Worldcrunch
The beautiful region of Lake Toba, in Indonesia’s North Sumatra, is home to the Batak people, composed of a number of ethnic groups with distinct languages, customs and architecture. The Batak houses rank among the most memorable I’ve had the chance to photograph (this list includes the tongkonan in nearby Sulawesi, Zulu kraals in South […]
Twelve years after the deadly Bali terror bombing, whose suspects were executed, Indonesia struggles with the implications and efficacity of capital punishment.
Villagers in the mountain outpost of Melung are among the few in rural Indonesia who can solve daily problems – and sell their products – thanks to an onsite Internet connection.
JAKARTA — In a suburban part of Jakarta, we’re walking down a dirt road up to a very small pink house at the end of an alley. There are chickens running around, and children playing. It’s here that Indonesia’s first retirement home for transsexual and transgender people — known as waria in Indonesia — is being built. In the doorway, two elderly transgenders whose teeth are missing call out “good morning.” Inside, Yulianus Rettoblaut peers into a mirror while a friend goes about the daily ritual of applying her heavy makeup — thick white foundation, fake eyelashes, bright red lipstick […]
The Toraja people in Southern Sulawesi, Indonesia, are famous for their elaborate funeral rites. Not only do they tend to mummify the deceased — they also store coffins in caves carved up on rocky cliffs and place a wooden effigy of the departed, called Tau tau, to guard the burial site. Spooky.
Since Indonesia transitioned to democracy in the late 1990s, life for the long-suffering ethnic Chinese population has gradually improved. It’s about to get even better.
Funeral proceedings for the Toraja people, in southern Sulawesi, include the slaughtering of a water buffalo. Four of them were killed in this case — a sign we were told that the deceased must have been from a wealthy family. Weirdly enough, the ritual throat-slitting and skinning of the bovid was followed by a Protestant […]
MALANG — Mohammad Yazid, 58, is walking slowly toward a health clinic. His whole body is trembling and he says he has a severe headache. He hands over a bag full of plastic refuse along with his Garbage Clinical Insurance card to the clinic staff. “I bring one kilo of plastic and paper waste,” he explains. “I’m glad I can pay for my health care with this. I don’t have to pay anything.” Another patient, Siti Hasanah, says she suffers from a breathing problem. She too pays for her health care by bringing in waste. “I’m happy,” Hasanah says. “I […]
TEL AVIV — Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah made an official visit to Indonesia last month. While a number of economic agreements were signed on the visit, one stood out for its huge tourism potential. Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim country, has an increasing number of would-be pilgrims interested in traveling to Palestine’s religious sites. […]
Fellow travelers from our organized tour were catching some rest in the shade of the tongkonan, the ancestral houses of the Toraja people in southern Sulawesi (the Indonesian island formerly know as Celebes). This was one of the first package holiday tours we went on, after having started to experiment with this form of group […]
On the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, this kid was helping his street-vendor dad to sell fruit bats — to be eaten as a supposed cure for asthma. The bats are now on the endangered species list, and the government has recently taken steps to put an end to their sale.
Wednesday, January 7, 2014 DEADLY ATTACK AT FRENCH SATIRICAL NEWSPAPER HQAt least 10 journalists and two policemen were killed after two heavily armed men opened fire at the Paris offices of the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo Wednesday morning. Four other people were seriously wounded in the shooting; the gunmen managed to flee and a […]
Monday, December 29, 2014 AIRASIA PLANE LIKELY AT “BOTTOM OF THE SEA”The head of Indonesia’s search-and-rescue agency has said that AirAsia flight QZ8501, which disappeared yesterday with 162 people on board, is likely “at the bottom of the sea,” CNN reports. Search operations have so far failed to locate the aircraft, which was flying from […]
Animal rights groups get their wish: no more monkey shows on the streets of Jakarta, which means raids to rescue the animals and job training to prepare their trainers for new work.
