Edition Monday, November 26, 2018 | International Bali Post

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Monday, November 26, 2018

‘Africa’s Grammys’ celebrate the hits of the continent LAGOS - After a 15-year career in banking and marketing, Nigerian Mike Dada was looking for a platform to “communicate the strength of Africa to the rest of the world”.

He decided to set up Afrima -- the All Africa Music Awards -- Africa’s equivalent of the Grammys, whose fourth edition takes place this weekend in Ghana’s capital, Accra. In 2014, penniless but passionate about music, he worked with private sponsors in Nigeria and a partner in Kenya.

Together, they organised the awards ceremony to “create jobs” and “make Africans proud”, he told local media, earning the backing of the African Union.

In four years, Afrima has managed to carve out a space as a platform to showcase the bubbling, innovative and prolific African music industry that has exploded in the past decade.

In Accra, it’s not World Music the continent is going to celebrate.

Instead, it’s Afropop, the Nigerianborn style which mixes Congolese soukous, Ivorian coupe-decale, Ghanaian Highlife and Jamaican dancehall that has got Africa’s youth dancing.

“Music is a bridge,” said Olivier Laouchez, chief executive of Trace TV, a French music channel popular

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Monday, November 26, 2018

on the continent.

“In Senegal, we listen to Nigerian hits in nightclubs and South Africa’s kwaito (afro-house) is exported to all radio stations on the continent.

“Today, what is bringing Africa together... is sport and music.”

- Diaspora One category has been dedicated to artists from the vast diaspora.

This year, the contenders include Franco-Malian Aya Nakamura and the surprising Afrotronix, an artist of Chadian origin who dresses like Daft Punk and makes house music with Sahelian rhythms and lyrics in Spanish.

Maître Gims, who comes from Democratic Republic of Congo and is repeatedly played on French radio, has racked up more than 200 million views on YouTube with “J’me Tire” (“I’m outta here”) and is Afrima’s most nominated artist this year.

The rapper is as much of an unknown to English-speaking Africa as Nigeria’s Davido is to French audiences, despite his 100 million-plus views on YouTube. “Thanks to Afrima we get to know musicians from all over the continent,” Oris Aigbokhaevbolo, a journalist with the Music in Africa website, told AFP. (afp)

French-Lebanese trumpeteer Ibrahim Maalouf

XAVIER LEOTY / AFP

Star trumpeter Maalouf convicted over schoolgirl sex assault

PARIS - Star trumpeter Ibrahim Maalouf, famed for his with his parents -- both musicians award-winning film soundtracks and mixing of eastern and -- during the country’s 15-year-civil western sounds, was handed a suspended prison sentence for war and settled in France.

He plays a four-pistoned instrusexual assault on Friday by a French court.

IBP/net

In four years, Afrima has managed to carve out a space as a platform to showcase the bubbling, innovative and prolific African music industry that has exploded in the past decade.

Maalouf, 37, was found guilty of assaulting a 14-year-old schoolgirl who was doing work experience at his music studio in a suburb southeast of Paris in 2013.

The girl, now aged 19, testified in court that he had kissed her and grabbed her without her consent.

Maalouf denied the allegations and portrayed her as an infatuated fan who was bitter after being rejected. The court in Creteil, a southeastern suburb of Paris, handed him a 20,000-euro ($23,000) fine as well as the suspended prison term.

Born in Lebanon, Maloouf fled

ment invented by his trumpeter father in the 1960s, as well as playing the piano, composing and teaching.

He has played with Sting and Elvis Costello among other music stars and last year won French cinema’s highest award, a Cesar, for the soundtrack of the film “In the Forests of Siberia”. (afp)

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FRANCOIS GUILLOT / AFP

A picture taken on November 25, 2018 on the Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris shows a tag reading “Down with the state, the cops and the nazis” a day after a rally by yellow vest (Gilets jaunes) protestors against rising oil prices and living costs. Security forces in Paris fired tear gas and water cannon on November 24 to disperse protesters. Several thousand demonstrators, wearing high-visibility yellow jackets, had gathered on the avenue as part of protests which began on November 17, 2018.

Clashes on Champs-Elysees as French protesters rage against taxes

Anti-government protesters clashed with French police on the Champs-Elysees in Paris on Saturday, leaving the area cloaked in tear gas and smoke from fires on a fresh day of demonstrations against President Emmanuel Macron.

Demonstrators wearing the yellow, high-visibility vests that symbolise their movement threw projectiles at police preventing them from moving along the famed shopping avenue, which was decked out in twinkling Christmas lights.

They also built barricades in some spots, and tore down traffic lights and street signs, creating riotous scenes reminiscent of France’s 1968 civil unrest, or street insurrections in the mid-19th century immortalised in paintings and movies.

Police arrested 130 people, 69

of those in Paris, and 24 people were injured, five of them police officers including one who suffered burns to his groin, the city police department and Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said.

Elsewhere, protesters took over highway toll booths to let traffic pass for free, or held go-slow vehicle processions, underlining one of their core complaints of escalating taxes on car fuel, especially diesel.

Macron, targeted by protesters’ calls that he resign, took to Twitter to thank police.

“Shame” on those who assaulted

or intimidated citizens, journalists and politicians, Macron said.

“There is no place for violence in the (French) Republic.”

Calm returned to the streets of the capital after midnight on Saturday, with the Champs-Elysees reopening to traffic. The clean-up operation also got under way as garbage trucks were deployed and workers removed barricades along the famous avenue.

- Smaller than a week ago The violence was on a smaller scale than a week ago when the

“yellow vest” movement staged its first nationwide protest.

“We’re not here to beat up cops.

We came because we want the government to hear us,” said one protest spokeswoman, Laetitia Dewalle, 37, adding that the largely spontaneous movement denounced “violence by pseudo-protesters” on the fringes.

“We have just demonstrated peacefully, and we were teargassed,” said Christophe, 49, who travelled from the Isere region in eastern France with his wife to protest in the capital.

The interior ministry counted 106,000 protesters across France on Saturday, with 8,000 in Paris, of whom around 5,000 were on the

Champs-Elysees. That was far less than the national tally of 282,000 in the November 17 protests.

Castaner said after the tumult died down that damage on the Champs-Elysees was “small”. The French government cast blame for the unruly protests on far-right politician Marine Le Pen, claiming she egged them on.

Continued to page 6 News can also be heard in “Bali Image” at Global Radio FM 96.5 from 9.30 until 10.00 am. Listen to Global Radio FM at http:// globalfmbali.listen2myradio.com or live video streaming at http:// radioglobalfmbali.com and http:// ustream.tv/channel/global-fm-bali.

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Monday, November 26, 2018

Bali News

Released Bali Nine drug-smuggler returns home to more legal woes

An Australian woman held in Indonesian prisons for 13 years for being part of the “Bali Nine” drug-smuggling gang returned home Thursday, facing more possible jail time for alleged crimes committed before her overseas ordeal.

Renae Lawrence, 41, arrived in Brisbane shortly after dawn and then flew on to her home town of Newcastle in New South Wales state. She is the only member of the group to find freedom.

Lawrence was met by a large crowd of reporters, photographers and TV cameras at both Brisbane and Newcastle airports, but ignored their questions.

She ran from the Newcastle terminal and jumped into a waiting vehicle to escape the media swarm and was driven off.

Police want to question Lawrence about outstanding arrest warrants dating from before her ill-fated departure for Bali in 2005, but did not prevent her from leaving the airport with family members.

Australian media reports said Lawrence faces two outstanding charges relating to a high-speed chase involving a stolen vehicle.

It was unclear if Newcastle police would pursue the charges, but federal Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton argued that she should not be given “credit” for her time in Indonesian prison.

“If you’ve committed offences in our country, you need to face the justice system here,” he said prior to her return.

Lawrence, the only female member of the Bali Nine, was caught with 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds) of heroin strapped to her body as she tried to board a flight back to Australia from Bali.

She was initially handed a life

term, but her sentence was later reduced to 20 years and then further cut due to good behaviour.

Of the nine in the original group, ringleaders Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan were executed by firing squad in 2015, sparking a diplomatic row between Australia and Indonesia, which has some of the world’s strictest drug laws including the death penalty.

Another member, Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen, died in prison in June from stomach cancer, while the remaining five are currently serving life sentences.

