Another addition to the ‘things I saw' file:
While riding to work, I saw a bunch of children chasing en masse after a bouncing tennis ball. A boy managed to corral it and the moment it was under his stewardship turned and pegged a girl, 7ish and wearing a jilbop, in the side of the head. She crumpled to the ground.
I was so stunned that I failed to notice the ricochet, a pretty honest 10 yards off the side of her skull, as well as the flock of children that turned on a dime to chase it down. This time a girl picked it up and instantly nailed a young boy in the gut, sending him quickly to the turf. Another girl collected the ball, and, with a surprisingly efficient throwing arm, dispatched another boy to the ground.
Just as I was considering what a sadistic game these children have invented, I noticed the gym teacher (gym teachers look pretty much the same across all cultures) standing on the side of the melee, sporting pretense in the direction of officiating. I was stunned. I guess the dodgeball debate has yet to reach Indonesia.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
Saturday, March 22, 2008
i am not jaded, all these things really happened
Stepan, forty five years old, builds reconstruction houses on the north coast of Aceh, enjoys fried meats of all hooves, and has an ongoing and unspecified grievance against Filipinos. An engineer from Germany, he also recently drew the short straw in the latest housing reshuffle, netting him the dishonor of bunking with the new ‘California boy’ American in town.
Scene 1
Stepan enters, in only his underwear, from his bedroom. His accent is palpable. Matthew is on the couch, laying under an oscillating fan while doing a crossword puzzle.
Matthew: Hey Stepan, how are you doing?
Stepan: [urgently] What are you doing? How did you get here?
Matthew: Yeah, I just moved from across the way. I am living in Room 1.
Stepan: Since ven?
Matthew: Ah, about 15 minutes ago?
Stepan: [shutting the door to his room] Strange days.
And, scene!
Scene 2
Matthew is reading a book on the sofa, while in the background a pot of tomato sauce simmers. Stepan enters smelling the air.
Stepan: Agh! Gad! Vat is that smell?
Matthew: Oh, hi, I am cooking some tomato sauce—have you already eaten?
Stepan: [smelling noisily] Does [another deep inhalation, followed by a cringe], does American cooking always smell so terrible? [exit]
Scene 3
Matthew is on the couch, half watching American idol, half solving a crossword. Stefan enters with a plate filled with individually wrapped Laughing Cow brand cheese bites and fried beef.
Stepan: [bracing his plate] Oh god! Oh no! The Asians, they love this care-a-oh-key stuff.
Matthew: Yes, I know, but for some reason I find my present keyhole view of American culture mesmerizing.
Stepan: Why this guy? Who is he? What does he know? We have in Germany and he is even naughtier.
Matthew: I think it is more about his persona, in addition to our fascination as Americans with British accents. I think the chick must be on drugs, though.
Stepan: [rising] There are two things destroying your country: American Idol and the Iraq war.
Mattthew: [confused] Oh, well…
Stepan: …Many people call this ‘cultural prostitution.’ I will! [exit]
And, scene!
Scene 1
Stepan enters, in only his underwear, from his bedroom. His accent is palpable. Matthew is on the couch, laying under an oscillating fan while doing a crossword puzzle.
Matthew: Hey Stepan, how are you doing?
Stepan: [urgently] What are you doing? How did you get here?
Matthew: Yeah, I just moved from across the way. I am living in Room 1.
Stepan: Since ven?
Matthew: Ah, about 15 minutes ago?
Stepan: [shutting the door to his room] Strange days.
And, scene!
Scene 2
Matthew is reading a book on the sofa, while in the background a pot of tomato sauce simmers. Stepan enters smelling the air.
Stepan: Agh! Gad! Vat is that smell?
Matthew: Oh, hi, I am cooking some tomato sauce—have you already eaten?
Stepan: [smelling noisily] Does [another deep inhalation, followed by a cringe], does American cooking always smell so terrible? [exit]
Scene 3
Matthew is on the couch, half watching American idol, half solving a crossword. Stefan enters with a plate filled with individually wrapped Laughing Cow brand cheese bites and fried beef.
Stepan: [bracing his plate] Oh god! Oh no! The Asians, they love this care-a-oh-key stuff.
Matthew: Yes, I know, but for some reason I find my present keyhole view of American culture mesmerizing.
Stepan: Why this guy? Who is he? What does he know? We have in Germany and he is even naughtier.
Matthew: I think it is more about his persona, in addition to our fascination as Americans with British accents. I think the chick must be on drugs, though.
Stepan: [rising] There are two things destroying your country: American Idol and the Iraq war.
Mattthew: [confused] Oh, well…
Stepan: …Many people call this ‘cultural prostitution.’ I will! [exit]
And, scene!
Monday, March 17, 2008
on the coast
Most of the NGOs are based in the southeast corner of Banda Aceh, in an upper middle class neighborhood that was minimally affected by the 2004 tsunami. The walls of my room are ringed by a line, albeit one that took me several weeks to even notice, about 4 feet off the ground, but if anything this is a testament to how unobtrusive the tsunami seems in this quarter of the city.
However, once you leave my neighborhood, things change drastically. The road out to the harbor is long and straight, and conspicuous in its newness as it runs northwest out to the coast. I had been on this road before, but always inside a car, and never out in the open air.
