Independence activities

This is independence week in several countries – Indonesia is one of them. Independence week involves a variety of activities including a lot of marching. Go anywhere in Bali during the month before Independence Day and you’ll often be slowed down by kids and adults marching in columns along the road. The first few times you see this, it’s one of those scenic things about a foreign culture that you take a photo of and write about to your family and friends. After you lived in the country a few years, the traffic congestion that long lines of marchers cause gets to be irritating. But once you get around to having some children that grow up and start taking part in the week’s activities, you develop another perspective on the whole thing.

So this year, there have been a few events involving kids from the local schools. Today my son and the two daughters that are still here were involved in the annual march. I didn’t know that it was today, so it was kind of a pleasant surprise when I entered the village on my motorbike to see lines of kids and adults marching through the village. By the time I reached the house, my son and youngest daughter were already finished, but did get a chance to see my second oldest daughter march.

Last night Rebecca was in a dance competition along with some of her friends. As usual the plan was to start at 8 pm, so I drove my motorbike over to the community field where the dances were going to be held. The dances started at 8:45, but the delay gave me time to have a nice conversation with my daughter, Mercedes’, former math teacher. The actual performances only lasted about an hour. I filmed all the dances – some traditional, some Indonesian pop – with my mini dvd camera and found out that the camera actually works better in dark conditions if I’m farther away from the light source.

Events like those of the last two days provide some form of entertainment for folks living in remote villages.