WAINGAPU — In a remote western village on the Indonesian island of Sumba, 37-year-old Rambu Cinta sits on the porch of her thatched roof house chewing beetle nut. For most of her life she has lived without electricity. “Before at night we didn’t have anything to do. So after we had eaten dinner we just went to sleep,” she says with a laugh. Now her family is one of 100 households that are getting electricity from a nearby micro-hydro power plant. Umbu Hanggar says it has changed the home economics for his family, and extended family. “With electricity, the women […]
Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2014 U.S. AND RUSSIA TO TEAM UP AGAINST ISIS The United States and Russia have agreed to share more intelligence on ISIS, as part of a renewed cooperation on global security and counter-terrorism efforts, Secretary of State John Kerry said after he met with the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Paris […]
The world’s largest Muslim country is slow to embrace measures to prevent the spread of HIV. And that’s bad news for prostitutes in the capital city.
THE JAKARTA POST (Indonesia), REUTERS, CNN Worldcrunch NABIRE – At least 18 people were killed in a stadium stampede on Sunday night after a riot broke out over the result of a boxing match in Nabire, in eastern Indonesia. Around midnight, just after the end of an amateur boxing game, some spectators started protesting the […]
MAKASSAR – The nostalgic traveler who goes to Indonesia with the idea of walking in the footsteps of Joseph Conrad and living out their own Spice Route literary adventures will be stunned by the sheer luxury of Makassar’s airport. A symbol of Indonesia’s rapid modernization and economic growth, this city of 1.5 million inhabitants does […]
LIBYA’S CHEMICAL WEAPONS DESTROYED Col. Muammar Gaddafi’s lethal arsenal of chemical weapons have quietly been destroyed over the last three months, The New York Times reports. The U.S. and Libya used a transportable oven technology to destroy hundreds of bombs and artillery rounds filled with a deadly mustard agent that American officials feared could be […]
Some skeptics, though, wonder whether all the enthusiasm for the developing world has created a sort of emerging market “bubble”.
JAKARTA – The color of the brackish water running down the drain across Pak Udis’ paddy field changes everyday: it goes from blue to green or red. One only needs to take a look around to understand why. A textile factory was built a few meters away from this Indonesian peasant’s parcel. Over the last […]
JAKARTA GLOBE, ANTARA NEWS (Indonesia), AAP (Australia) Worldcrunch JAKARTA – A new Islamic social networking site will be launched in Indonesia in November, and will offer “better protection” for young Muslims from “harmful content” reports the Jakarta Globe. According to the Indonesian newspaper, the Beta version of the site is currently being tested by 1,000 […]
REUTERS, RIA NOVOSTI, ROSCOSMOS (Russian Federation) Worldcrunch MOSCOW – Russia’s Proton rocket failed to bring two satellites into orbit after the launch late on Monday from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan, the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos said. Although the launch itself was a success (see video below), the rocket — carrying two multi-million […]
Once an island paradise, Bali is turning into a concrete jungle, threatening its environment, culture, religion, and even language. Can Bali survive tourism, ask the island’s worried inhabitants?
JAKARTA GLOBE (Indonesia) Worldcrunch The Jakarta Globe reported that Indonesian zookeepers moved Tori the smoking orangutan to an isolated island in the Taru Jurung Zoo this week to help the female primate kick her nicotine habit, zoo officials said. @TammyLeitner: Smoking orangutan is moved to island in Indonesia to kick her habit. Seriously??? Check out […]
More so than elsewhere in Indonesia, the world’s largest Islamic nation, the province of Aceh adheres to the strict precepts of Sharia law. If caught by the religious police, residents face public flogging and prison. Still, the rich have ways ar
Contemporary artists in Indonesia are starting to gain the attention of Western galleries. And like the craze for Chinese art that preceded it, the sudden attention could send prices for Indonesian pieces through the roof.
The world’s largest Muslim nation has been a vibrant, multi-faith democracy for 13 years. But that has not spared Indonesia from a rising number of terrorist attacks and growing religious intolerance.
In the small town of Taro, as elsewhere along the coast, the massive anti-tsunami wall could not withstand the violence of the wave that destroyed all in its path.
Since the Bali attack of 2002, police in the world’s largest Muslim country pray with extremists as part of program to ‘de-radicalize’ them. With only partial success.