I drove the road the other evening (to go look at a scooter), on the back of a motor bike with one of the transportation guys from the office. That which struck me the most was the inescapable flatness of the landscape. Five hundred meters off to the right the sea lolls rather stagnantly, but all around the crusty land, crisscrossed by scars from earth moving machines, is terrifyingly flat. Distant one thousand meter hills tower, screened by a detaching haze, over the coastal plain, but the sheer lack of relief seemed as nightmarish as the thistles of steel rebar that sprouted from the crown of every cement pillar.
We eventually found ourselves in a neighborhood, not two hundred meters from the tepid looking water, where every house, each the identical mirror image of the house adjacent—four cement corners framing the rough wooden walls of a bedroom, center room, and a kitchen out back—was crisscrossed by ad hoc bamboo scaffolding. Everything, including the dirt, bore an eerie and unmarked newness.
It being prayer time, and all the men away at the mosque, I was invited into someone’s house for some ‘cappuccino,’ the super sugary type (Indonesians would not have it any other way) that comes in an individual serving satchel. The house was pretty bare, TV, rattan mat on the floor, refrigerator, rice cooker, double burner gas stove. The people were very gracious and pleasantly surprised to have a bule in their home, especially one who could BS in Indonesian and keep up a steady stream of crazy white person witticisms.
After a while my host told me that he had something to show me and he produced from his wallet a folded up triangle of paper. Carefully unwrapping it, he shook out two razor thin gold flakes, each one about the size of a pencil eraser. Upon closer examination, these delicate little wafers appeared to be some sort of coinage, decorated on both sides with beautiful ornate script. They were brilliant; when I asked him what he had used to polish them he just laughed, clearly proud of my assumption, and flicked his head.
And, indeed, they were of an impressive lineage, as he found them on the beach, not far from his home, the day after the tsunami. As he told it, they were resting with a 250 year old underwater wreck when the waters reach down and dragged them back to terra firma. I asked them if he would sell them because, after all and especially in a culture that values charms and cosmic items (later that same evening someone tried to wow me with the invisible powers of their pet photoluminescent stone), they must have some value, but he vehemently assured me that he never would.
I must confess that I went home wowed by my host’s gold. For some reason I could not shake the utter contrast that his treasure embodied, how these of the most delicate and pristine were eventually repatriated by an event of unprecedented physical power and destruction. And, sitting on his new cement floor, while the mosques echoed through the twilight, I could not help but feel and admire the bravery and strength of the peoples of Aceh.
However, once you leave my neighborhood, things change drastically. The road out to the harbor is long and straight, and conspicuous in its newness as it runs northwest out to the coast. I had been on this road before, but always inside a car, and never out in the open air.
I drove the road the other evening (to go look at a scooter), on the back of a motor bike with one of the transportation guys from the office. That which struck me the most was the inescapable flatness of the landscape. Five hundred meters off to the right the sea lolls rather stagnantly, but all around the crusty land, crisscrossed by scars from earth moving machines, is terrifyingly flat. Distant one thousand meter hills tower, screened by a detaching haze, over the coastal plain, but the sheer lack of relief seemed as nightmarish as the thistles of steel rebar that sprouted from the crown of every cement pillar.
We eventually found ourselves in a neighborhood, not two hundred meters from the tepid looking water, where every house, each the identical mirror image of the house adjacent—four cement corners framing the rough wooden walls of a bedroom, center room, and a kitchen out back—was crisscrossed by ad hoc bamboo scaffolding. Everything, including the dirt, bore an eerie and unmarked newness.
It being prayer time, and all the men away at the mosque, I was invited into someone’s house for some ‘cappuccino,’ the super sugary type (Indonesians would not have it any other way) that comes in an individual serving satchel. The house was pretty bare, TV, rattan mat on the floor, refrigerator, rice cooker, double burner gas stove. The people were very gracious and pleasantly surprised to have a bule in their home, especially one who could BS in Indonesian and keep up a steady stream of crazy white person witticisms.
After a while my host told me that he had something to show me and he produced from his wallet a folded up triangle of paper. Carefully unwrapping it, he shook out two razor thin gold flakes, each one about the size of a pencil eraser. Upon closer examination, these delicate little wafers appeared to be some sort of coinage, decorated on both sides with beautiful ornate script. They were brilliant; when I asked him what he had used to polish them he just laughed, clearly proud of my assumption, and flicked his head.
And, indeed, they were of an impressive lineage, as he found them on the beach, not far from his home, the day after the tsunami. As he told it, they were resting with a 250 year old underwater wreck when the waters reach down and dragged them back to terra firma. I asked them if he would sell them because, after all and especially in a culture that values charms and cosmic items (later that same evening someone tried to wow me with the invisible powers of their pet photoluminescent stone), they must have some value, but he vehemently assured me that he never would.
I must confess that I went home wowed by my host’s gold. For some reason I could not shake the utter contrast that his treasure embodied, how these of the most delicate and pristine were eventually repatriated by an event of unprecedented physical power and destruction. And, sitting on his new cement floor, while the mosques echoed through the twilight, I could not help but feel and admire the bravery and strength of the peoples of Aceh.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Night at the Medan Tiara
For some reason, describing hotels really tickles me. In a few years, when I end up writing about places to stay in Leland, NC (‘The Gateway to Brunswick County’) for the ‘Excursions’ section of the Youngstown Buckeye Review, it should prove easy enough to see where I went wrong. Into the abyss-
Medan is the quintessential Indonesian working city: congested, polluted, and busy. It is the third largest city in Indonesia, with 2.5 million inhabitants. Situated in the North of Sumatra, with good proximity to the Strait of Malacca (and thereby international markets), Medan serves as an entrepot for much of the province’s natural resource driven (oil, gas, mining, forestry) development as well as its manufacturing industries. The Medanese are an interesting lot, a mixture of Chinese (who control the business community), Batak (an ethnicity from highland Sumatra known for their ferocity), and Tamils. Indonesians can always be counted on to refer to the people of Medan as ‘orang keras,’ or ‘intense people’ and Medan is the same way.
