Home | Vol 21 Table of Contents | Previous Issues | Contact Us: 07 55278753 / 0405463663 | Email: judybyronbay@yahoo.com
Surat Surat
A Nation Rocked to Sleep
Some thanks for Inspirasi
A life returning to 'normal'
A Nation Rocked to Sleep
Dear friends,
The Cindy Sheehan Peace Camp outside George Bush’s Texas Ranch is HUGE here. It’s now getting widespread attention in the mainstream media; radio stations and websites are giving regular updates.
The Australian media are on to it too: Here’s a link to the Sydney Morning Herald’s story:
http://smh.com.au/articles/2005/08/08/1123353263101.html
another good one is from Bush’s home town paper:
http://www.iconoclast-texas.com/News/2005/31-40/32news01.htm
You can e-mail Cindy direct with your message of support at: scindy121@aol.com
This website has daily blogs from Crawford: www.codepink4peace.org
Below is a poem by Carly Sheehan, the daughter of Cindy Sheehan. Her brother Casey was killed in Iraq last year.
A Nation Rocked to Sleep
by Carly Sheehan
Have you ever heard the sound of a mother screaming for her son?
The torrential rains of a mother's weeping will never be done
They call him a hero, you should be glad that he's one, but
Have you ever heard the sound of a mother screaming for her son?
Have you ever heard the sound of a father holding back his cries?
He must be brave because his boy died for another man's lies
The only grief he allows himself are long, deep sighs
Have you ever heard the sound of a father holding back his cries?
Have you ever heard the sound of taps played at your brother's grave?
They say that he died so that the flag will continue to wave
But I believe he died because they had oil to save
Have you ever heard the sound of taps played at your brother's grave?
Have you ever heard the sound of a nation being rocked to sleep?
The leaders want to keep you numb so the pain won't be so deep
But if we
the people let them continue another mother will weep
Let’s remember that mothers in the US, Iraq and the Holy Land scream and
weep together and they all deserve answers.
Your pilgrim
Donna
North Shore Peace & Democracy mail@sydneypeace.com
Some thanks for Inspirasi
Dear Judy and AIAA and all performers,
Congratulations on the festival and thanks again for the chance to work with you all, thank you Judy, Gill and everyone else who helped and on the success of the festival. Well done for promoting cultural harmony and helping the relationship between Australia and Indonesia to blossom.
With thanks,
Ebony, Wowo, and kids.
Dear Judy and the team,
Congratulations on a wonderful festival to celebrate Indonesian culture.
The Students at Mullum really enjoyed the puppet show – Looking forward to more,
Linda Keyte
Mullumbimby High School
Hi AIAA,
Congratulations to all of you who worked on the festival. It sounds excellent!... Keep up the good work! I hope I can make it to your next one.
Kerensa
Dear Judith and AIAA
Hope you all keeping well!
I want to thank the AIAA team and Judith Shelley for involving me on your last
Saturday event Indonesian Arts Festival at Byron Bay Community Centre.
My appreciations also to those children who were so cute and excited to wear
Indonesian costumes. I enjoyed so much to meet all of you at Byron and to Nina,
Mimin, Alita and Obek ... thank you so much for the yumi-yumi and especially
to Judith and Fam thank you for your kind hospitality.
Now I am back on the Gold Coast and again preparing for the next coming event.
Once again thank you so much and hope will cach up with you soon.
Vera - Indonesia Dance Group - Gold Coast, Australia
Hai Judy,
Here is a pic of Alfie and Rendra doing a workshop at our School - all thanks to meeting them at your festival.
trims
Bibi
Hi Judy,
It was a great pleasure to be a small part of Inspirasi. Again, congratulations on your outstanding work.
All the best, Ken
Ken McLeod
CLIC Mullumbimby
(Speaker Public Forum Inspirasi Festival)
A life returning to 'normal'
[the following letter was recently received from Bambang Suwito, one of the many Bali bombing victims who was helped financially through the Byron Loves Bali fundraising group. The following text is an English translation of the original, which is also reproduced here.]
