Thursday, February 28, 2008

Cirebon and Its Culture

Cirebon, located on West Java, is known as Wali (Evangelists in Catholic term) City, and was one of Islamic civilization centre in Indonesia. From this city, Islam was proselytized in Western Java. Also in this city, there had been an Islamic dynasty led by one of Wali Sanga, Syarif Hidayatullah, also known as Sunan Gunung Jati. Because of his meritorious service, Cirebon became one of Islamic dynasties playing an important role in proselytizing Islam.

Other meritorious service done by Sunan Gunung Jati was building Sang Cipta Rasa Mosque in 1480s. Located in Keraton Kasepuhan Town Square, this mosque has different architecture from other mosques. This mosque has no dome. Instead of dome, it has a roof which is like roof of Hindi temple. One of the reasons why he built it like that was to harmonize local culture and Islamic culture, so that local culture still could be maintained and people could live harmoniously, even though in diverse religions.

Culture harmonization is not only happened between local culture and Islamic culture, but also among Sundanese, Javanese, Sumatran, Indian, Persian, Syrian, and Chinese cultures. It can be seen by looking at traditional Cirebonese art, for example Cirebonese masks. Masks which are worn by Cirebonese mask dancer and those worn by Peking Opera actors are alike. Another example is acculturation between Sundanese and Javanese language. That is why Cirebonese people can talk in both Sundanese and Javanese language. Acculturation among many cultures makes Cirebonese people have imaginative agility in playing various cultural powers from outside Cirebon. This imaginative agility then implicates into local color of Cirebonese culture.

Historical Sites in Sumedang...

Beside tahu (a deep fried tofu), the uniqueness of Sumedang is its historical sites such as town squares, the Post Road, and the tomb of Tjut Nya' Dien. Sumedang still preserves the style of ancient town design, identified by the town square. There is a main town square in the center of the town which surrounded by many important buildings such as town-hall, museum, prison, mosque, court, market, offices, hotel, and schools. Almost every village has its own village square too, which is also surrounded by many important building. It’s make the activities are focused at certain areas. That town design was generally used by the Hindu, Buddhist, and Islamic kingdoms at 13th – 17th century.


Sumedang is divided by a major road that connected Anyer (Banten) to Panarukan (East Java), called Jalan Pos. This is one of the tree lanes that we could use when we go from the western part of Java to the eastern ones. It was built at 18th century when the Dutch still colonize our country. This road was built to deliver agricultural products, especially tea, from Bogor and Bandung to the other parts of Java. There is a historical spot in this road called Cadas Pangeran, 17 km from the town square. Cadas comes from its geographical characteristic which is rocky, so its construction is really difficult that causes many rodi (forced work) workers died. When Daendels (the governor general for that time) controlled the building process, he asked the Prince of Sumedang, Prince Kusumadinata IX to shake hands. But, the prince gave his left hand, while his right ones holding a keris (Javanese traditional sword). It proved that the prince didn’t agree with Daendels’ policies and ready to be at war to stop the rodi. That incident is immortalized by an inscription with Sundanese writing and a statue of the prince.


The most important site in Sumedang is the tomb of Tjut Nya’ Dien, a woman hero from Aceh. Her tomb was located merely hundreds meter from the town square, side by side with the cemetery of the prince’s families. Her tomb, renovated in 1987, is covered by marble with Latin and Arabian writing as its ornament and Aceh style roof. There is the correct spell of her name in her gravestone, Tjut Nya’ Dien. The ‘kuncén’ (guard) of her tomb said that almost of Acehnese executives have visited the tomb include the GAM soldiers and the TNI who will destroy the separatist movement in Aceh.



Pematangsiantar: An Adipura City?


Pematangsiantar is my hometown. Does anybody know where is it? Well, it’s located in North Sumatra. Pematangsiantar, also known as Siantar, is not a big city. But, it is the second biggest city in North Sumatra after the capital of the province, Medan. That’s about 3 hours away by car from Medan. The distance is 180 kilometres away from Medan. The entrance of the city is signed by a “Welcome to Pematangsiantar, an Adipura City” board.

Some years ago, Siantar is a very nice city. It has a clean environment, the air was fresh, and the trees were grown along the street. Besides, the weather was also great. There's no doubt that this city ever gained the Adipura Award in 1993, 2006 and 2007. Thus, this city attracted many tourisms.