The crown jewel of the Medan hotel hierarchy is the Hotel Medan Tiara (and Conference Center), the preferred choice of all my colleagues in Medan. I think we even have a special rate. The hotel, by consensus the nicest in the city, is in the first tower of a two tower complex, while the second tower (conceivably the Convention Center) straddles the line between uncompleted/bombed out with uncanny aplomb. I had no idea what awaited me inside.
The lobby of the Tiara is, naturally, still feted with cheap themed Chinese New Year Decorations more than a month after the holiday. On the left lies the Kutaraja Restaurant, featuring a menu where the nightly buffet is cheaper than everything on the menu, and to the right the Tor Tor Lounge, where you can redeem your free ‘welcome drink’ voucher received during check-in. Speaking of check-in, this is a protracted process, for me involving a long argument of whether I have to leave a US $40 deposit on the mini-bar (contents of the mini-bar: peanuts, bottled water, beer, coke lite, sweet tea, pocari sweat, and, inexplicably, twelve Toblerone). Eventually winning out on the grounds that there is no way they make a humanitarian organization put money down on the mini-bar, I bask in my victory as the young associate named ‘Trainee’ is chastised by management.
My room (the Tiara has an ambiguous room hierarchy: executive and quality) has the largest bed I have ever seen, a TV, an electronic safe, one shoe, a cellophane encased plate of cantaloupe slices that have shrunken so substantially that I spend my night playing ‘giant’ with them, and a bedside command post unit with buttons for everything in the room. Realizing the window is a sliding door that opens onto space, I resist the urge to explore further.
The lobby, by day a pacific respite decked with red firecracker garlands, becomes by night the scene of full contact prostitute derby. Heels and sequins lay in wait for the unassuming guest returning from dinner. Realizing the infinite wisdom of my decision to eschew the Tor Tor’s ‘welcome drink’ (suspiciously only valid after 9pm) in favor of TV, I strove to avoid eye contact of any kind, a strategy I quickly abandoned a few steps inside the front door. With my arms simultaneously pulled in three different directions, and verging dangerously close to being swept into a slipstream (terminating, temporarily, no doubt in the karaoke-belching Tor Tor) of halter tops and Chanel No. 5, I stiff armed my way across the rest of the tile between me and the elevator bank.
Back in my room, and after some devoted hand washing, I finally settled into bed. 'Shakespeare in Love' was on the Tiara’s movie network, a movie that, in its Indonesian incarnation, is surprisingly manageable to watch, like the digest version, clocking in at around 50 minutes. Thank you, censorship.
The next morning, happily, I got out of Medan and on to Simeulue.
Medan is the quintessential Indonesian working city: congested, polluted, and busy. It is the third largest city in Indonesia, with 2.5 million inhabitants. Situated in the North of Sumatra, with good proximity to the Strait of Malacca (and thereby international markets), Medan serves as an entrepot for much of the province’s natural resource driven (oil, gas, mining, forestry) development as well as its manufacturing industries. The Medanese are an interesting lot, a mixture of Chinese (who control the business community), Batak (an ethnicity from highland Sumatra known for their ferocity), and Tamils. Indonesians can always be counted on to refer to the people of Medan as ‘orang keras,’ or ‘intense people’ and Medan is the same way.
The crown jewel of the Medan hotel hierarchy is the Hotel Medan Tiara (and Conference Center), the preferred choice of all my colleagues in Medan. I think we even have a special rate. The hotel, by consensus the nicest in the city, is in the first tower of a two tower complex, while the second tower (conceivably the Convention Center) straddles the line between uncompleted/bombed out with uncanny aplomb. I had no idea what awaited me inside.
The lobby of the Tiara is, naturally, still feted with cheap themed Chinese New Year Decorations more than a month after the holiday. On the left lies the Kutaraja Restaurant, featuring a menu where the nightly buffet is cheaper than everything on the menu, and to the right the Tor Tor Lounge, where you can redeem your free ‘welcome drink’ voucher received during check-in. Speaking of check-in, this is a protracted process, for me involving a long argument of whether I have to leave a US $40 deposit on the mini-bar (contents of the mini-bar: peanuts, bottled water, beer, coke lite, sweet tea, pocari sweat, and, inexplicably, twelve Toblerone). Eventually winning out on the grounds that there is no way they make a humanitarian organization put money down on the mini-bar, I bask in my victory as the young associate named ‘Trainee’ is chastised by management.
My room (the Tiara has an ambiguous room hierarchy: executive and quality) has the largest bed I have ever seen, a TV, an electronic safe, one shoe, a cellophane encased plate of cantaloupe slices that have shrunken so substantially that I spend my night playing ‘giant’ with them, and a bedside command post unit with buttons for everything in the room. Realizing the window is a sliding door that opens onto space, I resist the urge to explore further.
The lobby, by day a pacific respite decked with red firecracker garlands, becomes by night the scene of full contact prostitute derby. Heels and sequins lay in wait for the unassuming guest returning from dinner. Realizing the infinite wisdom of my decision to eschew the Tor Tor’s ‘welcome drink’ (suspiciously only valid after 9pm) in favor of TV, I strove to avoid eye contact of any kind, a strategy I quickly abandoned a few steps inside the front door. With my arms simultaneously pulled in three different directions, and verging dangerously close to being swept into a slipstream (terminating, temporarily, no doubt in the karaoke-belching Tor Tor) of halter tops and Chanel No. 5, I stiff armed my way across the rest of the tile between me and the elevator bank.
