Jakartass Home thoughts from abroad. Alien thoughts from home.

I added a comment to my 'interview' with the Twittering Simplefool. Writing as an amateur psychologist, I attempted to explain his oft-times odd behaviour. I'm not particularly fond of psychoanalytical meanderings and I'd never accept another's hangups being hung on me. However, as well as his twitterrhoea it does appear to me that TS has an Oedipus complex.

In classical theory, people who are fixated at the Oedipal level are 'mother-fixated' or 'father-fixated', and reveal this by choosing sexual partners who are discernible surrogates for their parent(s).

Freud posited that boys and girls resolved the conflicts differently as a result of the male's castration anxiety (caused by Oedipal rivalry with the father) and the female's penis envy. He also held that the unsuccessful resolution of the Oedipus complex could result in neurosis, paedophilia, and homosexuality.

In a coherent letter to the Jakarta Post this week, friend and former colleague John Hargreaves offered a different analysis of what makes TS tick, and what gives the rest of us tics.
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From a psychological approach, the statement made by Communications and Information Technology Minister Tifatul Sembiring in connection with his shaking of hands with US First Lady Michelle Obama can be considered as narcissistic.

This description is from Erich Fromm’s The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness.

“Only he himself and what pertains to him has significance … and because of this double standard the narcissistic person shows severe defects in judgment and lacks the capacity for objectivity. Often the narcissistic person achieves a sense of security in his own entirely subjective conviction of his perfection, his superiority over others, his extraordinary qualities...”

This sort of personality is well-suited to people in professions with celebrity status, including politics, where he can be surrounded by fawning admirers, who are oblivious to their hero’s lack of genuine conviction or real accomplishments.

Since a narcissist politician will be considered insufferably vain if he merely proclaims his own personal brilliance, he creates, or appropriates, a group or ideology, building a symbiotic relationship with his followers.

As Fromm points out, “fostering group narcissism is very inexpensive from the standpoint of the social budget; in fact, it costs practically nothing compared with the social expense required to raise the standard of living.”

An historic, Indonesian example is Sukarno. Besides recruiting a stream of submissive women to gratify his personal narcissism, he showed a narcissistic orientation in his vision of Indonesia, promoting aggrieved slogans such as “Crush Malaysia” and “To hell with your aid” rather than pursue welfare policies that would have required him to confront economic reality.

Of course Tifatul has none of Sukarno’s greatness, but he has a very potent channel for group identity.

What are the practical implications of all this?

One is that many urban Indonesians, who are severed from their roots in the soil, from creative opportunity and from economic prospects, will seek new roots in group identity. If leaders fail to offer a vision of Indonesia founded on realism, inclusiveness and tolerance, then many people will succumb to visions founded in narcissistic self-deception, exclusiveness and intolerance.

A second is that education should promote reason, realistic observation, critical thought and imagination, rather than peddling illusions of certainty.

Fromm again: “From an educated guess, to a hypothesis, to a theory, an ever increasing approximation of certainty exists mediated by reason, realistic observation, critical thought and imagination. For the one who has these capacities, relative uncertainty is very acceptable because it is the result of the active use of his faculties, while certainty is boring because it is dead. But for those without these faculties… the fanatic who pretends to be certain becomes a most attractive figure, somebody akin to a savior.”

John Hargreaves
Jakarta
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I have often suggested to John that he should archive his letters online. That he hasn't (yet?) is why I offer no apologies for reproducing his latest missive here.
J

I've recently been conducting a series of 'interviews' with noted political figures. Two, Jakarta Gov. Fauzi Bowo and Minister of Information and Communication Tifatul Sembiring, are incompetent and out of their depth. Bodoh's legacy will be a city drowned in flood soaked traffic.The Simpering Twitterfool is quite clearly unable to communicate effectively and in spite of his degree in computer engineering has minimal knowledge of how to actually use them. Aburizal Bakrie is another matter altogether. His political philosophy is clearly Machiavellian.

Machiavelli is the only political thinker whose name has come into common use for designating a kind of politics, which exists and will continue to exist independently of his influence, a politics guided exclusively by considerations of expediency, which uses all means, fair or foul, iron or poison, for achieving its ends – its end being the aggrandizement of one's country or fatherland – but also using the fatherland in the service of the self-aggrandizement of the politician or statesman or one's party.

It has been suggested that I interview a lowly tax official named Gayus Halomoan Tambunan. There can be few Indonesians who are not aware of him, but my other readers might like to google his name to discover that he is a foolish fall guy and as much as he wants to save his skin by naming his bosses in the tax department, as well as prosecutors, police, judges and other highly influential low lifes in the legal mafia, most here are eagerly awaiting his pending lengthy imprisonment.

