Saturday, May 30, 2009

What Isn't Said, Tells More


look, that's me (right) and jill drinkin' some es soda gembira,
or "happy soda," in Bali. it's a picture from the beginning of the trip, but one
of the very few i was able to upload when we had slightly faster internet in yogya.
okay. agustini said we lacked pictures on the blog. there's the picture. :)

Oh, hey there, dedicated blog reader. After a week or so in Yogya and a 25-hour, roach-infested bus ride, Team Indonesia is back in Bali. As much as Yogya had to offer with its city scene, returning to an island where the culture is integral and very visible in the workings of daily life. (It also helps that Bali is much cooler than Java. And Bali is in the high eighties. I'm not even joking.)

We checked out the pesraman of the Pengosekan village today. Basically, it's a once a week, compulsory culture school for fourth, fifth, and sixth graders in the area. The costs are covered by the village fund, and the children are even provided some clothing and snacks. "What's the purpose of this culture school? What do they do, Nina?" Hold on, hold on -- I'm getting there! The pesraman teaches Balinese traditions; things like weaving boxes for rice offerings, learning the Balinese language, practicing yoga, and learning particular arts such as gammelan music and Balinese dance. It's usually held on Saturdays, so that's why we were able to visit and observe those fidgety youngsters at class. (Once again, we donned our sarongs for the occasion.)

The pesraman in this village follow a basic, established curriculum. Pengosekan's pesraman, according to the village leader we spoke with this morning, did not exist until 2005. In all honesty, I was taken back by this fact. Why didn't the Balinese in the Ubud have this before to share the complicated Hindu traditions in Bali with their children? The village leader, the Bendesa Adat Pengosekan, said that they really haven't seen tourism industry pull away older children from traditions as the children find jobs in hotels. "They still can go to the temple by themselves," Agustini translated to us. "A job doesn't mean they have to give up their traditions."

Sure, I'll buy that, but the independent twenty-year-old working in a hotel doesn't have the social structure -- the cranky grandpa, the jovial aunt, the stern mother -- to keep them involved in tradition. Again, I was amazed at how new the pesraman culture program was. It makes me think about how the culture on this island has evolved. In the past, the extended family was enough to teach and maintain traditions; now, they have a school to help share these valuable aspects of the culture. If anything, it illuminates that with the onrush of industrialization and tourism, there has been an impact on the people's ties to their culture in the modern world.

Food for thought. Just mull over that one for a while.

Peace, love --
Nina

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