Igniting Ideas, Making Actions Exposure Program to Yogyakarta
Thursday, 24 October 2019by adminstube
God is always near and He knows His children’s needs. The dream of three young Sumbanese girls, Vebiati Lende, Kristiani Pedi and Naomi Mora Kalak to get to Yogyakarta, finally came true. Yogyakarta on the Java island has become a magnet for young people across Indonesia to come to this city. However, not many students have opportunity and ability to realize their expectations to study in this city due to various things, especially economics.
Exposure Program to Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta is one of Stube-HEMAT Sumba programs that gives Sumba students opportunity, especially for those who have never been to Yogyakarta to study and to do activities in Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta for approximately three weeks effective. The opportunity to visit other places, to interact with people who have different cultural and language backgrounds or have a different way of life will enrich participants to understand humans and life.
Three young students who had the opportunity to study in Yogyakarta were Vebiati Lende (Theology college of Sumba Christian Church); Naomi Mora Kalak (Terpadu Theological College); and Kristiani Pedi (church activist and leader of Sumba youth community). During the visit, they explored Stube-HEMAT's vision and mission and concerned with young generation, sharpen their critical abilities through journalism, discussion of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and homosexuality seminar. Regarding the SDGs, as a global determination to achieve world development goals for human welfare and preservation of nature with 17 indicators, Naomi was interested in a topic of clean water availability because not every people in Sumba get clean water supply; Vebi paid attention to stunting cases among Sumba children; and Kristiani focused on education because Sumba still faces challenges for qualified teachers, schools distribution in each district, and more educational opportunities for Sumba women.
As learning context of Sumba which has agricultural area, they discussed vegetables, especially mustard greens, cherry tomatoes, green lettuce, and fruit in Kuncup garden and observed hydroponic and aquaponic farming systems in Indmira. These activities continued with local food processing from black glutinous rice flour processed into steamed bread, corn for pudding, pumpkin for steamed cake and breadfruit for chips.
In addition, kruisteek or cross-stitching arts became one of the topics to learn many kinds of handicrafts, enriched with batik that uses colet technique and ecoprint which uses leaves to print motifs on fabric. Also, the art of stringing beads, muti, yarn, wire and other accessories into necklaces, bracelets and headbands, which will be marketed in Sumba, provided skills for them. Photography and its tricks such as techniques, angle taking, speed and lighting, became their additional skills to make a product branding. In addition, they joined Stube-HEMAT Yogyakarta training on ‘Learning from Failure’ to open up participants' thoughts about failure and how to make a life strategy, not to be easy to give up.
A visit to Borobudur temple, experience of travelling by train, and a walk along philosophy axis of Yogyakarta completed their understanding about living outside Sumba Island. At the end of the program, they designed a follow-up what will be done on Sumba, such as sharing experience and knowledge with friends in Stube-HEMAT Sumba, producing handicrafts, processing local food into marketable food and giving motivation to church youth to optimize bare land by growing vegetables. From Jogja for Sumba, keep moving and dynamic! (TRU).
