I'm obviously very concern with how everything has turned out in the last few months. We've lost our hard earned reputation as a country with religious tolerance. Instead of appreciating diversity and differences, we lean toward exclusivity and singularity. Instead of avoiding conflict, we attack each other. And instead of introducing our Indonesian culture to a wider audience, we want to scrap off the culture because some people say we don't have that in Islam. You see, many people are striving to be a global citizen but we seemed to be going the opposite direction. We don't identify ourselves as part of the world anymore, we become closed minded, limiting our own opportunity as an individual as well as a country. If this doesn't get better soon, we surely cannot move forward, forget about saving the planet, we need to save our own people first.

To me, this is all too scary. Trust me,  I've had my share of crying witnessing all this chaos. My husband, my friends and even my kids know that.

But hey there are always some positive things you can take out of any situation. In this case, this Pilkada has taught me and open my eyes to different aspects of life; religion, family, values, politics and also parenting. Now I know what kind of environment I want my kids to live in, what kind of principles I want them to live by, the issues they need to stand for and the kind of characters I hope for them to develop. I guess this is one of the reasons why I'm more vocal in this election than any other, because I just realized how important politic is in shaping the direction of a country, they make decision that will affect the lives of the next generation.

Recently I asked them if they were to vote for class leaders or project leaders, will they choose based on religion? The answer is a firm OF COURSE NOT. To them choosing based on religion is like an insult to their common sense :D. Semoga yaa mereka bisa tetap terus berpikiran seperti itu, bahwa setiap orang terlahir berbeda ras, agama dan negara adalah takdir dari Tuhan. Surely He loves his people just as much and we all deserve to be treated equally.

Anyway, they remind me that children are not born prejudiced. They learn about hate and intolerance from the adults in their lives. Thank you for the reminder Jib & Je :-*