Especially as he was snapped in an appalling disguise enjoying the tennis match between Daniela Hantuchova and Yanina Wickmayer at the Tournament of Champions in Nusa Dua, Bali, on Friday 5th November, when he was supposed to be banged up in a police cell in Depok, a sunburb of Jakarta. Apparently, leaving his cell has been, but hopefully is now 'was', a regular occurrence, albeit at some cost.

If I had invited him around to Jakartass Towers I'd have had him say that it was an attempt to expose how easy it is to bribe one's jailers and that far from his escapade being an isolated case, as the police allege, he wanted to expose the 'one law for the rich' syndrome which is endemic here.

However, I can't sympathise with Gayus at all. On Monday, Gayus admitted to a panel of judges during a session of his trial (for allegedly bribing police detectives and a judge in exchange for being freed of charges of abetting tax evasion) that he had left the detention center for Bali for “refreshment”

"It meant nothing, I just miss my family. I just wanted some refreshment. I’ve been very stressed.”

Well, me too 'bro, me too!

But one question remains: why was tycoon/Golkar chairman Aburizal Bakrie at the same match? Gayus, as we know, had moonlighted as a tax consultant for Bakrie to fix his tax refunds and the Tax Office is continuing its probe into allegations of tax evasion by PT. Kaltim Prima Coal, a Bakrie company.

The third in an occasional series ^©Jakartass 2010

The second in an occasional series.

Your correspondent found lantern-jawed Aburizal Bakrie in a relaxed and jovial mood following the recent successful Golkar Convention which confirmed him as its Chairman For Life. We met in his throne room at Wisma Bakrie, his corporate H.Q. in Central Jakarta.

A number of conditions were agreed before our meeting: namely that there would be no mention of his business dealings in agriculture, real estate, trade, shipping, banking, insurance, media, manufacturing, construction, and mining. Nor should we touch on political issues such as the ousting of Saint Sri Mulyana as Minister of Finance because she initiated charges of tax evasion against a number of his companies.

J Firstly, Your Excrescence, thank you for seeing me at such short notice.
AB My pleasure, J. Did you have any problems getting here?
J None at all, Your Excrescence, thank you; it was really delightful looking down at the huddled masses in the gridlock below us.
(Note: AB had put one of his fleet of company helicopters at my disposal for my journey into town.)
AB By the way, let's keep this informal; call me Ab.

J Thank you, Your ….. Ab. Is this in any way related to your amazing physique?
AB How nice of you to notice, and yes, it relates back to my student days at Bandung Institute of Technology where, in '73, I graduated with my Masters in Social Engineering.
J Sorry to interrupt you, Your… Ab, but my research indicates that you graduated with either a degree in electrical or electronic engineering …
AB No, not true. I was the Social Secretary on the Student Council, which is where my love of political intrigue first surfaced. I was also captain of the badminton team which is when I developed my abs; my nickname arose from the locker room gossip. I was also called Dong for a while ….

J Are you suggesting that you were a ladies man, Ab?
AB Well, of course, it was only natural. With my family pedigree, my charm and good looks, how could I fail?
J Indeed, and I see that you haven't. You now have three children with your wife Tatty: Anindya, Anindhita and Anindra. Do you ever get confused remembering which is which?
AB No, of course not. It was a Tatty idea to call them Anind 1, 2 and 3.
J You must be very proud of them.
AB Of course, and especially Anind 3 who's proving to be a chip off the old block, as you Brits say (laughing).
J In what way?
AB Well, as you know, like me he's followed his father into our family business.
(Anindra is an MBA graduate from Bentley University, and currently holds the position of Vice President Director on the board of tvOne, a company in which his father is the major shareholder.)

J And he's also a ladies man ….. ?
AB Indeed. The problem for me as father is that the media seems to have had it in for him. I'm glad that he's now settled down with young Nia, and with SBY's blessing. Mind you, I do wish she hadn't changed her name. I mean, can you pronounce Ramadhania Ardiansyah? As she's also taken my honourable family name, at Tatty's suggestion, we've decided to call her Anind 4.

The one thing no-one can dispute is that Anind 3 has very good eyesight, eh? I mean, there was that Australian tramp Michelle Leslie who suggested that Anind 3 was involved with illegal drugs. No way hosay … mind you … if they were legal …

Then there was the story linking him with Manohara Odelia Pinot. All he did was to give her a lift in his plane and suddenly they were about to get married. No, he wasn't serious. Still, in his role as TV mogul, he did help get her cinetron on air. Besides, can you imagine her mother as a sister-in-law?
J No thanks, I've already got a few, and they're enough.