Greetings,
How are you Ibu Lin? Hope you are in good health & successful in your activities and I also hope all the friends in Australia are always in good condition. I am in good health and soon I will start to practice teaching in the school. The general condition in my school & family are well. Of course, this is because of the kindness of you & friends in Australia. I will never be bored of saying thank you because you & your group have done so much for me. And I will always treasure the kindness from you & your friends in Australia, I salute them for their humanity & always orientated towards the universal goodness. Thanks so much. Three months ago, I sent the proof of the bank transfer receipt from BCA bank by fax to you as well as a letter. Oh yes, now I am sending the proof again of the receipt because I was worried you didn’t receive my previous letter. Now I am a little busy because I have started to be active in an organization in school & in the village. I feel to progress with life to add my knowledge & experience because I know I have to survive in life & find the best solution for my life. Yes, maybe by being more active in the social organization or in school. I hope to gain more positive points by being more active intensely in the organization. The good news is that now I am the head of the youth organization in the village, relatively difficult also to manage people but I am happy that the social circle is supportive & encouraging. Now the organization has an asset worth Rp. 20,000,000 in the form of a shop & other assets. I will be very happy if you can advise about the organisation & towards its progress. An obsession that I realize now for example is to allocate money to buy musical instruments. To buy this, we need Rp 30,000,000 although we only have Rp 8,500,000. Of course we will have to be more involved to find the money to make our program a reality. Part of our plan is to make a music studio for the youth in our village, with the music instruments we can rent it out as a means to make more money for the organization. Many things I would like to make a reality but from before I have an obsession to make a music studio & a library for the public to use positively & of course orientated towards the progress of the public.
I really love music and I can play some musical instruments a bit, for example guitar - although not very well. Many of the young people in my village have talent and potential to plat great music.
I feel that their talent & potential can be better if we have musical instruments that will help & for future planning the youth will have a skill that will help them for their future. Besides, our public have a lack of desire to read, they prefer the visuals of television & other means that requires minimum thoughts – perhaps our community is a community in transition which cannot be categorised as a modern or a primitive community thats why they are really like things like Handset or other audio visual equipment without gaining optimal benefit or sometimes they don't get maximal use of this equipment for their progress and its as though its just a prestige symbol in their life.
I would like our community, like yours, to have the desire to read well so they will be able to have good knowledge in science & other subjects. Even though the books are expensive here, I would like to find a way to buy some books each month with the hope that one day, I will have a library for our community. Sometimes, I go to the second hand book store because I can find good books. With all this in mind, I would like to use some of the money that is for my studies to invest towards the progress of the shop & the rest I will deposit in the bank for my studies. The investment system in our organization gives 25% profit a month. I think apart from making a profit I will also help in the progress of our organization. I ask for forgiveness to change the intention of using the money for my studies because I feel it is a good moment for me to progress with this idea. I will also be thankful if you have advice or criticism about my ideas & I hope to have support from you & your friends for the success of our organization. I thank you for your time & kindness & apologies for writing in Indonesian, maybe many words that are not understood. You know I don’t have any coverage to send letter with English because it must been much wrong spell & vocabulary. Once again I thank you & your friends, wishing them good health & success. Please send my greetings to them & your family. My phone number: 085648270118. I would like to speak to you whenever even if it’s via the phone & I will be very happy if you can send any type of books to add to my book collection. I will appreciate it even if they are used books, I will receive them with happiness & thanks. I hope we will meet again sometime. Thanks for your time & if there are any mistakes or words you don’t understand, I apologise. Have a nice day. God Bless u all, see you next time (I hope soon) bye,
Bambang Suwito
Gresik, East Java, Indonesia
The original text follows:
Salam
Apa kabar Ibu Lin? Semoga anda sehat dan sukses dalam aktifitas anda,saya juga berharap semoga teman-teman di Australia juga selalu dalam kondisi yang baik. Kondisi kesehatan saya sangat baik, saya sekarang juga akan segera praktek mengajar pada sekolah sebagai salah satu pelajaran practice. Secara umum kondisi sekolah dan keluarga saya baik-baik saja, tentu semua itu karena kebaikan anda dan teman-teman di Australia. Saya tidak akan bosan mengucapkan terima kasih kepada anda sebab sudah banyak yang anda dan group berikan buat saya. Dan saya selalu menghargai kebaikan anda dan semua teman-teman di Australia, saya salut dengan mereka semua sebab mereka orang-orang sangat humanis dan selalu berorientasi pada kebaikan.secara universal. thanks so much. Tiga bulan yang lalu sudah saya kirimkan bukti terima transfer uang dari BCA lewat fax dan saya juga tulis surat buat anda juga. Saya kuatir nomor fax yang anda berikan saya dulu salah sebab sampai sekarang tidak ada indikasi bahwa surat saya sudah sampai, saya minta maaf mungkin lama saya tidak kirim e-mail buat anda. Oh yah, sekarang saya kirimkan lagi bukti dari bank sebab saya kuatir surat yang dulu tidak sampai kepada anda. Sekarang saya punya sedikit kesibukan sebab saya mulai aktif di organisasi sekolah dan di desa saya. Saya sangat ingin hidup progress dengan menambah pengetahuan dan pengalaman, sebab saya tahu saya harus survive dalam hidup dan mencari solusi terbaik buat hidup saya. Yah, mungkin dengan lebih aktif di organisasi social atau di sekolah. Saya berharap mendapat banyak point-point positif dengan lebih intens di organisasi. Kabar bagusnya, saya sekarang ketua organisasi pemuda di desa, relative sulit juga belajar memanage orang lain tapi saya bahagia lingkungan social saya mensuport dan memberi dukungan. Sekarang organisasi kami mempunyai asset Rp.20.000.000 berupa toko dan asset lain. Saya akan senang sekali jika anda memberi advis tentang organisasi dan untuk progress organisasi kami. Sebagian obsesi saya juga mulai terealisir sekarang, misalnya sekarang organisasi kami mulai mengalokasikan uang untuk membeli alat-alat musik. Untuk membeli alat-alat itu kami membutuhkan uang Rp 30.000.000 sedangkan kami baru mempunyai uang Rp 8.500.000.Tentu saja kami harus mencari uang dengan lebih giat untuk merealisasikan program tersebut. Planning kami, selain membuat studio musik untuk anak-anak muda di desa kami, alat-alat tersebut juga akan kami rentalkan sebagai pendapatan untuk menambah uang organisasi. Banyak yang ingin saya realisasikan, tapi dari dulu saya sangat terobsesi mempunyai studio musik dan mempunyai library untuk masyarakat kami dan menggunakannya untuk hal-hal positif dan tentu saja dengan orientasi kemajuan masyarakat kami.
