Hey everybody, so if you don't know anything about Indonesia, basically, all you have to know is that it's kind of like the Hawaii of the Muslim world, but it's like huge. It's like the biggest state and with orangutans. And that's it just no punchline. Let's just go to the intro song. *Intro song* It's time to learn Geography NOW! Hey everybody, I'm your host Barby. So as some of you know, I've been to Indonesia one time on one island for like three hours I ate one dish, so basically I'm like the Indonesia expert, right? Well, if not I'm kind of like the only guy on YouTube doing full profile videos like this, so for now You'll just have to kind of deal with me for like the next twelve or so minutes. Woohoo, default! Alright, so again if you don't know anything about Indonesia It's basically like if the Middle East and South East Asia had An incredibly colorful, loud, somewhat explosive set of babies, like thousands of them Okay, that doesn't really help First of all Indonesia is the world's largest archipelago nation Located right where the Indian Ocean meets the Pacific Ocean On the incredibly clustered set of islands making six countries Known commonly as Nusantara or the Malay Archipelago Atatatatatat, *Indonesian* Archipelago Sure, whatever makes you happy Indonesia actually has land borders with three of these countries East Timor, Papua New Guinea, and Malaysia, on the biggest island: Borneo or Kalimantan Which is one of the world's only two triple split nation islands The other one being Cyprus Although technically if you include the UN Buffer Zone it's kind of like four entities But the UN isn't a country Whatever just watch the Cyprus episode The country is divided into 34 provinces, five of which have special administrative statuses With the capital and most populous city Jakarta located on Java The world's most populous island with nearly half of the entire population of Indonesia in it The largest cities after Jakarta are Surabaya and Bandung both located on Java Island And Medan located on Sumatra Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta International Bali's Ngurah Rai International in Denpasar And Surabaya's Juanda International Now here's where things get a little speculative Today there are still arguments claimed as to exactly how many islands Indonesia has The National Coordinating Agency for Surveying and Mapping * now named Geospatial Information Agency * says Indonesia has about 13,500 The National Institute of Aeronautics and Space Agency says that it has about 18,300 Whereas the Indonesian government claims about 17,500 But whatever the point is there's a lot of them Over 8,800 have names and over 900 of them are permanently Inhabited You would think they are the country with the most islands, but surprisingly Finland and Canada beat them But a lot of their islands are kind of like boopadoop little islands in the lakes, so does it really count? Uh, I guess? Now let's talk about the five special administrative provinces They are: Aceh, Yogyakarta, West Papua and Papua, and the capital, Jakarta Now, no surprise the capital Jakarta acts as its own political entity Lots of countries do that, but what about the others? First, Aceh. Aceh is kind of like the black sheep of Indonesia It's the only province in which Sharia law is fully implemented Also, they kind of have like a ton of oil So, yeah, they've kind of asserted a very independent ideology That sets them apart as autonomous from the rest of Indonesia Then you have Yogyakarta, which is the only region that is still governed by a pre-colonial monarchy The Sultan of Yogyakarta who acts as a hereditary governor Otherwise we get the two Papuas, which collectively used to be the province called Irian Jaya But then in 2003 they got split into two Basically this is the place that has the least in common with the rest of Indonesia It has a culture and background closer to their cousins across the border in Papua New Guinea So then why is this part of Indonesia, well long story short, Indonesia was basically like: "Well now that we have our full sovereignty, we get everything that the Dutch colonized" But the people of Papua were not too happy so then Indonesia was like: "Alright, we'll give you a vote to stay or leave" "However, we would strongly implore you to make the *right* decision" So they voted to stay in, a lot of people complained, there's still some current opposition And to this day, the area has a relatively high level of autonomy And the government kind of just leaves them alone except for when it comes to mining for resources Oh, and the South Maluku area also kind of has like an independence dispute thing kind of going on But the major opponents to the Indonesian