However, there’s a bit peculiar that Pematangsiantar could win the award in the last two years. In 2000, there was a market burnt. It’s a trading center in Siantar, located between two main streets.Emergency posts were built on the street to make the economic of the city stable. The trees along the street were cut down. The repairment made the environment worse. Without any trees at the street and the depraving repairment, the air become polluted. It’s not chilly anymore. Due to the increasing amount of the vehicle, the weather became hotter and hotter. Even after the repairment was finished, the trees were not replanted. They were replaced by the small plants. However it didn’t help at all. The plants decreased. Besides, the rubbish increased again and again. In 2006, Siantar became an uncomfortable city. The weather was hot. It should be inquired whether Siantar could win the Adipura award again in 2006 and 2007. Where is my beloved Pematangsiantar?

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

My Sweet Home Town

Palembang. when you hear of my home town's name, you might think about to popular thing that originated from this city. The gorgeous Musi River and the delicious food, Pempek. Those two things always be the most wanted object by the tourist if they come to Palembang.

The Musi River is one of the longest river in Sumatera that so imporatant for the economic cycle in Palembang. Lots of people makes money from this river by opening the float restaurant that can be found along the the river bank, renting the boats for the tourists who want to enjoy the sight of the river, and so on. it is also a main track of transportation for the big Ship that bring the mounts of coals, livestocks, rice, woods from and t Palembang. in the age of he Sriwijaya Kingdom, Musi river was a source of the gold and also was the biggest harbor for the international trading across the Asia. For this all facts, Musi river kept being maintained and developed by the government as one of the crucial income source for the city.

Second one is the traditional food with the amazing flavor, Pempek. Pempek, that made from grounded fish, actually originated from the chinese trader living in the boat for months and maybe years in the time when Sriwijaya had its glory. By the time, people begin to be customed of consuming it and afterwards. pempek starts being a kind of main food, beside rice, for the people in Palembang. Pempek has different kind of shape and taste. The most popular one is what we call "Pempek Kapal Selam". It does not look like the actual submarine at all, though. It just has a simple shape of a half ball, with the egg inside. We eat pempek with a special sauce that we call "Cuka". The distinctive flavor of cuka and also the unique taste of Pempek, make this food not only become popular in Palembang, but also had been known well almost across Indonesia.

Friday, February 22, 2008

The Flood in My Hometown

Recently, in this long rainy season, Jakarta got some problems. One of them is flood. Some of rivers in Jakarta was overflow. The flood spots in Jakarta are Muara Kapuk, Kampung Melayu, Bukit Duri, Tanah Abang, Tegal Alur, and the others. The Flood made some disadvantages; the hindrance in daily transportation, the disturbance in people’s houses, and financial loss.

The flood made some roads in Jakarta useless. Because of the traffic jam occured in ten kilometers, trucks that have to deliver some stuff and people who wanted to go home trapped for hours. The flood went to the people’s houses. Some of them luckily just had a few centimeters, but the others got two meters or more. This flood ate furnitures, cars, TV, and even some people’s life. The financial loss for those was counted around 4.1 billion Rupiahs. Its the loss of money in trading activity, home loss, delayed business, etc.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

‘Kijing’ Beach : The Great Tourism Objects in Pontianak

There is much for me to tell you about my hometown, Pontianak. In Pontianak, we can find a lot of tourism objects. One of my favourit place is ‘Kijing’ Beach. It is not too far from Pontianak. just about 80 km. In there, we can find a fantastic scenery with long beach, white sand, blue water, and coconut fields. Better than ever, there is one spectacular place in ‘Kijing’ Beach. It’s the island, located about 3 km from the shore. That place is very natural and peaceful.

However, the beauty nature from ‘Kijing’ hasn’t been relized by a lot of tourists yet. The place usually empty, and seems not to be visited regularly. So we will also just find a little food sellers or shops there. I think the government must take a big attention for ‘Kijing’ Beach. It must be reconstructed, so it will at least attracts the local tourists. I hope someday, ‘Kijing’ Beach will be the one of tourism objects that counted for being visited by tourists, not only local citizen, but also international public.

Angklung, an attractive traditional musical instrument from West Java

Angklung is one of the famous traditional musical instruments from west java, which people found very attractive, massive, and concerned about. It is indeed very attractive to watch a group of angklung performs many kinds of music, from an elegant classic to a youthful rock. Angklung music is very simple but yet requires massive people because of its diatonic-based scale that each of notes are represents separately in one piece of angklung. It means that one note, such as "do", could only be played by one angklung. Imagine if in one song, there are 30 combinations of notes and that one person holds one angklung, so there would be at least 30 persons just to play one song. This is what makes a group of angklung usually needs so many people, and so angklung is known famously by its massive players.