Some critics have lashed out at the Australian police for tipping off their Indonesian counterparts about the gang and putting its members at risk of execution in Indonesia. (afp)

SONNY TUMBELAKA / AFP

Renae Lawrence (C) of Australia is escorted after being released from Bangli prison in Bangli regency on Bali island on November 21, 2018. The first member of the “Bali Nine” herointrafficking gang was released from prison on November 21 after serving 13 years, in a case that caused a huge diplomatic rift between Indonesia and Australia.

International

International

Activities

Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center

Monday, November 26, 2018

15

Awarded the Highest iAudit Score Food & Beverage Service 2018 IBP/net

“Bali weekend” performance in Leiden museum amazes dutch public

LONDON - Barong Dance was brought by the Indonesian Ambassador to the Kingdom of the Netherlands, I Gusti A. Wesaka Puja, with the accompaniment of Swara Shanti from Amstelveen received a standing ovation from the audience at the Bali Weekend event.

Held at the Volkenkunde Museum , Leiden, weekend, Swara Shanti Gamelan opened the performance by singing Sinom Ladrang which brought viewers to the atmosphere of daily life in Bali, an official of Social Affairs of the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture of the Indonesian Embassy in The Hague, Renata Siagian, told Antara London on Tuesday.

The cultural performance also featured the Kembang Girang dance by the Dwi Bumi dance studio and Rangda dance which is part of the “Bali Weekend” which was packaged as part of the Bali Grand Exhibition series “Welcome to Paradise” which was held since last October.

Ambassador I Gusti Agung Wesaka Puja after the performance said Bali is a well-known tourism destination in the Netherlands, therefore participation is to give appreciation to the Dutch community through the Balinese Barong dance. Hopefully visitors will be entertained with what is served and can strengthen relations between the two countries especially in the tourism and cultural sectors, “he said.

A similar hope was conveyed

by Anak Agung Bagus Krishna Sutedja, gamelan coach Swara Shanti, who had just completed his master`s program at Codarts Rotterdam, and Aafke, one of the Dutch citizens of Balinese cultural activists. At the end of this week,

Aafke also provides Balinese dance workshops to Dutch children visiting Volkenkunde.

During the weekend visitors not only visit the exhibition, but also watch cultural performances and attend various workshops and presentations about Bali include cooking Balinese food demonstrations, preparing offerings, making art items by processing them.

The Bali exhibition themed “Welcome to Paradise” was officially opened at the Volkenkunde Museum, Leiden, the Netherlands

by Ambassador I Gusti Agung Wesaka Puja and Mayor of Leiden and General Director of the Volkenkunde Museum, Stijn Schoonderwoerd attended by hundreds of visitors.

One of the keys to Bali`s success being one of the world`s tourist destinations is because Bali is known for its natural beauty, people`s warmth and harmony. Balinese people also always keep the teachings of religion emphasizing how between fellow life in harmony and peace.

The Balinese people under Tri Hita Karana teaches the concept of harmonious relations between Man and God, Fellow and with the Environment.

The Volkenkunde Museum located 19 KM from the city of The Hague has the largest collection of Bali outside Indonesia, in addition to collections of various countries such as Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

At lease 250 collections of Balinese artwork are displayed in the “Welcome to Paradise” Exhibition which runs until May 26 next year.

More than 200 thousand Dutch people travel to Bali every year. (ant)

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Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center, the biggest convention facilities in the area, recently awarded the Highest iAudit Score Food & Beverage Service 2018 by Archipelago International, a leading Indonesiabased hospitality management company.

The iAudit held twice a year to 130+ hotels managed by Archipelago International, and the auditor was Made Sumardika – West & East Area Corporate F&B Manager. The main aim of it are, to follow and implement the standards set by Archipelago International, both in terms of service standards, cleanliness, and tidiness in the area of food and beverage.

The main assessment to win in the iAudit are, restaurant with buffet service, ala carte service, BAR, room service, banquet service, manager role, grooming, and Food & Beverage Golden Rules. And Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center meets all of those categories, therefore, they got score 97.26% on the first iAudit on June 12th, 2018 and 98% score on the second process on August 28th, 2018.

“This is a teamwork achievement, and the appreciation can be a motivation to continue to provide the best service to our guests, and hopefully, we can maintain it in subsequent audits.” Said Sony Bambang Suryo as the General Manager of Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center on General Manager Conference at Aston Tropicana, Bandung on November 15th, 2018.

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Monday, November 26, 2018

Traveling

International

Exploring Austria’s Wine Routes

VIENNA - “Imagine the harmony of an orchestra, with no single instrument heard above another, this is what we aim for with our Weiner Gemischter Satz wine,” states Fritz Wieninger from his winery, in the sleepy outskirts of the Austrian capital.

The vintners of Austria are a very passionate breed. They are a new generation of wine makers producing high quality products. They are represented across the four main wine regions of Niederosterriech (Lower Austria); Burgenland; Steiermark (Styria) and Vienna.

Wrapping a metaphorical arm around the eastern shoulder of the country these regions are defined by very diverse landscapes, microclimates and outstanding grape varieties, such as the signature Grüner Veltliner, the dominant grape of Austria and revered by restauranteurs and sommeliers.

Along with this reputation, comes a new wave of “terroir” tourists, ready to explore a wine history dating back to the Celts and Romans but also in search of Austria’s variations of grapes, producers and wineries.

Vienna – a wine-producing capital city

With around 700 hectares of vineyards, Vienna is the only major wineproducing capital in the world, whose vineyards are all within the city-limits.

Viennese vintners such as Weininger and Mayer am Pfarrplatz are mixing tradition with innovation and most importantly, the grape varieties, to make the capital’s defining blend – Weiner Gemischter Satz (DAC) – a wine that has global prominence. The DAC is a designation of protected origin, given to a wine produced by a regional grape native to a particular area.

“Weininger” and winery “Mayer

am Pfarrplatz” both have plots on the Nussberg Hill, a standout vineyard location commanding spectacular views over the capital.

The rows of vines drop downwards before merging with Vienna’s dramatic cityscape; the Gothic spire of St. Stephen’s Cathedral, the Riesenrad Ferris Wheel and the Danube River, all visible.

Many wineries own and run a ‘Heuriger’ (translated as “this year’s wine”) referring to an Austrian wine-tavern. It was Emperor Joseph II’s decree of 17th August, 1784, that granted every individual the privilege of selling “foodstuffs”, wine and cider produced in-house throughout the year, that has evolved into today’s Heuriger’s, such as that owned by Mayer am Pfarrplatz, and aptly named ‘Heuriger Beethoven’.

It was home to the Maestro in 1817.

The Wachau Valley – An UNESCO World Heritage area

The sinewy Danube feeds, nourishes and passes numerous vineyards, but also provides an easy escape from Vienna by boat or bike, as a pleasant way to delve into Austria’s wine culture.

Vienna’s neighbouring wine regions offer a diverse vinicultural experience, driven by varying landscapes and climates; none more so than the Wachau Valley, an UNESCO World Heritage site since the year 2000, alongside the nearby Kamptal and Kremstal regions, all brimming with old-world charm. Just 1-hour’s drive from Vienna, the steep sided valley, stretches for 21 miles from Spitz to Loiben and creates numerous micro-

climates at every turn of the snaking and grand Danube River, upon which flows a steady stream of tourists.

The main producer here is Domäne Wachau, a winery located in the village of Dürnstein, home to just 200 inhabitants, yet a co-operative representing 250 vintner families, producing some 2.5 m bottles a year.

The Kellerberg vineyard rises up on a mosaic of terraces behind the winery, renowned for producing superior Reislings and Grüner Veltliners. Harvest can only be done by hand, but those with the arduous task are rewarded with dramatic vistas across the valley.

Immediately below, the modern winery stands next to the “Baroque Cellar Palace”, built in the early part of the 17th Century, whilst high above them both are the ruins of the Dürnstein Castle, in which Richard the Lionheart was held captive in 1192. Etchings and frescos circle the stately rooms. Below stairs, a 1km subterranean cellar network, turns grape to wine reflecting the unique Wachau Valley terroir.

Alongside a series of oak barrels a bust of ‘Ambassador Leopold Figl’ stands proud. He was a regular visitor to the cellar during negotiations that led to the State Treaty for the reestablishment of an Independent Austria after the Second World War. The cellar also offers up more surprises, as an experimental playground, with one corridor devoted to what they call Backstage wines that explore new styles of Grüner Veltliner, prepared in “Concrete eggs” and even a handcarved granite cask.