government are primarily based in the Netherlands Then you have the strange Riau Islands which looked like they should belong to Malaysia But they don't even though they have a strong Malay derived culture And you have the Ambalat Sea block which has a ton of oil that both they and Malaysia argue over So that essentially covers most of the administrative divisions of Indonesia Some of the most notable spots of interest in Indonesia might include: The National Monument and Museum Royal Kraton Ngayogyakarta Palace Ratu Boko The Magelang Chicken Shaped Church Borobudur, disputably the largest Buddhist temple in the world Maimun Palace The Taman Sari Underground Mosque The Equator Monument The Pura Ulun Danu Bratan Lake Temples Yeah, try to say that five times fast: "Pura Ulun Danu Bratan Lake" The Millennium Bridge The Sacred Monkey Temple The Hellmouth or Elephant Cave The Seven Story Pagoda of Sibu *CORRECTION: This is in Malaysia* The Smoked Mummy Villages of Aikim and Jiwika in Papua Or if you're lazy you can just go to The Taman Mini Indonesia Indah Park Which kinda has like a bunch of replicas of all the famous sites in Indonesia Oh, and keep in mind there's Dutch colonial style buildings all over Too many ancient temples and pagodas to list And no matter how many buildings and landmarks are built They will never compare to what mother nature has done, which brings us to: Indonesia's land is like that one ex we all had back in our 20's That we trusted a stupid friend to hook us up with Super attractive, but almost killed you a few times Indonesia lies on what is labeled as the prehistoric continental shelf known as Sundaland Which during the ice age times pretty much connected all of the islands together before the Wallace Line Until the ice melted and filled in the gaps Now that's where things get incredibly messed up Not only is indonesia right in the worst part of the ring of fire But the country is basically smashed between three converging major continental plates The Eurasian, the Pacific, and the Australian plates With dozens of minor plates and rifts like the Sunda, Timor, Banda, Malucca, and so on This in return gives Indonesia over 400 volcanoes disputably more than any in the world With over 150 active ones making it the most volcanically active country in the world as well This means on a daily basis Indonesia experiences on average about four earthquakes a day Ranging anywhere between the small timid three to a noticeable six on the richter scale And you never know where or when they will happen Hmm... *clap clap clap* Impressive... Nonetheless, volcanoes can be a good thing especially when concentrated close to the equator As the warmer humid climate allows moisture and minerals to coalesce Creating some of the most fertile land on the planet This is why places like Hawaii And Iceland are so radically different despite both being volcanic islands In the end, Indonesia got blessed with a flourishing abundance of flora and fauna The second highest concentration in the world after Brazil Many of which being endemic species, like the Rafflesia arnoldii and the Titan arum The largest flowers in the world, which each smell like rotting corpses And at over 180, they also have the highest concentration of mammals out of anywhere in the world Nonetheless, the national animal is actually a reptile, the largest in the world At three metres long, the famous Komodo Dragon which you can find a bunch of on Komodo Island Which is where they get their name from, and they can kill people! Just a heads up And the surprisingly not national animal even though everybody knows and loves them The only great ape in Asia, Orangutans, are only found on this archipelago as well By the way, they look docile and quiet, but orangutans can rip off your arm if you anger them So don't... Otherwise, the largest mountain Puncak Jaya is located in the east, in Papua The longest River, the Kapuas, flows on Kalimantan or Borneo Island Starting in the east emptying into the South China Sea The largest lake, as well as the largest volcanic lake in the world, Lake Toba can be found on Sumatra This is also the site of the largest speculated volcanic explosive eruption on Earth That essentially created a worldwide volcanic winter The eruption was so big that you can literally observe ashes from the explosion That went as far as Malawi in East Africa Remember guys mother nature is beautiful, but if she wants she can kill you Close to Puncak Jaya is Grasberg, the largest gold and copper mine in the world And on Mount Ijen on Java which spews up blue lava All over you can find Intrepid sulphur miners that literally go into the base of the volcanic craters Risking health just to get raw sulphur ores Otherwise you have other anomalies like the Sidoarjo mud volcanoes The three-colored Lake Kelimutu in Flores And the Kakaban Island Jellyfish Lake -
