Another head scratching moment for me and for people who assist me - as an Indonesian passport holder I always face the same issue every time I need or plan to go to other countries outside ASEAN. Applying for entry visas, with stacks of documents and tedious preparations required. At the end I always feel overwhelmed filling in the forms and preparing necessary documents. One has suggested to me to change nationality to make it easier for me whenever I need to travel overseas. You know, for citizens of some countries, they have visa waivers so they can just jump up and go overseas anytime they want. As a spontaneous person I feel this visa issue burdening me a lot.
Your comments:
Being Indonesian and proud of it, absolutely. However, if Indonesians would be given an opportunity to be a citizen of, say, Australia, Brunei, Malaysia, United States or Holland, there are many who would want to be a citizen of these countries.
The reason is simple, the Indonesian people are sick and tired of poverty, joblessness and big rupiah... of the rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer.
By the way, I was born in Indonesia and am a US citizen, but my love for Indonesia is no less than anybody else's, and I'm proud of my Indonesian heritage.
Ben Vansulitt
Indonesians can be proud of their country. But also take care of it, please.
Nicolas
It is more important to put values (honesty, truth, tolerance, democracy, etc) above labels (country, ethnics, religion, etc).
Arsene Wenger
You can be a citizen of another country and still be proud of being Indonesian. Why do you have to choose when you can have the best of both worlds? About the restrictions on having dual nationality, like everything else in Indonesia, it can be solved with a certain amount of rupiah.
And please don't even start moralizing about corruption etc. If the country's most treasured trait works to your advantage, then why not? You're happy, the fat cat official is happy. Everyone's happy.
Soedira Soedibrata
Being proud of a country you were born in is like being proud of a piece of steak that someone cooked for you. You didn't raise the cow to adulthood; you didn't butcher it and cook it to perfection. Is being an Indonesian a skill? It's more like a genetic occurrence that someone is born where they are.
Take pride in what you do and what you accomplish personally, not because of a random genetic event. As for Indonesians who try to change their citizenship, well, they probably lost their belief in the concept of Indonesia a while ago. But if you think about it, a lot of Indonesians who still live in Indonesia have also lost their beliefs in the original concept of the Republic of Indonesia.
Is endemic public corruption an ideal of the Boedi Oetomo movement? I highly doubt it. Did Sukarno and Hatta have in mind radical religious movements that would undermine the Bhinneka Tunggal Ika concept of the country? Probably not. Yet these things and many other negative aspects of Indonesian society are prevalent and becoming more so. Some of the questions I brought up need to be asked seriously by a lot of Indonesians but I'm afraid that complacency and the need to not rock this society's boat will prevent any kind of soul searching.
Arbiter
It is a very good article! That is true. people could not as easily hide their characteristics as their own national identities. However, although they change their skin and hair colors and where they will stay or live, their original identities will always follow them throughout life. In these circumstances, people should be honest with themselves about how they could not easily forget their ancestors.
So, I think she is not a clever person if she wants to change her nationality to another country because of the shortcomings of being Indonesian.
All countries, not just Indonesia, have their own shortcomings. Being proud of ourselves and enjoying our Indonesian identities are the best solution.
Ketti
I agree with the writer who is proud to be an Indonesian. I am married to a German and have lived in Germany for more than 40 years, but I still have my Indonesian passport. My children and grandchildren are proud of their Indonesian ancestors and heritage. I always try to explain my German friends about the true situation in our country which is not always easy, because of frequent media reports of corruption and poverty. Nevertheless I am proud of my nationality, hoping that at last the Indonesian government will begin to transform our country into a reliable and trustworthy part of this world. God bless our country and its people.
Diana Schwitzki
I give big kudos to the people who are proud to be Indonesian, and I certainly don't mean that in a sarcastic way. To be proud of a nation that is constantly whining about everything and everyone but still doesn't do anything about it, takes real patience and love. And I admire those people who have enough patience and enough love to be proud instead of ashamed to be Indonesian, because God knows I don't have enough of either quality. Indonesians have no consideration of other people whatsoever, and to say that Indonesia is renowned for its warmth is a load of crap.
Immigration at the airport or anywhere in the country is a complete joke, and I feel like a second class citizen in my own country because, as Jojox brilliantly puts it, we're too busy kissing white men's arses. Indonesians are too busy bitching about each other and are constantly envious of other people's success. It's ridiculous.
It's a real shame since Indonesia is a beautiful country with heaps of delicious traditional food and the diversity of cultures that we have is absolutely exquisite, but people's "bizarre" behavior overshadows all of those beautiful things and, argh, don't get me started all over again.
Ndari
