My Faculty, Ilmu Budaya.








The Indonesian Language and Culture Learning Service (INCULS) at Faculty of Cultural Sciences provide courses and workshops for a foreigner who are interested in Indonesian, Indonesian Culture and local languages and already offers to regular programs to many other universities such as University of California, Monash University etc.


The classroom


School Bell! Literally a bell being rung by a staff member every hour.

Our language teachers and tutors are really very interactive, constantly speaking and pointing to daily objects to add on new vocabulary, and the first day in class learning language was a little dry, although constant interaction are emphasized. It is going to be a steep learning curve though, as several of our teachers don’t really know English and everything was in Bahasa.

Over at INCULS there were many other students from all over the world, Australia, Libya, Japan, Korea, Holland, Belgium, Britain and even another guy from Singapore, and the funny thing is that they are unable to communicate in English because they only speak their native language but are fluent in Bahasa! It’s odd to be seeing all these people of other nationalities speaking Bahasa instead of other languages. There were Koreans, Japanese, and Africans all speaking to each other in Bahasa, a very unusual sight indeed.


one of the school cafes at the Economics Faculty.


Motorcycle park

There’s a small canteen right beside the faculty, and the canteen food was actually pretty good. You could get a bowl of mee soto ayam for only 4,000rp (S$0.70), drinks are a typical 1,000rp (S$0.14). Talk about really affordable school food! A lunch in school for under a dollar.


canteen













Mee Soto Ayam

The culture here at the Canteen is a little different, you order your food and it will get delivered to your table, besides the locals here don’t demand payment upon delivery, you only go back to the stall to pay once you have finished your food. The locals here don’t seem overly concerned about people cheating them and leaving without paying, honesty is very well respected over here. Moreover, the stall owners are always very polite, smiling when taking your order and they don’t ever seem flustered despite the midday lunch rush hour. A very pleasant experience if you ask me, something we don’t get back home.

After class was a short trip to Ambarrukmo plaza, or “Arm-plus” as it is known to the locals.

Ambarrukmo Plaza Mall is the largest mall and one of the only 3 malls in Yogyakarta and its located at Jalan Laksda Adisucipto which is a strategic road linking Yogyakarta, Solo and Surabaya. Plaza Ambarrukmo has 7 floors, with Carrefour Hypermarket, Centro Department Store, Gramedia Book Store, Timezone, Cineplex 21 etc. Watching a movie here costs 25,000rp (S$3.60), a real steal compared with back at home where movies typically cost $8-10.

Dinner was a 20,000rp (S$2.87) affair at Tamansari food court.

In Indonesia Water from the tap is not potable, and we gotta buy water, which is pretty cheap at 10,000rp (S$1.20) for 19 Litres.

There is actually a risk of buying "fake bottled" water on the streets, and the locals here trust the "AQUA" brand by Danone, there's even a hologram to certify that the water bottled in this bottle is "genuine" drinking water.






Came across this on the streets... Couldn't help but take a photo.. Large packs of semen.