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Kevin went to Yogyakarta in mid-April to do several things including meeting with listeners, and the management,
at RRI Yogyakarta, interviewing Pak Galang about a recent Australia-Indonesia student exchange event through
AIAV, plus visit recipients of assistance through AusAID supported activities such as ACICIS and Yogyakarta
- Central Java Community Assistance Program (YCAP)
I left Bali on Thursday afternoon for the flight to Yogyakarta. The flight was good and although the landing
was rough, as it usually is in Yogyakarta, I made it safely to the Ibis Marliboro.
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My first appointment was at Radio Republik Indonesia at their
PRO 2 station headquarters in Jl Geyjan. RRI management personnel (see left) welcomed me to the station
and Pak Saleh, Station Manager, introduced me to his fellow staff members and to a collection of students
and teachers invited for the visit.
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Ibu Munarsih acted as MC and guided the group through questions and answers for almost an hour. Ibu
Ele from ACICIS (Australian Consortium for ‘In-Country’ Indonesian Studies) also joined
me at RRI and spoke to the group about the work of ACICIS.
Many thanks to RRI Yogyakarta and we hope that a proposed KGI Fans’ Day in July or August will
go ahead with support and involvement from RRI, ACICIS and the IALF. More news on that soon.
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Ibu Munarsih at KGI in Bali - April 23rd.
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In the evening I met with Pak Galang Lufityanto and one of the Indonesian students involved in the first
and very successful student exchange activities conducted by the Australia
Indonesia Association of Victoria last January between schools in Australia and schools in the Yogyakarta
area. Fifteen students from Australia came to Yogyakarta last January and stayed with Indonesia families
for 6 weeks. Indonesian student Gufron told KGI that the experiences that he and his Indonesian friends
had were fantastic. Learning about cultural differences from their guests was the very best way to understand
those differences. Students from both cultures got to discuss first-hand the differences and the similarities – a
great learning experience. Check out the June 2009 magazine and listen to KGI before September 2009 to
hear Galang and Gufron talking about their experiences with Australian students in Yogyakarta earlier
this year.
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Pak Galang and Gufron
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On Friday morning I traveled out to Gajah Mada University to meet with Ms
Elena Williams, Yogyakarta Program Officer for ACICIS
and some of the current ACICIS students studying at Gajah
Mada from Australia. Every Friday morning local Indonesian students are invited to call in at the university
to have a sort of conversation club event with those ACICIS students who have some free time. Around 20 students
visited on Friday and there were 5 ACICIS students on hand to chat with. The discussions were terrific and
as expected there were lots of questions about Australia, Australian schools and the Aussie lifestyle.
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In the afternoon I went to visit the Yogyakarta
- Central java Community Assistance Program (YCAP), an AusAID project based in Yogyakarta. This project
established in response to the 2005 Yogyakarta earthquake and has been working tirelessly to help people affected
by the earthquake. This support, and training in many cases has been directed towards income generation, rehabilitation
of infrastructure and housing. Along with YCAP staff I visited two activities in Pundong, about 45 minutes
south of Yogyakarta. This area was badly affected by the earthquake.
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One activity was a community meeting to plan and discuss the assistance program to their community while
the other was a home visit to the home of Ibu Atun, a difabled victim of the earthquake. That
was an amazing experience to see how YCAP through local NGO YAKKUM is helping people like Atun and her
husband and family to get on with their lives. Ibu Atun's one week old baby was a pure delight to see,
and you can hear Atun talking with Rachma from YCAP on KGI soon.
*difabled - - not termed as disabled but rather having different abilities to others in the community
Check the June 2009 KGI magazine for more information about YCAP’s work with local NGOs (YAKKUM and Dria
Manunggal) and the communities of the Pundong area.
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Atun's one week old baby with her grandmother
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Ibu Atun (left) and Rachma Safitri
from YCAP
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