Fancy Indonesia Travel: Indonesian Airports

Indonesian tourism industry seems to be on its way up after the number of foreign tourist rose gradually in recent years. Statistics Indonesia stated that a total number of foreign traveler on January to May period increased by 5.64 % compare with the same period in the previous year (from 2.76 million in 2010 to 2.92 million in 2011). This stat shows a good hope for Indonesian economy through its tourism business.

Additionally, transport and its component such as airport are the integral part of tourism. In relation with this topic, Statistics Indonesia also released the statistical report of Indonesian Airports with some issues to be presented below: 

1.       Ngurah Rai International Airport Bali visited by 1.04 million foreign tourist (a third from total foreign tourist in this Period).

2.       Followed by Soekarno Hatta International Airport Jakarta with 746 thousand traveler arrived at this period.

3.       Sepinggan Airport Balikpapan increased by 62.56% from the same period last year.

4.       Followed by Sultan Syarif Kasim II Airport with 47.22%. 

5.      On the other hand, Sultan Hasanuddin Airport Makasar suffered a significant drop for 24.90% compare with last year.

Notts Indofest

The Nottingham Indonesian Festival is an annual non-profit special event which produced by The Association of Indonesian Students in The United Kingdom or Perhimpunan pelajar Indonesia di United Kingdom (PPI UK) together with PPI Nottingham as well as other PPI’s branches all around United Kingdom.

 The main goal of this event is just simply to gather students and Indonesian Citizens who study and work in the United Kingdom in one special occasion with combination of Indonesian culture, traditional foods and bazaar as well as sports competition. Furthermore beside the main goal of this festival which to gather all Indonesian people in the United Kingdom, there are other objectives to be settled such as to gain friendships and networks, as well as to promote Indonesian culture and traditional food to local people in United Kingdom, especially in Nottingham. 

               For the past three years, attendances has risen gradually from six hundred individuals on 2009,  more than nine hundred people came in 2010 and more than one thousand guesses participated in 2011. The figure shows the positive indicator in terms of total attendance. It also helps food stall renters and bazaar renters to get more income while attendance has risen gradually year by year.

History and culture: Jakarta

Jakarta is well known as a capital city of Indonesia. It is the centre of economic, cultural and political as well as the country’s largest city with 661 square kilometers (225 square miles) area covered. Over 9 million people population come from diverse tribes, culture and traditions, blend into a metropolitan city. Therefore, those reasons make Jakarta as a 10^th largest city in the world and the most populous town in Southeast Asia.

Jakarta as Capital and Metropolitan city

 Pre colonial Period: As a city, Jakarta was founded back in Padjajaran dynasty, to be precise the last Hinduism Kingdom in west Java. At that time, Jakarta was called as Sunda Kelapa. It was a trading town nationally as well as international trading centre. Afterwards, Portugal armada came into Sunda kelapa as a delegate from Malaka kingdom and made a castle nearby Ciliwung River.

Sunda Kelapa

Portugal small armada visited Sunda kelapa once again without knowing that The city had fallen into King Fatahillah, thus a war was unavoidable around Sunda Kelapa Gulf which was then finished with a won in Fatahillah side. And by his idea, on June 22, 1527 Sunda Kelapa's name was changed into Jayakarta, which means perfect victory. Later this day is remembered as a jakarta’s born day as a city and Jakarta citizens celebrate it every year. Dutch and English was attracted by the famous of Sunda kelapa as trading harbor. They came not only for trading mission but also to taking chance from every conflict showed up between local authorities with the purpose of gaining profit.

Colonial period: Cornelis de Houtman led Dutch armada for the first time to visited Jakarta in 1596 represent Veerenigde Oost-indische Campagnie (VOC).  the beginning of the 16th Century, the Dutch merchants establishes trading office in Jayakarta. Late 1618, British armada took over the winning of local inhabitants sympathy. Furthermore, under the order of Jan Pieterzoon Coen, the Dutch trading company or VOC erased away Jayakarta and changed the city’s name into Batavia in 1619. At that moment, VOC begun their colonialism in Indonesia for not less than 3.5 centuries until the arrival of Japanese armies in 1942 and colonized Indonesia for 3.5 years.

Jan Pieterzoon Coen

 Independence period: After falling into Japan's hands in 1942, Batavia changed its name again into Jakarta. When Japan surrendered to the Allied Force in 1945, Indonesia people through their representative which are Soekarno (1^st President of Indonesia) and M. hatta (1^st Vice president of Indonesia) proclaimed its Independence Day on 17^th August 1945.

Indonesia Independence Day Proclamation in Jakarta

Soekarno and M. Hatta on The Proclamation of Indonesia Independence Day 1945

Vocabulapic: Gotong royong=Mutual Aid

Term “Gotong-Royong” is very popular in Indonesian traditional culture. Some anthropologists like Paul Michael Taylor and Lorraine V. Aragon state that gotong royong is cooperation among many people to attain a shared goal. Which is can be implicate in every ways of human life. The spirit of gotong royong which has a similar meaning with volunteerism, is promoted as a cultural value in Indonesia. the simple example about this term is about to show below with concerned condition about how traditional Indonesia apart from big cities such as Jakarta, Surabaya etc.

 

 

 

 

 

Traditional dance: Cakalele

Kid training Cakalele

Cakalele is a traditional dance from Maluku, east part of Indonesia. This dance is originally a war dance for people in Maluku. They usually play it with thirty people in total using "Parang" or Maluku's traditional sword and "Salawaku" or Maluku's traditional combat shield. Now a days, people in Maluku performing this traditional dance to greet their prominent guesses who come to their land.

Cakalele Dance-Maluku

 

Fancy Indonesia Greeting

Tobelo, North Halmahera

Well, this is my first post on Fancy Indonesia. At this moment, I just want to give a brief introduction about this blog. Basically, in order to finish my MA degree, I have to make a project related to the course I take at Birmingham City University which is Media and Creative Enterprise. Fancy Indonesia is a promotional blog as an e-marketing strategy to promote Indonesian culture and heritage. 

Fancy Indonesia features rich range of articles from history, cuisine, batik to traditional culture of Indonesia. these articles will facilitate my marketing strategy to get visitors from outside Indonesia especially people in the UK to visit Fancy Indonesia and to visit Indonesian festival in the UK and around the world. In addition, Fancy Indonesia has a unique feature which is “vocabulapics”. It allows you to understand some difficult Indonesian words through pictures and small explanations. All in all, thank you for your time to view this blog. GOD Bless, cheers.