A Small Fragment from Deeper Parts of Indonesia.
In many literary works, we can interpret ‘siasah’ as our way to cope with the new environment and social changes. Not only to survive but also to strive. The word ‘siasah’ has always been crossing in my mind ever since I started a project with the Global Environment Facility – Small Grants Programme (the GEF-SGP) in 2017.
The project aims to document the local initiatives to tackle their most challenging issues, while keeping the idea of preserving biodiversity and mitigating climate change in the back of their minds. These local initiatives funded by the GEF-SGP were taking place in Semau Island of East Nusa Tenggara, Gorontalo, Wakatobi Islands of Southeast Sulawesi, dan Nusa Penida Island of Bali.
Along with the project, I witnessed an immense perseverance capacity from the people who live in such challenging and remote places of this vast archipelago country. Giving-up is simply not in their vocabulary. They believe that it is them themselves who can make the changes.
A collection of perseverance stories of these remarkable souls is summarized in a visual note – siasah or adaptation.
Perhaps, there are no words that can fully express one’s struggle – weaving hope to reach the light at the end of the tunnel. So, I hope this collection of photo stories can surpass the boundary and limitation
of words.
Robert Frank – a legendary documentary photographer, once said, “There is one thing the photograph must contain: the humanity of the moment”. A message that keeps me going to document fragments
of one’s journey and story with my camera, capturing the humanity
in it, and encourage people to realize how precious our life and environment are.
Adaption – siasah. For those who are seeking for gratitude. From whom I learned a lot.