Ladies and gentlemen, guess what I have! I hold in my hands... a letter. That's right, a letter,
and this letter is written by a child who lives in an entirely different country from me.
You see, I've written letters to kids from all over the world to try to learn
more about what life is like for families and kids – like you – who live in different places.
So what country does this particular kid live in, you may ask? Well, they live in... Indonesia!
That's right, Indonesia. Where is Indonesia, you may ask? Well,
we're going to learn all about it in this episode of Let's Take a Journey: Indonesia!
Okay, here we go, here we go. I can't wait to find out what life is like for someone who lives
in Indonesia! Dear Justin, Hi! My name is Siti. I am 8 years old and I live in the country of
Indonesia. Ah, Siti! That's a pretty name. My name is Justin… you already knew that. Indonesia
is made up of many, many islands. I live on the island of Sumatra,
and my city is Pekanbaru. So an island is a piece of land that's completely surrounded by water.
If we look at a map of Indonesia, it's pretty clear what Siti is talking about.
Indonesia is made up of more than 17,000 different islands, some big, some small.
Here we can see the island of Sumatra, and there we can see her city of Pekanbaru. This
is a picture of Pekanbaru from up in the air. That is the Leighton Bridge going over the Siak River.
My country is hot and humid all year round. It's like having summer all the time,
but we do have two seasons: a rainy season and a dry season. Indonesia is what we would call
tropical. It's located on the equator, so it's hot and humid all year round.
There are many trees here, and we are surrounded by rainforests, so that means lots of animals
live here too, like this hornbill. One time, I saw a spinning cobra near my front door.
That big snake scared me a lot, but I think I scared it too, because it left when it saw me!
Wow, I guess Siti really is among a lot of different animals. I wonder what other kinds of
animals live in Indonesia. In the early morning and evening, monkeys come out of the jungle.
They make a very loud sound. I was riding bikes with my friend, and a monkey chased us! Luckily,
we could ride pretty fast, and we got away from it. Guess what this is? It's a big,
big lizard called a monitor lizard. We see them sometimes on the side of the road. They don't move
very fast. I saw this one on my way to school, and he was in the same spot on my way home.
We also see little gecko lizards. We call them
cicaks. They like to come inside people's houses, but we don't mind them. They eat bugs.
Would you like to learn a little song about them? Cicak, cicak
di dingding diam-diam merayap, datang seekor nyamuk hap..... lalu ditangkap.
Oh that's cute, they have a little song about geckos! I just wish I knew what it meant.
Oh, here we go! English translation: Lizard, lizard on the wall,
watch it quietly creep and crawl. Mosquito buzzes, lizard jumps! Snap!..... Mosquito
for lunch. So I guess having a little lizard in your house to eat bugs is a welcome guest.
Let's learn a bit more about Indonesia.
My dad likes to ride his bike outside the city. He tells us stories about seeing elephant footprints
and tiger footprints in the dirt. There are so many animals here. Wow, could you imagine
just seeing elephant or tiger footprints while you're just walking along the road?
My favorite is the orangutan. Here is a mom and her baby at a national park in
Sumatra. It makes me sad that people burned the jungle to clear the land.
We smell smoke for many days. I feel bad for the animals that lose their home.
Yeah, that must be difficult. Trying to find a balance between the need to grow and harvest
crops and make room for people while also keeping the jungle healthy and alive. It must be hard.
Let's keep reading. I'm in the third grade. My teacher is Mr.
Hulu. I like him. He's nice to us and he likes to tell jokes.
We're learning English in school. My older brother is helping me write this. He's better at English
than I am. His name is Hasan. He's 10 years old. Here is a picture of him. He likes to be silly.
Hi, Hasan! Thank you for helping Siti write this letter. You're doing a great job so far!
Hasan is always with his friends. There's a park near our house,
and lots of kids from around the neighborhood go there to play.
His friends are usually nice to me, but sometimes they don't want a little sister tagging along.
I also have a little brother. His name is Janu. He was born in January. That's why my parents named
him Janu. Our main language is Bahasa Indonesia, or Indonesian. With many ethnicities and cultures,
there are more than 300 different languages here, but this language is the one everybody can speak.