Back in my room, and after some devoted hand washing, I finally settled into bed. 'Shakespeare in Love' was on the Tiara’s movie network, a movie that, in its Indonesian incarnation, is surprisingly manageable to watch, like the digest version, clocking in at around 50 minutes. Thank you, censorship.
The next morning, happily, I got out of Medan and on to Simeulue.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
an open letter
Dear People of Indonesia,
Thank you for your ongoing interest in me. There is nothing so welcoming as to be unable to eat a meal, read a book, or walk down a street without interrupting your laughter. I must have amazing timing or you must be a people always joking around, and though I sometimes feel left out, I can always tell from the outside that someone hit a good one.
One thing that I must protest is the constantly taking my picture in public. Yes, you two tables over, I realize that you have been shooting pictures of me throughout my dinner. Yes, teenager across the street, I can see you and your friends documenting my cup of coffee. In the future you might consider bickering and pushing at each other less in order to escape detection--the game was up long before your friend fell into the gutter as his end of the camera strap broke. Yes, person ‘just sending a text message’ with your phone perpendicular to the ground and two feet from my face, I have penetrated your fortress of stealthiness. Yes, person inexplicably jostling up against me on the ferry and giving what I am sure passes for a ‘gang symbol,’ I can see your elph-toting compatriot hiding behind those deck chairs.
I know all your friends will be impressed with this specimen of a white person that you ‘know,’ but I really need a break: I feel unpretty, skinny, and sweaty. I understand that there are few of us roaming the wild, and who knows when the next opportunity to bag one might come, but please, put away the glass for a moment. Yes, my skin, it is mesmerizing, something so aspirational that I too would apply toxic things to my person twice a day if I wasn’t so lucky. It is a shame that I even have to go out of doors for food and work, otherwise I could better preserve myself for our special photographic moment. For this I apologize.
No? Well, thanks for introducing yourself; it was great to meet you. Enjoy the souvenirs of all those crazy times we had together.
Sincerely,
Matthew Busch
ed note: everyone say it with me now, "Saatirre"
Thank you for your ongoing interest in me. There is nothing so welcoming as to be unable to eat a meal, read a book, or walk down a street without interrupting your laughter. I must have amazing timing or you must be a people always joking around, and though I sometimes feel left out, I can always tell from the outside that someone hit a good one.
One thing that I must protest is the constantly taking my picture in public. Yes, you two tables over, I realize that you have been shooting pictures of me throughout my dinner. Yes, teenager across the street, I can see you and your friends documenting my cup of coffee. In the future you might consider bickering and pushing at each other less in order to escape detection--the game was up long before your friend fell into the gutter as his end of the camera strap broke. Yes, person ‘just sending a text message’ with your phone perpendicular to the ground and two feet from my face, I have penetrated your fortress of stealthiness. Yes, person inexplicably jostling up against me on the ferry and giving what I am sure passes for a ‘gang symbol,’ I can see your elph-toting compatriot hiding behind those deck chairs.
I know all your friends will be impressed with this specimen of a white person that you ‘know,’ but I really need a break: I feel unpretty, skinny, and sweaty. I understand that there are few of us roaming the wild, and who knows when the next opportunity to bag one might come, but please, put away the glass for a moment. Yes, my skin, it is mesmerizing, something so aspirational that I too would apply toxic things to my person twice a day if I wasn’t so lucky. It is a shame that I even have to go out of doors for food and work, otherwise I could better preserve myself for our special photographic moment. For this I apologize.
No? Well, thanks for introducing yourself; it was great to meet you. Enjoy the souvenirs of all those crazy times we had together.
Sincerely,
Matthew Busch
ed note: everyone say it with me now, "Saatirre"
Thursday, March 6, 2008
swayze: a retrospective
This is a departure from convention, but when I heard about Patrick Swayze's fight with pancreatic cancer I wanted to make some gesture (I am still kicking myself for failing to get my act together and put together something to mark Norman Mailer's passing). You may say to yourself, 'Matt's just putting us on and cashing in on cheap laughs,' but my devotion to Swayze is as serious as, actually, as serious as pancreatic cancer itself.
And so, in no particular order, why I hold Swayze close to my heart:
1.
And so, in no particular order, why I hold Swayze close to my heart:
1.
2. The incredible Chris Farley 'Chippendales' SNL sketch: few others have come so close to the rarefied air of the infamous Bowie/Jagger 'Dancin' in the Streets' collaboration.
3. The Bodhisattva
4. "Good looking people turn me off. Myself included."
5. For being being a part of Keanu Reeves delivering the lines 'I am an FBI Agent!' in two different feature films [Youngblood, where Keanu plays a French-Canadian goalie, and the canonical Point Break]
6. "Back off Warchild, seriously."
7. Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights
8. "Chill, brah. You know who this is? Johnny Utah. Ohio State, all-conference"
9. Being involved in Keanu going to law school on a football scholarship.
10. Road House: "Pain don't hurt" and "My way...or the highway."
This could go on for a while (and would involve a link to the entire Point Break screenplay), but I think that is sufficient. Feel better soon, brah.
development thoughts
After working with a development organization (and around many others) for only a few weeks, I must confess to a bunch of opinions on the experience, first and foremost of which is that we (the wealthy world) do not do enough development work. Undoubtedly, a great deal of money gets spent (in Aceh and Nias reconstruction spending will amount to US$5.7 billion over five years) and while some goes for SUVs and high-priced expatriate staff, irregardless, in the field the marginal return on dollars spent is truly staggering. Like both of the Bills (Gates and Clinton) pointed out at commencement, wealthy countries can dramatically improve the fortunes of poorer countries for what amounts to relatively small sacrifice. This is the best investment we have going in terms of both philanthropy and security and we need to do a lot more of it.
However, I do not intend to sell the process as the paragon of efficiency or to make it sound easy. Often it is the exact opposite of this, such that even though I was surprised the first time the Chief of Party for Aceh used the idiom ‘like pushing a rope,’ I also understood.
Note: This was originally a much longer piece and I have tried to make it more managable by cutting in back as well as organizing separate sub-headings. I don't know if it helps. If you skip it, I will understand.
Today’s secret word is ‘unprecedented’
To digress, it is important to differentiate between disaster relief and development work—they engage differently, have different goals, prioritize differently, etc—but bear with me for a moment. I say that the disaster in Aceh blurred this distinction, not necessarily because it was completely unpredicted (after all few natural disasters are ‘predictable’) or the scope and scale of destruction, but because of two unique elements. One is the fact that Aceh already was in desperate need of development work (of which there were many organizations already engaged) as a result of 30 years of military conflict. The second is simply the sheer (and simply unprecedented) scale of the humanitarian response from the wealthy world. $5.7 billion has a way of obliterating the niche. Maybe I am lazy, but I am going to talk about them as one in the same.
Local Context
A key part of the problem is that you end up with a massive mobilization of people and resources hitting the ground with little or no ties to the community and cultural context. In any situation where money is being given out (in a figurative sense) inefficiencies will be created and in situations light on local contextualization, organizations often create suboptimal incentives and undertake projects that are both wasteful and alienating to the community. Stories abound about NGOs spending lots of cash to start up something like a livelihoods project for a local mat weaving cooperative that has no market and, after six months, a room in someone’s house overfilled with mats.
Community Mores
This sounds a bit snobby, but I have been amazed at how little some of the NGO community here actually understands local mores, both in terms of their work as well as private lives. It would be misleading to think that this only refers to westerners getting into the sauce or showing off a bit too much arm, as in fact there are a group of missionaries in town (the best way to pick the missionaries: Carolinians who work for obscure, never-before-heard of NGOs) who in a strategy apparently designed to ingratiate themselves to the community all (the females) wear jilbops (Islamic headscarves) in public. Not only is this kind of weird, but it offends many Muslims to have something Islamic appropriated by people who are not Muslims.
What exactly is an NGO?
Another element that has stood out to me is that local people, including (and perhaps most stunningly) the staff, do not seem quite clear on what NGOs actually can and cannot do. People certainly understand that these organizations have a lot of money but there is decidedly less understood about what some of the key tenets of development—sustainability and investment, to name two—actually mean. Many people (again, including the local staff) believe that there is a great deal of ‘free’ money and do not see why they cannot spend it on whatever they want. One colleague, our communications director in the province, is famous for handing in stories (per his job description designed to trumpet the organization’s successes) that focus largely on how craven and miserly our NGO is, for example, only replacing things lost in the tsunami/conflict, rather than building its beneficiaries bigger houses or more techy boats.
I think this sort of challenge can be expected and, what is more, in a way further underscores the argument for more development, as global inequality looks even more lopsided from this vantage. Moreover, in terms of capacity building among the local workforce, exposure to these types of organizations is something that I think will prove really beneficial. Not only does it provide stable, enumerative employment for local people who want to build their communities, but it demonstrates an organizational framework that is predicated on phillanthropic, consultative, and sustainable interventions.
Professionalism (and my Economics rant)
In terms of improving the quality of programming, a greater degree of professionalism would go a long way. Basically too many of these organizations are trying to design microeconomic interventions without the proper tools to get at the effects they are interested in. Basically what ends up happening is an organization tries to cobble out assessments and strategies based on an awkward synthesis of macro-style baseline indicators (often at a national or provincial level) and anecdotal evidence. Their capacity to analyze microeconomic effects is virtually nil, a considerable problem when you trade is in household-level interventions. Many of these organizations have no capacity (and what's more troubling, no idea anything is amiss) for in house data collection or analysis, a weakness that has really surprised given the state of funding and sophistication of other elements.
However, I do not intend to sell the process as the paragon of efficiency or to make it sound easy. Often it is the exact opposite of this, such that even though I was surprised the first time the Chief of Party for Aceh used the idiom ‘like pushing a rope,’ I also understood.
Note: This was originally a much longer piece and I have tried to make it more managable by cutting in back as well as organizing separate sub-headings. I don't know if it helps. If you skip it, I will understand.
Today’s secret word is ‘unprecedented’
To digress, it is important to differentiate between disaster relief and development work—they engage differently, have different goals, prioritize differently, etc—but bear with me for a moment. I say that the disaster in Aceh blurred this distinction, not necessarily because it was completely unpredicted (after all few natural disasters are ‘predictable’) or the scope and scale of destruction, but because of two unique elements. One is the fact that Aceh already was in desperate need of development work (of which there were many organizations already engaged) as a result of 30 years of military conflict. The second is simply the sheer (and simply unprecedented) scale of the humanitarian response from the wealthy world. $5.7 billion has a way of obliterating the niche. Maybe I am lazy, but I am going to talk about them as one in the same.