A short distance north-east of the Wachau Valley in Wagram, the Winery Fritz Salomon has had wine and viticulture present at their historical Manor ‘Oberstockstall’ since the beginning of the 12th Century. The Salomon family have owned the estate for the past 150-years and grow their grapes in some of Wagram’s oldest vineyards, according to biodynamic principles. The ancient cellar produces a diverse range of grape varieties, from Grüner and Reisling to Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir.

Wine and Architecture

At the centre of the Kamptal region in Lower Austria, on the edge

of the picturesque town of Langenlois is the Loisium – world of wine – a visitor centre, vinotheque (wine shop) and museum.

It is a totally immersive wine experience, which combines tastings with tours and housed in a modernist cube-like structure designed by architect Steven Holl. The building’s steel cladding reflects the sunlight and the Kamptal regions regular warm days and cool nights, which produce beautifully balanced white wines.

The wine centre’s geometric lines, cleverly follow the neat rows of vines, sloping gently south towards the town’s historic rooftops and church spire. It also points in the direction of the subterranean wine cellars whose tunnels date back some 900 years and tell the story of the winemaker’s life in a bygone era, and also the modern production of both wine and sparkling wine.

Another renowned wine dynasty is the House of Esterházy known the world over, a wine producer whose modernist winery is in clear view of the Esterházy Palace dating to the 17th Century, a link between family heritage and the future. And their immediate future is on the Leithaberg range of hills, with a new south-facing vineyard being prepared to produce Chardonnay.

Austria’s wine innovators

Natural wines have been growing in popularity and Austria is producing some of the best. Winery Meinklang in Burgenland has embraced biodynamic wine production since 2001, buying into the intimate relationship

between organic farming processes, the production of wines and keeping that close production circle tightly spinning. This includes filling cows’ horns with fresh manure and using it as the basis for natural fertiliser, as well as adhering to the cosmic calendar.

Niklas Peltzer of Meinklang Winery says that “artificial yeasts and artificial fermentation kills the original terroir” and Meinklang’s ethos is to give the wines an “honesty and authenticity in order to make a handcrafted product” without chemical manipulation.

Winery Gruber Röschitz, located in the Western part of the Weinviertel region (Austria’s biggest wineproducing area) is owned and run by a trio of siblings. They are young, ambitious and proud of their family’s agrarian roots stretching back 200-years and wine cultivation since the 1950s. Ewald Gruber, the eldest of the siblings is a firm believer in the organic production of wine; “the wine should be made in the vineyard not the cellar” he says pointing to healthy soils and vines.

Austria’s wine regions consist of so many family-owned estates, who still embrace ancestry, tradition and nature. And maybe Pulker’s Heuriger in Rührsdorf, an unassuming road-side wine tavern, best encapsulates it all. After a scenically spectacular drive along the southern bank of the Danube, visitors and locals can stop for a hearty farmer’s style lunch of succulent pork with crackling, washed down with a ‘Staubiger’ wine; an unfiltered smoky white wine that pairs perfectly with the food, rustic ambiance and Austria’s vinicultural landscape. (IBP/net)

Bali News

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

3

Provincial govt finalizes contributions of travelers

DENPASAR — The plan to collect a ten-dollar levy per tourist will soon become apparent because the provincial government of Bali is currently finalizing the academic draft as a legal instrument. This contribution will be used for cultural and environmental preservation. Meanwhile, tourists will get services along with insurance while in Bali.

“Tourists coming to Bali need good quality service as well as a safe, comfortable and peaceful condition. We need to provide good transportation, we need health insurance, we need protection, and we will give all these to tourists,” said the Governor of Bali, Wayan Koster, after attending a work meeting at the Bali House of Representatives on Monday (Nov. 19).

Koster added that tourists coming to Bali cannot only enjoy tourist attractions but all of their activities are also protected. This service improvement certainly requires costs that will be covered by tourist levies. This kind of contribution has actually been applied by several countries. Meanwhile, in Bali itself, it will form a body to manage, but still under the government.

“It can be managed by an accountable and transparent body, and its designation is meant to improve the quality of tourism implementation as a whole. The body is owned by the state, not a private sector,” he explained.

According to Koster, the 10-dollar levy per foreign tourist remains in a discourse. Similar levy will also be applied to domestic tourists, but the amount is planned to be IDR 10,000 per tourist. He is optimistic that tourists will accept this policy in the interest of preserving Balinese culture. They will not feel objections because it is not too expensive.

“We will first make the rules in the form of regional regulations (Perda). It can be directly collected at hotel and the airport. It will be inputted into the system, while the use is determined to be a source of local revenue. The potential almost reaches IDR 1 trillion. Travelers can get insurance, health insurance and services at all points while in Bali,” he explained.

Koster explained that tourists receive services since arriving at Ngurah Rai Airport by improving

MANGUPURA — Some time ago, a member of the Kuta Police came to Villa Impiana, Seminyak, Kuta, and then arrested Liam Connor Leppin, 21.

The arrest is related to cases of theft of safety boxes and active speakers.

“The crime scene of the theft is at the villa as well where the perpetrator stayed in room number

immigration and customs service so as to be faster without queuing for hours. Then, as soon as getting out of the airport, tourists will be escorted by good travel agency and through good road infrastructure.

At each point security personnel will also be alerted in collaboration with the police to create a safe atmosphere for tourists. “In tourist destinations, for tourists that will dive or climb, as being prone to accidents, they will be protected and all are covered,” he added.

In addition to contributions of tourists, Koster will also target

CSR funds as a source of revenue.

As per the rules, 5 percent of the CSR funds must be allocated to foster environmental programs. It will formulate a local regulation in order to be able to manage some of the funds, so that the allocation can be directed. For example, it is used for priority programs in the fields of culture, health, education, or tourism.

“Suppose that we can only manage a half of it through local regulations by an accountable and transparent body, this can be put into the Regional Budget through region-

ally generated revenue (PAD), and this is a big source for me. We’ll get hundreds of billions,” he said.

A member of PDI-P Faction in the Bali House of Representatives, I Ketut Kariyasa Adnyana, stated that such levies had been previously drafted, but for airport service users only. The draft was not approved by central government.

“The rules have been made, but crossed out. With this idea (tourist’s levy—Ed), if the Bali House of Representatives, governor, and Balinese people can agree, we are sure that it will run well. Now, we just need to convince central government,” he said.

According to Kariyasa, the management will not be contrary to the law and does not cause legal

Governor of Bali, Wayan Koster

Australian steals safety box

47. According to his confession, the perpetrator works as a bricklayer in his country,” said Chief of Kuta Police, Teuku Ricki Fadlianshah, accompanied by Chief of Criminal Investigation Unit, Putu Ika Prabawa, on Tuesday (Nov. 20).

The disclosure of this case, said Ika, began with the report from

I Wayan Jayendra, 39, related to the incident. At first, Jayendra was called by his co-worker, Kadek Nurawan, that the safety box in Housekeeping was lost. The safety box contains a watch, cellphone, iPad, power bank and gold earrings.

Besides, the active speakers inside the villa are also missing. “Jayendra

said the losses due to the incident are worth IDR 15 million,” he said.

After receiving the report, the Operation Team of the Kuta Police Criminal Investigation Unit, led

by Putu Budi Artama conducted the crime scene investigation.

When checking the CCTV footage installed around the scene, the

problems. The current constraints are still concerning regulations.

Actually, it is the same as the governor, Kariyasa is confident that foreign tourists will be enthusiastic about this contribution. This idea is in harmony with several foundation institutions in a number of countries engaged in environmental and cultural conservation wishing Bali to be sustainable and ready to spend money on it.

“They are afraid that Bali will disappear and become a memory only. This tourism has a negative impact like that. With the existence of economic growth, technology will make some regions exotic, which are rare on this earth as many have also been missing,” he explained. (kmb32)

IBP/kmb

perpetrator was recorded to carry active white speakers. Then, police arrested and took the perpetrator to police station, including the active speakers. When being interrogated, the perpetrator admitted to have had taken the items. “At present, we are still developing and looking for other evidence,” he said. (kmb36)

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Bali News

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Mepeed tradition on Puputan Margarana Memorial Day

Thai rubber farms stretched as US-China trade war saps demand

Thanking for heroes’ services by oblation ANNIVERSARY of the Puputan Margarana Memorial Day falling every November 20 is not only commemorated with flag raising ceremony but also with religious ceremony. In the process of Dewa Yadnya ceremony, there is a name called Mepeed tradition where housewives bring an offering in the form of fruits or canang gebogan arranged high and carried over their heads. The women who are residents of Klaci customary village walked from hamlet hall to the Margarana National Memorial Park (TPB) as a form of holy journey. The canang gebogan in the mepeed tradition is an expression of gratitude for the customary villagers of Klaci for the services of the Heroes.

