Where does the time go?

 Somehow I have been in Indonesia a month. Time has slipped by so quickly, and now I only have 19 days until I leave Lombok, and 23 days until I leave the country. I cannot believe it. It seems like yesterday I was shaking my professors’ hands as they left me and entrusted me with their precious research when I did not have a clue what I was doing. Luckily, I actually have learned quite a bit from my Master’s program, and I would argue I am an adaptive individual despite my desire for order so I feel actually really confident with the work that I have done here.

I have spent the last month at first learning about the island, the problems that the government is facing, the culture that makes it so vibrant, and about the forest that I have been so much time reading about online and in articles for the past several months. After my professors shook my hand and bid me farewell I sprinted out of the gates… meaning I hung around Mataram for a few days, went to the University of Mataram, realized that I would have difficult buying things because I could not speak the language, and getting acclimated to my little yellow house I am staying in, which is actually a preschool. The yellow house has lots of new friends I have made that keep me company, which startled me at first, but now I am used to like a lizard the likes to go in my trash and eat things and the ants that like to hang out on my computer as I type.

This is my first time traveling on my own so this was sprinting out of the gates for me. I usually have a group that I am with or at least a friend to help me navigate these things. I have been put on the edge of my comfort zone this trip and have been challenged many times, which is good, but also ridiculously scary. Luckily the people are not mean they just find me amusing and laugh at me, which I can deal with. I am a little clunky, clumsy, and eating with my right hand without spilling rice all over me is still a little difficult. I have also gotten over my fear of motorcycles, which is nice given that we have to ride one everywhere.

After a couple of days in Mataram it was time to start my research. I really like being in the villages much more than the city. There is always something to see and do, and I can walk around without fear of being hit by a motorcycle, car, or a horse drawn cart (they are faster then you would think).  The people are also always so nice. At first they are a little afraid of me. The children especially like to run and hide, but then they see I am silly and helpless, and then they start to warm up to me. They help teach me words, offer me food, and laugh when I drink gallons of water after only a little bit of spicy food. Indonesians are also really loving and funny people. They like to make jokes, laugh, smile and talk. Additionally everyone is always outside and in the presence of one another. It is not as much like that in the city, but in the villages everyone is like family.

I have conducted my research in two villages thus far in Malaka and Sigar Penjalin, and I will finish my research in two other villages throughout July. I have conducted 30 household surveys and 4 focus group discussions with two students from the University of Mataram in each village. Although the villages are around the same area they are exceptionally different.

Malaka is a village that is by the ocean and the main road that tourists take to get to their destinations in Lombok. This means that the village and the forest is easily accessible. This also means that the natural resources that the village can offer like rock, sand, and fuelwood are bought and sold in this village. Many people gain incomes from harvesting and processing these things.  This makes the village difficult to deal with when it comes to weaning them off forest resources since they depend on it for their livelihoods, and when they only make $2.00 a day in most cases it is hard to just say no. So we will have to think of things and get creative to think of ways they can gain income without cutting down the trees.

Sigar Penjalin is different in that it has a lot of farms and the forest is really hard to get to. The people that use fuelwood are usually using agricultural residue like coconut leaves, and not the stereotypical fuelwood that one would think of, which is stacks of branches and trees that people burn to cook and produce things. The forest around this area is really hard to get to for most people. You have to live there to want to use it. I know because I was brave enough to hop on a motorcycle and ride up steep hills and rocky slopes to get there. I eventually got off when the motorcycle was fully revved and we were literally stuck in one place on a hill. I walked the rest of the way, and I am so impressed by the women who walk up and down that everyday with 15 coconuts on their heads or fuelwood. I was so tired when we made it to the top of the hill. Their use of the forest was very different from Malaka. There was no fuelwood market they were just using fuelwood for personal consumption and some small industries. The government did have to intervene in this area after over a 150 ha of forest was converted to gardens for the people. They had to do forest rehabilitation and an enforcement program to make sure the problem did not get any worse.

This is also the village where I learned the word hati-hati, which means be careful, and they said it to me every time I entered the bathroom. Here is the reason why. The first time I used the bathroom at our homestay I had to take my socks off because bathrooms in Indonesia are always wet because it is an eastern style toilet and because the shower is just a bucket and a smaller bucket so you just throw water everywhere to clean yourself. Anyway, I was wearing shoes instead of flip flops because I had to walk up the mountain so I had socks on. After using the toilet I wanted to put my socks back on so I leaned against a wall so I would not fall. However, I did not realize the wall was not very stable so all the bricks and cement fell down, which also destroyed their piping system to bring in water. One of the bricks had fallen on my foot/ankle. Agus, one of the students that helps translate for me and do my research called to me to see if I was ok. I was foolishly trying to put the wall back together again, with not surprisingly little success. So we had to go down and tell the owner of the home what I had done, and he scurried off to look at the damage while 6 women surrounded me to help me with my wounds. It was an excellent first night. Luckily we only stayed there for two nights, but it was an adventure.

