Another Victoria's Secrets

the entrance to TACCE

I went to Bali yesterday, the first one-day trip I've ever did to the Island of the Gods. It was a business trip but me and my partners had a brief visit to this eco-friendly primary school at Jl. Ir. Sukarno, Banjar Pande, Pejeng, Gianyar area. The school name is TACCE (Tjok Agung Conservation and Cultural Education) Wood School Bali.

the goats

The school don't teach too many lessons. The curriculum is based on nature and human personality, so kids are taught to get connected and blending with mother earth. They plant, pet-farm and play. They develop great interaction skills between human, learn about cultures from around the world, create artworks, and just having fun, enjoying their early years as human. I guess this is the most important thing about being children.

playroom with bamboo curtain

As the kids will still get basic education about English grammar & vocabularies, Mathematics, Science, Geography and History, they are also taught spiritual teaching, yoga & meditation, physical education, theater arts, music, martial art, horse-back riding and have field trips. They have goats and rabbits as pets, organic vegetable gardens, and aquaponics plants in the green house. By this, they learn to take care of nature and be respective to other beings.

large yard just for the children playing!

The school carries the Neo-Humanism, an ecological, holistic, comprehensive philosophy. Drawing upon ancient teachings on the levels of consciousness, a neo-humanistic approach to education seeks to develop the more subtle capacities of the human mind. Neo-Humanism is the spirit of benevolence. To teach love one must embody it. To embody love one must see all as divine. To see all as divine one must practice methods of contemplation and inner reflection. Only then will one embody the true spirit of universal outlook in their thoughts and actions. (read more here)

aquaponic, the combination of fish and plant production using aquaculture and hydroponics systems

The school costs IDR 3,000,000.-/student/month and has 30 children going here from Monday to Friday now. The teachers are volunteers from many places around the world, as well as the multinational students. The kids are taught yoga as well, and this is really great for their self-control and as the base for their soul development. Perhaps if I had kids I'll send them here--and promote this idea to all of my friends. Too bad Jakarta (and other urban cities) don't have this kind of school. Anyone interested on building one, perhaps?

gardens and green house

TACCE Wood School Bali
Tjok Agung Conservation & Cultural Education
Jl. Raya Tampaksiring (Jl. Ir. Sukarno), Pejeng, Gianyar
+6282147949688
www.woodschoolbali.com

Don't forget to turn off the lights tonight from 8:30-9:30 p.m. local time. See you under the stars!

The Earth Hour 2014 is coming in two days, asking all of us a little contribution for this world we are living. Even before experiencing Nyepi in Bali--the idea of this whole 60+ things, only conducted for the whole 24 hours once a year--I had been participating with Earth Hour since its first year in 2008. Now more people are joining, why don't we go silent and dark for just one hour?
What's your contribution?

My cousins Angelika and Loren had already back to their home in Jakarta. That left me here with Hizkia and his girlfriend Saphira, who came the day Angel and Loren went home. We spent these last days together and also with my kost neighbors: Ana, Risty, Baim and Zora. But what most fun was that I got a new ride.


I found this folding bicycle at Rodalink store at Jl. Teuku Umar and fell in love with this Polygon Urbano 3.0 since the first sight. It has some plus points than the other folding bikes I saw before: it's pretty easy to fold and unfold (see the video below), pretty light for me to carry up and down the stairs by myself (my room is at second floor and I park it in my room) and looks pretty nice with me on it, tho not as lovely as a Brompton*. And the color is silver, which I much prefer.


I tried riding on it in the store and I apparently needed some time to adapt with biking again since maybe almost two decades (I almost never touched any bicycle since living in Bandung) so I brought it to Sanur and had some fun pedaling by the shore. Sanur is really a great place for cycling while in my area (Kerobokan) is pretty much crowded and the roads are very much uncomfortable because there are no sidewalks (the roads end straight to gutters at each side) and other vehicles are mostly speeding up in here.


Anyway, I am legally entering the commuter world now, in disguise on trying to burn more calories everyday rather than sitting sweetly on the scooter to get me anywhere. I really need to work out and I hope this new ride would help me get fitter. Thankfully I live in Bali, where pollution and traffic are less hectic than in Jakarta or Bandung--oh, I'm contributing on polluting less now by biking. Thank God for this bike, I'm superlovin' it!


*) Brompton is agreed to be the best folding bike in the world.

It had been 1 year, 3 months and 1 week now that I have survived settling in Bali. It took a lot of guts and a whole heart to move out to a new place without any family or friends. Lucky for me, Bali is still in Indonesia and the people speak both Indonesian and English, the two languages I expertise on. And I have friends here; both old friends, like Ana whom were my schoolmate in Binus, and new friends, like Dewi whom I met from work, so my days are not lonely.

