Indonesia Day

I attended an Indonesia Day today, which was organized by my University and the Embassy of Indonesia. I did not want to go, because there was rumor that we would have to sit there for six hours and listen to useless information about the Indonesia's transition to Democracy.

That was not true, however, and I had a rather good time. The first part included two lectures about Indonesia's history and political system (yawn). Here's what I found out. Indonesia is located between Eurasia and Australia and consists of about 17,000 islands that vary in size greatly. It is a very diverse country and is a part of both Pacific Ring of Fire and the World's tropical rain forests' belt. Ashes from the volcanoes provide the most fertile soil on planet. Java is the central island, the hub of Indonesia, but it is certainly not the biggest. The people of Indonesia are of the Malayan anthropological type. Indonesia exports quinine, pepper, rubber, coconut products, coffee, oil etc. Indonesia proclaimed independence from the Dutch in 1945. The Big Joke was about the fact that Indonesia has four seasons: dry, rainy, fruit and election.

The second part was the fun part where we got to enjoy Indonesian food and a dance number by a very lovely man. The food was good and the only surprise was a rather dreadful mix of roasted nuts and fish-heads. The dance number consisted of two dances. Both were mask dances, which means that the dancer wears a mask, naturally. The first one was a Japanese dance and the second was Java dance of love. Both were very original, which means that they were a little weird but interesting to watch. The outfits were worth something per se. I tried to take some pictures, but they did not come out very good, as he kept dancing so vigorously.