There is of course more I could say and write, but for now this will do. This country and this island has been good to me, and there is still a lot to look forward to. I get to learn what it is like to be in a Muslim country during Ramadan and see how people celebrate the holy month, I get to go to two more villages and learn about people’s lives, I get to witness the 3^rd democratic election that Indonesia will have had with a candidate that is being equivocated to Barak Obama and another that is like the previous dictator that ruled Indonesia for over 30 years, and I get to read, which is something I never get to do at home. These are my tales for now, and more will come when I have ac

Villages and Tourism

I finished my first round of surveying and interviewing of people in the village of Malaka, and I just got back from the famous Gili Islands where I spent a couple days snorkeling and being a stereotypical tourist. So I finally have time to sit down and tell you about my experiences.

Malaka is a large village with 12 hamlets, and it is just north of Senggigi, which is a beachfront tourist attraction. We were welcomed by incredibly nice people in the hamlet of Lendang Luar. We stayed in a community health center for the hamlet, which was a one bedroom facility with a bed, a filing cabinet, some chairs and some pillows.  For a health center it does not seem to be used very often. In the 5 days we were in the village it was used once for an immunization clinic. I am not sure how often people seek medical care, but there was no doctor as I could tell, and the resources for the medical center seemed limited.

The people were exceptionally friendly though. They made us meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day, and they even made it less spicy so I did not cry when I was eating, which has only happened once. Lombok is famous for their spicy food, and for someone that has grown up on a Mediterranean based diet spicy is not something I am used to. The village head we were staying with offered to take us to the various hamlets that we needed to go to, and when we were done he gave me honey from his hive, which is some of the best honey I have ever tasted. I am working on my Bahasa Indonesian so that I can have conversations with the people here and show the appreciation that I have for their kindness.

            The culture here is so friendly and open. We were able to walk up to homes and people would answer our questions, make us tea, and offer us cookies. They would have a 30 minute conversation and be happy to talk with us. By the time I am done with the day I have had 10 cups of tea or coffee and I am always full. This is a nice change from the United States where I do not know my neighbors and if you try to go up to talk to someone they ignore you or look at you like you have a disease. Even in the Gili Islands a place swarming with tourists and people “like me” I tended to talk to the local people because they saw I was alone and so they befriended me. Sometimes the men were trying to be too friendly/flirty, but it is nice that the sense of distance between people is much less here, and that starting a conversation with someone is not seen as threatening. The only complaint I have is that everyone smokes, which makes breathing less fun.

            So back to the village. We did 30 household surveys and 4 focus groups in the 5 days that we were there. It is actually quite tiring when each interview lasts at least 30 minutes each. We were trying to get a sense of the village and its use of fuelwood for industrial and home purposes. I am learning that this is quite difficult and after looking at the data I need to go back to the village and get a sense of the major industries in each hamlet, which I do not think I know as of right now. I learned this for the next village, and I think we can get a better sense of Malaka if we go back for one day.

As we did the interviews they got easier and easier, and the team started to work together better. We learned each other’s style and we each have strengths that are working well together. I have two students from the University of Mataram assisting me. Their names are Toney and Agus. Toney is funny and knows how to make people comfortable, which is awesome since I am a serious person with little fun in my soul when I am working. Agus is a very level headed individual and is exceptionally helpful when it comes to ensuring the interviews go well. He is quick and knows when certain questions need to be asked, which is nice to have as back up since he can help Toney interpret. I think it is working well. Otherwise they are just two college aged boys that goof around and do thing you would expect, and that is great!

            I think I will find this as I keep going, but education levels and incomes are relatively low in this community. Malaka is a major production village for primary goods for Mataram (capital city of Lombok) and the tourist areas. A lot of people have jobs collecting fuelwood, making bricks, collecting sand, breaking rocks into smaller stones by sitting for hours on end smashing rocks with a hammer for the foundation of buildings. The economic opportunity is limited here, and you can see the impacts that this constant resource extraction has had on the forest. I was talking to a villager that speaks very good English, and he was saying that the children have no incentive to go to school because their opportunities are limited in the village and essentially there is no incentive. Another boy I was talking to in Gili was telling me how much he wanted to be a teacher and show students “they need to go after their ambition,” but there he was serving me food on Gili island away from his family because he could not afford the $70/year tuition it costs to go to the University of Mataram.

