Tom Pepinsky

Category: Research

  • Signing on from Jakarta

    Greetings, loyal readers. TP here, back again in Jakarta for the majority of this month. Unfortunately, JMP is not joining me this time, as she is busy working and preparing for the arrival of the first of the next generation of indolaysia authors. I'm here doing the final bit of field research for my next big project, on the politics and economics of Islamic political movements in democratic Indonesia. This is the project that brought me here for the last two trips. If any readers are interested in seeing the first results of this research, you can check them out here. Pretty much the main argument can be summed up here:

    5-6-09

    Incidentally, the whole reason why we stared this blog is because I was out here to work on my dissertation. That dissertation is now just months away from being totally completed. Check it out.

    Today is dedicated to the many tasks inherent in arriving for field research: getting a new cell phone number, figuring out where my research affiliate's new office is, contacting interviewees to set up times, buying a bathing suit because I forgot to pack one, etc.

  • Interviews

    I have not had particularly good luck over the past week with my interviews.  When they happen they are good and useful.  I am just having a particularly hard time making them happen.  We make a plan for 10, I arrive at 10, but the meeting starts (at the earliest) at 10:45.  Or, something that happens more frequently these days, the meeting doesn’t happen at all and I am told to come back on some other day and time.  Given that it can take hours to get to some of these places, this does not inspire confidence.  Indonesians call their tendency to be late to things jam karet (rubber time), but this trip it’s much more than just being late for things.  Yesterday I learned that a press meeting that I had been personally invited to attend was postponed for two days–only when I arrived at the place where it was to take place.  I’m having revenge fantasies in which I am holding meetings in which I have something that they want, and if they do not arrive precisely on time I tell them to come back later.  Unlikely.

    So yesterday while consoling myself with some tasty West Sumatran food, I had an interesting experience.  The radio was playing a kroncong song that sounded strangely familiar.  (Kroncong is an Indonesian musical style that combines Western and Indonesian styles.  It frequently has a sort of reggae or Hawaiian feel to it, with heavy emphasis on the back beat.)  I thought and thought about why the song sounded so familiar, and then it came to me: it was a downbeat version of "Walk the Line."  Instead of Johnny Cash’s rich bass, the melody was played by an Indonesian flute or whistle.  Cool.