

Angkot fares range from 1,000-4,000 and rarely accumulate more than 5,000 (Singapore 1 dollar) even for travel that takes up a whole hour. Only pay at the end of the trip.

In Jogja, the city itself is pretty small, so renting a bicycle or motorbike is far more fun to immerse in the city’s culture. But more common forms of transportation is taxi (travelling anywhere in Jogja should not cost more than 5 Sing dollars by taxi), becak (trishaw) and andong-andong (horse carriage). For becak and andong-andong, haggle like your life depended on it because they are only for travelling short distances. Or you can go to Delta Homestay at Jalan Prawirotaman II, there is this becak driver by the name of Pak Jono who speaks English, very friendly and lets you pay whatever amount you like. He tends to make a detour to wayang kulit shops (I believe he receives commission) but overall, he is the best becak driver of the lot because you don’t have to haggle with him.

Bali has by far, the worst form of local transportation system because there are only Bluebird taxis. Never get into any other cab except Bluebird in Bali because the meter jumps suspiciously fast. Of course if you can drive or ride, renting a car or motorbike is much cheaper and more fun if you are the exploring type.

A form of transportation I never tried is the ojek (motorbike). Its available in all the cities. You basically find ojek stations where huge bunch of motorbikes are parked together and you can get an ojek driver to ride you to wherever you please. Haggle like mad too if you look nothing like an Indonesian and don’t speak Bahasa.

To travel to outlying areas like Lembang in Bandung, Borobudur and Prambanan in Jogja and Mount Bromo etc, you need to hire drivers and cars. Can simply go to travel agents to make arrangements- go to at least 5 travel agents to make sure you get the best price. Our travel agent was this 27 year old guy, Dhoni who also served as our driver. Well, he did give me wrong information with regard to Bromo (that nearly cost me my life) and made me pay for parkir so I don’t know if I recommend him very highly (although I promised him I would to my Singapore friends).

4. From Getting Ayam (Chicken) Majapahit to Daging Tumbuh: Fieldwork in Indonesian Comics

The main reason I’m traipsing off to Jakarta, Bogor, Bandung and Jogja is to meet comic collectors (I met tons), publishers (only managed to meet the 2nd major one out of 3) and artists (met tons too). The fun part is when they invite me to their homes, see their collection and their art and let me rummage through them. It all started with Suryo, whose a journalist in comic books in Jakarta. He is instrumental in my whole research because he hooked me up with so many people, gave me the starting knowledge I needed and invited me to comic book events like Kondefest and the launch of Jogja 5.6 Richter Skala. From Beng Rahadian, also Suryo’s friend, I also got to know and meet key figures in independent comics in Jogja.

But I had the best discussions about comics in Bandung because the comic community there does a bit of research themselves. One of the research groups from Institute of Technology of Bandung (ITB) for example, was sponsored by a Japanese company to undertake research in Pokemon. They are very into manga over there, studying the evolution, design etc of manga. Like I said before, I started out the trip without much expectation so what I received at the end was beyond what I needed. Once I started getting to know people, they introduced me to their network of people and from there I expanded my circle of contacts. I managed to get rare comic books like Kapten Bandung, Merebut Kota Perjuangan (a copy that was signed by ex-president Suharto!) and Ayam Majapahit (all of them from Tita who has an amazing comic book collection). She draws comics herself but moreso for personal motivations but has contributed alot to some comic compilations. Her day job is lecturing at the Faculty of Arts and Design in ITB.

 

 

In Jogja, I also got to meet the guy behind the revolutionary Daging Tumbuh comics- Eko Nugroho. I got a chance to see his art studio and ask him the reason his drawings had no faces.

Besides Eko Nugroho, I met other people who I didn’t get a chance to take photos of such as Samuel Indratma and Ismail who started up Apotik Komik- the group behind all the beautiful politically/socially motivated murals and graffiti in Jogja. The murals are hard to miss because they are EVERYWHERE. Besides drawing murals, they make comic books telling their local police force to buck up and had in fact, distributed these comic books to all the local police stations. Samuel and Eko also introduced me to the Indonesian Visual Arts Archives which archived all the theses done on Indonesian comic books as well as comic books that ran out of print.

I’ve yet to write an email to all the 20 plus people I met and interviewed to thank them for their hospitality and help whether it was sharing information, giving me their comic books or helping me find comic books. The oldest comic artist that I interviewed, Bambang Hirawan, who recovered from stroke because of his determination to continue drawing, sent me an email a week after I returned to remind me to keep in touch. He is the guy wearing the songkok in the pic of my interview with Mizan Publishing below and the man behind Iblis Dari Utara, although now he creates Islamic comics for Mizan Publishing. In fact, a part of my Honours thesis mentioned about his Sunan Kudus comic.

5. The Distractions: Shopping, Food, Mountains and Beaches

Okay, so I did not do research everyday. I made my own detours.

Good food is everywhere in Java. Like literally- Japanese, Western, Mexican, Greek, Italian, Sundanese, Balinese and whatever not. And they are cheap, cheap, cheap. All meals should be eaten with a keropok and fresh juice (avocado, melon, watermelon, carrot, tomato, strawberry, choco-durian etc). From restaurants, to street stalls to food courts, Java is a food paradise.

The best part is, you get to eat by beautiful sceneries like this:

And sometimes, get treated to some so-so entertainment.

Shopping is also TONS BETTER than Bangkok but good shopping is only in Bandung (with its tons of chic factory outlets)

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And in Bali’s Kuta Square.

