Blogger Indonesia of the Week (91): Yansen

Yansen bengkulu IndonesiaAny non-Indonesian who has a little more time to take a closer look at Indonesian culture might wonder about one thing unique about this nation: a widely common use of single name. Two of Indonesian first presidents, Sukarno and Suharto, are using a single name. Symbolizing that this habit of single-name is practiced by all strata of Indonesian society.

I myself regards this thing as normal until the first time I travel abroad with a single-name friend when an airport official complained to him. In another word, an Indonesian who considers a single-name as “unusual” must have travelled to another country at least once.

That’s why when I read Yansen profile and he highlights his single-name, I knew he’s been abroad and might have an experience in which his single name did put him into trouble a little bit or raise his friends’ eyebrows. Here what he’s to say:

“G for green chronicle” is Yansen. He was born in Kepahiang, a small town in Bengkulu Province, Sumatra. He doesn’t have a family name. Yup, that may be funny. But, most Indonesians don’t have family names. In fact, a lot of Indonesians only have one single name, just like him.

If you read his profile further, you’d come to know that the single-name stuff is just the only light thing he writes. Other than that, he’s got a very good blog meaning a blog with a very good content. And that should not make you wonder. His brief CV would tell you the reason:

After receiving a Bachelor of Forestry in 2002 from Department of Forestry, University of Bengkulu, he was appointed as an associate lecturer at the same department a year after. He was awarded Australian Development Scholarship (ADS) to do master degree in 2005. He went to James Cook University, Queensland and studied at the School of Tropical Biology. He finished his master in 2007. Early 2008, he won an Australian Leadership Award (ALA) scholarship to do PhD. He is now doing PhD at James Cook University.

If you read Indonesian newspapers both in English and Bahasa Indonesia regularly, you’d find his name every now and then outthere in Op-ed pages focusing on such topics as conservation, environment, forestry and agriculture. If you don’t, you can still enjoy his writing in his blog.

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As I wrote here, a blog with a particular niche and written by a person with academic authority could be called as an expert blog. A blog that would have a real contribution and impact in the long term and that will have serious attention from serious people. Such very good blog may not be instantly popular especially as far as Indonesian readers are concerned. One thing the author should remember is that he should not be discouraged by that. Because so far as blog goes, quality content may not automatically be in line with the amount of visitors and comments a blog gets. Likewise, a high traffic blog doesn’t necessarily have to do with quality content.

On our part, we should encourage people like Yansen to write more rigorously in his blog by having a visit or two to his blog and writing a good comment there. Making a good comment is a good start to create a good article and thus a good blog as well.[]