I have never been so aware of Easter as a religious holiday. For me, Easter is usually a long weekend off work and excess chocolate. But here on the Catholic island of Flores it is the highlight of the religious calendar. Although still a week away, the church has been staging special events, for example on Palm Sunday they flew in a Korean girl with stigmata.
I have never lived in a Catholic community before, and find some of its paradox’s confusing. The religious leaders (nuns and priests as well as the bishop) are clearly the wealthiest people in the area. Their homes and offices are always made of brick, often having two stories, and rumours has it that one of the priest houses even has a washing machine & tumble dryer – unimaginable luxury. But directly or indirectly is this not all paid for by the poorest people when they put their wages in the collection bowl? I guess everywhere in the world it is true that organised religion is rich – the Church of England is still the biggest land owner in my own country – but here it is the contrast that is striking. The church and its ‘employees’ have so much and it sits right next to, and is provided by, people who have so little.
But despite, or maybe because of this, the people are devout: peoples houses are full of Catholic icons; the cathedral is always busy; and many young men and women train to be priests and nuns (well who wouldn’t want to join this privileged section of society). However, in times of crisis their Catholic faith seems often to sit beside an older, more traditional culture of animism. My friend’s pregnant sister went into labour this week, it is proving to be difficult and her family are all by her bedside praying. But at the same time they believe that the difficult birth is due to black magic – someone has placed a spell on the pregnant woman and now the baby cannot get out. So alongside modern medicine and organised religion is tradition, and it is fascinating for a sceptic like myself to observe peoples simultaneous and unquestioning faith in all three.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
Monday, March 26, 2007
Fake plastic flowers
Last week Mike, a VSO volunteer based in Java, visited Ruteng. He has been here before & is quite well aquatinted with the people and the geography of the area. So I was surprised when having offered to cook Zoe & I dinner all he could produce was a pancake.
Now this was not a reflection on his cooking abilities (well, to be honest I don’t know about that, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt) but, as he explained, a reflection on the ingredients available in Ruteng. Apparently he had gone to the ‘supermarket’ expecting to be able to buy vegetables – fresh or frozen – and couldn’t. Well of course he couldn’t, it is quite normal to me now that the ‘supermarket’ doesn’t sell any kind of fresh produce – there is not a constant enough electricity supply to keep products cold or fresh. So most things are canned (meat, fish, some fruit & veg), dried (mushrooms, noodles, fish) or in instant-just-add-water packages (noodles, pasta, rice). If I spot a western item (tonic-water, baked-beans, corn flakes) I bulk buy, ‘cause next time I go it won’t be there.
Having got the hang of what is and isn’t available in the ‘supermarket’, I have started venturing into other shops. It is often difficult to tell from the outside what type of thing a shop sells, and frequently they will sell a confusing range of items. For example the ‘bakers’ also does a good range in computer equipment & women’s handbags, whilst the religious icon shop seems to make a nice profit out of selling mobile phone top-up.
On the other hand, there are one or two specialist shops. My favourite is the plastic-flower florist (people don’t keep houseplants inside the house, only stylised collections of undeniably plastic flowers), I haven’t checked but maybe they also do a nice line in plastic fruit, now that really would confuse the visitors!
Now this was not a reflection on his cooking abilities (well, to be honest I don’t know about that, but I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt) but, as he explained, a reflection on the ingredients available in Ruteng. Apparently he had gone to the ‘supermarket’ expecting to be able to buy vegetables – fresh or frozen – and couldn’t. Well of course he couldn’t, it is quite normal to me now that the ‘supermarket’ doesn’t sell any kind of fresh produce – there is not a constant enough electricity supply to keep products cold or fresh. So most things are canned (meat, fish, some fruit & veg), dried (mushrooms, noodles, fish) or in instant-just-add-water packages (noodles, pasta, rice). If I spot a western item (tonic-water, baked-beans, corn flakes) I bulk buy, ‘cause next time I go it won’t be there.
Having got the hang of what is and isn’t available in the ‘supermarket’, I have started venturing into other shops. It is often difficult to tell from the outside what type of thing a shop sells, and frequently they will sell a confusing range of items. For example the ‘bakers’ also does a good range in computer equipment & women’s handbags, whilst the religious icon shop seems to make a nice profit out of selling mobile phone top-up.
On the other hand, there are one or two specialist shops. My favourite is the plastic-flower florist (people don’t keep houseplants inside the house, only stylised collections of undeniably plastic flowers), I haven’t checked but maybe they also do a nice line in plastic fruit, now that really would confuse the visitors!
