Made by: Borbala Kezsmarki

From Hungary

The Beauty of Diversity - Harmony amount civilization

In my opinion traveling is the only experience that you pay for it and makes you richer. My mother is a field surveyor engineer, she took me everywhere, when I was a kid, and we travelled abroad since I was very little, because she thought it is important to see the world. So she encouraged me to get my own experiences as well. First time I have been in my life alone in abroad for longer time it was a voluntary workcamp in the middle of France in 2001. We been about 20 people from all different countries from Europe, spending the summer together, building a natural park, organizing programs for the local youth, cooking together everybody’s national food, learning about each other and from each other a lot.  I was seventeen years old, young, curious for the world and i thought i m the luckiest person to experience the beauty of the diversity of nations.

This was the first eye opening experience for me, how much part of the world i do not know, how much things, different way of thinking exist on our globe that i need to explore. And the best way if you have a common language, however I was speaking French, but English is the language that I believe if you speak you gain much more. After this voluntary project I took part many of others, organized and lead some in Hungary also, since Europe I travelled almost everywhere, made friendships from all over Europe, so I started to feel I want to who from the globe even more and more.

I started to work and live on my own money since I m 21 to ensure myself the freedom and possibility to travel wherever I want to go. But in the meantime I started a Doctoral School and I choose as my topic, Multiculturalism, because my main interest in History is different identity background thought of nations. When I was checking the scholarships to France I accidently found one interestingly eye-catching scholarship to Indonesia.  Ohh, I started to think, where is Indonesia exactly on the map? Wow, even on the map it looks amazing, thousands of islands, surrounded tropical ocean, komodo dragon, orangutan,  jungle, papua deserted tribes, wow, wow, wow, I need to get this scholarship. So I applied with a huge expectation, with plans how I m going to insert this year to my doctoral studies. But unfortunately I did not get the scholarship. I was really upset,  than second year I applied again and unluckily I was not a successful candidate again. What could I do, I started to invest more energy in my professional life, and forget about the scholarship. Than i started to grow and grow carrier aspect, started to think which car I should buy and maybe I should change my apartment for a bigger one, so I need more and more money, but I just realized on what happened with my dreams, I forgot about it… My original aim with earning money was exploring the world. How could I forgot this. Than I felt extremely empty, to become the victim of customizing civilization, so I decided I will travel in next year in Asia, having a sabbatical year, and applied again for third time to Darmasiswa scholarship to Indonesia. In the motivation letter I have been brutally honest. “ I want to have a sabbatical year, I would like to travel all around Indonesia, getting know the culture, through learning the language”.

And Abracadabra, I won. I won the scholarship to spend one year in Indonesia studying Indonesian language and culture in Bandung. Or thinking in the background, back of my mind; I won on a ticket to change my life, turn back to the routs learn about people, explore, explore, explore…. To be honest if in that time I won the lottery, I would come to Indonesia as well, so I felt again the same feeling, I don’t mind money I am the luckiest person of the world!!! Of course my family felt differently and most of my friend as well, in their eyes going to the third world, “doing nothing”, give up carrier, seemed the most stupid thing at the age almost 30. Well, maybe this decision is not for everyone, but for me it was the best, I can tell this for sure after finishing staying one year in Indonesia.

So let’s go back one year in time, last summer I spent my time on Internet, getting familiar with Indonesia, where the hell is the city of Bandung, where my University is going to be, what kind of clothes I need,  what kind of vaccination I need to go, how the people look like in that part of the earth..., etc. Plenty, plenty of questions running crazy in my mind. Excitement and fear growing in my heart in the same time, like: - I am too old to be a student again, how is to be a single woman in a super muslim area, how I can adopt my way of thinking, do I going to find friends, how the Indonesian people going to look at the Hungarian giant girl with 176 cm, I hate rice, what am I going to eat???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Than accidently happened that two guys who I know also got the same scholarship, so we decided get rid of our fears is the best to go before the school starts and have some “pre-exploring” trip in Sumatra. When we were waiting in Doha international airport I was watching passing the people, white, black, yellow, chocolate, cappuccino skin, all type of faces, races, clothes, from the entire world. I was checking how the Asians look like, who can be Indonesian? Jesus Christ how the Asian people can make a difference between themselves. Later I got know for Asians the Bules – white people look like the same as well. I needed couple of month, that my mind could recognize the different features of faces. When we landed in Jakarta, however we came from the summer, the big humidity hit us, like a punch. Than we catch a taxi and find an accommodation for three of us in the middle of the night in Jakarta Jalan Jaksa backbacker quarter. We were 2 guys 1 girl, we were ready with the cover story that one of my friend is my husband, the other one is my brother to get permission to stay in one room for the night, which is absolutely normal in Europe, but huge scandal in Indonesia.

