MOTHERHOODS MATTER

Kartini on Mother Nature, Education and how Women Civilise Men.

On January 21, 1901, 124 years ago today, R.A. Kartini wrote these thoughts:

“We went at midday to the shore with Mevrouw Conggrijp to bathe. It was splendidly calm, and the sea was all one colour. I sat on a rock with my feet in the water, and my eyes on the distant horizon. Oh! the world is so beautiful! Thanksgiving and peace were in my heart. If we go to Mother Nature for consolation she will not allow us to go away uncomforted.

I have thought so long and so much about education, especially of late, and I think it such a high, holy task …………..

Education means the forming of the mind and of the soul.

…………

I subscribe warmly to Mijnheer’s idea, which is set forth so clearly in his paper on the “Education of Native Girls,” “Woman as the Carrier of Civilization!”

…………..

Man receives from woman his very earliest nourishment, at her breast, the child learns to feel, to think and to speak; and I see more and more clearly that the very earliest education has an influence which extends over one’s whole after life.”

Geoff Fox, January 21, 2025, Australia

January 21, 2025
KIND-HEARTED KARTINI and CLIMATE CHANGES

Devastating climate change has been a part of God’s creation for a long time.

On January 17, 1903, (normally the wet season) Raden Ajeng Kartini wrote this to her friend in Holland about an unseasonal drought in Java:

“For three longs weeks not a drop of rain has fallen. It is boiling hot as it has never been before, even in the dryest Oostmoesson.

Father is in despair; the young rice in the fields is turning brown, Oh, our poor people! So far they have had enough to eat here and they do not know the most frightful of all calamities which a land can suffer—Famine. But what has not been, may be; and this great drought in the time of the wet season presages anything but good. What will happen if it keeps up? For several mornings the wind has blown as it usually does first in May. Has the turning point been reached, has the dry season begun?

It is frightful, every one looks on helpless. It is hard to see everything that has been sown and planted turn brown and die, without being able to turn a finger to help it, and the great heat harasses the body too; one feels dull and listless.

What do you think of such a complaint from a child of the sun? Oh, how frightful for the people who are working out in the fields, if for us in here it is so scalding hot, and this is the wet season (Westmoesson). Do not be chary with your cold; could you not spare a little of it? You may take as much of our warmth as you wish.”

Here is my attempt to write lyrical musings from the above:

“The Child Of The Sun

Take our heat, old Holland, and let us keep some of your cold.

Our people must eat,
But our crops are all dead
In a drought my heart dreads.
So let us get some of your cold.”

Geoff Fox, January 17, 2025, Australia

January 17, 2025

drought, java, kartini, kartini-lyrics, poetry
Meeting SBY – I saw his Kartiniist Soul.

On the 8th of August, 1903, Javanese princess and common people’s advocate Raden Ajeng Kartini wrote of a deeply meaningful meeting she had with a village midwife:

“Just now we have company; at the table where I sit there are five of us working. Justinah the wise woman came this morning and will stay until next week. We think her a treasure. She spends her time here usefully, teaches embroidery and is so severe when we are careless. When we make a mistake, she immediately pulls everything out. How rich I felt this morning when she laid her hand trustingly on my shoulder, while I explained something or other to her. Now she feels at home with us; I look with so much pleasure into her fine intelligent eyes; they say so much.

She is a dessa-child. Oh, how full of love is her calling! You would enjoy meeting her. She listens with attention when one speaks, and then asks such intelligent questions. If you ever come to our neighbourhood again, I hope to be able to take her to you. This clever little woman has already attended forty-eight women in child-birth, and she is such a young thing still, with all a child’s eagerness.”

Exactly one hundred and ten years years later on the 8th of August, 2013, I was blessed to meet an astonishimg Indonesian man, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, (SBY), who rose from birth into a lower middle class family in the very small village of Tremas (about 8 kilometre north northeast of the alun-alun in Pacitan on the glorious south coast of East Java) to become the first two-term democratically elected president of his homeland, Indonesia, the fourth largest nation on earth.

I told SBY in that very brief meeting a little bit both about the results of my cross cultural engagement with a wonderful grassroots man, Mr Syukur Kuseke, the traditional owner of Air Kaca, a national heritage (cagar budaya) site in Morotai and about my dad’s time in Morotai in World War Two. SBY said that he would like to visit Air Kaca. The president met very many people that day so my time with him was limited, but, as I left the room in the presidential palace, SBY’s eyes followed me with a child like eagerness to know more that I will never forget.

Alhamdullialh.

I praise the Lord for allowing me that treasured memory of meeting SBY.

The villages of the world are frequently where the greatest joys and purity are found, created and nurtured for us all.

Mbah Jeff (sudah tua), December 2nd, 2024, Melbourne, Australia

December 2, 2024

children, education, family, parenting
The Children Are The Future

To the people of the Republic Of Indonesia, I report a statement on the 8th of August 1903 by my personal heroine Raden Ajeng Kartini as she awaited her approaching marriage:

“The children are to be my future, and I shall live and work for them, strive, and suffer, if need be, for them.”

More recently, a significant event which also happened on the date of August 8, was in 1984: the birth of Sherly Tjoanda who is now set to become the governor-elect of North Maluku.

Congratulations, Sherly.

InsyaAllah nanti Kartiniisme mendunia.

Geoff Fox, budayawan, Melbourne, Australia, December 2nd, 2024.

December 2, 2024
Lest We Forget: R A Kartini Loved Her Dad And Loved Her Mum

In November 1899, Raden Ajeng Kartini wrote this in one of her letters to Holland about her father:

“Father knows everything that goes on in our hearts. Father does not tell us so, yet I am certain of it. Now and then Papa tells one or the other of us precisely what we have been thinking; something that we had kept to ourselves and never told to any one. It is without doubt, because Father loves us so much, and we so love him. Every now and then he discovers something, and lays it bare, that had been in the bottom of my heart, and of which I had thought no one except myself had the slightest idea. Does not that show true kinship of soul?”

In the same letter Kartini wrote this about her mother:

“O little Mother, dearest Mevrouwtje, I wish that you were back with us. Your daughters miss you so much. We long for the pleasant days that we spent with you to come again: the splendid times that we used to have in your dear little sitting-room, where you would read to us from great books, and where we spoke of so much, the memory of which shall always remain with us. I miss the intimate talks with you, when I used to tell my dear little mother all the rebellious thoughts that came into my head, and laid bare the feelings of my restless heart. When I was in a rebellious mood, I had but to see the love light in your face, and I was again the happy, careless child, that, in overflowing good spirits, could sing: “Whatever Heaven to me shall send, I’ll set my shoulders bravely under.” “

One of the foundations of Kartini’s greatness was her love for her parents.

Lest we forget: without family life, we are nothing.

Geoff Fox, 11th November, (Remembrance Day), 2024

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November 11, 2024
KARTINIISM – An Indonesian Gift To The World

Raden Ajeng Kartini was a first wave feminst genius.

In this site, I celebrate that genius.

Geoff Fox

10th October, 2024

October 10, 2024