Pics from the other side.

The Indonesian National Museum building. I couldn't take a picture of the main entrance because it was blocked by tour buses. Ugh.

Indonesia's National Monument - complete with a massive display in the basement underneath the monument portraying a particularly skewed version of the country's proud history.

Jakarta's version of riverside properties.

A massive replica of David covered in a blue-ish/purple print on the ground floor of a shopping centre. I don't know why.

An 80-year-old man who had been living and working on Indonesian fishing boats from the age of 12. These days he runs boat trips up and down the harbour.

Hi, I'm back

Hi!
Sorry I left you for a couple of weeks. I was away, you see. I was lucky enough to score a media junket to Jakarta and Bandung as part of a bid to promote the rest of Indonesia. You know, apart from that most cliched of holiday destinations, Bali.

It was an amazing trip and really opened my eyes to how lucky we are here in Australia.

I read a newspaper article while I was there about the president (SBY, who was recently re-elected) and his efforts at reducing poverty in the country. The article said that he had been relatively successful in reducing poverty because by the end of his first four years, he had reduced the amount of people living under the poverty line by 4 million.

Sounds fantastic, doesn't it? Except when put into the context of the total population living in poverty at the time. He reduced it from 36 million to 32 million. 32 million people living in poverty. And by poverty I do mean poverty.
That's about one and a half times the population of our entire country.

With this in mind, I have to say I can completely understand the reaction by an Indonesian district governor not to accept the Australian customs boat carrying refugees that were originally headed for Australia.
These guys have enough problems feeding and looking after their own people as it is. And we're a country with a relatively tiny population and a massive amount of land around us.

I've got to say I'm a bit disappointed that Mr Rudd seems to be trying to find his own Pacific Solution simply because the panic merchants are trying to tell us that we're getting swamped. He is a Labor Prime Minister and he has a responsibility to educate the public on some of the myths surrounding asylum seekers.
I'm sure he's probably a bit nervous considering Howard won an election on the back of the Children Overboard scandal, but he needs to take a stand. And not the sort of stand he's taking now.

The Definition of Hell

...is arriving at the gym at 6am only to discover you've left your iPod at home and you are to be subjected to an hour and a half of commercial breakfast radio. Ugh.

Gotta watch that black magic

It is with a heavy heart that this morning I opened my email inbox to receive the latest "press release" (read - offensive, fanatical diatribe) from Catch the Fire Ministries based over east.

It started out with a mildly interesting claim that the remains of a black (satanic) altar were found near Canberra and that the head pastor believed "dark forces were at work against the Government and the nation." Some might say dark forces were already at work inside Parliament House - has anyone noticed how grey Malcolm Turnbull's hair has become lately?

So the guy organised a mass Christian prayer session. As you do.
There's a little bit more that's mildly interesting (you know, in the way that a spider spinning a web around a fly is mildly interesting) about this black altar being a possible cause of the Black Sunday bushfires (yawn) before I came across this:

"Our main reason for going to Mount Ainslie is to pull down the strongholds of the devil, to repent and pray against any evil done in our land including the adverse affects of witchcraft, homosexuality and of course the devastation of abortion, so that God will save our land,” Pastor Daniel said."

Ummm, hold on. Homosexuality and abortion? What the fuck has that got to do with the price of eggs??

This sort of thing really upsets me. Perhaps it shouldn't. Perhaps I shouldn't let it. Perhaps I'm giving it too much credence by even writing about it now. One can only hope that the news outlets receiving these "press releases" are doing the same thing I'm doing. Hitting the delete button.

Those people

I used to blog, once upon a time, in an office far, far away, about a courier driver (CD) who used to frequent said office.

This CD used to annoy me endlessly with bad jokes, racist observations and generally bigoted points of view.

That was, until I moved offices. He now frequents my office on a daily basis and this morning he came up with a pearler when talking about a Zimbabwean-born journalist that recently began working for us.

CD: "He's a really nice guy."

Me: "Mm-hmm."

CD: "He's really well educated."

*At this point I am reminded of a Boston Legal episode in which William Shatner's character told Jaleel White's character that he was "Very well-educated. You know, for someone like yourself."*

Me: ...

CD: "You know, I really like it when those people (that's right, he said 'those people') get out of their home country, get a good education somewhere else and do well for themselves. Then, eventually, they can go back to their countries and make it a better place."

Me: "Um, yeah. Talk to you later."