2022
Festival full steam ahead but me slowing down
31 October 2022
To add to the breakfast theme of these emails! Preparing the breakfast table flowers at Lotus Cafe. Breakfast in such a glorious setting is such a beautiful start to every day.
Early start at the festival. Full morning of several sessions in a row then came home to rest before an evening event. Such a demanding pace, especially when one is constantly moving between two venues, both of which have big flights of terrifying stone steps. Not to mention the heat. But I have survived very well by pacing myself.
The day began with the delightful Desi Anwar. Well-known Indonesian TV news presenter over decades and now CNN presenter/ journalist. She has written a book about surviving and nurturing oneself in isolation over the Covid period. Very engaging personality. She grew up in England where her father was an Indonesian lecturer at SOAS in London working with my former lecturer, Russell Jones at Sydney Uni who found me lots of teaching work in London in the early 70s. Though I never actually met Desi’s father back then. I had a chat with Desi afterwards in the festival garden area, about her father and Russell.
The day began with the delightful Desi Anwar. Well-known Indonesian TV news presenter over decades and now CNN presenter/ journalist. She has written a book about surviving and nurturing oneself in isolation over the Covid period. Very engaging personality. She grew up in England where her father was an Indonesian lecturer at SOAS in London working with my former lecturer, Russell Jones at Sydney Uni who found me lots of teaching work in London in the early 70s. Though I never actually met Desi’s father back then. I had a chat with Desi afterwards in the festival garden area, about her father and Russell.
Then a follow-up to a story from 2004 - the murder by poisoning on a Garuda flight to Amsterdam of the human rights and labour activist, Munir, that shocked us all back then. Obviously, state orchestrated by the Soeharto Regime, his murder has never been resolved - only the perpetrator, a Garuda employee with the improbable name of Polycarpus, was jailed. No one from the Intelligence Agency that was implicated. Munir’s wife, Suciwati, and an American Human Rights guy, Matt Easton, have both written books, and their recounting of the murder and the follow up investigation was harrowing to hear again. Suciwati has tirelessly fought for justice all these years and for the causes that Munir devoted his life to. The great Human Rights Watch activist and journalist, Andreas Harsono, lent himself to this session purely as interpreter to Suciwati.
Then came the media panel with my friend, journalist Deborah Cassrels, plus Sydney Morning Herald’s former Indonesia correspondent, Jewel Topsfield, but it was the West Papua independent journalist, Aprila Wayar who had the most powerful points to make about being a journalist in Indonesia. No matter the frustrations, trials and tribulations of a foreign media person operating here, nothing compares to the dangers and serious issues of trying to report what is really going on in West Papua. Great discussion moderated by a young Australian BBC journalist operating out of Singapore.
A very special part of the day was an event put on in the evening by Threads of Life. Two stunning films, one about the role of textiles in a Balinese baby’s ceremonies and the other about a textile-making traditional community on the eastern tip of the island of Sumba. Both artistically brilliant and ethnographically significant - and even better, one of the young women from the Sumba film was there and, when asked, was only too happy to demonstrate for us how she ties her woven sarong for different purposes. William interviewed both her and ToL field worker Pung on the textile issues raised in the films. Fascinating. The girl was an economics graduate of a university in Surabaya but was back in the village learning to keep up the weaving traditions of her aristocratic family. Following, I had the pleasure of dinner with Jean and William who own and run ToL - four years since I last saw them. Very special in my Ubud life over the decades!
Rain held off for the festival. How lucky are we! It is now over and I am “recuperating” - but still have to write up Day 4. Stay tuned!