J Anyway, can I just ask you a couple of more questions? I know how busy you are.
AB Sure, I'm enjoying our chat.
J Firstly, did you just suggest that drugs should be legalised?
AB I'm in two minds about this. When I was Minister of Welfare (in SBY's first, reshuffled, cabinet) I spent a lot of time visiting prisons. They cost a lot to run and if drugs were legal then we could free up cell space for pornographers and other dangerous offenders.

I was talking to my friend George Soros the other day and he was telling me why he's donated $1 million to California's Proposition 19 initiative to legalise marijuana. He's looking at it as a business opportunity. Me too. There is massive unemployment in Indonesia, so why not legalise it. It would certainly be a growth industry … (laughter) … if you'll excuse my pun .. and there would be a pot load of money to be made.  (more laughter)

J A final question if I may. Your daughter Adinda .. Anind 2? … is rumoured to be involved in a new chain of beauty salons. Is there any truth in this?
AB Well, it's still under wraps, but yes it's substantially true. You know about the mudflow caused by the Yogya earthquake .. yeah, yeah, I'm getting fed up with the lies of geologists  … but we're interested in a win-win situation.

We're planning a worldwide chain of Sidoarjo Spas which would offer mud baths, along with the usual manicures, pedicures and so on. The so-called 'refugees' in the area will be shareholders. This is why we've only paid them 20% of the compensation they were expecting; the rest will be invested in shares which we anticipate will yield a healthy 2% per annum and ……

Whoa there. I thought we agreed that you wouldn't ask me about my business affairs. That's it, enough is enough.

You can bloody walk home!
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So I did.
^©Jakartass

That's the salutation that Indonesian Muslims are tweeting to all and sundry this Ramadhan, the fasting month. Roughly translated, it means "Sorry for my misdeeds since the last time I said this, and apologies for what I may do to you before I ought to say it again."

In a few days, Jakarta will start emptying as a few million perform mudik – return to their home villages.

It has already started.

Central Java Police chief Insp. Gen. Edward Aritonang has given the following rough estimate of the number of travelers who would pass through Central Java during Idul Fitri this year.

He said that there would be 5,189,153, an 5.8 percent increase over last year’s total of 4,807,482. The exodus is expected to peak two days before Idul Fitri starts on Sep. 10.

“Travelers using motorcycles still dominate the roads, with 1,969,821 people, those using private cars are estimated (sic) at 1,815,878 people, and 1,963,067 will use buses,” said Edward, adding that 257,631 people in Central Java were expected to travel by train, 45,350 by plane and 18,576 by sea.

Ministry official Hendri Subiyakto said Sunday that for every porn site blocked, new sites with different names and different URLs were created. He added that the government was respecting Muslims who were fasting by taking such steps.

Given that the fasting month is supposed to encourage tolerance, respect and forbearance, it seems to me that it would be worth chronicling a few snippets I've come across.

1. This short article was sent to me by frequent reader Ultra Tupai and comes from Berita Jakarta.com.

Mass Fight in Kramat Pulo

Instead of taking advantage of Ramadan for religious activities to strengthen belief in God, residents of Kramatpulo Dalam II, Senen, Central Jakarta fight against each other. It happened on Tuesday (8/31) midnight. Until now, the cause of chaos has not been known yet. Such a chaos has happened for times.

The fight between residents of RW 08 and RW 05 happened on Jl Kramat Raya Pulo Dalam III. In that incident, a mother was hit by rock and had to be taken to hospital.

Head of Central Jakarta Police Precinct, Police Commissioner Budi Sartono, stated that the incident have been investigated by his personnel.

"So far we cannot make conclusion about the incident," said Budi through his mobile phone.

2. Gov. Fuddy Bozo puts his foot in it.

In a efforts to control the seasonal influx of newcomers to the capital, Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo recently urged the public not to bring friends or relatives back with them after the Idul Fitri exodus.

“In Tambora there are so many people that you trip over children when you walk,” Fauzi said as quoted by beritajakarta.com at a fast-breaking event in the district last week.

3. And now some good news for good people .

Giving zazat (alms) is an obligation for Muslims at this time of the year. Many of us, Buddhists, Confucians, Christians and Atheists alike, who do not follow a set prayer schedule also contribute according to our circumstances.

Today, the Buddhists were rewarded by the Central Jakarta District Court who ordered a closure of Buddha Bar and demanded bar management PT Nireta Vista Creative, Jakarta Tourism Agency and Jakarta governor to pay Rp 1 billion in compensation to Buddhist community. The protests against innapropriate use of a religious icon to name an entertainment place that sells liquor began in 2009.