No one knows exactly when this Mepeed tradition was carried out first. According to chief of Klaci customary village, Nyoman Suamayasa, since he was born, this tradition has already existed. “I was born in 1967 and already existed.

Nobody knows when this tradition was carried out,” he said.

The parade of canang gebogan carried out by PKK housewives of Klaci customary village marched to Margarana Memorial Park. Suarmayasa said it involved each family of Klaci customary village. At present, there are 209 households registered in the Klaci customary village. So, there are 209 pieces of gebogan. “These families deliver food. However, they go hand in hand outside the temple priest and oblation makers. Since they are on duty when the ceremony takes place, the oblations have been placed in the memorial park first,” he explained.

After delivering the canang gebogan carried in tandem, the PKK housewives from Klaci customary village then danced the Rejang

Renteng dance. “Presenting an offering in the form of dance performance adds to devotional works while at the same time it increases the enthusiasm of the housewives in their devotional faith to those residing at this place,” explained Suamayasa.

He added that religious ceremony held to commemorate the Puputan Margarana is quite unique. If religious ceremonies in Bali are usually carried out every six months, the religious ceremonies at the Margarana Memorial Park are conducted once a year or every commemoration of the Puputan Margarana Day falling on November 20.

Preparations for the religious ceremony are carried out all the way to the exact date of November 17 from preparation, carrying out the renewal ceremony, melasti until finally Ida Sesuun is being enthroned and Ngantep Pujawali set at 13:00 on Tuesday (Nov. 20). Even though funding is limited, Suarmayasa said there is always a blessing from Ida

Rodger BOSCH / AFP

A worker tends to young plants in a banana farm close to the town of Caxito, set up by Angolan agro-livestock group Novagrolider, on November 14, 2018, in Bengo Province, about 60Km from the Capital, Luanda.

IBP/kmb24

Mepeed tradition where housewives bring an offering in the form of fruits or canang gebogan arranged high and carried over their heads.

Sesuunan for customary villages of Klaci so that they can always fulfill their duties and obligations properly.

He continued that mapeed tradition carried out every year in this memorial service gives the

meaning that customary villagers of Klaci regardless of the victims of war could fight and rise from trauma and showed off devotion and gratitude to the sacrifices of the Heroes. ”The area of Klaci customary village was destroyed

by the Puputan (all out) war.

All the citizens experience deep trauma. However, it can rise and enthusiasm in faith. This is the meaning of the mepeed tradition,” explained Suamayasa. (kmb24)

Tourist visit declines in October, China remains ranked first

Yanus Suprayogi

IBP/kmb

MANGUPURA - Tourist arrival from China during October 2018 decreased by 7 percent or 9,141 people compared to September. Despite the decline, China remains the largest tourist contributor to Bali amounting to120, 138 people in October.

From January to October, a total of 1,221,859 Chinese tourists travelled to Bali. Moreover, the dominance of Chinese tourists still persists in the percentage of 23.47 percent for the total number of visits. In the second and third ranks of the largest tourist contributors until October 2018 are still occupied by Australia and India, where they respectively had a total of 991,032 people and 293,300 people.

According to the General Manager of Ngurah Rai International Airport, Yanus

Suprayogi, the increase in tourists continues every month up to October 2018.

There is an increase of 6.58 percent or as many as 321,370 foreign tourists this year when compared to last year. As many as 5.2 million foreign tourists are recorded to enter Bali through Ngurah Rai International Airport during January to October 2018. “Tourist visits from China declined in October, but still dominated, followed

by Australia and India,” he concluded.

Based on data recorded from January to October, several countries included in the top 10 experienced an increase compared to last year. One of them which experienced a significant increase is the United State of America (USA) with an increase of 50.83 percent or 6,653 foreign tourists compared to last year. A big event held in October such as the IMF-World

Bank Annual Meeting 2018 and Our Ocean Conference 2018 completed in Bali is one of the factors increasing the arrival of foreign tourists.

“The big event last October, especially the IMF-World Bank Group Annual Meeting 2018 is a factor that can contribute to the increase in foreign tourists, although October is not included in the peak season for foreign tourist arrivals to Bali,” said Yanus.

Until now, said Yanus. Bali is still faced with low season conditions. However, the increase is expected to continuously grow until December 2018. “We are optimistic, the arrival of foreign tourists through Ngurah Rai International Airport will reach 6.27 million according to the target set by the Ministry of Tourism,” he assured. (kmb23)

13

‘Green fuel’: Bananas to help wean Angola off oil

CAXITO - Boxes of still-green bananas were shifted one-by-one from a towering stack of crates into a refrigerated shipping container.

Stamped “From Angola, with love”, the fruit is shipped to consumers 6,000 kilometres (3,700 miles) away and are part of Luanda’s drive to diversify its economy and wean itself from its dependence on oil. Novagrolider, a privatelyowned company, produces several dozen tonnes of bananas every week to be shipped to Portugal.

The firm, founded 10 years ago with Portuguese investment, has become a poster child for the economic transformation that the Angolan government is seeking.

At Novagrolider’s Caxito 600hectare (1,500-acre) plantation 60 kilometres northwest of Luanda, the banana plants, protected with blue plastic bags, bend under the weight of their fruit.

In a nearby hangar with a corrugated iron roof, two staff delicately dip the freshly-picked bunches into vast washing pools.

The bananas are meticulously sorted after being washed and weighed with as many as 4,000 boxes prepared daily.

The best-looking fruit is earmarked for dispatch to foreign markets with the rest kept for sale locally.

“We have two grades -- domestic

and export,” said supervisor Edwin Andres Luis Campos as he watches the production line closely.

“Domestic will be sold here in Angolan supermarkets in about four or five days. Export will be shipped to Europe in refrigerated containers that will arrive in Europe in between 20 and 25 days.”

Novagrolider’s output has grown exponentially in recent years and its parent company, Grupolider, which has interests in transport and property as well, employs 3,500 people.

It grows mangoes, pineapples and watermelons as well as bananas on its four fruit farms in Angola.

After a cautious start, company boss Joao Macedo’s appetite and ambition grew rapidly.

“Two years ago we started exporting to the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo -- but that wasn’t viable because of the state of the roads,” said Macedo in his airconditioned office in Luanda.

- Bananas, our ‘green fuel’ “Despite competition from South America, the quality of our products nonetheless allows us to sell in Portugal and Spain. And that’s not all.”

Macedo hopes to double produc-

tion to 170,000 tonnes annually and establish a foot-hold in the lucrative South African market.

Back in Caxito, the province’s top agriculture official shares Macedo’s enthusiasm.

“We’re financially encouraging small-scale farmers to increase the size of the areas they cultivate,” said Eliseo Mateos.

“Until now they’ve mostly used their production for subsistence, but now we want them to grow more so they can sell their crops at market.

“Bananas are our ‘green fuel’ -here we have one possible way of diversifying the economy.”

In the decade that followed the bloody 27-year civil war that ended in 2002, Angola enjoyed strong double-digit growth fuelled by oil, which accounts for 90 percent of Angola’s exports and 70 percent of government revenues.

But the slump in the price of crude in 2014 shook the economic model of the country, which is one of the poorest in Africa, locking it into a vicious cycle of economic contraction.

Unbridled inflation, recession, soaring debt and mass unemployment all followed. (afp)

BANGKOK - They work in the pre-dawn gloom tapping trees for the “white gold” that has made their country the world’s top rubber producer -- but as prices plunge due to the US-China trade war, Thai farmers are giving up the sap.

Thai latex makes everything from tyres and condoms to baby pacifiers and surgical gloves, the fruit of the rubber trees cultivated across endless acres of the country.

But the rubber trade is at a crossroads as a bitter dispute between the world’s two biggest economies ricochets across Southeast Asia with unexpected consequences.

Countries like Vietnam are benefiting as manufacturers migrate from China to avoid punishing tariffs on exports to the US. But in Thailand, the price of rubber has slumped twenty percent since June, as those same tariffs bite hard on demand from factories in China -- the market for more than half its latex exports.

Some of Thailand’s rubber workers are being forced to abandon their plantation jobs for factory work.

