I’m planning to start research in
Tectonic activity is what makes this country what it is, literally.
When I opened my local bank account, they handed me a list of numbers to choose from, just as they did when I bought my cell phone. This wasn’t aesthetic courtesy either; it was a very serious matter. I explained I don’t really care about the number - I’m foreign – and they just laughed. What an ignorant bule I am.
The current president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (“SBY”/ “Es-Be-Ye”), is actually in some political trouble over his apparent bad luck. His tenure has been marred by such a string of natural and human disasters that nothing short of a presidential-sized jinx can explain it: the tsunami, the earthquakes along the southern coast of
A couple of years ago in Yogya I arrived in a Bahasa Indonesia class and found my young teacher horrified at my sight (in itself not surprising, I guess). How could I have worn a green t-shirt so nonchalantly? Don’t I have other t-shirts? Everyone knows the Queen of the South loves green. She’ll come and get me and my teacher with me. Never – ever – wear green to the beach. Better not to wear it too close to the coast either.
But bad luck, superstition, or tectonic realities don’t always affect policy. Apparently there are plans for a bridge across the Sunda Straits that separate Java from
“Minister says 24 Indonesian islands disappeared: report”
Eid mubbarak, merry Christmas and (belated) happy Hannukah.
--
“The Chinese phrase for 'research' sounds a lot like that for 'alcohol and cigarettes'… "yanjiu" is research in Chinese, while "yan" = cigarettes and "jiu" = alcohol, albeit in different tones.”
- Beijing-J, (why she thought of this now, in the context of my fieldwork, is beyond me)
2 comments:
What I think you are saying is that superstition is correlated with the impact of unpredictable events on a given culture. Why is it that imagined causality is better than none at all? Or is it that only for the truly unpredictable there is simply no harm in a fictitious explanation? Surely I would feel horrible if my green shirt had 'caused' a tsunami, but would I really feel better if my blue shirt hadn't?
If I gaze at the ocean apprehensively, scanning the horizon for a distant wall of water, will my blue shirt comfort me? Is it conducive to a less anxious emotional state in the face of possible calamity?
Love,
Tassa
not enough cases for any correlation... (and "superstition" seems to be about everything, not just natural disasters). But it's an interesting idea. One could look at a case where there IS causality, like a sports commentator carelessly remarking about the percentage of free throw shooting just before a shot; a clear case of an actual jinx in action. But interestingly, it seems to be stronger for better free throw shooters (say, Adi Gordon rather than Hubert Roberts. Ah... those were the days).
My guess is, though, this is just confirmation bias run amok.
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