VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

The Ministry of Trade facilitated the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Indonesian business actors and trading partners from Egypt for four-wheeled vehicle tires amounting to US$20 million. This event was carried out online last Monday (1/11). The signing of the memorandum of understanding was carried out on the side-line of the 2021 Trade Expo Indonesia Digital Edition (TEI-DE) and witnessed online by Director General of National Export Development, Didi Sumedi and Indonesian Ambassador to Egypt, Lutfi Rauf. 

Didi Sumedi thanks the Indonesian trade representative for their support to facilitate business between Indonesia and Egypt. He also appreciates Indonesian businesspeople and entrepreneurs and their trading partners from Egypt, who persistently continue to strive developing amid an uncertain global economy. The trade relations between Indonesia and Egypt will always be good. In the second week of TEI-DE, according to Didi, the total of trade transactions was recorded at US$978.05 million. 

Meanwhile, Ambassador Lutfi Rauf said that TE-DE 2021 is an important moment for Indonesian and Egyptian businesspeople. This moment also proves that Indonesian and Egyptian businesspeople have succeeded in demonstrating good trade cooperation amid the Covid-19 pandemic. The Ambassador also explained that the Indonesia-Egypt trade balance resulted in a surplus of US$2.01 billion for January-August 2021. The surplus generated from Indonesia's exports to Egypt of US$7.68 billion and Indonesia's imports from Egypt was US$5.67 billion.

Voice of Indonesia presents Let’s Speak Indonesian, a program that introduces the Indonesian vocabulary and guides you to speak in the language. Mari Berbahasa Indonesia or Let’s Speak Indonesian is a joint initiative of Voice of Indonesia and the Language Development Agency of the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture.  Today’s topic is about Memesan Makanan which means Ordering Food. 

Here is the conversation entitled Pesan Apa? which means What would you like to order? This conversation happens between Kevin and a restaurant waiter. 

Let’s read to the conversation.

MUSIC

After reading to the conversation, now I am going to introduce some vocabulary and expressions related to the topic of the day.

In the dialog, you hear an expression Saya pesan nasi goreng ayam (2x) which means I order chicken fried rice. To order food, you can use expressions Saya pesan ..., Saya ingin ..., Saya mau …. When ordering food, you may hear an expression Mau pesan apa? (2x) which means What would you like to order? The expression is used to ask what food you want to order.

Let’s read to the other examples of expressions to order food.

Waiter                  : Pesan apa, Bapak (2x) which means What would you like to order, Sir?

Kevin          : Saya ingin ikan bakar (2x) which means I want grilled fish

Kevin          : Mau minum apa, Mela? (2x) which means What do you want to drink, Mela?

Mela           : Saya mau jus jambu (2x) which means I want guava juice

That was “Let’s Speak Indonesian” for today. Hopefully, this edition can be useful for those of you who want to know more about Indonesian language. 

Nusa tourism village is one of the tourism villages in Indonesia, which carries the theme of disaster education. Located in Lhoknga, Aceh Besar district or 30 kilometres away from downtown of Banda Aceh City, Nusa tourism village is a village that was built by the community independently after the tsunami that hit Aceh in 2004. If any tourists may visit the village, they can learn about disasters in the area as well as local wisdom owned by the surrounding community.

To enter this tourism village, visitors would feel the atmosphere of the village that is so beautiful. To travel to Nusa tourism village, one can see the green rice fields and rivers around. The scenery looks perfect with Baisan hills as the background. They can also enjoy the scenery while camping and fishing in the area that has been provided. Besides enjoying the natural beauty of nature, visitors can also learn about recycling trash processing. The residents of Nusa tourism village process proper waste to make handicrafts worth selling. The handicrafts that can be found in the area are tissue boxes, pencil cases, synthetic flowers, vases, and other home decorations. The visitors can also buy typical woven clothes of Aceh Besar Regency as well as bags and hats made from processed trash.

