It’s hot in Indonesia in October. Really hot. On the south coast of Bali
you can see tourists walking around wearily under the final release of the
sun’s heat before the November rains. A
few kilometres to the north, in the cooler shades of the ancient hilltop
village of Ubud, the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival (UWRF) is preparing to
celebrate its 10th anniversary.
At a press conference Janet De Neef (festival director), in answer to a
question about the focus of topics on women replied, ‘We started with Kartini
and now have come a full circle to pay homage again … that sense of coming
home.’ Under the auspices of the not-for-profit-foundation Yayasan Mudra Swari
Saraswati, the UWRF was set up in response to the Bali bombing as a healing
project. ‘When people thought of Bali they thought of Kuta. We needed to shift
the emphasis … celebrate writers and readers … lots of people who come are just
avid readers,’ said Janet. Australian author Richard Flannigan added, ‘The
response to the bomb was to build a bridge’, however, ‘. ..The challenge is to
make this an Indonesian festival rather than an expat festival’.
I looked around curiously at the dignified Balinese ushers and checked
the program again. Sixty Indonesians would be on panels discussing issues
related to Indonesia and of the 72 or so presentations, 20 were specifically
about Indonesia. The other presentations were mainly about South-East Asia and
cross-cultural issues between our countries. As it turned out, about a third of
the audiences at most events were from the immediate region. Not bad when you
consider Indonesia is a society that still maintains an oral tradition and has
significant problems with publishing (more of that later).
A ceremony was held on Friday 10 October at the Ubud Royal Palace. The
palace is a walled-in open area containing a raised shrine with immense ornate
wooden doors. Janet De Neef and Warwick Purser, both expats from Melbourne, were
seated in the front row of the forecourt amongst a number of other dignitaries.
Janet has been a restaurateur in Ubud since the 1980s. Warwick departed Toorak
(how could you possibly blame him?) for Jogjakarta some 30 years ago and later
established the successful manufacturing and export company Out of Asia. Other
dignitaries included the Indonesian Minister for Tourism and the Governor of
Bali. Seated behind were titled and untitled Balinese, other Indonesians and
westerners. Congregated around the seated area were a mix of settlers,
adventurers, foreign faces, expats from all over the world and Australians –
not the ‘I’ve been to Bali too’ kind. The people gathered here were frequent
and serious interlopers of Asia, here to take in their regular dose of
Indonesia, renew acquaintances and enjoy the events that followed.
Just after sunset on a warm and humid night under an open sky, an
all-female Gamelan orchestra, dressed in the vivid colours of magenta and deep
sky blue, sent their hypnotic tones out into the air over the audience and the
rest of the village, signalling the opening of the festival.
This year’s festival theme, ‘Through darkness to light’, was a reference
to a book written by Raden Adjeng Kartini 1879–1904. Kartini was a Javanese
woman who pioneered women’s education and emancipation in Indonesia. Each year
Indonesians recognise her work with a national holiday named after her. The
festival was celebrating, through Katini, the emancipation of all women around
the world.
The main events were held in airy Balinese Bales – open-air pavilions
situated in a group close to the museum. To get there you travelled through
town down a road to a gully under a canopy of trees, over a bridge above a deep
and narrow ravine and up a steep incline to a hilltop plateau. The plateau
overlooks a valley of still treetops vanishing below. This was the background
to the festival, and it would have to be one of the most spectacular literary
settings imaginable. Indeed, since the 1920s artistic people from all over the
world have been coming to Ubud to draw on its creative energy.
Indonesians love to talk and this was a perfect opportunity for them.
And it was infectious.
Begini, according to Indonesian writer and
novelist Ayu Utami, Kartini is not a simple icon: ‘She has a formal image as a
national hero but she agreed and accepted to enter into an arranged marriage
with a man who had concubines, thus she continued a patriarchal tradition.