Local Context
A key part of the problem is that you end up with a massive mobilization of people and resources hitting the ground with little or no ties to the community and cultural context. In any situation where money is being given out (in a figurative sense) inefficiencies will be created and in situations light on local contextualization, organizations often create suboptimal incentives and undertake projects that are both wasteful and alienating to the community. Stories abound about NGOs spending lots of cash to start up something like a livelihoods project for a local mat weaving cooperative that has no market and, after six months, a room in someone’s house overfilled with mats.
Community Mores
This sounds a bit snobby, but I have been amazed at how little some of the NGO community here actually understands local mores, both in terms of their work as well as private lives. It would be misleading to think that this only refers to westerners getting into the sauce or showing off a bit too much arm, as in fact there are a group of missionaries in town (the best way to pick the missionaries: Carolinians who work for obscure, never-before-heard of NGOs) who in a strategy apparently designed to ingratiate themselves to the community all (the females) wear jilbops (Islamic headscarves) in public. Not only is this kind of weird, but it offends many Muslims to have something Islamic appropriated by people who are not Muslims.
What exactly is an NGO?
Another element that has stood out to me is that local people, including (and perhaps most stunningly) the staff, do not seem quite clear on what NGOs actually can and cannot do. People certainly understand that these organizations have a lot of money but there is decidedly less understood about what some of the key tenets of development—sustainability and investment, to name two—actually mean. Many people (again, including the local staff) believe that there is a great deal of ‘free’ money and do not see why they cannot spend it on whatever they want. One colleague, our communications director in the province, is famous for handing in stories (per his job description designed to trumpet the organization’s successes) that focus largely on how craven and miserly our NGO is, for example, only replacing things lost in the tsunami/conflict, rather than building its beneficiaries bigger houses or more techy boats.
I think this sort of challenge can be expected and, what is more, in a way further underscores the argument for more development, as global inequality looks even more lopsided from this vantage. Moreover, in terms of capacity building among the local workforce, exposure to these types of organizations is something that I think will prove really beneficial. Not only does it provide stable, enumerative employment for local people who want to build their communities, but it demonstrates an organizational framework that is predicated on phillanthropic, consultative, and sustainable interventions.
Professionalism (and my Economics rant)
In terms of improving the quality of programming, a greater degree of professionalism would go a long way. Basically too many of these organizations are trying to design microeconomic interventions without the proper tools to get at the effects they are interested in. Basically what ends up happening is an organization tries to cobble out assessments and strategies based on an awkward synthesis of macro-style baseline indicators (often at a national or provincial level) and anecdotal evidence. Their capacity to analyze microeconomic effects is virtually nil, a considerable problem when you trade is in household-level interventions. Many of these organizations have no capacity (and what's more troubling, no idea anything is amiss) for in house data collection or analysis, a weakness that has really surprised given the state of funding and sophistication of other elements.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Night at the Wisma Bireuen Jaya
There is not a whole lot happening in Bireuen, a sleepy little corner of the east coast of Aceh where I have traveled down to for the handover of a few new schools to the community tomorrow, but the shinning light of town is the apt named Wisma Bireuen Jaya. [Tough to translate, but this means something like ‘extraordinary/transcendent guesthouse of Bireuen.’]
Seemingly modeled after the great American motor court, all pastel-painted cement and themed moulding, I initially described the Wisma as ‘less skeezy than expected.’ Check-in happens in a shallow, smoky room dominated by a massive slab of keys and tenderized by the radioactive glow and hypersonic drone of early evening Indonesian soap operas.
Checking-in being almost complete—facilitated by two increasingly incredulous looking women with hard eyes sunk into faces that exude an eerie pallor from the bleach (seriously, why do you want to be white? Do I look cool to you?) they rub into their faces each evening—when the proprietor, shirt open to his navel, mustache that kind of reminds me of the law enforcement fellow who always gets his pants cut open in ‘Zorro,’ descends on the business end of the room. Based on the amount of gold on his person, it seems reasonable to conclude that he does not trust banks.
As is a fairly common occurrence in Indonesia, the process will now need to be repeated, less efficiently and with greater confusion, to complete the operation. As the cigarette fused to his lip dwindles to a stump, keys are doled out, passports are ritualistically examined, voices are raised, and keys are snatched back again. The only thing that seems to obey any tug of time is the clay colored cigarette filter growing—at a pace that approaches imperceptibility—a salt and pepper crown not unlike the proprietor’s. I check several times in the free time I now have as the staff sorts out the conundrum of me and he seems somehow preserved by the air conditioning. Eventually the (still correct) set of keys is returned and one of the ladies of the manor escorts me to my room.
She forces the doors open with a polished lunge of the shoulder that, as I find out later, betrays less force than must actually be involved. Wielding a bazooka-imitating can of air freshener, I feel like I am on a ride-along police mission as the first imperative through the door (left, right, up, down) is to hit the entire room with a strong dose of the florally goodness. I somehow resist the urge to scream out ‘Clear, Sarge!’ now that all the room’s dirtiness has been dispatched.
Turning on the air conditioner, she prepares to give the room a killing dose of the other aerosol product included free in the room cost: the mosquito killing cloud. As much as I like bathing in something that causes immediate catastrophic neurological damage in insects, I managed to pull the Indonesian out fast enough to stop her. Genuinely stupefied, she graciously offers to leave it on my night stand (rather than across the room), presumably for my easy nighttime access.
