J

akarta is set to welcome thousands of songbird enthusiasts, arriving from all over the country to participate in a contest at the National Monument (Monas) on Sunday, Dec. 20.

The singing contest and bird exhibition is expected to attract around 4,000 participants and thousands of bird aficionados from across the archipelago, the event'€™s organizer, Rico, told reporters in a press briefing recently.

'€œWe have already received 1,700 online applications. Usually, applications submitted at the contest venue are triple the online application numbers so we are expecting to welcome 4,000 participants in total,'€ he said, adding that preparations for the contest had been 80 percent complete as of last Sunday.

'€œIn anticipation of such large participant and visitor numbers, we have secured a permit from the city administration to hold the event at Monas field, a sizable facility located in the heart of the city,'€ he said.

'€œI am sure Monas will be packed. In Jakarta alone, there are hundreds of thousands of bird lovers,'€ said Gunawan Moehamad, another organizer.

To attract visitors to the event, he said, they would be providing prizes such as a car, several motorcycles, bicycles and some electronic devices. Singers and comedians will also be present to entertain visitors.

Contestants need to decide which categories they are going to participate in with six different categories in the contest. Each category is distinguished according to its prize and registration fee.

The most expensive category, called Monas Class, has a first prize of Rp 30 million (US$2,148), Rp 10 million for runner up and Rp 5 million for third place. Each participant will need to a pay Rp 1 million registration fee to compete in this category.

The cheapest category, Ondel-ondel Class, provides a first prize of Rp 1.5 million, while runner up and third place will receive Rp 750,000 and Rp 350,000 respectively. Participants wanting to participate in this category will be required to pay a Rp 100,000 registration fee.

'€œLast year we provided Rp 20 million for the first prize in the most expensive category,'€ Rico said.

Each category has set rules with regard to the type of birds allowed to compete. Those birds eligible to participate in Monas Class are the murai batu (white-rumped shamas), kacer (magpie robins), lovebirds and cucak hijau (green bulbuls). Birds allowed to compete in Ondel-ondel Class are lovebirds, pleci (white-eyes), branjangan (horsefield'€™s bushlarks), colibri (hummingbirds) and tledekan (hill blue flycatchers).

The jury would consist of a panel of officials from RnB, an organization focused on bird breeding and protection, explained Rico, adding that the jury would determine a winner based on the bird'€™s activeness (how often and long a bird can sing), the ability to imitate a sound and singing volume.

Gunawan said that this year'€™s bird singing contest would be different from previous years. In addition to organizers moving the event location from Lapangan Banteng in Central Jakarta, he said, the contest would be the starting point for bird lovers in the country to meet and develop a national community.

For example, he said, the organizer would begin to undertake monthly visits to cities across the country to meet with bird lover communities and to campaign about bird and environmental protection.

Cities to be visited in the coming months include Surabaya in East Java, Denpasar in Bali, Surakarta and Semarang in Central Java, as well as other cities outside Java, he said.

'€œThese visits will be a follow-up to the contest,'€ he said.

Rico said that later, at the end of next year, bird lovers would also gather at a songbird contest in the capital to compete for the President Joko Widodo 2016 Cup. (saf)