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Monday, August 21, 2017

Indonesia, Cool Facts #187

<= 186. Brunei                                                                                                                188. Japan => 




- Monaco protested when Indonesia took a similar flag in use when the country got independence from the Netherlands in 1945
- The flag of Monaco had been adopted in 1881 and the colors had been heraldic colors of the Grimaldi family since at least 1339
- The proportion of the Indonesian flag is 2:3 and the proportion of the flag of Monaco is 4:5
- The colors of the Indonesian flag derive from the banner of the 13th century Majapahit Empire 
- It's suggested that the red and white symbolism has its origins in the older common Austronesian mythology of the duality of Mother Earth (red) and Father sky (white)
- That's maybe why the colors red and white are common in Austronesian flags from Tahiti to Madagascar
- The modern flag of Indonesia was first flown in Java in 1928, which was prohibited under Dutch rule
- Some nationalists tore the blue stripe of the Dutch flag to get the Indonesian red and white flag


Raising the flag of Indonesia in the national palace yard
Similar flags to Indonesia
How the Majapahit Empire naval banner inspired other flags


2. Geography of Indonesia  

- Indonesia is the largest archipelagic country in the world
- Indonesia extends 5120km from east to west and 1760km from north to south 
- Indonesia has 13,466 islands and about 6000 of them are inhabited
- Indonesia's largest islands are Java, Sumatra, Borneo (shared with Brunei and Malaysia), Sulawesi and New Guinea (shared with Papua New Guinea) 
- Indonesia's highest peak is Puncak Jaya at 4884m in Papua 
- Lake Toba in Sumatra is the largest lake with an area of 1145 square km
- Indonesia lies in the Ring of Fire, where tectonic plates meet 
- Indonesia has at least 150 active volcanos, in total there are 400 volcanoes
- Krakatoa and Tambora are both famous volcanoes for their devastating eruptions in the 1800s 
- In 1815 Tambora erupted killing 92,000 people, which was the largest eruption known on the planet during the last 10,000 years
- The eruption in 1815 of Tambora caused the whole world a year without summer because of the volcanic ash that spread in the atmosphere 
- The eruption of Krakatoa in 1883 was one of the most destructive volcanic events in recorder history as it killed nearly 40,000 people 
- The eruption of the supervolcano Toba about 70,000 years ago was one of the largest eruptions in world history and a global catastrophe
- The eruption is believed to cause a volcanic winter and cooling of the climate, which led to a genetic bottleneck in human evolution about 50,000 years ago



Mount Tambora





World's most explosive volcanic eruptions


- Bahasa Indonesia is the official language of Indonesia 
- There are almost 200 million speakers of Bahasa Indonesia in Indonesia
- It's a standardized register of Malay, an Austronesian language 
- The language has been used as a lingua franca in the multilingual Indonesian archipelago for centuries 
- There are more than 700 local languages in Indonesia 
- After Bahasa Indonesia the most common languages are Javanese, Sundanese and Balinese
- Old Malay was already spoken in the 600s in the Srivijayan Empire
- Old Malay spread in the archipelago and was used as lingua franca in the region 
- Indonesian, Malaysian, Singaporean and Brunei standards of Malay are essentially the same language 
- However Bahasa Indonesia and Malaysian Malay have differences in their pronunciation and vocabulary 
- Bahasa Indonesia has been influenced by Dutch, Javanese and Melayu pasar ("market Malay")
- The Dutch adopted Malay as the administrative language of their trading post, when the Dutch East India Company arrived in the archipelago 
- Unlike the Spanish, Portuguese, French or British, the Dutch didn't attempt to spread their language among the indigenous population 
- Unlike many other post-colonial states, Indonesia didn't adopt the language with most native speakers (Javanese) nor the language of the former colonial power (Dutch), but rather the second most widely spoken language 
- Bahasa Indonesia functions as a symbol of national identity and pride and it's a unifying among the various Indonesian ethnic groups
- Indonesian words borrowed to English include orangutan, gong, bamboo, rattan and sarong


Indonesian language infographic

4. West New Guinea in Indonesia

Facts about West New Guinea
West New Guinea or Papua is an island shared by two states, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. This part of Indonesia is the only Indonesian territory in Oceania. The estimates of the languages in this region varies between 200-700. West New Guinea has been part of Indonesia since 1963. The Indonesian people don't have cultural links to the indigenous population.

Independence referendum of 1969
In 1969 the UN accepted the annexation if a referendum was arranged and the population agreed to join Indonesia. Under the terms of New York Agreement, all women and men in Western New Guinea were supposed to have one vote in the independence referendum. However the Indonesian government decided the people there to be to primitive so they used a different method, the musyawarah, which was traditional Indonesian consensus of elders to decide the region's status. So Indonesia then hand-picked 1026 elders who were pressured to vote for union with Indonesia. Soon after West New Guinea became the 26th province of Indonesia.