As in many hotels, the bottom sheet and pillow shams are some sort of matching/themed affair (in this case that means…kittens!) and, based on the suggestion (as well as other tactile evidence) of the folded sheet on the pillow, not changed as often as the top sheet. Later, I sleep in the least favorite of my two sarongs, proving that I have yet to exhaust this wonderful garment’s many practical uses.
The bathroom will provide a crisis that yet again prompts the consideration of the slipperiest (and thus far, elusive) theoretical question of my life: Can and does soap clean itself?
Seemingly modeled after the great American motor court, all pastel-painted cement and themed moulding, I initially described the Wisma as ‘less skeezy than expected.’ Check-in happens in a shallow, smoky room dominated by a massive slab of keys and tenderized by the radioactive glow and hypersonic drone of early evening Indonesian soap operas.
Checking-in being almost complete—facilitated by two increasingly incredulous looking women with hard eyes sunk into faces that exude an eerie pallor from the bleach (seriously, why do you want to be white? Do I look cool to you?) they rub into their faces each evening—when the proprietor, shirt open to his navel, mustache that kind of reminds me of the law enforcement fellow who always gets his pants cut open in ‘Zorro,’ descends on the business end of the room. Based on the amount of gold on his person, it seems reasonable to conclude that he does not trust banks.
As is a fairly common occurrence in Indonesia, the process will now need to be repeated, less efficiently and with greater confusion, to complete the operation. As the cigarette fused to his lip dwindles to a stump, keys are doled out, passports are ritualistically examined, voices are raised, and keys are snatched back again. The only thing that seems to obey any tug of time is the clay colored cigarette filter growing—at a pace that approaches imperceptibility—a salt and pepper crown not unlike the proprietor’s. I check several times in the free time I now have as the staff sorts out the conundrum of me and he seems somehow preserved by the air conditioning. Eventually the (still correct) set of keys is returned and one of the ladies of the manor escorts me to my room.
She forces the doors open with a polished lunge of the shoulder that, as I find out later, betrays less force than must actually be involved. Wielding a bazooka-imitating can of air freshener, I feel like I am on a ride-along police mission as the first imperative through the door (left, right, up, down) is to hit the entire room with a strong dose of the florally goodness. I somehow resist the urge to scream out ‘Clear, Sarge!’ now that all the room’s dirtiness has been dispatched.
Turning on the air conditioner, she prepares to give the room a killing dose of the other aerosol product included free in the room cost: the mosquito killing cloud. As much as I like bathing in something that causes immediate catastrophic neurological damage in insects, I managed to pull the Indonesian out fast enough to stop her. Genuinely stupefied, she graciously offers to leave it on my night stand (rather than across the room), presumably for my easy nighttime access.
As in many hotels, the bottom sheet and pillow shams are some sort of matching/themed affair (in this case that means…kittens!) and, based on the suggestion (as well as other tactile evidence) of the folded sheet on the pillow, not changed as often as the top sheet. Later, I sleep in the least favorite of my two sarongs, proving that I have yet to exhaust this wonderful garment’s many practical uses.
The bathroom will provide a crisis that yet again prompts the consideration of the slipperiest (and thus far, elusive) theoretical question of my life: Can and does soap clean itself?
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
"street truths" or "love and consequences, fo real"
There is nothing like some sassy twelve year olds on motor bikes to remind you of your place. Banda Aceh, where there seems to be absolutely no societal coalescence arouns an unacceptably youthful age for motor bike operation, is as good a place as any to get your fill.
Often I might be walking through the neighborhood, perhaps returning from an especially innovative rice dining experience only to have my twilight reverie pierced by a revving of engines and chorus of ‘misters.’ The dust that is always and everywhere hangs from the weak headlight beams tangled up in my legs and I hold my breath.
While they are not very adept with their steeds (some also have trouble comfortably accessing the pedals), causing the bikes waggle and hiccup along as the try to match my ambling pace, they generally are able to ride along for a stretch while yelling ‘rokok!’ and ‘uang!’ before disappearing into a cloud of giggling, exhaust, and budding fohawks. These of course are the Bahasa Indonesian words for ‘cigarette!’ and ‘money!’ (The insult around Banda Aceh being that all development workers are good for is cash handouts), respectively.
Trust me, its degrading enough to have to go through middle school once, but now this? Maybe I should cave and buy off the little whippersnappers with cigarettes or start trying to work out an importing scheme necessary to turn them into my minions through a complex Sunkist-based reward system. Until then, I will not be leaving my room.
Often I might be walking through the neighborhood, perhaps returning from an especially innovative rice dining experience only to have my twilight reverie pierced by a revving of engines and chorus of ‘misters.’ The dust that is always and everywhere hangs from the weak headlight beams tangled up in my legs and I hold my breath.
While they are not very adept with their steeds (some also have trouble comfortably accessing the pedals), causing the bikes waggle and hiccup along as the try to match my ambling pace, they generally are able to ride along for a stretch while yelling ‘rokok!’ and ‘uang!’ before disappearing into a cloud of giggling, exhaust, and budding fohawks. These of course are the Bahasa Indonesian words for ‘cigarette!’ and ‘money!’ (The insult around Banda Aceh being that all development workers are good for is cash handouts), respectively.
Trust me, its degrading enough to have to go through middle school once, but now this? Maybe I should cave and buy off the little whippersnappers with cigarettes or start trying to work out an importing scheme necessary to turn them into my minions through a complex Sunkist-based reward system. Until then, I will not be leaving my room.
