By Luci Ostheimer ‘21, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

Pelajaran Bahasa Indonesia

Something I hear constantly in Aceh is menikmati hidup saja, which means “just enjoy life” in Bahasa Indonesia. I’ve heard it from friends, Gojek drivers, students, teachers, fruit sellers, neighbors; I’ve heard it at weddings, beaches, meetings, classrooms, parties, coffeeshops, on social media, everywhere. People tell me to santai, or relax, and enjoy. Duduk duduk dan ngopi - sit and drink coffee with friends. Pelan-pelan, slowly slowly. Tidak apa apa, no problem. Ini hidupku, jadi harus menikmati. It’s my life, so I must enjoy. Just take your time. Jangen lupa bahagia. Don’t forget to be happy.

By Luci Ostheimer ‘21, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

June 15. Today marks the end of my first month here in Banda Aceh and the start of my “summer vacation”, having just finished teaching my final set of classes. After nearly two semesters of teaching online, wondering if I would ever meet my students in person, here I am writing this report, sipping sanger, a sugary espresso riff made with sweetened condensed milk, at my friend’s cousin’s coffeeshop called Blvckbox. It’s a small yet suave cafe that serves a variety of drinks with names like “Smooth Criminals”, “Gangsta”, and “Royal Syndicate”, stylish names that belie a certain edginess common in coffeeshops around here. This is my first time going to a cafe on my own actually, usually I go with friends.While outside is uncharacteristically gray and gloomy for the dry season, things feel relatively normal, though I know that me being here is really the beginning of a new chapter for Shansi and Universitas Syiah Kuala, or UnSyiah, after a two year on-site fellow hiatus.

By Samantha Perez ‘21, UGM Fellow

In a few months time, I’ll have been in Indonesia for a year.

By Samantha Perez ‘21, UGM Fellow

The global pandemic prevented me from making the journey to Yogyakarta in August of last year as planned, and what was meant to be two years in Indonesia became fifteen months. I spent August through April teaching from my childhood bedroom at night, exhausted from my shift as a server at a local restaurant. Most of my friends had moved into the city or across the country, leaving me in the suburbs with my cat as companion and occasional confidant. I would scroll through Instagram stories of friends traveling around Europe, Latin America, sometimes countries in Southeast Asia, and try my hardest to not be bitter about it. Eventually I started to live as if I wasn’t going at all, so as to avoid disappointment.

By Kara Nepomuceno ‘20, UGM Fellow

As a teaching Fellow at Universitas Gadjah Mada, it has been my pleasure and privilege to work with first-year English students and graduate students. In my final semester, I co-taught Academic Writing for graduate students and independently taught Expository Writing for English undergraduates.

By Kara Nepomuceno ‘20, UGM Fellow

Dear Shansi community, 

I hope you are well! Even though I am not yet in Yogyakarta, I have still been able to learn, teach, and grow this semester. I would love to share three snapshots on the themes of education, language, and movement from my first six months as a Fellow. ​

By Emily Peterson ‘19, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

Navigation in Banda Aceh works differently than at home. Instead of maps and street names, most people navigate using other landmarks they already know. To get to our house I learned to turn right at Simpang Mesra, the intersection marked by large statue that looks like the tip of a ballpoint pen. Turn left at a different intersection with a large billboard displaying a woman in a white hijab to get to the mall. Keep going straight and you reach Simpang Lima, the intersection where five roads converge into one roundabout. Turn left and over the bridge to get to the gym and the supermarket.

By Emily Peterson ‘19, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

Navigation in Banda Aceh works differently than at home. Instead of maps and street names, most people navigate using other landmarks they already know. To get to our house I learned to turn right at Simpang Mesra, the intersection marked by large statue that looks like the tip of a ballpoint pen. Turn left at a different intersection with a large billboard displaying a woman in a white hijab to get to the mall. Keep going straight and you reach Simpang Lima, the intersection where five roads converge into one roundabout. Turn left and over the bridge to get to the gym and the supermarket.

By Sydney Allen ‘19, UGM Fellow

When I envisioned my second year as a Shansi Fellow, I pictured deepening relationships with friends, spending days working in the campus canteen, and getting involved in a project or two—perhaps helping to start an English journalism club within my department or assisting with the student-led play. During my first year in Jogja, I tried my best to acclimate and build a community.

Niko Thomashow ‘19, Gadjah Mada University Fellow

“Nikaio, mau ke mana?”  This is the most common question I receive in Indonesia. “Where do you want to go?”  I never fully register the question. Sometimes I try to imagine how my face looks while I’m staring off into the distance trying to find the answer, probably distracted by my own thoughts that are as distant from Indonesia as my farmhouse in the Adirondacks. 

Hyacinth Parker ‘17, UGM Fellow

Since moving to Indonesia, I have made lists. There have been a variety. A list of Western foods I want to make – chicken pot pie and mashed potatoes at the top, though I never remember craving them at home. A list of clothing that I hope the people at the laundry service don’t shrink, burn or lose. A list of self-service laundromats I started going to after they shrunk a friend’s dress, burned my jacket, and lost all of our dish towels. The money I’ve spent for the week. The people who have exclaimed “But you’re Black!” in Indonesian when I tell them I’m from the United States.

Peter D’Auria ‘14, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

Sometimes while falling asleep in Aceh I would feel earthquakes. In a country crisscrossed by fault lines, in a city devastated fifteen years ago by a catastrophic quake and the following tsunami, it always seemed inevitable that I would experience an earthquake before my time there was up. Lying in bed, slipping into unconsciousness, I would suddenly feel the house shaking—the bedroom wobbling around me; the mattress shuddering, and I would think: This is it.

