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PEOPLE WITH BEAUTIFUL SMILE (INDONESIA)
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PEOPLE WITH BEAUTIFUL SMILE (INDONESIA)
When the hatch of the airplane opens and
passengers are getting off to the boarding bridge, a stifling heat and spicy
smell remind me of something like the nostalgia in my heart and I realize that
I came Indonesia again. Jakarta airport is a Javanese style
building with a gabled-hipped roof constructed with steel pipes. The interior color is unified in
brown. Tropical plantation and
lawn in the courtyard are always well cared in fresh green. In June 12, 1988, I took the flight of
Garuda Indonesia 873 from Tokyo (Narita) to Jakarta. It was my first visit to Indonesia. I had been in charge of a construction work
of a chemical textile plant in Bangladesh for 4 years from 1980 through
1984. I did not know anything about
Indonesia except that more than 85 percent of people are Islamic and it is the
most populous Islamic country in the world. Based on such poor knowledge about Indonesia and experience
in Bangladesh, I tried to imagine what is Indonesia like. It did not take me much time to find
that the people living in this country is completely different from what I had
been imagined looking at the people I met during the short trip from the
airport to the hotel. At that time when I was in Bangladesh,
there was a male-dominated society and most of female Islamic citizens were
concentrating in the housework and they were not in the presence of
others. On the other hand, in
Indonesia, I could find many lively women working everywhere in the city and
offices like in Japan. And
everywhere, they, both men and women welcomed me with a beautiful smile that
makes my heart gentle and cheerful.
It reminded me of old days in Japan. The purpose of the visit to Indonesia at
that time was a business of plastics film production plant. Carrying a technical proposal prepared
by myself as usual, we visited our customers in Jakarta and Semarang by
turns. Our team consisted of 5
persons. Two were from Jakarta
office of the trading company, one from the headquarters of the trading company
and the other one from the headquarters of the company in which I was
working. 4 are commercial and
myself is technical. Mr.R is
Indonesian and others are Japanese. Presentation meeting always starts from
technical part. The both customers
are newcomers in the film production business field. So I had to explain everything in details such as for types,
characteristics and application of the film products, equipment and facilities
required for producing films, utilities requirement, building layout, land
requirement, construction and start-up schedule, operators requirement and
their training program, product quality control, outline of feasibility
calculation and so on.
Fortunately for us, we succeeded to sign a
contract with both companies at almost the same time. I think that Mr.R contributed much to the success of the
business. The plant layout I
prepared were accepted by each customer with the exception of the location of
the entrance, for which the customers decided finally in consultation with “Fusui”
because the owners of the both customers were Chinese originally. It took us for about two months of
negotiation before signing the contract.
At the signing on the contract, the owner of one of the companies asked
me, “You are the technical person in charge are you?” “Yes” I said.
He asked me again, “Can I trust you?” After a few seconds of hesitation, “Yes of course” I
replied. Then he signed the
contract immediately and offered me his hand. What he said depressed me more than any words in the
contract until the plant had been transferred to his company and the products
had been accepted by Indonesian market. As the film production was a new experience
for the most of engineers and operators in these two companies, I introduced a
Turkish film producer to one of the two companies and a Hungarian film producer
to another for training their operators.
I attended ten (10) operators trained in Hungary. Nowadays, most of them left the company
or moved to the other companies but a few operators are still working in the
same company. We have quite a good
time talking about old days whenever I visit their factory. After I retired from the company I worked,
I have visited these two companies for technical assistance and troubleshooting
several times invited by owners. There were two other large film producers
in Indonesia. I visited the
largest film producers in Indonesia located in Surabaya for selling the plant
several times but we could not succeed except only one equipment used for producing
films in 1989. On the other hand,
I became friends with the president of the company. He invited me many times to his plants for assisting the
engineers for improving the plant facilities and adding new production lines. When he installs the new production line to
increase the production capacity or improve the productivity, he decides the
basic plan and the conception of the main process by himself and he leaves
everything details to his staff members.
His policy is very clear.
The main process equipment should be procured from the top manufacturers
in the world one by one giving precedence to the efficiency and the performance
of the equipment. The plant is
completed by its own technology and responsibility while most of Asian film
producers purchase a complete plant from a plant supplier on condition that the
supplier guarantees not only performance of the plant but also product quality
and production capacity. In this
case, however, all equipment will not be always the best ones in the world. Design work for constructing a new line or
modernization of the existing plant is carried out by a project team consisting
of several different categories of engineers. It requires very high level of engineering capability and
experience. Young engineers in
this company work very hard rushing about busily in the world till the plant
has been completed and started up successfully. This is the fruit of the apt policy of the top management
and the effort of the engineers to meet his confidence in them. I used to attend their meetings with
Japanese manufacturers in Japan and also in Surabaya. I also visited China together with one of the engineers in
this company for inspection of the equipment procured in China. They are all diligent and excellent
engineers and will become the management of the company in the future. Actually, a leader of the engineers
when I met him first has become a director of the company now. Besides engineering assistance work, we, my
son and I are running a small export company for supplying spare parts to
maintain the equipment in good condition to several industrial production
plants mainly in Asia. This
company in Indonesia is one of the most important customers for us. I have been to the famous hot spring named “Dogo
Onsen” in Shikoku-island together with the president of the company, Mr.K and
Mrs.K, invited by one of the machine manufacturers in Japan. We stayed in a pure Japanese style
hotel “Ryokan” and enjoyed “Onsen” (hot spring) and Japanese foods. They like “Sashimi”, “Tempura” and “Unagi”
(eel) very much. I explained how
to take a bath in “Onsen” and I went together with Mr.K. Mrs.K also looked pleased it. Mr.K is very interested in the car. He has several numbers of excellent
cars in his garage. I asked, “How
many cars do you have?” Before he
replied to my question, Mrs.K suggested me, “You should not ask him like
that. You should ask him how many
cars do you change a year?” And
then he replied, “I have not changed my wife.” When I had a physical problem, I was very glad to receive mails from many friends in this company saying, “I prayed to God that you would recover from your illness.” The following is the mail from Mr. K. “You worked too much up to now. You need a good rest. I will provide a comfortable room with meals and massage for you to stay in Surabaya for a month or so.” I thought that it would be very happy if I would be able to spend such a relaxed carefree life but I declined his kind offer because I had to go to the hospital periodically. Thanks to the prays by my friends, I have recovered from my illness most probably according to my doctor.
