Parijs van Java

Given that I have been in Bandung for over two months already and have not yet done so, I will explain a little bit about my Indonesian home town. Located in the Mountains in West Java, Bandung is described by Indonesians as “cold.” Cold, mind you, means a high of about 85° F (28° C) year-round, Instead of Jakarta's 90° F (32° C). Inland, Bandung is an area with no beaches, but a relatively (key word: relatively) low chance of floods, and almost no tsunamis. They say if you live anywhere on Java you live close to an active volcano, and Bandung is no exception. I live close to Tangkuban Perahu which translates into “the upside down boat” and, you guessed it, looks like an upside down boat. Don't worry, while its active, it's not as active as you'd think, and I'm still at a pretty low risk of volcanic eruption, but recently, we've been getting volcanic ash, a toxically fun gift from Mount Merapi's eruption in Central Java. Basically, Bandung is no one-tornado-warning-a-year Michigan, but for someone living on the Ring of Fire, it's pretty dang safe....I feel a Johnny Cash song coming on, how about you? haha.

Enough about eminent doom in Bandung, let me describe life here: Bandung is a strange cross between Seattle, Los Angeles and Boston. Seattle, because it rains A LOT; Los angeles, because of its sprawl and general pedestrian-unfriendly nature; and Boston, because it is the nation's most famous college town. When I googled Bandung's universitas and sekolah tinggi (university and college), I got 10 results, the most famous of which is ITB (Bandung Institute of Technology), which I have mentioned in previous posts. As a result, Bandung has many shops and activities that cater to the economically-deprived college student including book stores, outlet malls, pasta shops, and places where you can buy paper-thin steaks for about $2 or $3. The best part, however, are the festivals every weekend! Usually, there is something going on at Sabuga, ITB's multipurpose building, and if not, some other school has got something to do. Its a great place for an exchange student because I can meet a lot of former exchange students now in college, and I'm not limited to my high school's extracurriculars! Bandung is also home to the military base of the Siliwangi Tigers, which happens to be right next to my school. If you walk anywhere away from school, you are bound to find statues of tigers in scary positions and soldiers in heroic ones.

Bandung also has a rich history, much of which I don't know, haha. I'm sure some of my Indonesian friends will end up helping me out in the comment section though. Bandung was built by the Dutch, who felt Jakarta was just too hot. It was then Nicknamed Parijs Van Java, or Paris of Java, for its beauty, cool temperature, resort-feel and overall European-ness. Nowadays, it still seems a little European, but it has clearly become like every other Java-sprawl: dirty, crowded, and full of motorcycles. It's still quite beautiful, but it takes a little more time to notice. People from Jakarta still come to visit on weekends, which only clogs traffic more. It was also home to the Asia-Africa confrence, a conference that united non-aligned (plus a few aligned ones haha) countries during the cold war. Another fun fact: the first Indonesian president, Sukarno, went to ITB. Hmmm...thats enough history for today.

The only things that I can complain about in Bandung are the traffic and pollution. I have previously described the frequent traffic jams, and the real-life game of Frogger that is crossing the street, but another annoying thing is the lack of a grid system. Jl. Cihampelas is one way and turns into dr. Setiabudi, which ends up with another branch called Jl. Cipaganti. Jl. Siliwangi is somewhere in there too haha. Its a nightmare to navigate on your own and you are not always sure the Angkot you are taking will go the same path the way home. The pollution is also a bit of an issue, although its hardly something unique to Bandung. Foreigners and locals alike develop a cough. One friend tells me that he had a cough throughout his life that magically dissappeared when he lived in Wisconsin for a year (gotta love that Dairy-air ;) ). Sure enough, it came back when he returned to Indonesia.

Once, I went to school very tired and I didn't want to do work, then I remembered that was everyday of my 5 years of high school

Well I think now that I have been to school for 7 days I should talk about my school in Indonesia. I go to SMAN 3 Bandung (Public Senior High School 3 in Bandung. pronounced es-em-ah TEE-guh). Its located in Old Bandung in a building built by the Dutch, which it shares with a different high school, SMAN 5 Bandung. Everyday, Students put on (in my oppinion) ugly and uncomfortable uniforms consisting on a white collared shirt embroidered with your name and school, and an ankle length bluish skirt (bluish pants for boys). Recently, I got my skirt caught in the door of the Ankot on the way home from school. By the time I got off, it was wet from puddles the ankot had driven through. On fridays, you where a shirt patterned with your schools batik. Hopefully, I will be able to post some photos of this. I've been told this is the best high school in Bandung and that if you want to study, you go to SMAN 3 and if you want to have fun, you go to SMAN 5. Getting into high school in Indonesia is more like getting into college in the US: you get into high school based on the grades you had in middle school, not based on where you live. This means I have a long way to drive to school everyday haha. As classes start, the school plays a little western folk tune. I kind of wonder if the school realizes what they are playing since fiercely anti-alcohol SMAN 3 plays “Little Brown jug” on a daily basis. Also, instead of going from one teachers class to another, you stay put on wildly uncomfortable wooden chairs (I've been taking a cushion to school to sit on) and the teachers come to you! Sounds nice since there is less walking, but it means you can't really choose your classes beyond picking a major in science or social studies. I'm majoring in Social studies at our schools only tiny 11th grade social studies class.
Now I'd like to introduce you to the controversy; the reason why my class is so much smaller than all the others: If you major in Science in high school, you can major in whatever you want in college, but if you major in Social Studies, you can only major in a field of Social Studies in college. As a result, students have to take tests to get into a pure science class, and if they fail, they are placed in social science. Also, students are encouraged by parents and teachers to take science even if their interest is in social studies, and those who taking social science anyway are labeled as slackers. This was strange to me coming from PCEP, where most of our best teachers are in social studies, and it seems a lot of kids are pushed the other direction. This school system was set up by the Dutch and my schoolmates postulate that it was to keep Indonesians from fully understanding government, making them less politically powerful and easy to govern. If you haven't already figured this out, the reason my class is so small and that it is the only social studies class in the 11th grade is because SMAN 3 has a reputation to uphold. Not only are the parents of students at SMAN 3 more likely to push their kids into Science, but the school does as well, because the more engineers from the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB for short. Its the Indonesian equivalent of MIT), the better the reputation of the school. At this point, I drew a parallel: I remembered how Mrs. Caldwell, my 10th grade bio teacher, used to tell us she was preparing us to get into the University of Michigan and our school counselors telling us the school requirements were based on those to get into the University of Michigan and Michigan State University. It seems Indonesia is in a frustrating educational position that many students want to change. Good luck to them!
I'll end on a good note telling you about some of features of my school. Our school has really good, cheap, food which you seem to be allowed to eat in class. SMAN 3 has a very nice cafeteria, and (to the annoyance of 3's students) students from SMAN 5 will come to each there causing it to get a little crowded (but not PCEP crowded haha). My school also has two fountains, a garden, and wifi so I find it very pretty to go there. I'm liking my teachers, although I have no idea what most of them are saying, except my German teacher who teaches part of her lesson in English (I think because English is closer to German) and my civics teacher who I think made her lesson partly in English for me.hmm...if theres anything else you'd like to know about my school, shoot me a comment.