Peter D’ Auria ‘14, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

A butterfly entering your house means that you will have a visitor. It’s become clear that the house I live in does not belong to me. The creatures living here are following their own schedules, pursuing their own agendas. A small brown frog has made my bathroom its home, returning even after I gently evicted it.

Eli Fisher ‘16, UGM Fellow

Over the past two years of living in Indonesia I have seen more Nazi paraphernalia and heard more Nazi references than I ever could have imagined. I’ve seen Nazi salutes in class, swastikas on backpacks, and a parade of about 30 motorbikes driving down the road proudly holding large red flags adorned with swastikas. There was even a Nazi themed café in the city of Bandung, and a wax museum in Yogyakarta, where guests were encouraged to take selfies with a life-size wax statue of Hitler with the Auschwitz concentration camp as the backdrop.

Eli Fisher ‘16, UGM Fellow

I have been struggling with what to write for this narrative for far too long. Should it be funny? Should it be a narrative about my own personal growth? Should it be informative? Should it be a story that serves as representative of a larger lesson? Alas, I have decided to present some stories and reflections, from the sublime to the mundane, about my time in Yogyakarta thus far.

Julia Skrovan ‘15, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

I always had a slightly tricky relationship with the door to the campus office. It’s surprisingly heavy, made of a tinted glass that makes it difficult to see inside, and it opens inward, obstructing a couch that sits in a narrow passageway across from an often busy reception desk. Because of its weight, I often felt as if I were barging in.

Julia Skrovan ‘15, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

“Dari mana? (Where are you from?)” The shopkeeper asked.

It was my time to shine. Freshly arrived in Banda Aceh from my language training in Yogya, I was eager to participate in what I considered safe, predictable introductions.

Teresa Tippens ‘15, UGM Fellow

I’m not sure where to begin when talking about the end of my fellowship. On one hand, I’m exhausted from two years of working a job that’s been more than a little chaotic and living in a place that’s tested the limits of my body and mind. On the other, I want to hold onto the tiny moments of perfection that suddenly crest to the surface and never let them go. But they are water, and they will not be held.

Teresa Tippens ‘15, UGM Fellow

My co-fellow in Aceh, Patrick, and I have a bit of a running joke about our positions within Shansi. I’m the “naughty child” because earlier in the year, I kept forgetting to reply to emails inquiring about my health and safety, which obviously didn’t sit well with the Shansi staff.

Patrick Gilfether ‘15, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

“Dari mana?” As much as a request for information, it is a greeting. When a stranger enters your shop: “Dari mana?” When a neighbour returns home: “Dari mana?” When you enter the office after lunch: “Dari Mana?” When you stop to fill up your bike at the gas station: “Dari mana?”

Where are you coming from?

Patrick Gilfether ‘15, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

Days of waiting: 217

Weeks of orientation: 3

Bags packed: 2

Hours in transit: 29

Longest lay-over: 6 hours

Number of airport showers: 2

Leila Goldstein ‘14, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

I was first introduced to flypaper in Indonesia. The first time I saw it in action, the adhesive paper was already covered with dead and dying flies. I watched as a soon-to-be prisoner flew by with one of her legs grazing the sticky coating. I saw her place down another leg to help with pulling off the first.

Leila Goldstein ‘14, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

There is something exhausting about trying to find meaning in your everyday life. Going from one of the most liberal places in America to one of the most conservative places in Indonesia has been a huge adjustment. And being on this fellowship has made me reconsider what it is I am doing here and my own desires for certainty.

Ruby Saha ‘14, Gadjah Mada University Fellow

The hotel where I stayed displayed photos of boats that had crashed into houses miles away from shore, some of which remain in situ today as memorials and tourist attractions. But it was hard to map these images of debris and desolation onto the clean, quiet little space I traversed between the hotel and the public school where I taught for a week.

Ruby Saha ‘14, Gadjah Mada University Fellow

Saturday night; it’s early still. The band was supposed to play thirty minutes ago, but the stereo carries on blasting eighties hits to an empty bar. Dim bluish lights play across the curved spines of servers slumped over the bar with only a few faded Marley posters for company. Paper bats flap lazily in the hazy corners, lingering remnants from Halloween half a year ago.

Julia Gaynes ‘13, Gadjah Mada University Fellow

During the previous night’s show, when I had struck my inversion for the final pose (too far downstage it turned out), the stage curtains swept over me and I had rolled towards the audience like a cat stumbling into the wreathes of hell.

Julia Gaynes ‘13, Gadjah Mada University Fellow

There was some poetry to the eruption, particularly in the way it shut me in on Valentine’s Day among ash that stuffed up Yogyakarta like dust in a box. Perhaps this was why, after being woken up in the early morning by messages warning me to shut my doors and windows, I walked out onto my balcony, breathed in the gray, and smiled.

Karl Orozco ‘13, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

A role-playing game (RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, either through literal acting or through a process of structured decision-making or character development.

Karl Orozco ‘13, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

Coffee culture.” It was these two words paired side-by-side that I kept hearing before beginning my fellowship in Banda Aceh, Indonesia. “Banda Aceh has a unique coffee culture” is an approximation of what everyone told me about my future home.

Cory Rogers ‘12, Gadjah Mada University Fellow

The Shansi Fellowship is often imagined as an effort to “join worlds.” But this conception, as least as I understood it in the summer of 2012, fails to capture what made my personal experience in Yogyakarta formative and profound.

Tino Merino ‘12, Syiah Kuala University Fellow

I met Aan my third week in Banda Aceh when I approached a group of law students in lieu of taking a nap. He didn’t introduce himself as Aan but as the Alejandro who inspired Lady Gaga to write a song with the same name. I relished the opportunity to answer the get-to-know you questions everyone asks.