I wrote about the issue here and here and here.

4. That the Minister for Communication, Informations and Technology deserves the soubriquet Twittering Simplefool is clearly indicated in this article about the efforts of his ministry to block websites they deem to be pornographic.

Ministry official Hendri Subiyakto said Sunday that for every porn site blocked, new sites with different names and different URLs were created. He added that the government was respecting Muslims who were fasting by taking such steps.

What has caught my eye more, however, is a column by Debnath Guharoy of Roy Morgan Research who gives some statistics about handphones and the internet.

• There are some 90 million unique subscribers, "human beings 14 years of age and older", to "the cellular world of constant connectivity" (i.e. mobile Phones) across the country.

The distinction between a human being and an “active” SIM card warrants repetition. Considering that there are some 160 million Indonesians who are 14+, there is still a long way to go. Of the 11 million entrants in the April-June quarter, 7 million are kampung dwellers. Nationwide, they comprise almost half the cellular population today, more than half of the millions intending to join the community tomorrow.

• The number of regular users of the web via computers exceed more than 8 million people 14 years and older. But that number is dwarfed by the number of users accessing it via their mobile phones, primarily for social networking. Facebook alone claim over 18 million Indonesian users.

There the good news ends.

The high cost of downloading data at slow speeds remains a deterent, regardless of the mode of access to the internet. Applications such as mobile banking are becoming more popular, but remains in the hands of a tiny fraction of society. Bigger screens, higher speeds and lower costs are all essential to e-commerce spreading beyond airline reservations in Indonesia.

In terms of average speed, Indonesia doesn’t make it to the Top 100 countries, far from it in fact. Though harder to prove, costs on the other hand are among the highest in the world.

Against that backdrop, the US$110 million spent by the telecommunications minister on anti-pornography filters is difficult to fathom.

In my view, it's the "bigger screens" which are the key to the Simplefool's idiocy. Although mobile phones may offer speedy access to porno sites, can anyone really get turned on by watching sexual cavorting on mini-screens? Give me a wide screen any time.

So the reported "US$110 million" has been spent to stop less than 9 million of us accessing the sites his ministry can't block; that's c.$13.75 per computer.

Trouble is, I still can't get broadband in Jakartass Towers, my dongles never receive signals and there isn't a fibre-optic cable network nearer than 500 metres. And I'm not going to bother using my 2kbs dial up connection for solitary satisfaction.

So, with these comforting words taken from the b3ta weekly newsletter let me close by telling you that my internet connection was so slow yesterday I ended up just shagging the wife.

I think I'm owed an apology, Minister.
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5. This is a late addendum, but it's so ridiculous that it must be included.

An obscure group led by an academic from a respected Islamic university in Indonesia is reportedly set to petition the Constitutional Court to declare that the (Buddhist) Borobudur Temple in Central Java belongs to Islam.

Read the full article for the convoluted and cockeyed reasoning.

The United Nations has declared today, July 18th, as the International Mandela Day.

When he walked out of prison he declared that his mission was to "liberate the oppressed and the oppressor both."

When he took the reins as President in post-apartheid South Africa, he said, “For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chain, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others. The true test of our devotion to freedom is just beginning.”

Fine words which all Indonesians should take to heart.

To be free means that oppressors as exemplified by the so-called Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) and Abdurizal Bakrie with his arrogant display of wealth to the disadvantage of others, particularly the long-suffering oppressed refugees of the Lapindo mudflow, should face up to their responsibilities as members of a pluralistic society.

Power and wealth are ephemeral – you can't take them with you, both are as dust. Sure, there are dynasties, but bodies politic, familial and imperial inevitably fade away. I believe that there is still time to build a fair society, one that cares for future generations rather than bankrupting them before they're even born, and one that creates and maintains a world of enlightened rather than straitened (strait-jacketed?) people, regardless of our differences.

What this country needs are heroes. Yes, there is a National Heroes Day on November 10th, and a dedicated cemetery originally set aside for fighters for this country's independence, but now a final resting place for those who've served successive governments. However, I'm not referring to public figures, nor to our parents or other personal heroes.

I'm thinking more of unsung heroes whose vision and endeavour make a difference. We don't have to know the name(s) of these social entrepreneurs and perhaps they too are happy to stay out of the limelight because they know that the causes they believe in are just. And because we are free to support them, to follow their examples, that we can all make the world a better place.

Although I regularly provide examples of my 'heroes', today I offer the Bicycle Congress of Indonesia (KSI), a group which includes Bike2Work, the Indonesian Antique Bicycle Community (Kosti) and Ontel Jakarta Sehat.

