Kang GURU Travels
to Jakarta, November 2007
Kevin's visit to Jakarta was to collect information basically for the December 2007 Kang Guru magazine. That
meant quite a few interviews, many taxi rides and lots of fun too. In Jakarta Kevin met with TV chef Ibu Sisca,
The Australian Ambassador, Mr. Bill Farmer, and Deputy Ambassador, Ms. Louise Hand plus the Head of
AusAID in Indonesia, Mr. Blair Exell. In Yogyakarta, Kevin met with Indonesian motorbike champion Doni Tata
Pradita.
My first interview was with well-known Indonesian cook and television personality, Ibu Sisca. I met her at her
house for the interview. To my great surprise Ibu Sisca had prepared a very special lunch for me. The food was
Indonesian food of course but there were a few surprises for me. I really like opor ayam but this
time the chicken meat was shredded so at first I didn’t know what it was – to look at anyway. It
was delicious as were the other dishes. I guess there were at least 12 different dishes spread out for me to
try. What a great start to an interview.
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Ibu Sisca talked about her career with food including cooking and selling cakes in Surabaya when she was
still an SMP student, working for Feminina magazine as a food stylist and consultant and finally her past
12 years on Indonesian television. Her cooking program goes all over Indonesia and is even broadcast in
Singapore, Malaysia and she told me that it can also be seen in Saudi Arabia.
Ibu Sisca has written 53 cook books, she has studied in Japan and the United States, travels regularly to
Singapore to work there AND she absolutely loves what she does. Read more about Ibu Sisca, or Ibu Masak
as she calls herself, in the December 2007 Kang Guru magazine.
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The second interview was with Mr. Bill Farmer, the Australian Ambassador to Indonesia. Mr. Farmer talked about
food for the next magazine and how he loves hot, hot food especially food from Padang. He also spoke of more
serious matters such as illegal fishing by Indonesian fishermen in Australian waters, the continuing and
somewhat surprising connections between Australian and Indonesia and also about Tamara, an orangutan born
in Australia and recently returned to ‘the wild’ in Indonesia.
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Mr Blair Exell at work in Aceh 2007
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The next interview was with Mr. Blair Exell, Head of AusAID Indonesia. He has only been in Indonesia for a
few months and it was good to have him interviewed for Kang Guru. Mr Exell talked about his role with AusAID
in Indonesia, his background and past Indonesian experience plus he chatted to me about food. We had to do
that! Check out the article on Blair in the December 2007 magazine.
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Immediately after the interview with Blair, I went to Ms. Louise Hand's house for lunch and the next interview.
Ms. Louise Hand is Australia’s Deputy Ambassador to Indonesia. Louise was keen to talk about her recent
experiences when opening a wonderful new school in Banjarbaru, Kalimantan, for the Basic Education Program in
Indonesia. Food was a hot topic too and you can read more about that interview in the December 2007 magazine.
And I can tell you that Louise is a wonderful cook and loves cooking. Maybe you do too?
Ms. Louise Hand with teachers from the Banjarbaru area at the opening of SMPN 13 Banjarbaru - an AIBEP school
inIndonesia
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Louise and the children chatting at SMPN 13 Banjarbaru
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On my last evening in Jakarta I attended a reception at the Ambassador’s residence for Dr. David David.
Along with a hard working support team including Yayasan Citra Baru in Jakarta, his team of surgeons and medical
staff are doing wonderful work with giving people with facial deformities a better future. Check
out their website now!
On my way home to Bali on Wednesday morning I flew via Yogyakarta. There I met a fine young SMA student who is
destined to become a world champion one day. His name is Doni Tata Pradita. He is already famous in Indonesia,
and overseas too in the motorcross world, for his skill and success with MotoGP for Yamaha. I met Doni at his
school, SMA 1 Sleman where we had a very interesting interview for about 30 minutes. It was Dina from Kediri
who made it all happen as she wrote to Kang Guru and requested that we interview Doni. So thanks Dina for that
suggestion. Doni will appear in the December 2007 Kang Guru magazine for sure.
From Yogyakarta I returned to Bali and onto the job of joining with other Kang Guru staff to finish writing the
December edition of the magazine.
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