The newly crowned Miss Indonesia Karenina Sunny Halim might have amazed people with her fluent English, but surprised just as many with her poor Indonesian. On the final night of the Miss Indonesia pageant last week, Kerenina needed a translator to help her understand the judges' questions.

Karenina admits this is a weakness but has promised to improve her Indonesian language skills. "It's been hard for me *to speak Indonesian*, because I use English every day," says the half-American woman. "But I will learn. Indonesian is an easy language, as long as we're willing to learn."

Your comments:

This is a very absurd thing. I really don't understand what the criteria of this contest is.

I think, Karenina should not be eligible to receive this kind of award nor is she qualified to be a contestant as well.

Beside the bad criteria, the other thing is bad judges.

Nasrul

It's unbelievable. Why was the jury amazed with her fluent English? Isn't it normal since English is her mother tongue? Her mom is American. On the contrary, the other finalists can't speak English as fluently as she does because English is their second language. But their Indonesian is definitely more fluent than hers.

Sheika Rauf

Pity English is not Indonesia's national language. Bahasa Indonesia has proven not to assist the ordinary Indonesian in any way.

In many parts of Indonesia, it is seen as the language of a conqueror - a language that was forced on them.

Certainly Indonesians would be far better educated using English and could communicate worldwide, which is something they cannot do now.

As it current stands, Indonesians are seen as ignorant and easily manipulated by powerful local groups, even in the Islamic world.

John Ralph

Some Indonesians mistakenly believe white-skinned foreigners should be given more attention than the average Indonesian in public places. This trend is also noticeable in Thailand as well.

Non-white individuals particularly from Southeast Asia, regardless of their educational level, have acquired their colonial subser-vient attitudes passed on by their ancestors.

The cycle has to be broken. It is indeed a farce to nominate a Miss Indonesia who cannot speak Indonesian to represent Indonesia in the Miss Universe pageant.

As to John Ralph saying it is a "pity that English is not the national language of Indonesia" and concluding that mainstream Indonesians remain ignorant. The constitution of the United States of America does not state English is the country's national language. Furthermore, some fellow Americans speak very bad English.

Edward K.

It is time for Indonesians to stop admiring the "bule" look and start to be proud of the real Indonesian beauty!

Kangaranga

I'm not going to blame the new Miss Indonesia. It's not her fault the pageant judges (including the sponsor of the event) are a bunch of narrow-minded people. What a joke! Just like how Ferdinand thinks that 300 million people in China speak "good" English.

Robert Witjaksono

Browse the Internet and see how the whole world is making fun of Indonesia in this event!

I cannot be more embarrassed than now. How can the judges be so completely shallow they cannot even consider the consequences of their choice when they made somebody who knows so little about Indonesia and can't even speak the language represent the country she grew up in?

The judges say that it would be humiliating to choose somebody who can't speak English to represent Indonesia in Miss World. Guess what, now they have humiliated us even more!

Now the big news portals online are talking about how stupid Indonesians are to have even let this happen!

Elisheva Wiriaatmadja

This is very humiliating for Indonesia but it's not her fault. We should blame the judges for their shoddy work.

Angelica

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