The Museum is more interesting than ASA :)

26 November 2006
The youths of my congregation, along with some other congregations, have always organized an event called ASA anually. The event is aimed at the kids who live on the streets, known as ‘anak jalanan’ in Indonesian. These kids come from diverse backgrounds. Some come from complete families; some others have no parents. The event is meant to show the church’s attention to these street kids without trying to evangelize them. ASA, Apresiasi Seni Anak, is held anually and filled with fun competitions such as dancing, drawing, and singing for those kids.
Sounds really nice, right? Well, the idea is nice but truly, I don’t like ASA that much. I cannot imagine dealing with those kids. Some are very terrible and I don’t like kids anyway, whether they come from the marginal communities or my own community. (So it does not mean that I don’t have social concerns. I do have social concerns but not that much maybe, hahaha, and especially not to the street kids)
Since I was the chair of the youth commission, I just wanted to show that I cared for the people who had done such a great job organising ASA so I showed up there. But I couldn’t deny myself. I didn’t like ASA. I briefly took a look at the activities and greeted the people and that was it. Mission accomplished.
Next to the ASA’s venue, fortunately there is a museum, called Musem Taman Prasasti. The museum is not in a building; it’s open space. It houses various Dutch tombstones. Some of them are really beautiful. As an avid historian, I of course enjoy visiting a museum more than coming to ASA. As a result, I spent more time at the Museum than at ASA. Well, that was not good actually, because I came there for ASA in the first place. But I had fun at the museum and enjoyed taking pictures around.
The moral of the story: First, just be yourself. It might not be good in other people’s perspective, but you don’t have to lie to yourself and pretend to enjoy something that you don’t enjoy.
Second, at times, certainly we do need to take into account other people’s feeling, and finding the balance between being honest to yourself and respecting people’s feeling is always a tricky one. I hoped I had done the correct thing yesterday. Hopefully.