too many strange places To this day, Indonesia is the number one producer of palm oil, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, coconut, and vanilla Some national dishes might include things like: Rendang Satay - or Saté *Correct pronunciation: Saté* Gado-gado Lontong Ketupat Papeda Ikan bakar Pempek Tumpeng Lemang And the national dish: Nasi goreng which basically just means fried rice which has no exact recipe You can mix it up and kind of do whatever you want to it Oh and keep in mind Malaysia might argue that some of these dishes belong to them But that's a whole other story tied in with history and culture. Yeah, we got time why not talk about it Now there's a lot of curious mysteries when it comes to Indonesia's people like: How did they become predominantly muslim? Or what's the whole deal with them in Malaysia? Or wait, this guy is considered an Indonesian? What?! First of all, the country has about 263 million people, making it the fourth most populous country in the world With the largest population of Muslims as well Now here's the thing in a sense. Yes, 95% of the population is considered native Indonesian That's an incredibly broad term, considering that Indonesia has about 300 different ethno-linguistic groups Split up across all the island regions of the country If you look at a map with the actual ethnic group breakdown, it kinda looks something like this Nonetheless the two largest parent ethnic groups are the Javanese that make up about 40% The Sudanese that make about 15% Otherwise, the rest of the population is primarily made up of smaller groups and tribes That have only around 2 to 3 percent each like the Batak, the Sulawesi, the Balinese Minangkabau, Betawi, Papuan, Dayak, and so on Finally about 5% are non-indigenous Indonesians like Chinese, Arabs, Indians, and even a few Europeans They also use the Indonesian Rupiah as their currency, they use the type-C plug outlet And they drive on the left side of the road And here's where things get a little confusing: culture and language The one thing that kind of unites all Indonesians is that they share the national language Bahasa Indonesia Which means the Indonesian language However Bahasa Indonesia is actually kind of like a lingua franca to many of the people As Indonesia is the world's largest trilingual country In addition to Bahasa indonesia most people speak their own mother tongue as well as English Yep, English. They caught on quick when they realized it was the money language The funny thing, is even though the Javanese make up the largest people group The Javanese language is not an official language Technically it could have been, but then that would have favored one people group over all the others Which would have caused tension, so they kind of had to choose like a neutral default Plus, Javanese is like really hard to learn And the original writing system, although very beautiful is incredibly difficult to write Nonetheless, at nearly 100 million speakers this makes Javanese the largest non-official minority language in the world And that's why the Bahasa Indonesia language is so strange It's not even technically indigenous to Indonesia, but more Malay derived To this day, people who speak Bahasa Indonesia can understand Somewhere around 60 to 70% of what their neighbors are saying in Malaysia The biggest difference though would be the loan words as Indonesia took quite a bit of influence from the Dutch back in colonial times For example kantoor versus kantor, dokter versus dokter, Mantel/mantel, Oma, Opa, Wortel/wortel Speaking of the Dutch, quick history lesson: Hindu kingdoms Buddhist kingdoms Islamic kingdoms The Portuguese come in quickly But then the dutch flock in Japan comes in for a couple of years and decimates a huge chunk of the population Independence Republic The Suharto Years Controversial incidents and fights with ethnic Chinese, Timorese, and Papuan peoples Suharto falls Reformation period begins And here we are today In Indonesia, all citizens are required to register under one of six recognized religion categories: Islam, Protestant, Catholic, Hindu, Buddhist and Confucianism If you don't identify with either, then sorry... Prior to Islam entering around the 13th century, Indonesia was actually primarily Hindu and Buddhist It's disputed on how exactly Indonesia became prevalently Muslim Some people say that it's because of the Arab traders that came by in the early first millennium Others will say that maybe it had to do with the Malacca Sultanate conquest That fought against the Hindu and Buddhist kingdoms