Muhammad Cohen

Category: Bali

  • Ubud encounters: Jalanan, Jakarta buskers rock

    Fresh off its Busan International Film Festival triumph, Jalanan played to a standing room only crowd on Monday night at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival.

    Daniel Ziv’s film portrays five tumultuous years in the life of street musicians Boni, Ho and Titi, as well as Jakarta, where Canadian-born Ziv moved in 1999. The charismatic and talented performers, mainly singing on buses, provide the documentary with its storylines and nearly all of its soundtrack and words. By the end of the movie, the three stars and Indonesia’s capital city have all undergone profound, and not always welcome, changes. The film is deeply moving and troubling, yet above all charming and supremely entertaining. You may well cry at the end – because you’re said it’s over

    Jalanan (Streetside) made its world premiere in Busan on October 5 and won the Korean festival’s top documentary honor. The film is due for theatrical release early next year. Ziv and his team are seeking donations via FundRazr to help publicize the movie and fund bank accounts for the musicians. Jalanan vividly demonstrates how much difference a dollar or two makes in their tenuous situations.

    Following the screening under the stars on the huge lawn of the Antonio Blanco Museum, the three star performers rocked the house, accompanied by Indonesian band Navicula. It was one of those nights that makes the Ubud festival so fabulous. For Jalanan and its team, Busan and Ubud look like just the start of their triumphs.

    Totally globalized native New Yorker and former broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about television news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his bio, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook and Twitter @MuhammadCohen.

  • Ubud encounters: Uda Agus, Indonesia get social

    At the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival in Bali, Indonesian short story writer Uda Agus told a story to illustrate how seamlessly digital media has blended with traditional culture. (Look for more from the festival, which runs through October 15, here and at Asia Times.)

    Agus, a native of West Sumatra, told about a tragic day in the village when a teenager came running to his grandmother, screaming, “Grandpa has fallen out of a tree.”

    “Quick, give me your mobile phone,” the grandmother said.

    “Why?”

    “I want to update my status from married to widow.”

    Totally globalized native New Yorker and former broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about television news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his bio, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook and Twitter @MuhammadCohen.

  • Ubud encounters: Bernice Chauly calls foul, Angelo Suarez calls cops

    On opening day at the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival in Bali, a panel on Southeast Asian writers featuring Malaysian writer Bernice Chauly and Philippine conceptual writer Angelo Suarez fielded a question about artistic freedom in their countries. (Look for more from the festival, which runs through October 15, here and at Asia Times.)

    Chauly, who curates the George Town Literary Festival in her native Penang, said, “There’s a huge problem with censorship in Malaysia. I also work as an actress, and I was in a film that’s been stuck at the censorship board for more than a year.” The film features an angel that speaks in English, and a father with five children from five wives. “There are no fixed rules, so someone can just decide that they’re offended.”

    Author of the memoir Growing up with Ghosts, Chauly added, “It’s safer to write in English if you want to be controversial.” We have become extremely sensitive about race and religion. If you’re not Muslim, you can’t use the Allah. It’s ridiculous.”

    Suarez explained there’s a word in the Philippine language Tagalog, kuyog, which means to be lynched by a mob. “If someone doesn’t like your work, you will get lynched by someone in some fashion.”

    Noting, “Religion is always inviting transgression,” he told about the Manila exhibition of a sculpture of Jesus with a penis in his forehead. “It’s offensive to me not because it’s a transgression, but because it’s a bad art. I think some form of aesthetic police has to be created.”

    Totally globalized native New Yorker and former broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about television news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his bio, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook and Twitter @MuhammadCohen.

  • Air Asia Indonesia performance doesn’t fly

    Air Asia founder Tony Fernandes says “Indonesia is the jewel in our crown.” If he’s serious, he’d better upgrade his royal caretakers.

    I’m a longtime Air Asia flyer. I’m used to the budget carrier’s no-frills, pay-for-it-if-you-want-it approach laden with creative surcharges, and I’m resigned to its at best indifferent customer service. But my experience with Air Asia Indonesia was a shock.

    First, there’s the absolutely tacky – and in many jurisdictions likely illegal – practice of requiring that each passenger pay in advance for baggage, whether they have any or not, rather than being straightforward and simply adding that mandatory charge to the base fare. While Air Asia has always dug up ways to charge for services, it’s never gone to this extreme, making customers buy something regardless of whether they want or need it. That goes against the entire Air Asia ethos.

    Far worse was the experience when I tried to fly Air Asia Indonesia from Bali to a family wedding in Makassar. My wife’s youngest brother was getting married, so she and our six year old daughter both had key roles in the ceremony. En route to the airport – I’d been on assignment for Fodors.com – we got caught in Bali’s extraordinary traffic as it prepares for major international meetings later this year, and arrived at 2:40pm for a 3:30pm flight.

