The Spectrums

What really interesting from this camp is how wide the spectrum of people and thus the emotion that we are being exposed to.

To describe how wide the spectrum we are being exposed to, it ranges from:

• Harvard MBA graduate who is currently a CEO of Johnson & Johnson to “Ibu Jamu” (a lady selling traditional herbal supplement on her back) whilst also acting as mobile librarian to the poor,

• a director of global research company based in New York which was a son of “Supir Angkot” to a lady which developed Hydropower station in remote areas until she was once kidnapped by Aceh Separatist Movement group (GAM) and how she decided to get back to Aceh a week after she got kidnapped still trying to convey how potential their area is for hydropower and how that could be used a sustainable source of income for the community,

• a school owner which applied a very advanced concept of “Centers of Learning” at very minimal budget with around 95% of the students are the children of domestic maids and drivers, where similar school using the same concept charged Rp. 50 million for the entrance fee and Rp. 3.5 million monthly fee to an advisor of KPK (Corruption Eradication Commission) which gave us advice not to quickly react with making a direct confrontation when we see the Head of School scrupulously misallocated the budget rather to focus more on teaching the value of honesty to the students,

• a career coach who conveyed a very important message that you do not possess your job. It belongs to a company and things will get pretty complicated when the company is a publicly-listed company since it could be owned by thousands of shareholders, hence do not attach your identity to something so vague called the job title to a social thinker from NYU came from a physics background conveying the power of narration, how problem solving approach faced by individuals once it is narrated effectively could be used as a powerful fuel for collectively driving a social movement,

• a friend of mine who shared her story that challenges that she was facing when she took an architecture project for designing an under-aged prison and the reality that she was seeing inside the prison to another friend who compete in an international competition for designing a robot representing Indonesia,

• a Dean's List for Outstanding Academic Achievement recipient in mathematics and physics from ITB to another friend who spent 5 months in Merapi helping the victims of the volcano eruption,

• a professional who quits his job in a media giant with expected earning is assumed to be somewhat nearing 6 digits figures in dollar terms to join Indonesia Mengajar to a girl who was on a mountain expedition to Russia,

• a wonderful lady who gave up her lifestyle travelling to 1 continent every quarter staying from Ritz Carlton to Hilton to be an educational consultant teaching us how to actually teach with heart to another wonderful lady who forms a school in her backyard terrace just by using her pension funds,

• and the most striking news that strucked us was when we heard that a father of our fellow friend in camp passed away and how he was being sent off to his family straight away whilst it is impossible for us on to give support on his side since our schedule really was super tight and it would be impossible to replace/substitute the sessions nor to cancel the sessions.

For me personally, it is interesting how the situation forced me to look from a perspective unimaginable to me before and how the situation forced to appreciate and respect the perspectives after I understand how one could actually come with that perspectives, how the situation forced me to be inspired and most importantly how the situation forced me to realise how little have I known.

On the contrary, what is hurting me sometime is how I felt slapped and how I sometime felt like I got bashed emotionally from the reality that I am seeing. Sometimes, this roller coaster ride is really exhausting, maybe for some these exposures are not that wide, but for me it really feels like I am constantly changing polars without much time to adapt, since this ride has an “Intensive” adjective attached to the name.

Honestly, it is emotionally overwhelming. I was thinking hard and saying to myself “I need to find a solution for this, otherwise this ride will be too tiring!” God answers my set back and this is indeed a very important lesson, “Duddy, once you have identified your emotion, you need to be able to quickly detach that emotion with full consciousness and let your heart be ready for another ride in a fresh start”

Have a good day everyone :)