Calls for a new and fair referendum
Several times after the event, there have been requests by different international organisations and for example Desmond Tutu. In 2011 the Federal Republic of West Papua was formed at the third West Papuan People's Congress and they declared the referendum of 1969 invalid and seeked recognition by the UN as an independent nation. Because of the referendum there were rebellions in remote mountainous areas in 1969, 1977 and mid 1980s. The area gained "'Special Autonomy" in 2001, although the implementation has been partial and often criticized. The Free Papua Movement still seeks independence in the area.


West New Guinea
Free West Papua Movement


5. Aceh Sultanate in Indonesia 

History of Aceh
The Sultanate of Aceh was a regional power in the 16th and 17th centuries, before experiencing a long period of decline. The Sultanate of Aceh was an enemy of the Sultanate of Johor and Portuguese-controlled Malacca, who all tried to control the trade through the Strait of Malacca. At the time the most important exports going through the strait were pepper and tin. In addition to its military strengths it was also a noted centre of Islamic scholarship and trade. Aceh is also thought to be the place where the spread of Islam in Indonesia began.

Dutch conquest in 1903
The Sultanate was established in 1496, when the first Sultan was coronated. The Sultanate of Aceh was the last part of the Indonesian archipelago, which the Dutch managed to conquer. The Sultanate of Aceh survived until 1903 with the support of the British, but in the end they weren't able to stop the Dutch conquest. After the Aceh War in 1903, the Sultanate of Aceh was annexed into the Dutch East Indies.

Rebellions after independence
After the independence of Indonesia Aceh was incorporated into the province of North Sumatra. This event led to the Aceh Rebellion between 1953-1959 after Daud Beureu'eh declared independent. The American gas and oil companies started exploiting Aceh's natural resources in the 1970s under an agreement by the Indonesian government. Aceh's oil and natural gas reserves are one of the largest in the world.

Free Aceh Movement
This resulted in the independence declaration of Aceh in 1976 and started the Free Aceh Movement. Aceh didn't get independence, but the movement got large support from the Acehnese people in the 1990s. As a result the Indonesian government broadened Aceh's autonomy in 2001. In 2003 after some repressive measures an offensive began in Aceh and the province was proclaimed in a state of emergency. The next year in 2004 the people of Aceh suffered greatly from the tsunami.

Peace Treaty in 2005
In 2005 the Acehnese rebel movement GAM signed a peace deal with the government after fighting for independence for 29 years. There was a perception that the tsunami was a punishment for insufficient piety in this proudly Muslim province. Aceh got broad autonomy and the former rebel leaders became the leaders of the Aceh administration.


Flag of Aceh Sultanate
Last Sultan of Aceh, Tuanku Muhammad Daud Syah Johan  Berdaulat
Free Aceh Movement women soldiers and GAM commander in 1999

Timeline

45,000 Homo Sapiens reached the region around this time
2000BC Austronesian people arrived in Indonesia and pushed the indigenous Melanesian people to the far eastern regions
600s Srivijaya kingdom flourished as a result of trade
700s-900s Agricultural Buddhist Sailendra and Hindu Mataram dynasties thrived and declined in Java, leaving religious monuments like Borobudur, Sewu and Prambanan
914 Bali Kingdom was established
1200s Islam started spreading to Sumatra with Arab merchants
1293 Majapahit Kingdom was established, which was one of the last major empires in the region and one of the most powerful empires in the history of Indonesia and Southeast Asia
1512 Portuguese traders led by Fransisco Serrao sought to monopolize the sources of nutmeg, cloves and cubeb pepper in Maluku
1602 The Dutch established the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and it gained foothold in Batavia and Ambonia in the following decades
1800 Following bankruptcy the VOC was formally dissolved and the Dutch East Indies became a Dutch colony 
1903 The Sultanate of Aceh was conquered by the Dutch
1922 Nationalistic students in the Netherlands formed the Perhimpoenan Indonesia movement to campaign for full independence of Indonesia from the Dutch
1942 Dutch rule in Indonesia ended when Japan occupied the country
1945 The Japanese withdrew from Indonesia, which was declared independent and Sukarno appointed as president 
1949 The Dutch recognized the independence of Indonesia after an armed struggle in which the Dutch tried to re-establish their rule in Indonesia
1965 An attempted coup by the the Communists against the authoritarian president Sukarno
1968 General Suharto was appointed president 
1969 The Dutch territory of West New Guinea was incorporated into Indonesia
1975 Indonesia occupied the Catholic East Timor, former Portuguese colony
1990s The Asian financial crisis in the end of the decade hit Indonesia the hardest
1998 Suharto resigned after popular protests around the country 
1999 East Timor voted to secede from Indonesia
2002 East Timor became independent from Indonesia under UN surveillance
2004 First direct presidential elections were won by Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono who won a second term in 2009
2005 A political settlement to the armed separatist conflict in Aceh was reached

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