“I couldn’t feed my children anymore,” said Annita, who used to work 10 hours a day harvesting latex in Chiang Rai, northern Thailand, making just $7 a day, less than the minimum wage and half the going rate several years ago.

So she has taken a job at a packing plant earning around $9 daily.

“Nobody wanted to stay. The plantation owner can’t find workers anymore -- the work is too difficult for the wages,” she told AFP. While the plight of US soybean farmers hit by the tariffs has

grabbed the headlines -- they face a 25 percent levy to access China, the world’s biggest soybean market -- other troubles are quietly brewing across the world.

The bottom has fallen out of the once-booming industry as Thai rubber prices plummet to about $1.21 a kilogram -- they were five times that in 2011.

- Too much rubber Around one third of all the rubber in the world comes from Thailand’s forests, where latex is harvested at night or before dawn by tappers who make an incision and collect the sap as it bleeds out.

The country currently produces about 4.6 million tonnes of rubber a year and the sudden drop in Chinese demand has compounded a longer term global oversupply crisis to push prices off a cliff.

“A climate of uncertainty” pervades the industry after US tariffs hit nearly half of all Chinese imports, according to Karako Kittipol, marketing manager at Thai Hua Rubber.

“Chinese companies don’t want to have too much rubber in stock,” he told AFP. The value of the yuan against the US dollar has also dipped, making rubber more expensive for Chinese manufacturers to buy.

Thailand is a bystander in the trade war between the world’s two largest economies.

But the ruling junta is trying to address the supply-side issues and is aiming to reduce the area under cultivation for rubber by more than 60,000 hectares per year over the next five years. (afp)

Jonathan KLEIN / AFP

In this picture taken on October 17, 2018 a woman cuts out stains from a raw rubber sheet at a factory in Rayong Province, Thailand.

12

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

Bali News

International

BUSINESS

Monday, November 26, 2018

5

Bali Named Best Wedding Destination 2018 by T + L India

JORGE GUERRERO /

This file photo taken on October 16, 2018 Picture shows Gibraltar Rock from La Linea de la Concepcion near the southern Spanish city of Cadiz on October 16, 2018. Spain’s prime minister reiterated his threat to vote against the draft deal on Britain’s exit from the European Union at the weekend unless it guarantees Madrid’s veto over Gibraltar’s future status.

Gibraltar: Tiny, rocky outcrop risks derailing Brexit deal

As Britain heads for a weekend summit designed to seal its impending departure from the European Union, Spain is threatening to throw a last-minute spanner in the works over the tiny peninsula of Gibraltar.

Madrid, which has long laid claim to the overseas British territory attached to the Spanish mainland, is threatening to derail the whole Brexit process over the status of “The Rock” -- population barely 30,000.

Spain fears the withdrawal deal does not explicitly hand it a postBrexit veto on future relations between the EU and Gibraltar, which in a 2002 referendum voted overwhelmingly against shared sovereignty between London and Madrid. After Britain and the EU agreed to a draft Brexit declaration on Thursday, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez repeated a threat to scupper the deal.

“After my conversation with (British Prime Minister) Theresa May, our positions remain far away.

My government will always defend the interests of Spain,” he wrote on

Twitter. “If there are no changes, we will veto Brexit.” Gibraltar’s chief minister had earlier accused Spain of seeking to force an issue which has regularly driven a wedge between London and Madrid.

Fabian Picardo told parliament that Spain, the eurozone’s fourth largest economy, “does not need a whip to get the smallest economy in Europe to sit around the table with it and have a meaningful discussion about cooperation.”

- ‘Verges on insanity’ The geography of Gibraltar -- a 2.6-square-mile (6.8-square-kilometer) rocky outcrop on Spain’s southern tip -- meant that there was no shortage of reasons to cooperate with Spain, he added.

Spain wants to negotiate directly with London on all issues related to Gibraltar, which was ceded to the

British crown in a peace treaty in 1713, after Britain leaves the EU. This had been provided for, initially, in a clause to the draft withdrawal agreement that effectively gave Madrid a veto on any Gibraltar-related agreement between the block and the UK. The clause has, however, disappeared from the final draft. And while Spain threatens to derail the entire Brexit deal over this omission, Gibraltarians say they are being used as pawns in a struggle for power. For Hamish Thomson, a 44-year-old anaesthetist, “it verges on insanity that a country (Spain) of half-a-million square kilometres with a population of 46 million and profound internal issues spends so much of its energy on a three-mile square outcrop of limestone with 30,000 people on it.”

Elton Moreno, also 44 and

a manager at a Gibraltar-based gaming company, said: “I’m not surprised. I’m surprised anyone is surprised that we’re being used in this tug of war. I’m just feeling tired that we always seem to be in the news.

“And I’m angry that our currency keeps on fluctuating because of incompetence in the UK government.” Gibraltarians voted by 96 percent to stay in the EU in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

- ‘Hardly surprising’ Prime Minister Sanchez on Wednesday said that “we are defending the interests of the Spanish nation and shall do so to the end”.

In 1969, Spanish dictator Francisco Franco ordered the border between Spain and Gibraltar closed after Gibraltarians voted overwhelmingly in 1967 to retain links to Britain. The border only reopened 13 years later, seven years after his death. As tensions rise once more, barrister Moses Anaho-

ry, 48, complained it was “wholly unacceptable for the Spanish Government to threaten to exercise its veto over the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement at the eleventh hour.

“Unfortunately, while unacceptable, it’s hardly surprising for Spain to raise the ‘Gibraltar issue’ at the last minute,” said Anahory.

“It certainly does nothing to create an atmosphere locally that Spain can be trusted to respect agreements it has signed up to,” including a 2006 tripartite cooperation accord. Owen Smith, 41, a barrister, said: “Like the vast majority of Gibraltarians I voted to remain and I’d be happy to see the Brexit process derailed if remaining in the EU was the outcome.

“But I don’t see the current row about Gibraltar as one capable of derailing the Brexit process. Spain is applying pressure to achieve last minute concessions in respect of Gibraltar. I hope they don’t succeed -- but I’m worried they might.” (afp)

Bali was named the Best Wedding Destination International 2018. This best award predicate was given in the Travel + Leisure (T + L) India’s Best Award 2018. Status as the Best Wedding Destination International of Indian version of T + L was handed over on Tuesday (Nov. 13) local time at ITC Maurya, New Delhi, India.

VITO of India, Sanjay Sondhi, stated the best title of T + L India is increasing the value of Bali tourist destination. “This award is very prestigious. Bali will continue to rise. This award further emphasizes Bali as the best destination for Indian tourists,” said Sanjay on Wednesday (Nov. 14).

To be the Best Wedding Destination International 2018, Bali had a long way to go. The Island of the Gods must compete against many

destinations from other countries.

Moreover, this T + L India’s Best Award 2018 was voted openly to the public and closed on Tuesday (Oct. 30). This voting was done online by involving visitors through https://travelandleisureindia.in.

Entering its seventh year, the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 totally featured 50 categories. Other than Best Wedding Destination International, there are categories for Best Honeymoon Destination, Best City,

Best Emerging Destination, and Best Heritage Destination. There are also Best Food Destinations, Best Airline-International, and many others.

Sanjai said that Bali has some competitors including Tuscany.

However, Bali was chosen because of its popularity and exoticism.

There are many conveniences provided by Bali, even without sacrificing quality. The more important is the ease of connection and public

understanding.

By using the ‘India’s Best in Class’ theme, the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 is very prestigious. Its score is in line with “World’s Best Awards” belonging to the T + L edition of the United States. And, over time, the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 is highly developed because the first edition of this award in 2011 only presented 42 categories.

Minister of Tourism, Arief Yahya, explained the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 is very prestigious.

This Best Wedding Destination International 2018 for Bali has many positive sides because this best recognition is given internationally.

With this predicate, we are optimistic that the movement of tourists to Bali will be increasingly positive, especially those from India.

The minister successfully bringing the Ministry of Tourism to achieve No. 1 and become the #TheBestMinistryTourism2018 in the Asia Pacific in Bangkok added that this T + L India’s Best Award 2018 strengthens the 3C aspects of the Island of the Gods. Confidence and credibility of Bali as a whole will rise. More importantly, the calibration becomes the evidence on the quality of the Island of the Gods when compared to other destinations in similar categories. (kmb)

Sate Lilit, Unique Menu of Balinese People

Satay … satay… do you like to eat satay? Try to taste this Balinese delicious sate lilit or twisted satay. This kind of satay does not only offer delicious taste, but also

beauty in terms of appearance and presentation. Whether being realized or not, other than requiring patience and high skills, the making of twisted satay also requires a

beautiful artistic spirit.

