ASEAN Workshop on Cultural Heritage Tourism 2011

 As a Travel Tourism Student at Sahid Institute of Tourism, I was one of the lucky Indonesian students who were able to participate in the ASEAN Workshop on Cultural Heritage Tourism held on 28 September - 2 October 2011 at Bandung together with the Darmasiswa Students of Sahid Institute of Tourism as part of the activities of ASEAN Tourism Resource Management and Developing Network of Heritage.

Darmasiswa (foreign student exchange program) is a non-degree scholarship program offered to all students from countries which have diplomatic relationship with Indonesia to study Indonesian Language and Indonesian’s culture.  This program is organized by the Ministry of National Education (MoNE) in cooperation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA).

Students may join the 6 (Six) Months program or the 1 (One) Year program. The Six-Month program is a six-month scholarship program to study Indonesian language in selected Indonesian Higher Education Institutions. The One Year program is a one-year scholarship program to study Indonesian language and Art (traditional music, traditional dance, Indonesian crafts, tourism and culinary programs) in selected Indonesian Higher Education Institutions.

The main purpose of the Darmasiswa program is to promote and increase the interest in the language and culture of Indonesia in the eyes of foreigners, as well as to provide stronger cultural links and understanding among participating countries. It can be proved by the number of countries interested in sending students to participate in Darmasiswa.

Sahid Insitute of Tourism accepted 13 participants from 7 different countries. All of which accommodates at the provided dormitory at Campus.

Back to the main topic on ASEAN Workshop on Cultural Heritage Tourism, I had so many new experiences such as trying variety of Indonesian Cuisines, watching Sundanese traditional dance and feeling Kampung Sumber Alam’s beautiful atmosphere while swimming in the hot spring water which is located at Jalan.Raya Cipanas no.122, Garut Jawa Barat.

During this week, my knowledge grew wider, my mind opened up more. One of the examples is that, this abbreviated word “ASEAN” is Association of Southeast Asian Nations and it has ten Member States: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei Darussalam, Vietnam, Lao PDR, Myanmar and Cambodia.

I really enjoyed the activities in Community Hong learning all about Bamboo and the Indonesians’ traditional games. Before this activity, I never knew how useful bamboo can be; how it can be used to make so many musical Instruments (like “angklung”) and make toys such as “keris” and grasshoppers from the bamboo leaves, and how a wheat padding equipment can be used as an musical instrument as well as padding the rice wheat.

The most enjoyable part of this workshop was going to Kampung Naga. Getting to experience a night at Kampung Naga was a privilege. It is located on the roadway that connects Tasikmalaya - Bandung via Garut.  The extraordinary view of the scenery and its traditional houses on our way down of 330steps to the village was just simply breath-taking!

Kampung Naga has 113 buildings, with a population of 308 which consists of 108 families but there are only 2-3 people that are originally from Kampung Naga. Majority are from Garut and Tasik Melaya. And the fact that there’s a rule about how our feet can’t be directed to a specific direction (west) because they said it is where the Ka’bah is located and a little of their history was good to know for our knowledge.

The full-day activities were really fun; Fishing with nets, seeing the process how rice were made and waking up to the sound of chickens at early morning and hearing the sound of drums for every hour that went by.

Learning how to make baskets from bamboo looked like really hard-work. The man that was already an expert said it took him 6 years to master it. Each basket uses 70 pieces of bamboo and takes 1 hour per basket to be made.

Witnessing a village with no electricity that has to use some sort of lantern with petrol oil and a rope as their light as the day gets darker at around 6pm with fishes swimming under a cubical bamboo toilet was extremely interesting to experience and see.

Seeing their culture and their way of living was something I could never imagine. So it was a really huge privilege participating in the ASEAN Workshop.

Much appreciation goes out to Sahid Institute of Tourism, the Committees, the lecturers’ and everyone else that made this week a non-forgettable adventure and giving the opportunity to meet people from other parts of the world. Also, I would like to make some time to appreciate STP Bandung/Enhai for the experience of staying at their hotel.

More pictures from the Workshop :

ASEAN-African Conference Museum

Kampung Sumber Alam