Still, it's not easy to settle down in a new place, especially in the place where the tradition is thick and the culture is different. Here I'm helping you to adapt better, and quicker, in Bali:

1.  Ride the Bike
Everybody in Bali, both old and young, men and women, locals and tourists, ride the bike. I mean a motorcycle (which they call as 'sepeda' or bike), not a bicycle (here they call it as 'sepeda gayung'). It's like the number one transportation here because public buses' (angkot and Trans Bali) tracks are limited and do not go to small roads. Make sure you have the license (SIM C) and have learn to ride it in safe place with no traffic (try parking lots). It's much easier to ride the automatic kind than the ones with gears. Hundreds of bike rentals available along Kuta and Seminyak roads, but you can also buy yourself a bike if you certain to stay in long period in Bali. It'll help you big time, especially if you are an active and mobile person.
Price for daily rental is IDR 40,000-70,000 and monthly rental is IDR 500,000-600,000 for automatic bikes.

2.  Navigate Yourself
If you have lived all your life indoor, it's time to read the sun position now. Balinese people use compass direction to show ways to get somewhere (in case you are asking) and it's important to know which direction you are facing. Simplest way is to have the map on hand and know where the beach is. If you are in Kuta/Seminyak area, just remember that the beach is the West (kauh); if you are in Sanur or Tulamben area, the beach is the East (kangin); if you are in South Uluwatu area, the cliff is facing South (kelod) and if you are in Singaraja, the beach is the North (also kelod for it's seaward; kaja is used  toward the mountain). Better learn to read the map and stick to it, trust me. Also, Balinese people are good in calculating distance. Use the meter on your dashboard to figure out your first distances, then remember it for next calculations. It'll get better with practice.

3.  Speak Balinese
It's important to know local language when you are living there. I know Sundanese and it's a little help because the language is not so different. Buy a language book or, even better, learn from the locals. Make sure you know the most important words, such as hello/greeting (om swastyastu) and thank you (matur suksma). You can go further from there, plenty of time for this but make sure to get as much information as you can.

4.  Respect
There are people all around the world living or staying in Bali, especially in the South Bali, and they come from different places, culture, and religion. Respect is a must to survive; being open minded is another help. We can always learn something new from other people here, thus our network expands. But not only for people, we need to respect the nature also. Balinese Hindu people believe that God is in the nature, so we must treat the environment with lots of respect. Do not litter, do not damage the coral and sea life, do not damage the earth with heavy and massive structure, do adapt wild dogs, do care for the greens and reduce the use of plastic bags. Respect and be in peace with yourselves, then the universe will respect you also. Remember that karma works fast in Bali!

5.  Dress Properly
Balinese people have so many ceremonies they can ask for leave for up to 13 days in a month when they work. Big chance you will be invited to attend or to invite yourself to one of their sacred rituals. For women, the simplest and most common dress is kebaya just like in Java (a tube top/long torso/girdle with a brocade/chiffon blouse on top of it and a wastra cloth wrapping and covering the legs), but with a prada belt (a shawl wrapped around the hips) and for men, they wear udeng or headband, a shirt, and for the bottom part there are a wastra cloth, a kampuh cloth on top of it, and an umpal (a shawl) to tie up the cloths. You can add a flower on your hair/on the back of your ear. If you want to respect the host of the ceremony, dress up!
image taken via sphotos


You really don't have to wear the traditional dress everyday or speak Balinese all the time for sure. 99% of people in South Bali speaks English and other international languages. But it's nice to have all the points above so you can blend more easily with the locals, especially the ones that are not in the South Bali. Good luck for that!

Yesterday, Monday June 3rd, I woke up very early and arrived at Ubung at 6 a.m. at dawn. Nobody was there before me but soon people were coming over. After it was settled, we departed to Lake Batur; 13 students of year 2011 in an Elf bus, 9 more students of year 2010 in another bus, and me, Bli Agus and Bli Made Dwi in a Jazz car. I didn't know these people before, but it's a good time to get to know more in this program.

So the program was about the socialization of the forming of a cooperative (Koperasi) for organic producers all around Bali. The members of Organik Mandiri Sejahtera that had been collected until now was 700 people from 14 villages and 5 districts. This is a very large number, especially because the idea came for social interest.

I didn't really get involved with the process but I agreed to help on the ceremony day. I was in charge of 22 students of Agriculture major from Udayana University who participated as ushers and receptionists. We were all dressed in Balinese kebaya, the local traditional dress. The first batch (of year 2011) came together with me but the second one came around 11 p.m. so I didn't get to really know them.