The process starts from concocting spices, processing the meat and then making it by twisting (sticking and twisting) on ??the bamboo satay stalk in a flat shape. During the process of making satay, it is also an opportunity to strengthen kinship because anyone can twist satay.

Twisted satay has such a distinctive taste. Moreover, the roasting process will appear so tempting.

Children are easily tempted, so they really want to taste it. For those having teeth but not strong enough to chew, it will be better to eat this smooth and sticky twisted satay.

In the past, twisted satay used ingredients in the form of chicken or pork. Twisted satay is made as a means as ritual paraphernalia of mecaru (exorcism rite) to maintain harmonious relationship between

humans and nature. Now, twisted satay is also sold as a complement to local menus where in a portion it is served with rice and other delicacies.

In strategic places such as tourist attractions, the corner of the city and traditional markets are very easy to find the twisted satay merchants.

Hotels, restaurants and food stalls will surely provide this twisted satay. However, the ingredients used are marine fish, such as snapper, tuna or others. Similarly, the type of stalk used is lemongrass.

At hotels or restaurants, the twisted satay is neatly packed and the spices are adjusted to the tourists’ appetite, so that anyone can enjoy it. The presentation is also neatly arranged in order to look appealing. If you enjoy satay, it will be better to be accompanied with

special chili sauce.

How to make twisted satay?

First of all, slice the fish meat into small pieces and then refine by using a blender so that it really turns smooth. The seasonings use authentic Balinese spices such as, garlic, ginger, coriander, turmeric, candlenut, salt, coconut oil, bay leaves and optionally can be added with grated coconut.

Balinese style twisted satay has flavors that are not inferior to satay in general. When coupled with its unique appearance, it will attract more eyes to taste it. Eating twisted satay can create a unique experience during your excursion on the Island of the Gods. It will be better to taste while remaining warm after being roasted. Twisted satay is the hallmark of Balinese cuisine. (kmb)

6

Monday, November 26, 2018

W

International

RLD

From parcel delivery to security, Singapore bets big on drones

SINGAPORE - Hi-tech Singapore is planning to roll out a swarm of drones for tasks that include delivering parcels, inspecting buildings and providing security, but safety and privacy concerns mean the initiative may hit turbulence.

Companies have already started testing the devices for commercial use, mainly in an area of over 200 hectares (500 acres) dotted with high-rise buildings and shopping malls, specially designated by the government for the trials.

It is part of the affluent city’s drive to embrace technological innovation, as well as an effort to tackle a manpower shortage in a country of just 5.6 million, which relies on foreign migrant workers in many low-paying sectors.

Commercial use of unmanned aerial vehicles is already taking off around the world, in areas as diverse as crop-spraying and surveying for insurance claims, but Singapore’s push represents a particularly ambitious bet on the technology.

Singapore’s civil aviation authority has got behind the project, saying it recognises the potential for drones “to transform mobility and logistics”, and is working with industry players as it seeks to shape regulations

for the sector.

During recent tests, a drone buzzed through the air, snapping pictures of a tower block’s facade, trials for a system that could see laborious human inspections of the city’s ubiquitous high-rises replaced by automated checks.

“Today’s existing building inspection process is extremely slow, expensive, tedious, prone to accidents, fatigue and human error,” said Shawn Koo, chief technical officer of H3 Zoom, a unit of the firm H3 Dynamics, which is behind the tests.

Such inspections are typically carried out by workers from South or Southeast Asia, who hang precariously outside buildings on platforms suspended by ropes.

The new system will see high-resolution images taken by drones and analysed to check for defects, with inspections taking a few days rather than a few weeks, as they do at the moment. H3 Zoom hopes to fully launch the inspections next year.

- Robotic guards -

Drones are also being tested as robotic guards by local firm ST Aerospace.

At its command centre, screens show a simulated security breach in a fence. A black drone is deployed, which chases an intruder while transmitting live images that direct security officers towards him to make an arrest.

Tests have also been carried out for drone parcel delivery while a hospital operator plans to use the devices to transport blood samples and specimens between its hospitals and central laboratory.

But transforming the futuristic vision into reality faces hurdles. The prospect of having a drone suddenly whizz by your apartment or office has sparked privacy concerns in the landscarce city.

Angry Singaporeans called for police to investigate after a video circulated on social media in September showing a recreational

drone flying close to a residential building, while some private condos have banned the devices.

K o o f r o m H 3 Z o o m co nceded that many people still

had “misconceptions” about drones: “Some might view it as a spying vehicle, others might think drones are out there to do harm.” (afp)

Clashes...

From page 1

But Le Pen rejected that accusation saying she had “never called for any violence whatsoever” and in turn accused the government of “organising the tension” and seeking to make her a scapegoat.

Meanwhile, opposition parties on both the right and left accused the government of trying to reduce the protests to just the sporadic scenes of violence, and turning a deaf ear to the demonstrators’ grievances.

Roslan RAHMAN / AFP

This photo taken on September 9, 2018 shows staff members of Singapore technology firm H3 Dynamics preparing to fly a drone to inspect a building facade in Singapore.

of the sprawling capital’s railroads.

Passengers save time and money -- paying just 10 pesos (20 US cents) a trip -- but must face the constant risk of being crushed by a passing locomotive if they or the trolley boys don’t move fast enough.

“Our job here is very dangerous, you need to know what time the train will pass by,” said 57-year-old Rene

Vargas Almeria, who has been at it for nearly 20 years.

Commuter trains travel nearly two dozen times a day along this 1.2-kilometre (one-mile) stretch of rail in the Santa Mesa district, where authorities grudgingly tolerate the carts due to their popularity. The trolley boys also ply a few other stretches of Manila’s battered rail system, that carries an

average of 45,000 passengers a day.

Incredibly, casualties are relatively rare. Police do not keep statistics, but said they couldn’t remember the last time a fatality occurred.

The same cannot be said of close calls -- anyone who spends time pushing or riding the carts seems to have a hair-raising story to share.

Rodolfo Maurello’s scariest near-

Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of the radical left France Unbowed party who attended a separate march Saturday protesting violence against women, tweeted that the action on the streets was “a mass protest of the people” which signalled “the end for Castaner”.

The “yellow vests” hail overwhelmingly from non-urban areas of France. They feel overlooked and penalised by policies they see as being pushed through by elitist politicians in Paris.

Former investment banker Macron was elected on a pledge to put more money in workers’ pockets.

But the effects of his pro-business reforms on unemployment and purchasing power have been limited so far.

Many of the often low-income “yellow vest” protesters are particularly incensed at his decision to hike anti-pollution taxes on

diesel, while scrapping a wealth tax on the rich.

“I’m not just fighting against the price of fuel. It’s about tax, what we pay,” protester Catherine Marguier told AFP near the village of La Gravelle in northwest France.

Meanwhile, in a separate protest in the southern city of Marseille, police fired teargas at bottle-throwing demonstrators upset by the “gentrification” renovation work on the town’s biggest square.

Around 1,200 demonstrators took part and two were arrested.

- Rural frustrations -

A week ago, two people died and over 750 people, including 136 police officers, were injured in sometimes violent demonstrations that have shone a light on frustrations in many rural areas and small towns of France.

Monday, November 26, 2018

11

Abused Hong Kong maid Erwiana “disappointed” after employer’s early prison release

A former Indonesian domestic worker in a high-profile abuse case said Thursday she was “sad and disappointed” after her employer, who was jailed for starving and beating her, walked free before finishing her sentence.

Dodging traffic, and death, on Manila’s railway carts MANILA - As soon as the train rumbles past, the men heave their home-made pushcarts back onto the tracks and passengers hop aboard -cheating death and beating Manila’s notorious traffic. Scores of commuters in the city of about 12 million are propelled to their destinations daily by so-called “trolley boys” pushing metal carts that ply a few segments

International

- ‘Gap between rich and poor’ -

miss in almost two decades as a trolley boy came when he failed to notice the train behind him as he was pushing a cart packed with passengers.

“The train was just metres away,” the 60-year-old said, recalling how he turned around with only seconds to spare and waved it to a stop.