            It made me very frustrated to go from the village of Malaka to Gili where all the tourists were. Everyday these tourists pass by this village and they will never know the lives of these people, they will never know their language, and they will never know the kindness of their culture. They come here for a couple of days to have a good time and then leave without even seeing the country that they are coming to. I enjoyed the islands, but it was difficult to know that the tourist experience was all Lombok was to them.

            Hopefully the work I do here will have an impact and can influence policy to offer economic opportunity that protect the environment while offering people ways to gain income. The villager that I mentioned earlier asked what I would do for Malaka. Off the top of my head I suggested having a short nature hike where people could get a guided tour to learn the plant species of the forest. This would give people incentive to protect the forest, would encourage people to stay in school so they can lead the tours, and would hopefully bring income into the community. He liked the idea and may pursue it. I guess what is great about this world is you can create something out of nothing, and I think Lombok and Indonesia is on its way to something as they become a middle income country. I just want to make sure it is not at the expense of the environment or at the expense of the health of people. These are just some of the thoughts as of right now.  

Ecosystem Services, Surveys and Gender

On Sunday I arrived on the island of Lombok, where I will conducting my research and where I will live for the next two months or so. This week has been a whirlwind of experiences as I have been following a group of international researchers that are working on evaluating schemes of payment for ecosystem services throughout the island to talk to government officials and community groups. There are so many interesting elements to the dynamics between people and the environment that I have never considered before.

For those that do not know,  ecosystem services are the benefits that we receive from ecosystems that are important to us. For example, vegetation in forests slow down water when it rains so that it can seep into the soil slowly and then be slowly transferred to streams, rivers and groundwater. Without forests, rainwater will fall to the ground and it will not be captured by roots, leaves, etc so it will hit the ground directly, will cause erosion and topsoil loss, could cause flooding in an area, and will ruin the flows of streams, rivers and ground water. This means that people will not have consistent access to the water that they used to. Forests provide many other ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration to limit climate change, biodiversity to prevent disease from spreading throughout the ecosystem, cultural services such as spiritual locations for local people, plants that have medicinal potential or purpose, ecotourism opportunities, and much more. All ecosystem provide a variety of different services that humans benefit from.

Now that you know what ecosystem services are, payment of ecosystem services is a way to work with local communities to encourage them to maintain or expand ecosystem services in the ecosystem that they live in. So in the case of Indonesia, groups are trying to work with farmers specifically to work on reforestation efforts to promote and expand the ecosystem services that the forest can give with an emphasis on watershed protection. Government entities and nongovernmental organizations (NGO) are giving money or resources to farmer groups to initiate reforestation efforts, but the success of these initiatives is questionable. This group of researchers is looking into ways that these systems of payment of ecosystem services can be improved.

With this team I have been able to meet with Indonesian forest managers, local farmer groups, NGOs, and researchers. I have had the privilege of going through the forest with all of these individuals and learning about this issues farmers are facing, what the forest is being used for by the community, and the challenges forest managers are dealing with in trying to balance all these different elements with a very small budget. It has been fun to learn and listen.

In addition to learning about the forest with this team, I have been developing my research methods with my advisers to study fuelwood usage on the island. Today I had my first run through with my questionnaire. It is clear I have to practice a few more times and edit the survey itself, but it was wonderful to be able to talk to people about their use of the forest. Indonesians are incredibly friendly, welcoming and wonderful people. I was so happy to be in the field today listening to their stories and thoughts.

I was able to meet with the village head with my professor and a student from the University of Mataram that is helping me with my research, and he introduced us to some of the villagers. We started by interviewing the head of the Hamlet. He was a quiet older man that told us of his garden and the crops that he grows. He let us know about some of the use of the forest, and it was really interesting.

The part that I liked the most was interviewing the women. I never realized how gendered fuelwood collection could be, but it makes sense. The women spend about 4 hours a day collecting fuelwood. They walk 2km and collect two bundles. One they use for their cooking, and the other bundle they sell to a man that collects all the wood and takes it to market. The bundles go for 5,000 Rupiah, or about 50 cents in USD. For four hours of time $1.00 worth of fuelwood is not much to collect. In the focus group that was conducted today most of the women said that was their main source of income. Some were married and others were not so this is their only source of income unless special construction projects are started in the village. The women in this province in general are poorly educated and if their husband leaves them, which is likely (divorce rates are about 50% or more in North Lombok) then they are left with very few options to make a living. So they turn to the forest.  

Granted this is only one focus group in a village that I am not going to be conducting further research in, but it was good to see the social dynamics I am working with and to see how people are using the forest. By no means are these results conclusive. I am excited to see what I will find so that I can make policy recommendations that address some of these underlying issues that we find. Hopefully in the end it can help some of the poorest people on the island while conserving the forest ecosystem.