Campaign Season

Good news! National election + Good Friday = four day weekend.

Real Campaign
Tomorrow is Indonesia's election of the national legislature. I haven't been following it very closely, but I know that the outcome will be extremely important for the presidential election later this year. In honor of the election, here's a picture from Kalimantan (but I've seen the same kind of thing lots of places in Jakarta.)

It's the Indonesian version of lawn signs: campaign posters with pictures of stoic politicians (no artificially whitened teeth or Blagojevich hairstyles) and checkboxes with the corresponding party number. I've also seen some campaign ads on TV that are very poorly spliced into the commercials breaks interrupting all those commercials that I really wanted to see. I can't really comment on those since the only thing I understand of all of them is "Untuk Indonesia," which just means "For Indonesia."

Campaign to Learn More Indonesian
Fun fact about the Indonesian language: to express a belief or opinion, most Indonesians will say "saya rasa," which is literally "I feel." But it is a mark of a more educated person to use "saya pikir," which is "I think." This is the kind of stuff that I find fascinating about learning a new language, all the little cultural assumptions that are hidden in language. Like "terima kasih," the expression for "thank you," is literally "receive" + "love." And "sama-sama" (which means "you're welcome" and is just plain fun to say) is something like "same here." I know I said fact (which usually implies one), but it's hard to stick to just one when I'm learning so much interesting stuff about the language. Please forgive the dorkiness.

Campaign for Having a Great Weekend
Even though I don't have school tomorrow, I'm still getting up early because I'm being introduced to the Jakartan public bus system tomorrow by Ami, one of my fellow teachers. We're going to the national monument and a cathedral, and I'm hoping for cool pictures and all around good times. I love Ami because she's my personal cheerleader for learning Indonesian. She forces me to speak Indonesian when we eat lunch together, and she teaches me songs in Indonesian. Today we performed a song she taught me for our Wednesday afternoon chapel service. And I didn't screw up the words.

Other campaigns I've supported this week:
The Movement for Getting Student Work Off Laura's Desk
Drink More Fresh Juice Society
People Recognizing That Taxes are Especially Painful When You Graduate from College and Move to Another Country in the Same Year
Lovers of Leftovers
Campaign to Stay Up Late for No Good Reason
The Movement to Promote Better Student Grammar
People Looking Forward Visiting Home in Two and a Half Months!