Deisha Tamar

June 19 2011

The Jakarta Post

(as published here)

 

The Bina Nusantara University English department closed the academic year out with a bang with its annual stage production. 

This year, the faculty and students produced Masquerade at the campus auditorium on June 11 before a paying audience of nearly 300.

In 2009, the English department debuted with The Fall of Men, and the play the next year was Don’t Mess with Charlie. After the success of the first two productions, this year’s play was even more successful, with a bigger audience and more media coverage.

Directed by Venantius Vladimir Ivan, who has directed all the productions the last three years, the script was written by Yani Susanti, an English Department lecturer, who also plays Maritje in the play. Though keeping with the concept of a production by the English Department faculty and students, a Chinese Department lecturer will also join in this year to play a Chinese-Indonesian woman who occasionally grumbles in her native tongue.

After presenting the Western way of life and culture in The Fall of Men, a story surrounding the Roman Empire, and Don’t Mess with Charlie, about Chicago’s mafia, Masquerade harkens back to the Dutch colonial period in 1910, when Jakarta was still known as Batavia. Masquerade represents the multi-cultural and ethnically diverse Batavia that still exists in Jakarta today. Unlike the department’s previous productions, this year’s play features singing and dancing. 

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Deisha Tamar

15 May 2011

The Jakarta Post

(as published here)

World student organization held Asean Youth Congress in Bina Nusantara (Binus) University in Jakarta aimed at empowering the youth. 

The Asean Youth Congress (AYC) that ran from April 25 to 27 was the first ever held by AIESEC, a global, non-political NGO dubbed the world’s largest student-run organization focusing on youth leadership and management development. 

Although AIESEC is contracted from French’s Association Internationale des Etudiants en Sciences Economiques et Commerciales, the organization expands wider than just economic and commercial sciences.

With the vision of peace and fulfillment of humankind’s potential, AIESEC was established in 1948 and now present in more than 107 countries with more than 50,000 members. 

In Indonesia, AIESEC has been around since 1984 and is ranked in the top 10 countries according to Ika Rahmayutari, the president of AIESEC Indonesia. Ika said there were six universities already joined AIESEC; including University of Indonesia, Andalas University in West Sumatra and Diponegoro University in Central Java.

“The memberships would soon be expanding to Binus University, Gadjah Mada University and Bogor Institute of Agriculture,” said Ika.

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Deisha Tamar 

April 21 2011 

The Jakarta Post

(as published here)

 

Foreigners who want to learn Indonesian usually go to Yogyakarta, as the city is famed as the education hub of Indonesia. 

And when they want to have a nice vacation they go to Bali. They may not know, however, that they now can kill two birds with one stone by leaning Indonesian in one of the Island of Gods’ most vibrant cities.

Cinta Bahasa is an Indonesian language school located in Ubud, Bali. Cinta Bahasa, which means “Love Language”, is an abbreviation of aku cinta bahasa Indonesia (I love Indonesian). 

The course provides classes for those who want to master Indonesian. The course is located at Campuhan College, a non-profit school specializing in language and communication training for low-income Balinese students.

The course is also situated in the same place as Campuhan College, which is on the main Campuhan-Sanginggan highway, on Jl. Raya Sanggingan, west of Ubud. Both Cinta Bahasa and Campuhan College are part of the Karuna Bali Foundation, which focuses on education and individual growth opportunities for the Balinese.

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Deisha Tamar Manuhutu

The Jakarta Post

October 24, 2010

(as published here)

Imagine this: Flying for almost 14 hours with five strangers you just met at the airport and spending fi ve weeks in an unknown land with 19 strangers.

If that was the tagline for the US Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) put on their ad for the SUSI (Study of United States Institutes) 2010 program, I would most likely have never given a thought to signing up.  

But, thankfully, that wasn’t their ad. 

The SUSI Global Student Leaders program, just like it says, is a five-week program for young undergraduate foreign student leaders to study in an academic institution in the US to enhance their knowledge of American culture and society. 

It was held by the ECA, which partnered with the non-profi t Academy for Educational Development (AED), from July 26 to Aug. 3. 

This year, the program had several themes: global environmental issues, new media, social entrepreneurship, religious pluralism in the US and women’s leadership. 

The program I attended was new media. I also got to meet other participants in the global environmental and social entrepreneurship areas in the last week of our program in Washington, D.C., for a final conference and cultural exhibit. 

The 20 participants in the New Media program came from Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines. We were all university students in our third or final years. 

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After the first highly celebrated play last year, The Fall of Men, on March 6 this year Binus University's English Department proudly showcased its second annual theater performance: Don't Mess with Charlie

With much anticipation, around 200 people flocked the university's Anggrek Auditorium. The audience comprised mostly students, lecturers and friends and families of the cast and crew. Tickets sold for Rp 25,000 for regular seats, Rp 35,000 for wing seats and up to Rp 50,000 for VIP seats.

The play was penned by Alex Jhon, a lecturer in the English Department, who also played the main character, Charlie. It was directed by Venantius Vladimir Ivan, who also directed last year's performance. The play took four months of preparation and was not just another ordinary theater performance. It was a collaborative effort between lecturers and students of the English Department, as the actors and actresses made this play unique and worth watching. Another plus was the accompanying three-piece band of keyboard, contrabass and drum (all played by lecturers), creating harmonious jazz tunes as the running theme.

In the opening act, a student sang. There was also a poetry recital by a lecturer and a student from the department.

The story was reminiscent of Mario Puzo's famous masterpiece, The Godfather, since it was about the mafia. Set in Chicago in 1942, it revolved around Charlie, a Caucasian 21-year-old man living with his African-American foster family, Mama Jenkin and Bubba. The family runs the Angel Colored Pub. Charlie's life changes after working with Don Carusso, a mafia bigwig and padrone of the Carusso family.

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