The plastic-flower florist, Ruteng
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
What’s in a blog? (part 2)
This week I have been reading ‘Letters From the Field 1925-1875’ by Margaret Mead. I have long been a fan of Mead, but realised I have never directly read any of her work. This book consists of letters she wrote whilst conducting her anthropological fieldwork in the western pacific, including Bali, so many of the descriptions are familiar – in fact there is one description of rice paddies that is spookily similar to my own (see black, white & green all over).
Mead’s letters were written with a similar rational to my writing also (although I admit to not feeling, or wanting to feel quite as ‘immersed’ as she does). In her introduction she writes:
Letters written & received in the field have a very special significance. Immersing oneself in life in the field is good, but one must be careful not to drown. One must somehow maintain the delicate balance between empathetic participation and self-awareness… letters can be a way of occasionally righting the balance as, for an hour or two, one relates oneself to people who are part of one’s other world and tries to make a little more real for them this world which absorbs one.
Most interestingly though was the audience Mead was writing for. She wrote just one letter & sent it to her friends, family and colleagues so that they would be able to ‘share somehow in what happened so that, when I came home, they would know me better, not as a stranger but as myself’. But these letters were copied and circulated to friends of friends, as Mead puts it ‘unknown readers who were close to people who were close to me – an audience one step removed from intimacy’. This strikes me as very much like a blog, like this blog.
The modern day blog however is in some ways more intimate. The speed of modern communications means that I can ‘relate myself’ and the ‘people who are part of one’s other world’ can read it almost instantaneously. Correspondingly, ‘people who are part of one’s other world’ can respond instantaneously – leaving comments, asking questions, discussing together the experiences I am reporting. I think anthropologically Mead would have appreciated this grounding (she died in 1978, before the advent of such travellers luxuries as the World Wide Web), as I do. So please continue to post comments, letting me know who my audience is & what you would like to know… helping me not to drown.
Mead’s letters were written with a similar rational to my writing also (although I admit to not feeling, or wanting to feel quite as ‘immersed’ as she does). In her introduction she writes:
Letters written & received in the field have a very special significance. Immersing oneself in life in the field is good, but one must be careful not to drown. One must somehow maintain the delicate balance between empathetic participation and self-awareness… letters can be a way of occasionally righting the balance as, for an hour or two, one relates oneself to people who are part of one’s other world and tries to make a little more real for them this world which absorbs one.
Most interestingly though was the audience Mead was writing for. She wrote just one letter & sent it to her friends, family and colleagues so that they would be able to ‘share somehow in what happened so that, when I came home, they would know me better, not as a stranger but as myself’. But these letters were copied and circulated to friends of friends, as Mead puts it ‘unknown readers who were close to people who were close to me – an audience one step removed from intimacy’. This strikes me as very much like a blog, like this blog.
The modern day blog however is in some ways more intimate. The speed of modern communications means that I can ‘relate myself’ and the ‘people who are part of one’s other world’ can read it almost instantaneously. Correspondingly, ‘people who are part of one’s other world’ can respond instantaneously – leaving comments, asking questions, discussing together the experiences I am reporting. I think anthropologically Mead would have appreciated this grounding (she died in 1978, before the advent of such travellers luxuries as the World Wide Web), as I do. So please continue to post comments, letting me know who my audience is & what you would like to know… helping me not to drown.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Disaster tourist
Everything in Manggarai is defined by the contours of the land – the roads, the fields, and the people’s lifestyles. Now this is scarred, both literally & metaphorically. Today I went out to see some of the villages affected by the landslide – all along the road there was evidence of recent landslides varying from small crumbling cliffs to huge gashes in the mountainside. In the worst affected village there were huge gaps were houses used to be & the people spoke of the gaps in their lives where their loved-ones used to be.
Last week, the president of Indonesia also visited the affected area, although he didn’t go as far as the affected villages he just met with the villagers who were to afraid to return to their homes. Actually, that is not quite true – the rains had stopped a few days before the president arrived & the villagers were eager to return to there villages but were told not to so the president could see ‘all the homeless people’. A further irony of the president’s visit was that a number of trees had to be cut down so his helicopter could land (remembering a primary cause of the landslides was deforestation!).
