Pulau Flores

News in short

krisnawan — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 12:31:17 +0000

Ende police join police forces around the world in arresting school students playing truant
In Nage/Ngada, three traditional houses burn down due to short circuit
On Lembata Island, 3.000 residents hold demo against mining projects in front of the regent’s office, but the regent refuses to meet with the demonstrators

(Sources: Flores Pos, Pos Kupang)

Ensiklopedia Indonesia

krisnawan — Tue, 23 Nov 2010 17:24:02 +0000

The other day I came across an old Indonesian encyclopedia from the year 1973. Here’s the entry on the island of Flores, copied verbatim, with the old spelling unchanged:

Flores

pulau, terletak antara 119°48’ Budjur Timur – 123°1’ Budjur Timur dan 8°3’ Lintang Selatan – 8°58’ Lintang Selatan luasnja ± 14.273 km². Pantai Barat tinggi atau berteras-teras; dipantai Utara terdapat punggung-punggung pegunungan; hanja di beberapa tempat berdapat dataran rendah; pantai Timur mempunjai dua teluk, pantai Selatan sebelah Timur sampai Teluk Ende tinggi, sebelah Barat rendah dan rata. Disepandjang pulau terdapat pegunungan dengan puntjak pegunungan Ruteng (2.300 m), Gunung Inerie (2.400 m). Sungai-sungai pendek dan tak berarti untuk pelajaran. Musim Timur merupakan musim kemarau jang pandjang, musim hudjan pendek dengan hudjan jang djatuhnja deras. Tanaman penting: padi, djagung, sagu, kelapa, kapas, kajumanis, kopi. Ternak jang penting: kuda, kerbau, babi, kambing dan biri-biri. Dewasa ini direntjanakan perusahaan kapas negera. Penduduk Flores Barat berkeluarga dengan sukubangsa-sukubangsa di Indonesia Barat (Melaju), di Flores Timur berkeluarga dengan sukubangsa-sukubangsa Indonesia Timur (Irian), badan lebih besar, kulit hitam dan rambut keriting.

Daerah Tingkat II di pulau Flores. Djumlah penduduk 194.203.

Passenger boat sinks near Flores coast

krisnawan — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 10:24:17 +0000

A passenger boat on its way to Maumere, the biggest town on Flores, from the small island of Palu’e, just off of the northern coast of Flores, sank yesterday. From the 50 passengers onboard, around 20 are still missing.

There have been a number of boat accidents in Nusa Tenggara Timur in these past few months, all of which involved small boats or mid-sized motorised craft like the one that sank today. None of the incidents involved the larger ferries run by the state-owned PELNI company, so for those interested in travelling by boat in Eastern Indonesia, PELNI should still be considered a valid option.

However, for those who want to visit Palu’e, taking a private boat from Maumere will stay the only option.

Tsunami and flooding

krisnawan — Sun, 10 Oct 2010 09:12:58 +0000

Many regions across Indonesia are suffering from flooding right now due to torrential rains. Flores is no exception, though no casualties have occurred yet and no evacuations have been necessary. However, as the Flores Pos reported on October 7th, it brought back grim memories of the tsunami caused by the big earthquake in Maumere in 1992. Inhabitants of Maumere, especially of those areas most severely hit were apprehensive.

Here’s hoping that the situation will not get any worse – the rain seems to stay as the usual cycle of dry and rainy seasons seem to continue to be out of whack.

“Tourism clusters” announced by the provincial government

krisnawan — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 10:29:25 +0000

The provincial government of Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT) announced in Kupang that the province would be divided into four different “tourism clusters”, each centering around a key tourism attraction. Flores will be divided into two clusters, the first encompassing the Manggarai Barat, Manggarai, Manggarai Timur, Ngada and Nagekeo regencies. The notion is to develop this cluster as “exotic of island” (this is the English used in the Flores Pos article), of course epitomized by the Komodo dragons and the national park they reside in. Other tourism spots mentioned for this cluster involve “maritime sightseeing” around the waters in Labuan Bajo, diving in the 17 Islands Park in Riung, and the cultural tourism in Bena-Bajawa, as well as the archeaologial sites in Liang Bua (Manggarai).

The second cluster Flores is part of includes Ende, Sikka, Flores Timor and (off-island) Lembata regencies. It will be based on the notion of ecotourism, with its key attraction being Kelimutu, a set of volcano lakes whose hue periodically changes. Other attractions in this cluster include diving in Maumere Bay, the religious tourism for the Easter Procession in Larantuka and the traditional whale-hunting in Lamalera, Lembata. (My personal opinion is that the NTT tourism authorities should probably not promote this last attraction too much in the West).

The rest of the province is also divided into two more clusters, one consisting of (the Western part of) Timor, Alor, Rote and Sabu islands, and the other of the island of Sumba. The former offers potential for both maritime and cultural tourism, while the latter is renowned for its cultural heritage, such as the megalithic stones found on Sumba and traditional rituals still kept alive by its people.

This undertaking by the provincial government also seems to be supported by the Swiss government, mainly through a Swiss NGO by the name of Swisscontact (and whose employess I have run into before). Funds of about 4 million USD were provided by the Swiss, which is in line of a national goal set by the Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudoyono (SBY) to develop further ten tourism destinations in Indonesia, including in NTT province. The Swiss ambassador to Indonesia explained that the goal of the Swiss project in Flores was to increase the number of tourists visiting the island from 25,000 annually in 2008 to 45,000 in 2013, and to permanently employ an additional 700 local people in the tourism industry.