    The employee at the desk refused to check us in, even the plane had not even arrived at the airport. And, of course, Air Asia wouldn’t consider rescheduling our flights or refunding our money. We asked him for let us talk to the supervisor; this employee claimed he was the supervisor. We asked him to let us talk to the people at the gate to see if they could help us – again, the aircraft hadn’t arrived yet, so it’s not as if boarding had already begun – and he refused. As my wife pleaded and our daughter cried, the employee seemed to delight in our predicament, rather than show any desire to help us.

    We appealed to other airport personnel, including the security staff, to assist us. They recognized the absurdity of the Air Asia employee’s behavior and tried to intervene on our behalf. Again, the Air Asia employee refused to show any common sense or common decency. Instead, he became confrontational and aggressive toward us. We were in a completely ridiculous situation, but it was clear that the person who could fix it wouldn’t.

    Fortunately, we found an alternative flight to Makassar with another carrier at substantial additional cost, and missed nearly all of the evening ceremonies due to the later flight time. All of this unhappiness could have been avoided if this one Air Asia Indonesia employee had chosen cooperation rather confrontation as his mode of customer service. When purchased our new tickets, we couldn’t help notice that the Air Asia ticket counter’s thick glass window had been broken; apparently we are not the carrier’s first dissatisfied customers in Bali.

    Perhaps worst of all, I wrote to Air Asia about the incident via its website with full details, including the name of the employee. I got an acknowledgement that the item was received but no further response. I tried to follow up without success, then began the whole process again, and again got no reply. No one at Air Asia had the guts to stand up and say the employee followed our rules and we stand by his actions, or to apologize and say they’d try to ensure future customers didn’t face similarly suffer in situations that could be fixed so easily.

    So let me now ask Tony Fernandes whether he thinks his employees took good care of Air Asia’s crown jewel in this case. I look forward to his response.

    Totally globalized native New Yorker and former broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about television news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his bio, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook and Twitter @MuhammadCohen.

  • Fodors.com pick Sarong rises in Miele Asia 20

    Best restaurant lists usually provoke equal parts envy and ennui. I’d love to enjoy some top-notch gourmet experiences, but decorated eateries tend to be upmarket joints where dishes bear little resemblance to what real people eat and are served with sides of high prices and attitude. Moreover, my taste runs more toward dai pai dong jok (congee from a street stall) and vegetarian “meats” from wet markets.

    While working on the Lovely Planet Indonesia guide and the inaugural edition of the Borneo guide, I steered travelers away from Samarinda’s purported best burgers toward authentic local foods ikan bakar lalapan (barbecued fish served with fragrant kemangi leaves) and soto banjar. That’s territory where best restaurant reviewers are rare.

    But on the recently released Miele Asia’s Top 20 list, I found a restaurant that fits my taste, one that I’ve sampled, enjoyed and perhaps even influenced.

    Sarong has been a mainstay at the top of Bali’s food chain for several years. It debuted at number 18 on the Miele Asia list last year and rose to 13th place this year. Friends have come back from Bali raving about Sarong, and I’ve passed the word to others on their way to Bali, many returning with their own glowing reviews. When asked to work on the Fodors.com guide to Bali, I put Sarong on my restaurant list and was lucky enough to sample it, along with some of the island’s other stars including Bumbu Bali and Naughty Nuri’s.

    As noted in my Fodors.com review of Sarong, the menu captures the flavors of Asian street food and family cooking, served in elegant settings and paired with creative cocktails and fine wines. Leaving Sarong, I ran into chef Will Meyrick, and we began talking about the restaurant and the just completed meal. While the scallop appetizer, curry and roast lamb were overwhelmingly delicious, my wife (who is Indonesian) and I focused on the Acehnese specialty burung puyuh sembunyi (hidden quail) – a bird chopped into parts and buried in a mound of greens that in Aceh would be marijuana. We noted that the leaves seemed to overly indulge the Indonesian passion for deep frying. Meyrick defended the dish as capturing the essence of its Acehnese model.

    A few nights later at Mama San, Sarong’s more casual sister restaurant, we ran into Meyrick again. After we thanked him for another memorable meal, he said, “A few of us tried the burung puyuh and you had a point. So we tweaked it a bit. Thanks for letting us know.” We gained new respect for Meyrick for giving credence to our opinions.

    Now we’ll be happy to lend our thoughts to Robuchon Au Dome in Macau at the top of Miele Asia list or its Hong Kong cousin, L’Atelier de Robuchon, at number three. Please send an email to arrange a booking.

    Totally globalized native New Yorker and former broadcast news producer Muhammad Cohen is author of Hong Kong On Air, a novel set in his adopted hometown during the 1997 handover about television news, love, betrayal, high finance, and cheap lingerie. See his bio, online archive and more at www.muhammadcohen.com; follow him on Facebook and Twitter @MuhammadCohen.