The president’s visit must have cost a lot of money, there were many people involved and high levels of security. He donated around a million dollars, but it was felt to be too little too late (or, perhaps more worryingly in this corrupt country too much too late). But was my visit really any better? I went with a local group to distribute money & clothing, but all the same I couldn’t help but feel like a disaster tourist. The group gave me a free combat-style jacket and hat, a free lunch, a free ride & all I really contributed was a white face & a sympathetic smile. I don’t know if this makes my visit any better or any worse than the president’s, but I do know that both leave a bitter taste in my mouth.
me & three other vols wearing our freebies
the scar on the mountain
a temporary grave
Last week, the president of Indonesia also visited the affected area, although he didn’t go as far as the affected villages he just met with the villagers who were to afraid to return to their homes. Actually, that is not quite true – the rains had stopped a few days before the president arrived & the villagers were eager to return to there villages but were told not to so the president could see ‘all the homeless people’. A further irony of the president’s visit was that a number of trees had to be cut down so his helicopter could land (remembering a primary cause of the landslides was deforestation!).
The president’s visit must have cost a lot of money, there were many people involved and high levels of security. He donated around a million dollars, but it was felt to be too little too late (or, perhaps more worryingly in this corrupt country too much too late). But was my visit really any better? I went with a local group to distribute money & clothing, but all the same I couldn’t help but feel like a disaster tourist. The group gave me a free combat-style jacket and hat, a free lunch, a free ride & all I really contributed was a white face & a sympathetic smile. I don’t know if this makes my visit any better or any worse than the president’s, but I do know that both leave a bitter taste in my mouth.
me & three other vols wearing our freebies
the scar on the mountain
a temporary grave
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
I don’t like bananas
I was a little bit disappointed that none of my friends from home commented on the previous post that I don’t like bananas. Never mind I will take the initiative myself.
It is certainly true that in England I did not (do not?) like bananas. But here there is little other choice of fruit at the moment (the mango season has finished). But although there is no choice of fruit, there is a choice of bananas.
As opposed to the single fruit we have in England called ‘banana’, here there are hundreds of varieties, all tasting a little bit different or having a different recommended way of eating. As well as the ‘normal’ yellow ones there are red ones, green ones, huge ones (as big as your arm) and tiny ones (no larger than your thumb). There are ones that make your teeth feel funny (in a kind of rhubarb way), and ones that can not be eaten raw (not sure what happens if you do). My favourites are the sweetest ones!
Beyond this there are different ways of serving them that makes them more appetising. A favourite snack in Ruteng in pisang gorang – fried bananas. These are bananas sliced lengthways, covered in batter & deep-fat-fried, preferably served hot. Another option is bananas and custard (although maybe it’s just the bule who like this!) And if all else fails, you can always dip them in chocolate spread!
bananas on the tree
bananas by the road
bananas in the market
It is certainly true that in England I did not (do not?) like bananas. But here there is little other choice of fruit at the moment (the mango season has finished). But although there is no choice of fruit, there is a choice of bananas.
As opposed to the single fruit we have in England called ‘banana’, here there are hundreds of varieties, all tasting a little bit different or having a different recommended way of eating. As well as the ‘normal’ yellow ones there are red ones, green ones, huge ones (as big as your arm) and tiny ones (no larger than your thumb). There are ones that make your teeth feel funny (in a kind of rhubarb way), and ones that can not be eaten raw (not sure what happens if you do). My favourites are the sweetest ones!
Beyond this there are different ways of serving them that makes them more appetising. A favourite snack in Ruteng in pisang gorang – fried bananas. These are bananas sliced lengthways, covered in batter & deep-fat-fried, preferably served hot. Another option is bananas and custard (although maybe it’s just the bule who like this!) And if all else fails, you can always dip them in chocolate spread!
bananas on the tree
bananas by the road
bananas in the market
Friday, March 09, 2007
How to ask questions
Me: Saya mou beli buah (I would like to buy some fruit)
Shopkeeper: buah tida ada (fruit doesn’t exist)
Me: Ok, ada apel? (Ok, do you have any apples?)
Shopkeeper: tidak ada apels (apples don’t exist)
Me: ada jeruk? (do oranges exist?)
Shopkeeper: ya, ada juruk (yes oranges exist)
Me: apa lagi (anything else?)
Shopkeeper: pisang (bananas)
Me: ok, saya minta pisang? (ok, may I have bananas?)
Shopkeeper: ya (yes)
That is an attempt at an amusing example of the difficulty of asking questions here. It’s not that people lie (although it can feel like it sometimes) but that you have to be able to ask the right questions.
It happens in every walk of life – the problem is not too serious when buying bananas, but is more difficult in working life (“have you done X” “ya” – but three days later you find out they haven’t). And in research it is impossible.
My research used four methodologies: participatory problem analysis; case studies; focus groups; and interviews. Until now, I have been working with the preliminary analysis based on feed-back and discussions with the colleagues who conducted the fieldwork. But over this past week I have been analysing the interview data in more detail, and this presents a totally different picture to the one my colleagues painted. Whereas my colleagues said gender was a real issue (women need men’s permission to seek healthcare), the data doesn’t actually support this.