Rohana Kudus would have been a better figure for emancipation.’ Dr. Joost Coté
(Senior Research Fellow, History, Monash University) made the point, ‘Kartini
published in Dutch’. Interesting. Then by what kind of circuitous route did her
polemics reach Indonesians? Coté said Kartini was in touch with a new
nationalistic spirit in Indonesia and was a sensation in her own day in
metropolitan Netherlands and Java. Her ideas also appealed to conservative
Javanese aristocracy and colonialists. Indonesian poet Dea Anugrah said ‘Now
Kartini Day is used to show choice in wearing traditional clothes or showing
sensual parts of body’. By sensual she was referring to arms and legs.
When she was young, Indonesian songwriter and novelist Dewi Lestari
thought ‘Kartini Day was a celebration of national costumes. Now we have taken
it to another level, we try to understand better the meaning of being a woman
than before 1998’. Dewi said it’s still difficult to talk about women in
Indonesia. ‘Critics call some female writing “the fragrant literature” but now
we are more free to express ourselves. Issues that were not heard of, like
women trafficking, are now more courageous to speak out (being disclosed to the
public), is now given extra attention by media. There are female writers who
are criticised by moral speakers; I know there are religious leaders who warn
their people not to read my books. Some say men are the only people to talk
about sexuality. Some are attacked by others who don’t share the same thing –
day in day out we see how people get attacked because of (their) faith. I
believe we are exercising ourselves for a more open faith, laws are not
enforced to regulate this tension, the extremes are more apparent … people are imposing their own beliefs on others.’
Indonesian Founder of the Rainbow Reading Gardens Nile Tanzil said
‘Woman on (the archipelago) islands are dominated by men, (I) just have to keep
talking, in eastern part (of Indonesia) women’s role is in the kitchen,
sometimes I have a meeting in the kitchen (to communicate directly with the
women). Educating is very related to books (but it’s) challenging to convince
children and teachers to think in terms of reading books, fun books to read for
fun, we provide books on people like Helen Keller. Justin Salamantra (for
example) was born of poverty and won the Noble Prize for Literature’. Nile; now
shedding a tear - ‘after reading Katrina I cried because I wanted to be like
her, that my life be useful, I wanted to be the next Kartini’.
At a presentation titled ‘The Elders’, Australian Aboriginal activist
Bilaware Lee and Balinese leader Cok Sawitri discussed the changes they have
witnessed in their lives and the impact these changes have had on their
respective peoples. Bilaware said ‘Aboriginals haven’t had a good relationship
with feminism because we were already independent. Women are born spiritual;
men have to attain it. Women are responsible for love and wellbeing, the role
as nurturer.’ At the same time, though, she said, ‘Woman by herself is
incomplete; same with man’. She continued, ‘We are going through huge earth and
cosmic changes … this is the age of change, dragonfly dreaming, huge power of
collective strength, we have to work on a spiritual level … I am in a country
that still says terra nullis. I follow my Aboriginality. Every time an elder
dies, a library burns down.’
Cok Sawitri asked forgiveness from the spirits. She spoke in high
Balinese and in symbolic terms. She said that ‘long ago the island was filled
with flowers and floating on the ocean’. She said ‘in a ceremony the woman
leads – only in Bali do we have women as high priests – and it is bad to be
cursed by a Balinese woman. Balinese culture is both patriarchal and
matriarchal – women can propose. The Balinese mind is pretending to be like the
westerner but only going after money is not good … anything to do with the five
elements you can’t interfere with. Nothing good will come of it. Stop being
arrogant, stop saying “I’m from here or there”. We are all the same, let us
learn together to be good humans and organisations.’ Later she commented, ‘The
way to kill a culture is kill the language. Another way is kill the food. And
kill the faith. Movement of Islamisation. Even our scholars speak English, our
president speaks English, then you loose the feel of the language.’ She
concluded the session with a spiritual song.
At another forum called ‘Inspiring Women’, Egyptian novelist Mona Prince
said after the recent elections following the Muslim Brotherhood gaining power,
‘suddenly Egypt was full of bearded men. Former terrorists were released from
prison and there were virginity tests. Why is it that women have to pay the
political price? It comes down to a question of power, because men feel
insecure – if women stand up for themselves they are questioning the power
relationships. Don’t be afraid by the accusation of cultural imperialism.’
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