(Source: Flores Pos of September 25, 2010)

Rabies on Flores

krisnawan — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 16:31:49 +0000

As I’ve written in an earlier post (albeit in German), more than 100 people die of rabies in Flores every year. The Pos Kupang from August 9^th also reiterated that within NTT province, only the islands between Flores and Lembata – Flores, Adonara, Solor and Lembata – were known to be rabies areas, whereas the other bigger islands in the province, Timor, Sumba, Alor, Rote and Sabu were considered rabies free.

On my way to Flores I was travelling through Bali, and when I was sitting in one of those places there with free wifi internet, I had a chance encounter with a rabies expert (presumably) from South Africa. She told me that in case you are bitten without any prior vaccination, the WHO recommends treatment with immunoglobulin, which is not indicated in cases of individuals with prior vaccination (though they still need to undergo treatment). The problem is that immunoglobulin is hard to get in Indonesia, even in Bali. If you’re in Bali, you can fly overnight to Singapore where they have plenty of immunoglobulin, but if getting from Flores to Singapore within 24 hours would be infinitely more difficult. So get vaccinated before you go! Rabies vaccine necessary for treatment post-exposure is usually available in the hospitals in the bigger towns on Flores.

Also to those worried about the ‘recent rabies outbreak’ on Bali: She told me that the increased numbers probably reflect better monitoring than anything else. Rabies probably has been present in Bali for a long time already.

(Sources: Pos Kupang, WHO: www.who.int/rabies/human/postexp/en/index.html)

Ramadan in Flores

krisnawan — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 11:28:00 +0000

The holy month of Ramadan is coming to an end throughout the Islamic World and is being celebrated with one of the most important holidays in Islam, known as lebaran in Indonesian.

Even though Flores is predominantly Catholic (estimates usually put the figure at about 85%), there are sizeable Muslim populations especially in coastal areas. These reflect settlement by sea-faring people such as the Buginese or the Bajaw, but also autochthonous ethnic groups that were converted by missionaries coming from the Sultanates of Bima on Sumbawa and Gowa on Sulawesi. Flores presents a great example of religious harmony in Indonesia, and one of the reasons for this is that in a given ethnic group. So for this lebaran, many Muslims with celebrate together with their Catholic family members and neighbours.

Murder case of priest slain in Nagekeo

krisnawan — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 06:40:35 +0000

I still remember the news from October 2008 that the corpse of a slain priest had been found in Nagekeo Regency, next to his motorcycle and without his valuables, which made the case look like a robbery. Or that’s what I thought at least.

But it appears that Flores is still a very safe place and robberies don’t happen, as the police later was able to track down and arrest five people who were thought to have conspired to murder the priest because he had refused to officiate at one man’s religious wedding. Two of the five, a woman who had first been interviewed as a witness of the priest’s death as she had admitted getting a ride from him, and the man whose request to be married had been turned down by the priest, were sentenced to life in prison in May 2009 by the district court in Bajawa, Ngada Regency. While some people were not satisfied with that sentence as they had called for the death penalty for the murder of a priest, the man’s wife strongly denied that her husband had any involvement in the murder and decried a ‘legal mafia’ being at work in this case. She said that the priest had merely said that her husband should learn how to read and write before marriage.

Now one year later, the high court in the provincial capital Kupang overturned the lower court’s verdict and acquitted both accused due to lack of conclusive evidence. However, the popular sentiment seems to be very much against the accused as on August 27, an article in the Flores Pos in turn denounced the high court of being run by a ‘legal mafia’ itself. Indeed it seems an odd turn of event, from life in prison to complete acquittal. The woman had been found in possession of the victim’s cell phone, had abandoned his body, which was found only five days later, and had admitted having witnessed him being beaten to death, so it would appear that she would have been guilty of some crime, but then I’m no expert in Indonesian law. We will see if the prosecution appeals the case to the Supreme Court in Jakarta and lets the saga continue.

(Sources: local media such as Flores Pos and Pos Kupang and national media such as Kompas)

A new name for Maumere Airport

krisnawan — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 10:33:48 +0000

On August 9th, the main airport on Flores, in Maumere got a new name. It was named after one of Maumere’s greatest son, the late Franciscus Xavier Seda.

Frans Seda was born in 1926 in Sikka Regency and educated, amongst other places, at the Catholic University of Tilburg in the Netherlands. He served in several capacities in both the Sukarno and Suharto governments, the most important post being one of Suharto’s first finance ministers. Later he was active outside of Suharto’s Golkar Party, having served as chairman of the Indonesian Catholic Party and as an advisor to the PDI-P, the party led today by Megawati Sukarno, the former president and Sukarno’s daughter. (There is also a connection between these two parties as the Indonesian Catholic Party was dissolved in 1971 to become part of the PDP, which is a predecessor party to the PDI-P.)

He was also committed to his Catholic faith, not just in his capacity as chairman of said Indonesian Catholic Party, but he was also instrumental in making the visit of Pope John Paul II. to Sikka Regency in 1989 a reality. Furthermore, thanks to his many national and international connections, he was also very helpful in alerting the national government and international donors to the plight of the people after the horrible earthquake on December 12th, 1992, in Sikka Regency. Frans Seda passed away on December 31st, 2009, in Jakarta.

(Sources: Flores Pos from August 16th, and Wikipedia)

Back to Flores

krisnawan — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 09:37:32 +0000

After two years, I’m finally back to Flores again. And it’s high time to get this blog moving again. I’ll try to write in English from now on, so this can reach a wider audience.