This "massiveness" of angklung has created it's own unique bond through the generation. Since years ago, people sure are concerned about this instrument and has been trying to develop it worldwide by performing mini shows and concerts around the country and even overseas. So many angklung groups from very young elementary students to a professional musicians have made these improvements possible in order to save our culture.

Existence of Betawi's Culture-Task 1-Revision


As a result of people coming to Jakarta, Jakarta is influenced by many cultures, such as Chinese, Sundanese, Javanese, and any other cultures. Influences of these “outer” cultures are threatening Betawi's own, unique, culture (the original culture of Jakarta). Many of Betawi's culture is now starting to extinct, such as its traditional house, traditional songs, traditional foods, etc. Kids in Jakarta are now rarely playing traditional games such as Galasin. They prefer modern games to those traditional ones. And now, civilians of Jakarta tend to be individualistic, which is so unlike the original culture of Jakarta, where people live together and care about each other. If this situation continues, Betawi's culture will extinct in so little time.

Jakarta is now trying to conserve its culture, Betawi, by declaring some areas and landmarks as Jakarta’s cultural sites that hold its true, unique, one of a kind culture. One of these sites named Situ Babakan. In Situ Babakan we can find actual people living with Betawi's original culture. Through this, young people of Betawi, who will continue its traditions, can learn about their root. I hope by the existence of these sites, Betawi's original culture will always be conserved.


What is "Heat Exchanger"? (TASK 2)

For them who work in chemical processes such as a chemical engineering, maybe know what a heat exchanger is, but how about the others? Do you know what is heat exchanger? A heat exchanger is a kind of device/machine used for exchanging heat between two flowing streams/fluids (can be liquids or gases or mixed of them). The streams flow through the exchanger separated by a conducting wall (usually made from iron or other kind of metal) so that the heat can flow from the hotter stream to the colder stream.
There are several types of heat exchanger like the shell-and-tube heat, the parallel-plate exchanger, etc. But the simplest type is the concentric-tube heat exchanger which consists of one pipe surrounding another. In this case, one fluid flows through the annular space outside the inner pipe and the heat conducting through the pipe wall. Different from the one we have talking about, in a parallel-plate exchanger, the cold and hot fluids flow through alternate spaces between plates.
Based on the direction of the fluid flow, there are two kinds of heat exchanger, co-current or parallel flow and countercurrent flow. In the first one, both fluids entering the exchanger on the same end and flowing in the same direction along the exchanger, the temperature difference between two fluids decreases during the process. in the second one, each fluid enters the exchanger on the counter flow so that the temperature difference doesn't vary as dramatically as in the first one. Furthermore, we can conclude that in countercurrent flow, the outlet of the cold fluid maybe hotter than the outlet of the hot fluid.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

task 1 Writting abaout my Hometown by William WP




As a beautiful city, Bandung is one of the best place to spend your holiday with your friends or family in Java Island because many reasons. Not only the nice weather, but also many kinds of distro make visitant feel comfortable in Bandung.A lots of cafes placed in Dago Pakar are visited frequently, specially by visitors from Jakarta.Many shops selling Bandung's special food,such as Sundanesse food and traditional snacks which are very delicious to eat (you can share them with your family or friends), are very crowded.
Bandung has so many mall. First, on the south of Bandung, there is Bandung Supermall as the first luxurious mall opened in Bandung. Next, Istana Plaza which has ice-skating rink is located on Pasirkaliki Street, middle of Bandung. We still have Bandung Indah Plaza, placed in downtown, apparently, I think it is the oldest shopping center in Bandung. After that, we possess Cihampelas Walk which have two theatres with affordable price to get the ticket.In the end, Parijs van Java that stands along Sukajadi Street nearby Ciwalk is the most favorite mall to visit

My Unique Bandung (TASK 1)

Talking about Bandung means talking about it's unique geographical history. Bandung was formed by successive volcanic activity which formed great part of Java island. Ancient Bandung, except Dago area, was a big lake surrounding by several moutains such as 'Tangkuban Parahu', 'Malabar', and 'Burangrang'. One time, after a very very long erosion, one hole was made in one chalky area we know as Padalarang. This hole, people called 'Sanghyang Tikoro', was very big and deep so that all the water in the Bandung lake ran out into underground river behind the hole. As a result, Bandung lake dried and some ancient people stayed at Dago Pakar started to enter this swamp area and make a new population there.

