AFPJAKARTA, KOMPAS.com - U.S. President Barack Obama was given a rock star’s welcome at one of Indonesia’s biggest universities on Wednesday, where he charmed an audience with speech laced with local lingo and a message of reform.
The speech concludes a nostalgic visit to Indonesia, where Obama spent four years as a young boy, and the president spoke warmly of his childhood memories of the world’s most populous Muslim country.
“Assalamu’alaikum. Salam sejahtera,” Obama began, an Indonesian salutation meaning ’Peace be upon you, prosperous greetings’, which drew whoops of approval from a crowd clearly impressed by his surprisingly good accent and delivery.
The 6,000 students, staff and officials that crammed into the university’s stiffling graduation hall listening intently to his speech, bursting into rapturous applause each he spoke Indonesian or mentioned famous Jakarta landmarks such as Sarinah mall.
“Pulang kampung, nih,” he added, a slang phrase meaning “I’ve come home to the village”, prompting laughs and applause. “Indonesia is part of me,” he added in Indonesian.
After warming up his crowd with descriptions of the Jakarta of his youth — of friendly street vendors selling satay, of flying kites, and of chasing dragonflies in rice paddy fields — Obama dove into more serious topics like religion and democracy.
He evoked the memory of university students who protested peacefully for the overthrow of former dictator President Suharto, ushering in an era of democratic reform.
“Frayed relations"
He praised majority Muslim Indonesia’s relative religious harmony and promised the U.S. would work harder to find repair the “frayed relations” between the U.S. and the Islamic world. “I thought he was fantastic, especially what he said about religious harmony,” one impressed student, Triamy Verdita, told Reuters after the speech.
“I think it was good when he said many Americans don’t know about Indonesia and he called for many Americans to come and study here,” she said. Other students complained that a poor sound system made it difficult to hear clearly and that they had been forced to line up since dawn.
“Also, only invited students could hear him speak and most of the students were made to go home today and yesterday,” said Imaddudin Abdullah, an international relations student who was among those selected to attend.
“I thought what he said about democracy was very good but from what I can see, the goals of the reform era still haven’t been achieved in Indonesia.
Not everyone is prosperous, there’s no economic democracy,” he said. “Look at the corruption all around.”
Graft remains rife in Indonesia, where it’s common to be asked for bribes by everyone from traffic police to judges. Judging by the loud applause and cheers, however, it appeared that the majority of students were very impressed both with Obama’s delivery and his message.
“He still knows about Indonesia, he still remembers the Indonesian language, he even remembered the name of a mall,” said Choky Ramadhan, a law student.
“His speech was too short. It was like watching a music concert,” he said. “We were left wanting more.”
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