“The sound of its brakes screeching was very loud.” (afp) Revolts against taxes have been a feature of French public life for centuries. Citizens still pay some of the highest in Europe as a percentage of GDP, and fuel-price protests are a common modern occurrence.

Previous rounds pitting the government against drivers took place in 1995, 2000, 2004, and 2008, often when tax increases coincided with high oil prices -- as they have this year.

A poll by the Odoxa research group for Le Figaro newspaper this week found that 77 percent of respondents described it as “justified”. (afp)

Erwiana Sulistyaningsih became the face of abused maids in Hong Kong, after pictures showed how she was imprisoned, starved and violently beaten by her former employer.

Law Wan-tung was sentenced to six years in prison in 2015 for grievous bodily harm, assault, criminal intimidation and failure to pay wages, and was ordered by a court last year to pay more than $100,000 in damages.

But Law secured an early release from prison a few months ago, the South China Morning Post reported Wednesday, citing a lawyer from the city’s justice department.

Erwiana expressed her disappointment Thursday and said the six-year sentence was not enough “for the terrible crimes that she committed against me and the other victims”.

“I feel very sad and disappointed when I learned that my former employer Law Wan-tung was released from jail earlier than the actual imprisonment that she had to serve,” she said.

“She.. tortured me, held me captive, denied me rest and refused to pay me any wages,” Erwiana told reporters.

“It is my hope that Law Wan-tung can admit to her wrongdoings, apologise to the victims and resolve to never do the same thing to anyone ever again,” she added.

Tutik Lestari Ningsih -- another former maid from Indonesia of Law -- said the news made her feel “very unsafe” because Law had previously threatened to kill her.

The Correctional Services Department said in a statement to AFP that due to privacy regulations they would not disclose specific details.

Prison inmates can receive a one-third sentence reduction on good behaviour, although Law had not yet served adequate time of her sentence for this to apply.

More than 340,000 domestic helpers work in Hong Kong -- mostly from the Philippines and Indonesia -- often performing menial tasks for low wages while living in poor conditions. (afp)

In this file photo taken on February 27, 2015, former Indonesian domestic helper Erwiana Sulistyaningsih (C) looks on as a supporter (R) speaks to the press in front of the District Court following the sentencing of her former employer Law Wan-tung in Hong Kong.

Britain gives visa free visit for Indonesian business people

Government sets priority to develop human resources

JAKARTA - The Government of Britain offers visa free visits for Indonesian business people representing 23 selected companies.

“The most important criterion is that the companies have big contribution to the economic relations between Indonesia and Britain,” says British Ambassadors to Indonesia Moazzam Malik here on Thursday.

Indonesia is the third country in Asia Pacific receiving the “Selected Business Scheme” after China and India. “This means we see it important the business potentials in Indonesia , beneficial to Britain and Indonesia,” Malik said.

Dominique Hardy, the Director

of British Visa Department for Asia Pacific said at present there are only 23 companies selected but it is not impossible that the number would increase as Britain would make regular evaluation.

“The 23 companies deserve to be included in the list as so far their staff and families have traveled to Britain regularly,” Hardy said.

The companies to receive the SBS facility are British companies having branches in Indonesia and Indonesian companies having units in Britain such as PT Bank HSBC, PT Standard Chartered, PT Sinar Mas Grup, and PT Astra Zeneca Indonesia. (ant)

Anthony WALLACE / AFP

JAKARTA - The government has set a development priority to improve human resources in the coming five years, a senior minister stated.

“The development of human resources is important, so the target is the two relevant sectors of education and health,” Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan stated on Wednesday.

According to Pandjaitan, the government will allocate 20 percent of the state budget for development of the education sector.

In the meantime, the state budget allocation for the health sector will

account for some five percent.

“The budget allocation for education will be directed at building polytechnics and vocational schools, as currently, the numbers are very small,” the minister revealed.

Pandjaitan said that in five years, the government will build massive polytechnic schools.

“Alike infrastructure development, we will also build massive polytechnics,” Pandjaitan stated.

The coordinating minister for maritime affairs further noted that in addition to increasing the capacity of human resources, the government will continue

with the development of infrastructure, bureaucratic and legal reforms, and industries having added value.

In the health sector, the government is committed to reducing the rate of stunting.

“Indonesia is a vast country, and it is certainly not easy to solve the problem of stunting in a short time,” Pandjaitan noted.

“Stunting,” or chronic malnutrition, is common among children in their growing years.

Symptoms of stunting usually arise due to low access to health services, clean water, and nutritious food. (ant)

10

Destination

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Durant scores season-high 44 as Warriors edge Kings

LOS ANGELES - Kevin Durant delivered a seasonhigh 44 points as the Golden State Warriors needed a wild finish to hold off the Sacramento Kings 117-116 on Saturday night.

DENPASAR - Sakenan Temple or ‘Pura Sakenan’ as referred to by locals, is an important temple in the southern region of Bali, located on the north-western shore of Serangan, a small island located 10km south of Denpasar. Once strong for its unique feature of pilgrimages during the 210-day piodalan temple anniversary celebrations with processions leading to the Serangan Island on foot or by traditional wooden boats, reclamations in the 90s have changed the ways, as well as the natural landscape of

the island.

Sakenan Temple was built in the tenth century by high priest Mpu Kuturan, who arrived in Bali in 1001AD before the fall of the Majapahit Kingdom, on a mission to restructure the socio-religious aspects of the Balinese communities. The temple is comprised of two significant areas, the largest having undergone renovation except for its antique walls around the temple grounds, and a smaller part that retains its olden features. The old temple was built of limestone and corals sourced from the surrounding

coastal reefs. Within and around the temple grounds are large and towering trees that are silent witnesses of the temple’s past. Given the infusion of dynamism in Balinese Hinduism, these trees are adorned with chequered cloths and are regarded as dwellings of guardian spirits of the temple grounds. Hundreds of pilgrims from the various village temples in southern Denpasar flock to the Sakenan Temple for its 210-day piodalan temple anniversary celebrations which coincides with the holy day of Kuningan, 10 days after the

Galungan Day celebrations, another major Balinese Hindu observation.

Before the reclamations that took place in the 90s pilgrims would carry ancient heirlooms and sacred temple objects at low tide by foot through mangrove forests towards Serangan.

At high tide, traditional outriggers taxi the crowd over the waters. Now, the land mass is easily reachable by automobiles via a 110m bridge, making the colourful and unique boat rides memories of the past. Upon arrival, devotees proceed towards the Pura Susunan Wadon, a temple separate from the main Sakenan Temple grounds, located an approximate half kilometre to the east. Then prayers continue at the Pura Susunan Agung, and then the Pura Dalem Sakenan close to the westernmost shore of Serangan Island.

Good to Know Pujawali or the grand celebrations and the piodalan or temple anniversary of Sakenan Temple falls on every Kliwon Kuningan Saturday, the day of the Kuningan observation in the Balinese 210-

day Pawukon calendar and is held over three days with the height of the revelries on the Sunday. Access to the Sakenan Temple and the Serangan Island is easy via the bridge. However during the threeday temple celebrations, entrance fees apply to both pilgrims and visitors on cars and motorcycles.

Fees range from IDR 2,000-5,000 and are collected by the village officials for the community’s fund.

Several exceptional ritual dances are performed during the height of the piodalan celebrations, usually over the Kuningan weekend. These range from Barong dances to various Tari Topeng or mask dances, and all provide rare, spur-of-themoment photo opportunities. As with any Bali temple visit, you may enter in proper temple attire, that is, a simple sarong and waist sash.

Try to walk around offerings placed on the ground instead of stepping over them. Try not to obstruct a line of procession in progress.

Also, women must remember not to enter temples during their periods.

(IBP/net)

Two-time reigning NBA finals MVP Durant also had a seasonhigh 16 free throws on 17 attempts for the Warriors, who won their second straight after snapping a four-game losing skid on Friday by beating Portland.

Klay Thompson got the winning basket with a put back of his own miss with five seconds remaining in the fourth.

“I don’t know if I got fouled, but who cares I got the putback,” Thompson said. “You’ll take a game-winner any way you can get it I don’t care how ugly it is.”

The Kings made the Warriors work for the victory as De’Aaron Fox made two free throws with 26 seconds remaining to put Sacramento ahead after Thompson missed a 33-footer moments earlier. Durant converted two free throws with 1:27 left and also had 13 rebounds and seven assists, while Thompson wound up with 31 points.

Thompson shot 12 of 26 with five three-pointers as Stephen Curry missed his ninth straight game because of a strained left groin.

