Two Indonesian students won trip to France

Mariani Dewi ,  The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Sat, 03/29/2008 11:13 AM

Two Indonesian students won a French language competition in Jakarta Thursday, entitling them to travel to France for study in July.

The competition was organized as part of Francophonie Week in Indonesia.

The winner, Meyrani Siahaan, a student at the State University of Medan in North Sumatra, beat out nine other participants in the final at the French Embassy in Jakarta.

She will be joined by runner-up Mitra Wulandari from the State University of Jakarta for one month in Montpellier, southern France.

There they will attend linguistic training and a series of cultural programs, including visiting various sites in the city and province, as well as an excursion to Paris.

The competition was organized by the embassy and 10 universities in Indonesia that teach French. Each university sent one representative to participate in the final, and the overall winner was chosen by a team of four from the cultural department of the embassy and the France cultural center, CCF.

The participants were asked to write prose, a poem or a script on the theme of "meeting".

"You meet a friend but you can also meet other people. It can also mean the meeting of people from different cultures. It is a very large notion," French Ambassador to Indonesia Catherine Boivineau told The Jakarta Post before the announcement.

"They (finalists) had to explain what this word means to them. The criteria were the substance and the expression in the French language."

Meyrani, who started learning French at the university, wrote a poem on the life of Butet Manurung, an Indonesian female conservationist-turned-activist who has spent years in the Sumatran jungle working to eradicate illiteracy among the isolated tribes there.

Although Meyrani has never met Butet personally, she knew about her from various media.

"I was interested in her because she willingly left everything she had (to live in jungle)," Meyrani said.

While in France, the winners will meet the winners from 54 other Francophonie countries as well as local students. Meyrani plans to use her time before departure learning Indonesian arts, especially Batak dances, songs and language to introduce to her peers.

"They (the winners) will have the opportunity to talk about their own country. They will be, to some extent, ambassadors (of Indonesia)," Embassy's attach* of education and language cooperation Jacques Couillerot said.

Responding to the keen interest of the participants, Couillerot promised the competition, now in its second year, would be held again.

"It is very important to increase the motivation to feel attracted by the French culture. Before this, students had no opportunities to go to France. Now the French Embassy is giving this opportunity for the best ones," Couillerot said.

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