Saya sangat menyukai musik, dan saya sedikit menguasai alat musik misalnya gitar meskipun tidak terlalu bagus.dan banyak anak muda di desa saya yang mempunyai talent dan potensi bermain musik yang bagus.
Saya ingin talenta dan potensi mereka akan lebih baik jika kami memiliki alat-alat musik yang mendukung, dan planning jangka panjangnya agar anak-anak muda itu mempunyai skill yang bagus untuk hidup mereka. Disamping itu masyarakat kami kurang mempunyai minat membaca, mereka lebih menyukai hal-hal yang bersifat visual seperti TV dan hal-hal yang bersifat instant tanpa melalui proses berfikir mungkin masyarakat kami adalah masyarakat transisi yang tidak dapat dikategorikan sebagai masyarakat modern atau primitive maka mereka sangat menyukai alat-alat seperti Handset atau alat-alat audio visual lainnya tanpa mengambil manfaat optimal atau kadang mereka tidak dapat maximal menggunakan alat-alat tersebut untuk kemajuan dan sepertinya hanya sebagai prestise symbol dalam hidup mereka.
Saya sangat ingin masyarakat kami seperti masyarakat anda yang mempunyai minat baca sangat bagus,sehingga mereka mempunyai pengetahuan yang baik dalam sains atau hal-hal lain. Meskipun disini harga buku sangat mahal saya berusaha setiap bulan membeli beberapa judul buku dengan harapan suatu saat saya mempunyai library untuk masyarakat kami. Kadang saya pergi ke pasar buku-buku bekas, sebab kadang-kadang saya menemukan buku bagus di tempat itu. Dengan pertimbangan hal-hal itu maka saya ingin mengambil uang sekolah saya sekarang, dengan asumsi uang tersebut sebagian saya investasikan buat kemajuan toko kami dan sebagian tetap saya simpan di bank untuk keperluan sekolah. System investsi di organisasi kami adalah bagi hasil dengan persentase keuntungan 25 % tiap bulan, saya pikir disamping saya mendapat untung juga untuk mengembangkan organisasi kami. Selanjutnya sebagian keuntungan organisasi akan kami alokasikan untuk melakukan program kerja organisasi. Saya minta maaf harus merubah rencana soal uang sekolah, sebab peluang untuk berkembang saat ini saya pikir momentnya cukup bagus. Saya juga sangat berterima kasih jika anda memberi advis atau kritik tentang ide-ide saya dan saya harap suport dari anda dan teman-teman group anda untuk kesuksesan organisasi kami. Saya ucapkan terima kasih atas waktu anda, juga atas kebaikan anda dan maaf saya menulis surat dalam bahasa Indonesia.mungkin banyak kata-kata yang tidak mengerti.You know, I don’t have any coverage to send letter with English because its must been much wrong spell and vocabulary. Sekali lagi saya terima kasih kepada anda dan teman-teman, semoga mereka semua sehat dan sukses. Tolong sampaikan salam saya buat mereka dan keluarga anda ( kabar suami dan anak anda " sean " bagus? ) Ini no telp saya 085648270118,kapan-kapan saya ingin berbicara dengan anda walaupun via telephone dan saya akan senang sekali jika anda mengirimi buku-buku apa saja untuk tambahan koleksi buku saya. Saya sangat menghargai meskipun buku bekas saya akan terima dengan senang hati dan rasa terima kasih. Saya berharap dapat bertemu lagi dengan anda kapan-kapan.thanks atas waktu anda dan jika ada kata yang salah atau tidak mengerti saya minta maaf.
Have a nice day and God Bless u All, see you next time ( I hope soon ) bye !
Salam
Bambang Suwito