The people of Nusa tourism village still keep their traditional and local culture values so that tourists can feel the experience of the village’s culture. They can see the art performances, such as Sedati dance, Rapai Geleng dance, Ranup Lampuan dance, and Ratoh Duek dance. As a gift, besides buying handicrafts from the local community, tourists can also buy Oen Temuru chips. It is one of the creative economic products from the people of Nusa tourism village. The snacks are based on curry leaves processed as chips. Curry leaves are generally known as mixed ingredients of Aceh’s typical cuisine, Ayam tangkap. Besides the Oen Temuru chips, visitors can also taste Beulangong soup, banana chips, honey, Kembang Goyang, Timphan Asoe Kaya, Seupet cake, Kekarah and Emping Melinjo. If tourists want to stay in this village, they may stay at the traditional wooden stilt houses built by the local people independently.

In general, gastronomy is a science that discusses good eating habits or it’s also associated with something related to the delicacy of food and beverage. However, according to Vita Datau, Founder of the Indonesia Gastronomy Network, gastronomy is not only a matter of food and beverage served on the table, but also a science that studies the details of the story behind the food itself from the history of food, the origin of food ingredients, processing, cooking methods until how the food is eaten. So, gastronomy is an ecosystem that includes everything about food from upstream to downstream. In addition, gastronomy also looks at how food is a part of the lifestyle of society, if there is food that is consumed for generations. Gastronomy also looks at culture, how traditions are related to food. Take for example; food is also used in traditional ceremonies and offerings.

Recently, Salatiga City has been proposed to be nominated as a Creative City of Gastronomy to the UNESCO Creative Cities Network (UCCN). The certainty of the proposal was obtained through a letter from the Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO (KNIU). Seen from various aspects, Salatiga City is considered an ideal city as a Gastronomic City in Indonesia. The choice of Salatiga City as a Gastronomic City is logical. In terms of location, it is very strategic for tourists to visit. It shares borders with three important cities in Central Java and Yogyakarta. They are Semarang, Surakarta, and Yogyakarta. Meanwhile, in terms of beauty, Salatiga City is quite beautiful. In fact, during colonial rule, it was nicknamed: Salatiga Dea Schoonnste Staad Van Midden Java, or Salatiga the Most Beautiful City in Central Java. In addition, it has also long been the home of ethnic; it has its own strength in culinary terms. There are various special dishes that are the mainstay of Salatiga City, including beef satay, opor duck, soto esto, gecok goat, round sekoteng, enting-enting gepuk, and the iconic Salatiga City’s specialty dish is Tumpang Koyor. Salatiga City is the second oldest city in Indonesia; it’s 1271 years old. So, there are a lot of kinds of food that have existed for a long time and can be seen from the gastronomic perspective that supports the nomination of UCCN Gastronomy Heritage.

Salatiga City has potential not only culinary, but also diversity. It is a place where 196,082 people with various ethnicities mingle or interact together. This multi-ethnic population makes the gastronomic potential in Salatiga City very high. In the socio-cultural field, until now acculturation in Salatiga City is still on-going. This makes the community more appreciative of diversity and tolerance. The acceptance of diversity can also be good news for tourists who will visit and feel the friendliness of the people. The potential of Salatiga City cannot be separated from the achievements it has made. It has been awarded as the Most Tolerant City in Indonesia, Child Friendly City, Human Rights Friendly City, and other awards. In addition, to get to a world-class Gastronomic City, there are many things that are prepared. One of them is ecosystem preparation, starting from the construction of traditional markets, local culinary education to the improvement of service quality, cleanliness, health, and strengthening other ecosystems. Although ecosystem development is still on-going, this effort does not need to start from the beginning. Because the gastronomic ecosystem in Salatiga City has developed very creatively. This strength will be the initial capital, as well as the most potential enchantment for the success of Salatiga City's journey as a Gastronomic City.