This fact makes Bandung different from any other big cities in Indonesia, especially in Java island. When the other cities located near the shore for some reason, Bandung located in a highland in the center of west Java. However, this makes Bandung special and unique. For example Bandung has a longer rainy season and lower temperature than the other cities. As a result even in dry season, nobody will feel hot in Bandung, it's still comfortable for everybody. Nevertheless, Bandung is visited by more tourists than the other cities, especially in a long weekend, because of its beautiful scenery, climate and condition.

Introduction

Hi,Mr. Jati,I'm Hendy and since now,I'll give my contribution to this blog. Thank you very much.

Sunday, February 17, 2008

My Hometown : The Extravagant Bandung

Since its first establishment in the 15th century, Bandung has been one of the most important city in Java. During the ancient kingdom of Pajajaran, Bandung was its capital city. In early 1800s, Dutch Indies Governor, H.W. Daendels, started to rebuilt a city in Bandung. Since then, the beauty of Bandung, which is also called Paris van Java, has been spreaded all over the world. However, it's not only its beauty which made Bandung famous, but also its nice cool weather. In the mean time, Bandung is one of most visited city in Indonesia. Many tourism objects located around Bandung, such as Gunung Tangkubanperahu and the Historical Japanese Cave.
But nowadays, people come to Bandung mainly to shop and eat. There are so many delicious food sold in Bandung. From traditional Sundanese Cuisine in Sambara and Bumbu Desa Resto to mouth watering Chinese Food in Eastern and Queen, delicious Japanese Dishes in Sushi Tei and Momiji until authentic Western Food in Wind Chime and Chiba are served in Bandung. Other tourists' favorites are Brownies Kukus Amanda and Pisang Molen at Kartika Sari.
Another tourist attraction is the factory outlets in Dago, Riau, and Setiabudhi street. Local tourists, mainly from Jakarta, visit these shops for their good quality and up to date clothes which are offfered in affordable prices. They prefer to buy clothes in Bandung to Jakarta because the environment here is more comfortable. They don't care that the price here is more expensive than in Jakarta, especially compared with WTC Mangga Dua. They say, shopping in Bandung is much more relaxing than in Jakarta.
Despite the unsolved garbage problem and heavy traffic jams in main streets, Bandung still has its own appeal to attract people to come. That's why Bandung is an extravagant hometown for me.

Batam Island, The City of Industry and Tourism

Batam, a city that is located near Singapore, is one of the biggest industrial city in Indonesia. Batam has various big industries like electronics, mechanics, steel, petroleum, etc. Companies and manufacturers are also from many countries. Most of the products of the industries are exported, but some of them are sold in Indonesia. Industries in Batam are important assets in adding income of our country.

Batam not only proud of its industries, but also its tourism. Many interesting places in Batam that attract visitors not only local but also foreign tourists. Barelang, which is abbreviation of Batam-Rempang-Galang, is a row of islands that are jointed by bridges. The first bridge, which is the biggest among the others and the best in its architecture, connect Batam Island and Rempang Island. Some people said that the first bridge is the miniature of San Francisco’s Golden Gate bridge due to its architecture. In Galang Island, visitors always come to Camp of Vietnam, a place where refugees from Vietnam had ever been there during the war last days. Beside Barelang, Batam has many beautiful beaches. Batam also has many fine places to relax our mind in the evening. Sitting on a bench in Marina while looking beautiful sunset or listening to the sound of the sea waves and order various menus of seafood in Harbor Bay while the lights of ships in port give a romantic nuance is nice choice. Batam also can be proud of its Coastarina, which has big letters as big as Hollywood’s.

The government of Batam has arranged the objectives of Batam City well. The main objective is making Batam the “copy” of Singapore. Since Batam got the Special Economic Zone (SEZ) status on 2007, that makes Batam has the special authority to makes economic relation to the other countries directly, the government works hard to attracts investor as many as possible. Beside that, the government gives strong regulations in order to improve Batam’s security. The government also works hard to fixes the problem in environment. People hope that Batam can be the modern, developed, and clean city as Singapore does, without leaves its nature and the cultures of Indonesia behind.

Thursday, February 14, 2008

Introduction

Hi. I'm Gilang Hardadi, my ID number is 130 07 030.

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Welcome

Welcome to Academic Writing Class.