We arrived at Wantilan, on the west side of Lake Batur, at 8 a.m. and got prepared our guest lists and other forms the members and invitations needed to fill in. After completing the registration they needed to make a photo, taken by Bli Made Dwi. Then they were ushered to the Pura Jati temple at the north-east side of the hall.

The program started at around 11.30 p.m. when Ratu Pedanda (head of the Hindu priests from the Brahman caste in Bali) gave opening speech, followed by Mrs. Ni Luh Kartini (woman activist for organic production in agriculture and also a lecturer in Udayana University) and Pemangku (a Hindu priest). The speeches were closed by briefing from the Department of Agriculture from the government about the structure of a legal cooperative organization.

The program was supposed to be done at 3-4 p.m, but we finished at 2 p.m. already. It was because the food came late so the programs had to be started earlier than the schedule and the farmers, being uneducated mostly, just went home after the stomach was full. We knew it'd be hard to handle them, but we didn't expected that they'd just go home like that. It was kind of surprising.


But we are grateful enough for the whole programs, although we didn't get all the forms they should fill in, and we went to Pura Ulun Danu (the 'water source' temple) for the administration and to thank and farewell to the Jero Mangku (head of Pemangku in a temple). It took another hour or two before we could go home. We reached Ubung at around 7 p.m. at dusk time.

It was totally a social work for me, and I felt so good because it was not just to support a 'go green' program, support our farmers, and also to know people who care enough to make the cooperative. I got many new friends, especially the girls I was working with. It was really a fun day, not only because of the foggy scenery of the Lake and Mount Batur, those pine trees and also to learn more about Balinese language. Matur Suksma!

P.S. matur suksma = thank you

Like birds?
You gotta check this short film by Chris Jordan.


It's about an island in North Pacific 2,000 miles away from the nearest continent which is full with birds, but also with the dead birds' bodies (which captured by the photographer) with plastics inside it. It shows the irony of our plastic waste that became their food eventually kills the animals and, slowly, our natural environment. The film has a really nice but also ironic scenes of the island and habitat. It's worth to watch and to donate, too--then work on our own plastic garbage!

Vancouver is a coastal city, inhabited with 560,000 people and also said to be the most comfortable city to live in by the Economist magazine. Indeed, the city is not only comfortable to live in but also being a reference of Canada as the renewed natural resource user. Vancouver leads in the developed technology using. Vancouver has 100 years-plan to live in green and clean. The city also leads in the use of electricity from water energy, which now supplies 90% of the total energy.

Other than that, Vancouver also implements the developed technology; garbage storage with solar energy can now found in the entire city, in size the same of regular garbage storage, but can keep it five times larger the amount of garbage (which makes the city needs less garbage trucks with emission on the streets.)


Green City No. 1
Reykjavík, Iceland

Reykjavík is a small city on the list, with only 115,000 souls living here from overall 300,000 souls in the whole Iceland. But its result to the world worth thumbs up. Iceland plans to free its dependent to fossil fuel in 2050 to become a hydrogen economy. Now, Reykjavík (and the whole Iceland) gets the energy for heat, hot water and electricity all from water energy and geothermal source--which both can be renewed and free from glasshouse gas emission. Some vehicles also use hydrogen, including three city buses.

by courtesy of Uncle Pat.

Jakarta was flooded again!
I went to Jl. Sabang to have an early breakfast (or super late supper) with my friends last nite at about 1-2 a.m. and it was hardly raining in Center Jakarta around 12.30-3.30 a.m. After 3 hours raining it's kinda disappointing to find that there is still some streets flooded in Jakarta. It's about 25 cm high at 3.45 a.m. and we had to find a way to get to the car by not getting wet (and we succeed, LOL!)





It's quite a shame and a sad thing that our country still can not handle this flooding thing. But I'm not in the mood talking about our country. I am here posting this to ask your participation on helping the world to breathe better. Our world is now suffering and we should really do act something. I need not only me to do this thing alone but all of us, start by you, to please do care about the environment.

Start little:
Do not litter.
Recycle.
Reduce the use of electricity, water, plastic, paper, etc.
Reuse anything that you can use twice or more.
Plant something green in your garden.
Anything!!

Remember that every little thing can make a big difference. Fixing a bad habit (save energy, for example) can save millions of people and the world out there. Starting a new good habit (like separating paper and organic trashes into different bags and recycle what we can) can save even more!

LET'S GO GREEN, PEOPLE!