People here don’t respond well to open ended questions. They seem only to tell you what you want to hear, so the interviewees may have told the interviewers what they thought was the ‘right’ answer. Or maybe the anomaly in the results is that the fieldworkers have brought their own biases and opinions to their analysis (i.e. they were telling me what they thought were the ‘right’ answers). My head tells me to work with the data that I’ve got, but my heart tells me to listen to my colleagues. I wish I could find an answer to this problem, but I just can’t ask the right question.
Shopkeeper: buah tida ada (fruit doesn’t exist)
Me: Ok, ada apel? (Ok, do you have any apples?)
Shopkeeper: tidak ada apels (apples don’t exist)
Me: ada jeruk? (do oranges exist?)
Shopkeeper: ya, ada juruk (yes oranges exist)
Me: apa lagi (anything else?)
Shopkeeper: pisang (bananas)
Me: ok, saya minta pisang? (ok, may I have bananas?)
Shopkeeper: ya (yes)
That is an attempt at an amusing example of the difficulty of asking questions here. It’s not that people lie (although it can feel like it sometimes) but that you have to be able to ask the right questions.
It happens in every walk of life – the problem is not too serious when buying bananas, but is more difficult in working life (“have you done X” “ya” – but three days later you find out they haven’t). And in research it is impossible.
My research used four methodologies: participatory problem analysis; case studies; focus groups; and interviews. Until now, I have been working with the preliminary analysis based on feed-back and discussions with the colleagues who conducted the fieldwork. But over this past week I have been analysing the interview data in more detail, and this presents a totally different picture to the one my colleagues painted. Whereas my colleagues said gender was a real issue (women need men’s permission to seek healthcare), the data doesn’t actually support this.
People here don’t respond well to open ended questions. They seem only to tell you what you want to hear, so the interviewees may have told the interviewers what they thought was the ‘right’ answer. Or maybe the anomaly in the results is that the fieldworkers have brought their own biases and opinions to their analysis (i.e. they were telling me what they thought were the ‘right’ answers). My head tells me to work with the data that I’ve got, but my heart tells me to listen to my colleagues. I wish I could find an answer to this problem, but I just can’t ask the right question.
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Pathetic
Pathetic fallacy, for you non-literary types, is a device used in fiction to show that the environment is sympathetic to the protagonist (or vice versa), for example try reading any Thomas Hardy novel. Anyway, the situation here is very pathetic – the bad weather continues & the people are miserable and homeless. There have not been anymore landslides, although it is a risk (or maybe it is like one of those penny-shove machines in an amusement arcade, where anything likely to fall has done so and the mounds just teeter on the edge to tease us). But there are now thousands of displaced people and relief workers are still trying to get help to the most remote areas.
My organisation is involved in the relief effort, and my boss asked me the other day why it is that the worst disasters always happen to the poorest people. This is a wicked irony. The riskiest areas to live in are populated by the poorest people, both at a national level and at a local one (drought in Ethiopia, seismic activity in NTT, floods in New Orleans). Land is cheap when it is dangerous.
Furthermore, when disasters do occur to poor people they are less able to help themselves, and other people are less willing to help them too. After all what is there of value to save? They have no industry, no commerce; there is no military significance. The only valuable thing to these people is there lives. But it seems that that is not enough. Pathetic.
.JPG)
The bodies
.JPG)
The villages
.JPG)
The homeless
My organisation is involved in the relief effort, and my boss asked me the other day why it is that the worst disasters always happen to the poorest people. This is a wicked irony. The riskiest areas to live in are populated by the poorest people, both at a national level and at a local one (drought in Ethiopia, seismic activity in NTT, floods in New Orleans). Land is cheap when it is dangerous.
Furthermore, when disasters do occur to poor people they are less able to help themselves, and other people are less willing to help them too. After all what is there of value to save? They have no industry, no commerce; there is no military significance. The only valuable thing to these people is there lives. But it seems that that is not enough. Pathetic.
.JPG)
The bodies
.JPG)
The villages
.JPG)
The homeless
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Rain, rain, go away
One thing I forgot to mention the other day when I was moaning about how bored I get here was that my mood was somewhat precipitated by the fact that it’s been raining constantly for days. Not rain in the pissy drizzle style of an English winter, but full blown, nonstop monsoon downpours.