That night we went for a walk, it was a terribly warm, middle of Augustus, we were watching the people eating in street warungs, no hygiene, no fridge for the food, no normal washing the dishes, some rats crossing the legs of eating people, we were disgusted, and thought who can be as crazy to eat such a place…but surprisingly in two-three weeks we had no problem with eating street food.

So slowly we got lost of the natural beauties of Sumatra, meet more and more local people and got amazed how is possible all locals always non-stop smiling. I read a survey that Indonesian people are considering themselves as the most happy people of the world, and the heart attack rate is extremely down, so I decided I need to learn the “magic technique”. I consider after one year, the secret of Indonesians “take it easy”. In Europe we are always running, in Indonesia I never saw a person to run after a bus, or be in hurry. Time does not matter. Off course if you make yourself nervous for time it does not help, but if you accept that the bus goes, when there are enough people, no order, you can have a cigarette, have some chat with the locals, nice black coffee, and simply without rush you can enjoy more your life.

After Sumatra I got addicted to travelling in Indonesia, to explore more and more place, to get know different cultures. Indonesia has amazing variety of cultures, dances, music, history background of people. Getting know, even have a good overview of it in one year is almost impossible. There are plenty of languages, Bahasa Indonesia is just a unification, a help to understand Indonesian people with themselves, but through learning language travelling got much more easier. Speaking with locals always made all my trip unique, and staying in Jawa it is almost impossibly difficult without language. It was a great experience to get an insight of Indonesian University, however European standards are a little bit different. But this was part of getting know of way of thinking Indonesia, the systems, the teachers, and it was specially interesting to watch how different nationalities adjusting to Indonesian culture.

Everybody has ups and downs, heating and loving Indonesia in the same time. Asian nations can adjust more, I think one of the biggest difficulties for Europeans is that Indonesian does not know of the meaning and existence of confrontation. For example if you ask something they never ever will say –I do not know. For example: - Where is this street, do you know? – Yes, Yes,… So where is it? … - Yes, Yes,… They just say yes for everything, and than making trouble of course. Well, there are plenty of other difficulties, like accept the life standards, the waste all around, the mandi, interesting habits and so on. But you need to get rid of all the “bad” stuff and start to enjoy living like Indonesians. The sentence everywhere is true – If you are in Rome, act like Rome people.

Maybe I wrote now not just good things, seems maybe negative, but the rats, cockroaches, dhyeria, high fever, get lost on the street, spending days on buses, crazy drivers, crazy traffic all around, all annoying things, that can happen, are all part of the experience. If you face challenges, you are going to appreciate more the results. The diversity of things beside your own culture on the beginning makes you dizzy, that is the cultural shock, that is absolutely normal. But than you will find your favorite dish from the one thousand different one, you will find the smiling ibu on your street who is inviting you to her house, you will buy a motor bike and enjoy the freedom of riding. Or you will watch a sunset from Lembang, having a coffee in Puculot, and explore all the hidden secrets of your city. You will get know amazing people with amazing stories, you will see deeper the  mixture of strong believe of ghost and healers, and Muslim religion. And many many amazing, interesting thing, which is explorable just through living in a country.

So after all, we all fall in love with Indonesia, some of us got Indonesian boyfriend, girlfriend, some of us would like to stay in Indonesia forever, or a little bit more long. For  me, one year was enough, but the question is what we can take home from Indonesia. For me the most amazing thing was learning about different cultures, nations. The diversity is huge in between Toraja, Batak, Dayak, and so on people in Indonesia. I realized I could more easily get friends with Chatolic people or less muslim person, I realized how much the freedom is important for me, but I can have the respect and acceptance of other religions. We all got new friends, we will see how long the new friendship going to lost. I m looking forward to being with my family, but Indonesia the beauty of diversity is changed my life. I will try to live my life in Hungary as I did in Indonesia – “Take it easy and keep spirit! – Santai dan Semangat! 

Thanks for this huge, life long experience!