I bought alot of clothes and art paintings. There’s this place in Bali called Tangkuban Perahu, its a warehouse selling art pieces and accessories at dirtcheap prices. I bought these 2 cartoon paintings for few dollars there:

I also went a little crazy seeing one mountain after another, one volcano crater after another, one historic site after another and one beach after another.

Cafe Batavia, Jakarta- very expensive but wonderful ambience.

History Museum, Jakarta- Remains of Java Man and Majapahit Exhibition

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Wayang Museum, Jakarta

Botanical Gardens, Bogor- Built by Stamford Raffles

Volcanic crater in Lembang, Bandung- Tangkuban Perahu

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Parangritis Beach- Home of the Southern Sea Goddess

Kraton (Sultan’s Palace) and his Massive Bathing Facility, the Taman Sari Watercastle in Jogja

Freezing Mount Dieng, Jogja. See video here and here.

Prambanan at Sunset, Solo

Open-Air Ramayana Ballet at Prambanan, Solo

Borobudur, Jogja

I ended my detours with this: Sunset at Double 6 Beach, Kuta, Bali

6. Nearly Died at Mount Bromo

I talked about Mount Bromo above. Let me just say that at 4 degree celcius, stinking sulphur, fog and life-risking drive up the mountain was worth it because of these:

What’s strange is Mount Bromo is Hindu territory- I believe the last Javanese Hindus, known as the Tenggerese in the entire island. But if you travelled downwards to Probolinggo, its Muslim territory. When we were at Probolinggo, we were held captive by a bunch of pesantren (madrasah) students who wanted to practice their English on us. The boy speaking to me is 15 years old, his name is Rafi’i and he is heading to Egypt for further studies once he graduates from High School. He says his ambition is to be a philosopher and he told me that he read the Indonesian version of Sophie’s World and how after reading it, he has alot of questions that keeps him awake at night. My friend Iskandar pointed out to me, “Do you realise they all speak English like Americans?” He only realised this because the boy speaking to him asked him about intonations of certain words. The boys told us that we spoke English like Chinese people and spent 30 minutes making fun of our Malay, “Kamu dari maner? Sayer dari Koteeer- ha ha ha.” I learnt some Sundanese and Madurese from the boys but my tongue just couldn’t pronounce the words. We said goodbye when they had to leave for Friday prayers.

What was worst was after all that near-death experiences going up and down Bromo, I still had another 10 hour bus ride to Denpasar. My bus even went up a ship to get us to Bali. I did not take photo of the bus travelling up the ship but the interesting thing was, the ship wasn’t even huge but yet could hold so many buses and cars!

7. Afterthoughts

I enjoyed myself 100%. I wished though for one little moment, I could just stay at one place for a whole month and just live there and see what’s that like rather than shuffling every few days. The parts we got lost, misinformed or stupidly got ourselves into turned out to be the best moments.

I can’t wait to get back for my next fieldtrip. I end here with my favourite photos:

View from Argo Wilis train.

Prambanan shot with a Nokie 6288.

Highest point at Taman Sari, overlooking Jogja city.

Sweltering hot at Borobudur.

Morning at Parangritis, got hit by a pounding wave and nearly dropped my camera

If you want more, check out my photo collection here and the videos here.

 

My research is about the history of English in colonial Southeast Asia and I was in Myanmar last September to do research at the National Archives. During this trip I was fortunate to have had Li Ching who studies the traditional Burmese orchestra and Alice who studies Buddhist monuments with me. I always feel safe when I am in Burma (even when I am alone) but it is refreshing to have friends along to share a laugh with. My study is historical but on this trip, we gathered enough data to write a paper called “Burmese Food and the Romanization and Phonetization of the English Language.”

 

Here is a copy of our breakfast menu at the hotel:

 

Look at what comes with the rice porridge:

 

 

 

For lunch, look at number 4 and number 5 of the menu at a restaurant in the Chinatown area of Yangon:

 

 

Of course animal innards are common in Philippine cuisine and I am used to it but somehow when translated to English I am reminded of, rather than a mouth-watering dish, a painful medical procedure.

 

But I am sure the restaurant people meant well because this is the greeting I saw on the wall:

 

Look at number 7 of this menu. Despite the warning, we went ahead and had it for dinner.

 

After the Gon-Bad Chicken we headed of to Sandy’s, one of the nicest restaurants in Yangon to clean up our stomachs with item number 17 of the menu:

 

 

 

Here is a picture of Li Ching, Alice and myself at Sandy’s:

 

This is what we actually ate:

 

This is Mohinga (pronounced Mo-hing-ga) which is catfish soup with cilantro, lemon, chili, and your choice of tempura-like vegetables. It is Burma’s most popular dish. It doesn’t smell good but it tastes great.

 

 

This plate is so typically Burmese. As soon as you sit down at a table, they put this in front of you. Up north they give you two large platters of it and it is always free. The sauce on the middle is a shrimp paste but there are so many variations of it.

 

This is at Feel Restaurant which is about 200 meters from the Archives. I would have lunch there everyday.

 

 

No MacDonald’s, no Pizza Hut, no Dunkin Donuts, no KFC, no Starbucks for a month can actually be quite refreshing. So how do the Burmese manage to keep American franchises out of Myanmar? Look at this huge sign they put up facing the American embassy on Merchant Road in downtown Yangon. Number three reads: “Oppose all foreign nations interfering in internal affairs of the state.” Number four reads: “Crush all internal and external destructive elements as the common enemy.”

 

 

Apparently to stand up to the Americans you have to have your strong, hot colons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a collaborative effort between the students and faculty of NUS’ Southeast Asian Studies Programme. Very soon we will be uploading our tales of adventure while navigating the multitudinous waters of Southeast Asia. We hope you will enjoy it!