I have a couple of friends since 1988 when
I visited in Indonesia first. One
of them has been invited by Mr.K and working in one of his affiliated companies
in Surabaya. He invites me for
dinner every time I visit Surabaya.
The other one is Mr.R who has just retired from the trading company in
Jakarta and still working in the same company as a sales adviser of gas engine,
cement plants and new jet plane while he has his own companies for air
conditioner sales/repairing and tapioca plantation/starch factory. He has a fishing boat and enjoy fishing
very much and his knowledge about fishes is professional level but strangely
enough, he never eat fish. Whenever we go to the fish restaurant, he chooses fresh and
tasty fishes among those spread on the trays and instructs the recipe to the
cook. He is just watching us while
we are eating fishes. His selection
is always correct but I don’t know how he knows the taste of the fishes. Last year, February 2007, a wide area in
Jakarta suffered from flood. His
house was in safety but all houses and loads around his house are flooded. His family was confined in the house
for a week. I received a mail with
some pictures that he cruised around his house by a boat. Then I asked him if he could catch a
fish. In recent years, a flood is
no rare matter in Japan too. We
had serious floods even in large cities like Tokyo and Nagoya. Flood in the cities occurs when the
instantaneous amount of rainfall exceeds the design limit of the
infrastructures such as the sizes of the side ditches of the loads and the
underground sewage pipes. Let’s change the subject. I was not interested in “Karaoke”
before visiting Indonesia in 1988.
My stay in Jakarta for negotiating with the customers lasted for over
two months. During this period,
the person in charge of the trading company invited me to “Karaoke” very often. There was a nightclub opening till 2 AM
mainly for Japanese businessmen.
Many young hostesses gave us a warm reception with the Indonesian smile. They seemed to learn the Japanese songs by
singing together with us and enjoy it on the other. After they found that my repertoire of the songs is narrower
than theirs, they invited me to sing together trying to find songs that I
know. Thanks to their enthusiastic
and intensive lessons almost every night, I became a good singer and my
repertoire of the Japanese songs became wider than before. Whenever I go to “Karaoke” sometimes in
Japan even now, I remember the “Karaoke nightclub” in Jakarta with nostalgia. Indonesia is the world's fourth most populous country and the most populous
Muslim-majority nation, however, no reference is made to Islam in the Indonesian
constitution. Indonesia is a republic, with an elected legislature and
president. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica
International Yearbook 2007, 76.5 percent of the people in Indonesia are
Islam. There are many other
religions, Christian (Protestant and Catholic), Hindu, Buddhism and so on. They are intermingled in the country
and seem to be friendly atmosphere.
Although we hear news of an act of terrorism once in a while, the large
majority of people are living together happily in harmony and they must be
wishing for a peaceful life. They have many public holidays in
Indonesia. When I made a call to
my friend, he said, “I have the day-off for an Islamic holiday today.” Then I asked him, “Why do you
celebrate Islamic festival? You
are a Christian aren’t you? Are
you converted to Muslim?” “No, it
is a public holiday today.” He said. Incidentally, the following table indicates public holidays
declared by Indonesian government for year 2008. Beside official holidays, there are so-called “libur
bersama” or “cuti bersama”, or joint holiday(s) here and there, declared
nationwide by the government. In
total, there are 14 public holidays and 9 “cuti bersama” or joint holiday(s). This seems to symbolize the
multiracial, multicultural and multireligional nation of Indonesia. Date English
name Local
name
Remarks I found that I took only a few rolls of
photo film in Indonesia when I edit a photo album for my website despite that I
have been to Indonesia 25 times. I
think the reason is that my purpose of visiting in Indonesia were always
business and have gone to sightseeing only a few times. I tried to visit Bali to stay one or
two days on the return way to Japan many times but unfortunately, I have not succeeded
because of sudden change of my business trip schedule every time. In November 1994, I took a holiday for a
week to go to Bali together with my family. We stayed in Kuta for three days to relax in the beach and
look at the sunset, and then moved to Ubud to stay there for another three days
to commune with nature and enjoy Balinese arts. We had a very nice time there and still talking about the
memories in Bali with my family. In March 2002, after finishing a business
in Semarang, I visited to Borobudur together with the business members
including Mr.R. Borobudur is the
place where I really wanted to visit since when I visited Indonesia first in
1988. The sacred Buddhist temple,
the largest in Indonesia is one of the monuments to civilization in the world today,
which still magnificently endures. I still have many places where I want to
visit in Indonesia for sightseeing but nothing is pleasanter than to meet my
friends in Indonesia.  |
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