and the truth is, both might be right Inevitably, Bali became like the last sort of haven for whatever Hindus were left The Eastern Nusa Tenggara region and the Papuas remained predominantly Christian As the Dutch and Portuguese share the gospel Islamic culture in Indonesia is a little different from what it looks like in the Middle East For one, most mosques don't have the typical dome structure And actually many of them resemble Hindu temples like the Demak Great Mosque When a family member dies their relatives might often come together and pray for a whole week Then again on the fortieth day, and then on the year anniversary, and then on the 500th day and so on Also, the night before Eid Al-Fitr, the youth might gather and go around neighborhoods reciting the takbir Those are some things you don't really typically find in the Middle East Clothing modesty customs are pretty loose Not all muslim women wear hijabs, however the ones that do might also complement it with Western clothing Like branded t-shirts with skin tight sleeves and jeans When I was in Indonesia, I saw a hijab wearing woman with short sleeves and Capri pants exposing her calves I was like: *gasp* can they do that? Now in terms of culture again it depends on where you are And many indigenous people still follow ancient traditions Everything from the Minangkabau candle dance to the gamelan players of Yogyakarta Wayang Javanese shadow puppetry, Balinese festivals Sumatran Pencak Silat martial art tournaments, Kenyah motif paintings of the Kalimantan tribes The deadly Pasola game played by Sumba People, Karapan cow racing on Madura Island The strange burial traditions of the Toraja people, and everywhere you can find those pointy long houses Otherwise, some notable people of indonesian descent might include people like: The first president Sukarno Gajah Mada R.A. Kartini B.J. Habibie Iko Uwais Yayan Ruhiyan Cecep Arif Rahman Agnes Monica Iwan Fals Anggun Megawati Sukarnoputri The Hartono Brothers And YouTubers Brian Immanuel and Raditya Dika Now, it's so hard to cover Indonesia's culture because there's so many different people groups Each with their own cultures It's insanely colourful and rich I wish we could cover more, but we got to move on to some diplomanatics, shall we? Okay, so Indonesia is basically like the kingpin of Southeast Asia With the largest population and economy as well as being a member of the G20 Therefore they know how to manage relations First of all the rest of the Muslim nations in the middle East generally get along with Indonesia As they see them as kind of like their strange Asian cousins Indonesians make up the largest group of pilgrims for the hajj in Mecca However there has been some controversy with Saudi Arabia In regards to migrant worker abuse and death sentences Since then Indonesia dramatically decreased its expat programs The U.S., Netherlands and Australia are kind of like their biggest non-Asian supporters In addition to trade and business, the U.S. played a huge role in Indonesia's independence And they work closely during cold war times The Netherlands still holds close ties to Indonesia despite post-colonial bitterness Plus tons of Indonesians live in the Netherlands To this day, they have the second largest population of Indonesians Outside of Indonesia after Malaysia at nearly 2 million Australia gives some of the most aid to Indonesia Especially after catastrophe incidents and even though there are some controversies Involving immigration and attacks on Australians abroad, they still share close ties generally Now Indonesia and Malaysia are kind of like the Colombia and Venezuela of Southeast Asia They're like the twins separated at birth and have a strange love/hate relationship Malays accused Indonesians of stealing their culture and language Indonesians accused them of not being grateful for all their help during war times But when they actually meet up as people it's like they're totally brothers Nonetheless most Indonesians I talked to have said Japan is probably their best friend Which is funny because Japan kind of really messed things up during World War two Nonetheless they've moved on and today Japan makes up the largest export partner Tourists flock in year round and the two have been building each other up for over half a century In conclusion, Indonesia's people are very much like their islands Numerous, with lush colorful strange diversity Sometimes a cyclone earthquake or volcano of controversy erupts But at the end of the day, they still flourish together as one Stay tuned, Iran is coming up next
Nice seeing fellow geograpeeps here
So Indonesia will become like Iran ? /s
He's so hot and smart. What a guy.
So nice seeing barby here hmm