The rain is so heavy it makes it impossible to leave the house, difficult to hear music or the TV (the metal roof really amplifies what is already a tad more than ‘rain drops falling on my head’), and generally thoroughly depressing to be in Ruteng. I do wonder what suicide rates are like here during the rainy season, but as this is a Catholic region there are, of course, no suicides (they must be hanging out with the gays & the women who have abortions in some Western country far from here!)
Therefore it came as no surprise, but was shocking none the less that there has been a devastating landslide nearby. I first heard about it from a friend in England (don’t you just love the way news travels, but I’ve covered that before) but it was soon backed up by local gossip suggesting that 70 people have been killed. Reports are still hazy, the BBC say 40 dead, whilsy the Jakarta Post say 27 dead and 65 missing. I guess it takes a while to clarify details in this type of disaster.
The rain is so heavy it makes it impossible to leave the house, difficult to hear music or the TV (the metal roof really amplifies what is already a tad more than ‘rain drops falling on my head’), and generally thoroughly depressing to be in Ruteng. I do wonder what suicide rates are like here during the rainy season, but as this is a Catholic region there are, of course, no suicides (they must be hanging out with the gays & the women who have abortions in some Western country far from here!)
Therefore it came as no surprise, but was shocking none the less that there has been a devastating landslide nearby. I first heard about it from a friend in England (don’t you just love the way news travels, but I’ve covered that before) but it was soon backed up by local gossip suggesting that 70 people have been killed. Reports are still hazy, the BBC say 40 dead, whilsy the Jakarta Post say 27 dead and 65 missing. I guess it takes a while to clarify details in this type of disaster.
map of the Manggarai region... I am in Ruteng, the worst of the landslides occured in Cibal
I am, of course, fine – thanks to all of you who saw the news & texted to check on me. But what really strikes me in this land of disasters is the futility of it all. It may sound nasty but it really feels sometimes like they invite catastrophe… the treacherously winding roads (no Romans here!), the annual rains that cause annual landslides, or my personal favorite – the recent case of journalists & investigators who boarded the wreck of a recently burnt out ferry, only for it to promptly (and apparently surprisingly) sink. At the time an official from the rescue services was quoted as saying "we just didn't expect it to happen", but strangely that has disapeared off all news websites now, but you can get the gist on the BBC (Indonesian ferry suddenly sinks).
I can’t help wondering why Indonesian officials cannot learn lessons from these annual disasters. I don’t mean glib English style inquiries, but simple common sense actions – wearing crash helmets on motorbikes, town planning laws, or even just counting the number of people who board a ship before it sails. In a country this big is life really so cheap?
I am, of course, fine – thanks to all of you who saw the news & texted to check on me. But what really strikes me in this land of disasters is the futility of it all. It may sound nasty but it really feels sometimes like they invite catastrophe… the treacherously winding roads (no Romans here!), the annual rains that cause annual landslides, or my personal favorite – the recent case of journalists & investigators who boarded the wreck of a recently burnt out ferry, only for it to promptly (and apparently surprisingly) sink. At the time an official from the rescue services was quoted as saying "we just didn't expect it to happen", but strangely that has disapeared off all news websites now, but you can get the gist on the BBC (Indonesian ferry suddenly sinks).
I can’t help wondering why Indonesian officials cannot learn lessons from these annual disasters. I don’t mean glib English style inquiries, but simple common sense actions – wearing crash helmets on motorbikes, town planning laws, or even just counting the number of people who board a ship before it sails. In a country this big is life really so cheap?
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Bored
Now I am starting to settle down here, I am finding that one of my biggest frustration is boredom. The boredom occurs on many levels:
- the food is boring - why on earth does anyone choose to eat rice three times a day
- my clothes are boring - remember the Conservative tea-party look?
- I’m reluctant to say my job is boring, but in many ways it is - although the research is interesting I'd prefer to have more than one project on the go at once
- and of course there is no entertainment - I don’t have tv or radio, and you will remember that Ruteng has a distinct lack of fun places to go. The entertainment that I do have, books and dvds, are rationed in fear that one-day soon I will run out.
Zoe & I have taken to whinging ‘I’m bored’ like tiresome spoilt children as we wonder listlessly around the house. A good example of our level of despair is that this week's highlight was a party at a home for retired priest’s!
Worse however is that I find the boredom self-perpetuating – it drains me of enthusiasm or drive to do anything other than being bored. I have so much free time here, but the despondency born out of boredom turns a viscous circle and I just feel guilty and lethargic.
Writing this I have tried to think what I would do in the UK if I were bored – probably just turn the TV on & forget about it, letting mind-numbing trashy programmes wash over me. So maybe it’s a good lesson to recognise these feelings, and maybe now I will do something about them… or maybe I'll start tomorrow!
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