English is better than Bahasa Indonesia? No way!

Whether you realise it or not, if you’re an Indonesian and you love this blog, chances are high that you agree to the statement that says “English is more superior than Bahasa Indonesia”.

Not that I’m stereotyping all Indonesians here. Because honestly I used to think that way too, until I finally reached a conclusion that all languages are equal before God.

Just like race, religion, or sex, language is simply a cultural feature that could be used to trace the historical aspects of a particular society. Hence, since each culture in the world has their positive and negative traits, I do believe that there is no such thing called “the superiority of language”.

In direct contrast to the French, I have known fellow Indonesians to be “unproud” of their own language. They think that speaking English is the coolest thing on earth that one could ever achieve.

I don’t need to quote from Roy Morgan here, because I have examples of my own.

Here is one typical dialogue between me and a newly-introduced friend:

Friend: Lu sekolah di mana? (Which school do you attend?)

Me: Gua udah lulus. Dari SMA di Singapur. Tapi gua sekarang belom kuliah kok (I’ve graduated from a high school in Singapore. But I haven’t attended college yet as for now)

Friend: Iya? Kereeeenn!! Pasti Bahasa Inggrisnya jago dehh!! (Really? Cooooolll!! Your English must be really good!!)

Me: [smiled]

I used to be pleased to get such compliments in the past.

But as time went on, such compliments were too often repeated by many Indonesians from various backgrounds, be they teachers, students, taxi drivers, warnet (net café) attendants, Batak, Javanese, Balinese, Chinese, etc that leads me to ask myself:

“Why on earth do they think that the English language is really that cool?”

It is perfectly OK to adore English due to their widespread usage. The fact remains that English is the main lingua franca in the world, spoken by over two-third of the world population either as their first or second language. And most of those who belong to the other one-third could at least understand the meaning of “Yes”, “No”, or “Thank You”.

But I have one message to be carefully noted by all Indonesians here:

Tolong jangan pernah anggap Bahasa Indonesia sebagai Bahasa yang memalukan!

(Please do not treat Indonesian as a language to be ashamed of!)

Really, all of us should be proud to have Bahasa Indonesia as our mother tongue.

Linguists and other so-called experts have often criticised the national language of Indonesia, saying that “Bahasa Indonesia is an artificial language”, due to the fact that a heavy share of its vocabulary is borrowed from other languages, such as Dutch, Arabic, or Malay.

But I choose to see it from the other side of the fence. With such a heavy percentage of loanwords, I prefer to call Bahasa Indonesia as a flexible language; a language that can adapt easily to any foreign cultures without having to contaminate their own.

Such are the positive aspects that I see in the Indonesian language that I could now declare out loud that no matter what other people say; Indonesian will always be the best language for me. I am proud to be a half-Indonesian, and I am proud to be a native speaker of Bahasa Indonesia.

Now I could presume that some of you might be tempted to ask me this question:

“If you are really that chauvinistic with your own native language, why don’t you switch your Blog language to Bahasa Indonesia instead?”

Hahaha.

I’m not chauvinistic, because doing that would mean that I’m contradicting my foremost stance above.

And to be honest, such an allure –the inclination to switch my blog language from English to my native Indonesian— has passed my mind more than once.

But for the greater good of Indonesia; the place where I was raised, the country where half of my ancestors descended from, and most importantly; the nation I love, I choose to ignore my own self-centred tendencies and continue to blog in English.

By blogging in English, I could introduce the beauty and fascinations of Indonesia to the outside world.

By blogging in English, people could know that Indonesia is unlike what they see in the CNN, with all the bombings, bloody riots, and dictatorships.

And I know very well that many Westerners out there who still think that the incumbent President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is more or less the same with the late former President Soeharto. Such is the pathetic assumption by the outside world of Indonesia that the Indonesian tourism grades so poor these days.

The statistics have shown that 20 million people visited the tiny state-island of Singapore in year 2007 in comparison to the 5.5 million people who visited Indonesia in the same year. And do you know how big Singapore is? It’s only a little bit larger than Jakarta!

Well, by blogging in English, I realise that I could introduce the real face of Indonesia to the outside world. The average Korean gamer and an officeworker in Spain –whose native languages are not English— could at least understand what is going on in Bandung if I am to discuss a topic about “Bandung’s tasty treats”.

And with all the multitudinous paraphernalia of the Indonesian life that I could discuss in my blog, I really hope that I could prove useful in my contribution to Indonesia.

I could safely assume that other native Indonesian bloggers who choose to blog in English also agree to my way of thinking. Because if they don’t think as such, then it’s a pity. They’re blogging in English for the wrong reason.