Would you like to learn some words in Indonesian? “Good morning” is “Selamat pagi.” “Good afternoon”
is “Selamat siang.” So “Good morning” is “Selamat pagi”;
“Good afternoon” is “Selamat siang.” I wonder what “Goodnight is”? Ah,
there you go. And to say “Goodnight,” you say “Selamat malam.” Wow, that's so cool! We now
know how to say good morning, good afternoon, and goodnight in the Indonesian language.
I also have lessons in history, geography, science, and math. My favorite subject
is art. I love to draw and paint. I have two best friends. Their names are Asmara and Endah.
We all walk to school together. My aunt and uncle and cousins live in our building.
They're a lot of fun! I took this picture when we were riding bikes around the park.
We're also learning how to play badminton. It's a very popular sport here! We practice it in
the park. If you've never played badminton before, it's a game you play with a racket
and a little thing called a birdie, and you take turns hitting the birdie over a net.
It could be a very fun, casual game or it could be very fast and competitive.
After school, I'll do some chores, and then I'll either ride my bike, play computer games, or watch
TV. Hm, I wonder if the kind of games and music and TV that Siti likes are the kind of things that
you like. That's a good follow-up question for my next letter. Oh, well, here we go! I listen
to all different types of music. I especially like K-pop and other pop music. Every year in March,
there's a big jazz festival in the capital city of Jakarta. My mom and dad want to take us next year.
Our biggest holiday is on August 17th. It's Independence Day. We spend weeks
getting ready. Oh, it's like how here in the United States, we celebrate our Independence
Day on the 4th of July every year. We dress up in colorful costumes. My little cousin had a
beautiful costume last year. There are lots of fun games and contests! Here are some friends
during a marble spoon race. Keeping the marble in the spoon is hard! One of the games we play
during this celebration is Panjat Pinang. It's a contest to climb a palm tree pole.
Climbing a palm tree? I think I could do that. The palm tree trunk is greased, so it's very
slippery! People try hard to be the winner to reach the top and get the prize. Okay I take back
what I just said. If the whole tree is covered in grease, I don't think I could climb that.
I'll tell you about some of the foods we eat in Indonesia. This is a picture of a
fruit we buy from a lady who sells them on the street. It's called a durian and it stinks!
It stinks? Huh, oh, I see. So this is how the durian looks like when you get it, and you eat
what's on the inside. Durian is delicious, but it smells like... let's just say it stinks bad.
We are not allowed to bring it to school or any public places because, well, it stinks! Well,
now I want to try a durian! It must be really yummy if people are willing to put up with the
smell just to eat it… in the privacy of their own homes, of course. You know, one time I put fish in
a microwave at school, and that stunk really bad. Everyone was mad at me for a month. Ew.
My mom will go to the market to get fresh fruit and vegetables and meat. Have you
ever had rambutan? Of course, you peel the prickly skin. It looks like an egg,
but it's actually like a juicy grape. We eat a lot of rice. We call it nasi. We add rice to
our dish at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. My dad likes to grill spicy meat on long sticks.
It's called satay, but my favorite dish is a spicy beef dish called rendang.
Ooh, so you can see here's some of the ingredients that make up rendang:
garlic, ginger, hot peppers, coriander. This looks really good. I think I'm gonna look up
a recipe and try to make some myself. What do you think? Think I can make a decent rendang?
As a special treat, we get klepon. It's a sweet dough ball filled with brown sugar
and then covered in coconut. Oh, I've never heard of klepon before. Looks good though, doesn't it?
Let's see what else Siti has to say. My mom works at a factory. She makes beautiful fabrics and
rugs. My dad works at the airport. He gets to meet lots of people from all over the world. He likes
his job a lot. Every day, he has a new story to tell us. My mom is calling me now. I have to help
her prepare dinner. I hope she's making rendang! Please write back soon. Your friend, Siti.
You know, Siti, I will write back, and I'll tell you all about what life is like in America!
There's quite a few things that we have in common, although I don't see monitor lizards when I'm
walking around town, that's for sure, although there are parts of America where people will see
alligators come up on land! No tigers though, but we do have mountain lions... no monkeys though.
Wow, that was really fun learning all about what life is like for Siti and her friends
and family in Indonesia! What about Siti's life do you think is different from your own?
Can you think of some things that are pretty much the same?
That about wraps up our journey to Indonesia for today. Ready to stamp our passport?
See you all soon, and in the meantime, remember to always be clever!