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Ahmad Fuadi: Finding comfort in sharing stories
A handful of people want to step out of their comfort zone because sometimes a comfortable life is just not enough.
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Ahmad Fuadi (Ahmad Fuadi/File)
I
n the late 2000s, Ahmad Fuadi reached a point where he found that his life had become too comfortable. He felt this urgent need to achieve greater things. Back then, the former journalist of Tempo Magazine had achieved the so-called dream of educated middle-class Indonesians.
Born in Bayur, Agam, West Sumatra, in 1972, Ahmad earned his bachelor’s degree in international relations from Padjadjaran University in Bandung, West Java. He got a scholarship from Fulbright to complete his Master’s degree in media and public affairs from George Washington University in the United States.
Ahmad had also received multiple scholarships, including from Chevening, which enabled him to study documentary film making at the Royal Holloway, University of London. In addition, he had a great job as an established and well-respected journalist abroad.
Throughout his journey, from academic life and scholarship hunting to reporting, his family had always been there for him. Yet, despite this supposedly happy life, Ahmad said he felt that something was missing.
“At that time, I had a great time studying, working and going home to a loving family. It was cool. It was comfortable. But then I began to feel that such comforts gave me discomfort for some reason. I began to wonder why I felt that way,” the 44-year-old Ahmad told The Jakarta Post in a recent interview. Ahmad went deep into his heart to find out what was really bugging him. After intense soul searching, he began to remember the teachings from his mentors during his childhood days studying at the Pondok Modern Gontor Islamic boarding school in Ponorogo, East Java.
“I remembered one quote from Prophet Muhammad that said the noblest of men was those who could bring good to a lot of people. After I thought about that quote, I felt that I had been very selfish.
“All my life, the only thing I had cared about was me and my family. I had never done anything for other people,” he said.
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He looked at friends who had been successful in giving back to society.
“Some of them managed to open an Islamic boarding school because they were gifted with the ability to preach. Some were very rich and donated a lot to good causes. They all shared something with other people. I wondered what I could share. I knew I could write, but what kind of stories should I write?”
Ahmad already had a great story to write, but he did not realize it. The person who could see this potential was his wife, Danya Dewanti.
Ahmad and Danya were complete opposites in terms of background. While Ahmad spent much of his childhood in a village near Lake Maninjau in Sumatra and his teenage years in an Islamic boarding school in another small city in East Java, Danya grew up in the metropolis of Jakarta. Despite their differences, they clicked and married.
Ahmad often shared stories from his Islamic boarding school days with his wife. These stories, in Ahmad’s mind, were nothing special and had little interesting value but Danya found them compelling, entertaining and funny.
“City people like my wife apparently don’t know what goes on inside an Islamic boarding school. Therefore, she suggested that I write a book about my experience of living in an Islamic boarding school because she believed a lot of people would find it interesting,” Ahmad said.
In July 2009, Ahmad released his debut novel titled Negeri 5 Menara (Land of Five Towers), which used a fictional approach to chronicle his experience of living in an Islamic boarding school along with his five best friends. Negeri 5 Menara became an instant hit among Indonesian readers and a best seller. Ahmad was awarded the 2010 Indonesian Readers Award for his work and was nominated for the Khatulistiwa Literary Award in the same year.
The success of Negeri 5 Menara in Indonesia also caught the attention of Malaysian publishing company PTS Litera, which decided to translate the book into Malay for Malaysian readers. Ahmad followed up Negeri 5 Menara with Ranah 3 Warna (Realm of Three Colors) in 2011 and Rantau 1 Muara in 2013 and thus completed a trilogy.
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Ahmad said his immediate success as a novelist was due to several factors.
“The market at that time was very friendly for a book like Negeri 5 Menara. There were many successful novels that talked about the education system, which became a hit during that period. For example, Andrea Hirata’s Laskar Pelangi [Rainbow Troops]. My novel focused on the same theme and genre, so the market was very receptive,” he said.
However, Ahmad stressed that while the market was suitable for a certain theme or genre, a novel would not work if it had not been written from the heart.
“I always believe that a good novel always comes from good intentions and writing that comes from the heart. The deepest stories are in your heart. You only need to find them. And once you find them and write them, your readers will be able to connect,” he said.
Ahmad’s success with his trilogy earned him an invitation from the Japanese government to visit Japan as a cultural leader representative for Indonesia.
He said the Japanese government had a program called the Cultural Leader Program, in which people from other countries are invited to visit Japan and experience the life there as much as they want.
“I had many interesting findings in Japan and I might make a novel using Japan as a background. But I need to visit the country more in the future to get an idea of what to write about.
“So yes, writing can take you anywhere.”