The Congress is a coming together of like-minded individuals, an example of a community driven, bottom up, development which, at last, is effecting changes in the governmental mindset.

Home Minister Gamawan Fauzi, who opened the congress, said [that] given the large number of cyclists in Indonesia – estimated at 23 million – there were no reasons for the Transportation Ministry not to provide bicycle lanes.

Hoorah. I hope all riders, estimated at 50,000, who participated in today's carnival had a good Mandela Day.
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Postscript.
I've added a page of Indonesian Environmental Groups at the top. This is most probably out of date, so please let me know of any glaring errors, broken links etc.and of any groups you think should be included, esp. Jakarta specific.

To my regret, I don’t play a musical instrument, yet music has always been part of my life and I’ve written extensively about what it means to me and have now made a separate page above which includes this post.

From early 1973 until mid 1976, I was a “hippy squatter” in Rectory Gardens, Clapham, London SW4. It is a short triangular traffic-free haven where two busy roads came together. We were a mixed bunch who did our bit to be part of the local community, yet we lived our lives somewhat divorced from societal expectations.

Before that, we had lived in Charrington St., behind St.Pancras Station in an area known as Somers Town. It was there that we suggested that the Greater London Council should initiate a “hard-to-let’ policy which gave some housing entitlement to otherwise excluded single people and childless couples. Fellow squatters included Charlie Charles who was later to be the drummer in the Blockheads.

When the GLC were ready to renovate Summers Town as we called it, some of us moved south to the borough of Lambeth, me to Rectory Gardens. There were lawyers and teachers in our street – I paid my way through wallpapering gigs – and musicians including Thunderclap Newman tinkering with his electrical stuff, and Charlie Hart, bassist with Ian Dury‘s pre-Blockhead group Kilburn and the Highroads – Charlie is the short guy third from the right – lived in the street.

There was a derelict plot of land where a house had once been; we cleared it of rubbish and turned it into Rectory Garden. We also (re)opened a small shop which we stocked with stray vegetables found at the nearby Nine Elms wholesale vegetable market. It was probably the only shop in our area which would sell a single tomato, cheaply, to a pensioner. (Income was put into a communal fund which was spent on projects, such as house renovations, which all residents were entitled to ‘vote’ on.)

A few months after I’d moved into Rectory Gardens, the mother of Son No.1 joined me (and he was conceived). A single parent, at the time she was running a playgroup for under-fives in a nearby church hall.

Which brings me to Charlie Gillette, co-founder of Oval Records, “pioneering purveyors of quirky pop.”

He and his wife Buffy had placed their then two children in the playgroup. I remember him as a very good neighbour. He was a listener and not judgmental, and certainly didn’t share in the media generated derogatory opinion of our squatting lifestyle. He was not a celebrity, yet he had many fans.

I didn’t know it at the time, but Charlie was the manager of Kilburn and the Highroads. What I did know was that thanks to his radio show, Honky Tonk, he was sent loads of promo records. He was kind enough to donate those he didn’t want to our small retail enterprise. Some of them were dross, including one by a Philly soul singer with the same name as me which I sprayed gold and mounted it as a wall decoration.

He also discovered many artists, such as Elvis Costello and Dire Straits. He gave us a white label promo copy of the latter’s breakthrough multi-million seller Sultans of Swing which he had first played on Honky Tonk.

On his radio shows he played the music he liked rather than what he was paid to sell.

From the Guardian
Few people can have opened so many ears to such a variety of music over the last four decades as Charlie Gillett, the author and radio disc jockey, who has died aged 68 after a long illness. Charlie wrote the first serious history of rock’n'roll and went on to become a central figure in drawing together the confluence of international sounds that became known, to the benefit of many artists whose work might otherwise have remained in obscurity, as world music.

The radio was Charlie’s medium, and from Honky Tonk, his 1970s Radio London show, to his weekly BBC World Service broadcasts in recent years, he nurtured an audience whose loyalty to him and belief in his integrity were unshakeable.

From the Times
A warm and generous man devoted to his family and with no interest in the trappings of success, he was deeply self-effacing and always insisted that he was an enthusiast for the music that he played and wrote about rather than an expert. His broadcasting style was unique and proudly lacking in slickness; his live radio shows seldom went by without him playing at least one song at the wrong speed or announcing the wrong track. Yet it was all part of his charm and only served to endear him further to his loyal listeners.

Sadly Charlie died after a long illness on 17th March at the age of 68.

This is how I remember him.

Charlie (left) in 1972