Siapakah Si Indra

In our life, everybody has felt change of pace. The change is always to make us to take it carefully.  Because we can get the positive thing and don’t trust the negative thing. In the topic that I will write now is my experience in culture shock.

First I want to give the reader some information in culture shock. Culture shock is feeling from somebody where we feel shock or confused to meet the new environment or surrounding such as lifestyle and culture. In many cases, some people that feel the culture shock can solve this problem by adapting faster with their new environment. They adapt their selves by imitating like a person doing in new environment. And they will leave identity. Sometimes this effort can make negative effect for us. Because what we imitate is not always good for us. Beside it there are some people that feel the culture shock can solve this problem with their new environment without leaving their cultural identity, but with a little change of pace. They can choose whether it is good or bad. In many cases, some people can’t adapt with theirs new environment and can take many time to adapt their selves. They usually get stressful, can be angry and don’t care about their new environment.

Now I want to tell the reader about my experience with culture shock. I was born in Ambon City, Province of Maluku. In there I grow up in Ambonese people which have simple and pluralism culture. But, actually my parents come from another island in Indonesia with lot of tradition and habit. From this I can feel the different view with Ambonese people habits and indigenous habits which is from my parents. But, these things I don’t care because the Ambonese people can tolerance and accept the comers like my parents since they first came to Ambon island in 1966. When I get 13 years old in Ambon City had accident of humanity in 1999. Because of that I and my family move to Bandung city, province of West Java for temporary residences.

When I entered the Bandung’s environment, I feel the anxiety because I have lost my friends and the symbols of social intercourse that I know before. Then I also get a problem with my dialect because I usually use Ambonese language but in Bandung more people always speaking in Sundanese language. When I first listened to this speaking, I feel this language is more difficult than I expected. But in time step by step, I can familiar the Sundanese language in a little speaking. Beside that I get another problem with lifestyle in Bandung. Because I am from the small city and now I am here in the one of the big city in Indonesia. So I feel confuse with the lot of many name of address or street in term that sometimes Bandung’s people say it. But we must try to remember that things. After that I get some knowledge of the language and begin to get more closely with them and I can open the way into the new cultural environment.

I live in Bandung for 4 years and now I move to Depok city because I had accepted by University of Indonesia as student. In this experience, I feel a little different with Bandung because the habitual action people in Depok is not big different with Bandung. Maybe it’s because the same of education city and the Sundanese culture still exist in Depok. It’s not important thing that I get a little problem with Depok’s weather. Depok city is more hot temperature than Bandung city, but I can adapt its next.

Written by Indra to Project Work 2003.