Saturday, March 1, 2008
looking for biscuits
“…so the first place to try is that unfinished woods shops near the flooded lot/fishing pond on the corner. Ask the old lady for ‘biscuits.’”
Yes, I am frantically trying to get this all down and, even worse, he is talking fast.
“If not, go to the grocery store called ‘ramai’ across the street from the grand mosque. The trick there is to go in and mill around in the back of the store until a Chinese man with three thumbs approaches. He will take care of it.”
Back on the street, the becak driver who dropped me off is fitting quick drags on a cigarette into the pauses of a slanted grin, his old time Dutch motorcycle helmet, cocked to one side, seems to be in cahoots with the smile. His teeth look like they have been out too long in a strong wind.
Trying to nonchalantly schlep a lumpy black bag as well as I can, I hop into the sidecar: whether I like it or not, this is a round trip. Off we putter into the twilight, he chattering away and helpfully pointing out every roadside police post along the route. I squirm and try to change the subject; he laughs short bursts of clove smoke at me. Thus was my first experience buying beer in Banda Aceh.
Aceh is different than everywhere else in Indonesia because in addition to the conventional civil and criminal legal systems, there is an Islamic legal system, called syariah. When the peace accords were signed in 2005, ending the conflict between the government of Indonesia and GAM (the Acehnese separatist movement), syariah’s extension into criminal law was one of the ‘concessions’ that the central government was willing to make. Islamic courts in Aceh have long dealt with issues of marriage and inheritance, marriage, and divorce, but the criminal element was new and the first elements enacted were capital punishment for sexual relations outside marriage, possession or consumption of alcohol, and gambling.
This has presented an interesting situation on the ground because while the Acehnese are certainly some of the most pious people in Indonesia, many Acehnese are unhappy with syariah, claim they never fought for it, and see it as a way for Jakarta to co-opt Acehnese grievances by casting them as a bunch of religious fundamentalists. Many former GAM leaders (a highly devout group), who since the peace have been elected to various public offices, have openly campaigned for an end to syariah.
It seems as if much of the popular disenchantment with syariah stems from the police force that has been set up to enforce it, sometimes known as ‘the vice and virtue’ patrol. In my estimation, most Acehnese already live their lives according to Islamic principles and want Islamic law applied to probate and family issues. These same Muslims though cool on the idea when it manifests itself in yet another wrinkle to the already crooked police/community power dynamic. More than anything, it seems that the Acehnese are pretty laid back people and are no religious fundamentalists and they simply do not react well to anything that results in forced, on-the-spot hair cuts for women caught without headscarves.
Anyways, for foreigners, things are a bit more casual; I think we are expected to behave a little bit like the infidels that we are. Caught with beer, nothing too terrible would have happened to me, perhaps a bribe. I went home, my heart nonetheless beating a little bit stronger, ordered a pizza, drank brews, and watched westerns.
Yes, I am frantically trying to get this all down and, even worse, he is talking fast.
“If not, go to the grocery store called ‘ramai’ across the street from the grand mosque. The trick there is to go in and mill around in the back of the store until a Chinese man with three thumbs approaches. He will take care of it.”
* * *
Back on the street, the becak driver who dropped me off is fitting quick drags on a cigarette into the pauses of a slanted grin, his old time Dutch motorcycle helmet, cocked to one side, seems to be in cahoots with the smile. His teeth look like they have been out too long in a strong wind.
Trying to nonchalantly schlep a lumpy black bag as well as I can, I hop into the sidecar: whether I like it or not, this is a round trip. Off we putter into the twilight, he chattering away and helpfully pointing out every roadside police post along the route. I squirm and try to change the subject; he laughs short bursts of clove smoke at me. Thus was my first experience buying beer in Banda Aceh.
* * *
Aceh is different than everywhere else in Indonesia because in addition to the conventional civil and criminal legal systems, there is an Islamic legal system, called syariah. When the peace accords were signed in 2005, ending the conflict between the government of Indonesia and GAM (the Acehnese separatist movement), syariah’s extension into criminal law was one of the ‘concessions’ that the central government was willing to make. Islamic courts in Aceh have long dealt with issues of marriage and inheritance, marriage, and divorce, but the criminal element was new and the first elements enacted were capital punishment for sexual relations outside marriage, possession or consumption of alcohol, and gambling.
This has presented an interesting situation on the ground because while the Acehnese are certainly some of the most pious people in Indonesia, many Acehnese are unhappy with syariah, claim they never fought for it, and see it as a way for Jakarta to co-opt Acehnese grievances by casting them as a bunch of religious fundamentalists. Many former GAM leaders (a highly devout group), who since the peace have been elected to various public offices, have openly campaigned for an end to syariah.
It seems as if much of the popular disenchantment with syariah stems from the police force that has been set up to enforce it, sometimes known as ‘the vice and virtue’ patrol. In my estimation, most Acehnese already live their lives according to Islamic principles and want Islamic law applied to probate and family issues. These same Muslims though cool on the idea when it manifests itself in yet another wrinkle to the already crooked police/community power dynamic. More than anything, it seems that the Acehnese are pretty laid back people and are no religious fundamentalists and they simply do not react well to anything that results in forced, on-the-spot hair cuts for women caught without headscarves.
Anyways, for foreigners, things are a bit more casual; I think we are expected to behave a little bit like the infidels that we are. Caught with beer, nothing too terrible would have happened to me, perhaps a bribe. I went home, my heart nonetheless beating a little bit stronger, ordered a pizza, drank brews, and watched westerns.
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