Curry, the two-time MVP, was re-examined Saturday and is expected to resume practising next week with a good chance he would return to game action during an upcoming five-game road trip.

“He’s doing much better and we’re just going to keep taking it day by day,” Kerr said.

- Timberwolves beat Bulls Meanwhile, Karl-Anthony Towns had 35 points and 22 rebounds, Derrick Rose came off the bench to score 22 points and the Minnesota Timberwolves beat the Chicago Bulls 111-96.

Jeff Teague added 18 points for Minnesota, which pulled away late to win for the fifth time in seven games since trading Jimmy Butler to Philadelphia.

Both the Timberwolves and Bulls were playing the second game of a back-to-back and their third game in four nights.

“We want to make the right plays, play to each other’s strengths, cover up each other’s weaknesses and play tough,” Minnesota coach Tom Thibodeau said.

“On the nights in which you don’t shoot well, hopefully your rebounding and your defense can carry you through.”

Zach LaVine scored 28 points and Jabari Parker had 27 as the Bulls lost for the sixth time in seven contests. Both players have reached 20 points in the past three games.

Justin Holiday had 14 points and 11 rebounds for the Bulls.

In Cleveland, rookie Collin Sexton scored a season-high 29 points and the Cleveland Cavaliers overcame 40 points by Houston’s James Harden to defeat the Rockets 117-108. (afp)

Copyright 2018 NBAE Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images/AFP

Kevin Durant #35 of the Golden State Warriors handles the ball against the Sacramento Kings on November 24, 2018 at ORACLE Arena in Oakland, California.

Bivol beats Pascal to retain WBA light-lightweight belt

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It is for Job Vacancy, Property, Selling or Buying Please contact Gugiek : 08123840500

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The 27-year-old Bivol (R) cruised to victory in the third defense of his title as he won almost every round against the heavy underdog Pascal.

LOS ANGELES - Russian Dmitry Bivol retained his WBA light heavyweight crown with a unanimous decision over Canada’s Jean Pascal at the Hard Rock Hotel in Atlantic City on Saturday.

The 27-year-old Bivol cruised to victory in the third defense of his title as he won almost every round against the heavy underdog Pascal.

Two judges scored it 119-109 and the other had it 117-111 in favor of Bivol.

Bivol landed a hard right hand in the fourth round to the side of Pascal’s head which wobbled the challenger. Bivol kept up the attack throughout and landed a total of 217 punches to just 60 for Pascal.

He had Pascal backpedaling through most of the fight and the only thing he didn’t do was get the knockout.

“Every time you shoot for the knockout but sometimes you can’t.

But I showed my boxing skills,”

said Bivol who improved to 15-0 with 11 KOs. The 36-year-old Pascal has been in the ring with some of the best in his 13-year boxing career.

But he looked rusty in his first serious fight since losing a decision to Canelo Alvarez in June 2017.

In his most recent fight in July he knocked out a former minor league hockey player, Steve Bosse, in the eighth round of a novelty bout. (afp)

8

Monday, November 26, 2018

Monday, November 26, 2018

‘Shameful’ Boca bus attack forces Copa Libertadores final postponement

Saturday’s “superclasico” Copa Libertadores final second leg between Argentine arch rivals River Plate and Boca Juniors was postponed until Sunday following a “shameful” attack on the Boca team bus that left players affected by smoke inhalation and broken glass.

Alejandro Dominguez, the president of competition organizers Conmebol told FOX television that the two teams had agreed to the postponement and the game will now take place at River’s Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires at 5pm (2000 GMT) on Sunday.

“I want to congratulate both club presidents because there has been a gentleman’s agreement between them,” said Dominguez, head of South American football’s governing body. “In these conditions the game was distorted. One team couldn’t play and the other doesn’t want to play against a rival that isn’t in the right conditions.”

Conmebol originally delayed the match more than two hours when Boca players were affected by tear gas and broken glass after their team bus was pelted with “pepper spray, sticks and stones” on the way to the stadium.

“It’s a very sad day, there are a few misfits at every club,” said Boca

president Daniel Angelici.

“This should shame us as a society and I find it very sad that we have to reschedule such an important match.”

His River counterpart, Rodolfo D’Onofrio added: “As an Argentine and as a football leader, I find this shameful.”

Despite the bus travelling through the streets of the upmarket Nunez neighborhood towards River’s ground under police guard, it came under fire from projectiles thrown by a group of the home side’s fans.

After the match was postponed, there were scuffles and several arrests outside the ground between as supporters clashed with police.

- ‘Attacked from everywhere’ -

After Conmebol’s original decision just to delay the match, Boca veteran Carlos Tevez spoke to Fox television and complained: “We’re not in a condition to play. They’re forcing us to play.”

JAVIER GONZALEZ TOLEDO / AFP

Security forces stand guard as supporters of River Plate leave the Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires after authorities postponed the all-Argentine Copa Libertadores second leg final match between River Plate and Boca Juniors until Sunday following an attack on the Boca team bus that left players affected by smoke inhalation and broken glass, on November 24, 2018.

Boca players were left coughing and teary eyed after the attack that shattered several of their bus’s windows.

“They attacked us from everywhere,” said Boca captain Pablo Perez, who was taken to a local hospital for treatment before returning to the ground.

“Pablo has just returned from hospital and has a bandage on his eye,” added Tevez, a former Manchester United, Manchester City and Juventus forward.

“Other team-mates have cuts.

We’ve only just been able to breathe well because we were affected by the gas. We can’t play like this,” said Tevez, who won the Copa Libertadores in 2003 during his first of three stints with Boca.

However, organizers later relented.

“It’s not easy to take this decision when there are 60,000 people in the stadium and the (television) rights have been sold to a ton of countries,” said Angelici.

“But the most important thing is to look after the physical and psychological condition of the team.”

D’Onofrio added: “It’s the right decision and we hope to be able to play in peace tomorrow.”

It is the first time ever two Argentine teams have contested the final of the Copa Libertadores, the South American equivalent of Europe’s Champions League and has been dubbed the biggest club match in the history of Argentine football.

The two sides are locked at 2-2 from the first leg two weeks ago at Boca’s iconic Bombonera stadium, which was also delayed 24 hours but due to the weather.

Conmebol had originally seemed to be insisting the game go ahead and a statement from its medical commission shown on television said some players had suffered “superficial cuts” and that there was no medical reason to postpone the match. (afp)

9

Atletico denied long-awaited win over Barca, Eibar stun RealWrap fbl | Liga | ESP

CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / AFP

Monaco’s French head coach Thierry Henry looks on during the French L1 football match between Caen (SMC) and Monaco (ASM) on November 24, 2018, at the Michel d’Ornano stadium in Caen, northwestern France.

Henry gets first Monaco win as PSG tighten grip on Ligue 1

Radamel Falcao secured Thierry Henry his first win as Monaco boss with a free-kick that would have made his manager proud as Paris Saint-Germain warmed up for Liverpool’s visit by strengthening their hold on Ligue 1 with a routine win over Toulouse without Neymar and Kylian Mbappe.

The Colombian striker struck with a dipping set-piece nine minutes after the break, and Henry could be seen smiling on the touchline as his players celebrated Falcao’s winner wildly.

“I’m happy for the team, all the fans, we needed that, even if it was not a match for the purists,” said Monaco coach Henry afterwards.

“Style is important, in general, but... we can think about style later.”

Falcao’s fifth league goal of the campaign secured Monaco’s first win in any competition since the opening day of the league season, a miserable run of form that has left them second-bottom in Ligue 1 despite Saturday’s win.

The victory came seven games into Henry’s reign at Monaco, where a host of injuries has further complicated an already difficult start to his tenure.

“This is only the beginning, there are still a lot of matches and battles to come. I happy for the team, for the hard work they put in that for a while was not rewarded.”

- Disjointed PSG -

Earlier on Saturday Uruguay striker Edinson Cavani saved a disjointed performance from runaway leaders PSG to maintain their 100 percent start to the season ahead of the crunch Champions League clash with Liverpool on Wednesday.

Neymar and Mbappe were both injured during friendlies in the international break, and PSG are sweating on their recovery for the huge Group C clash with the Parisians just a point behind the Reds and Napoli and gunning to qualify from the competition’s tightest group.

Shorn of their two stars, PSG dominated possession but struggled to create chances against 15thplaced Toulouse.

However coach Thomas Tuchel said that he was “optimistic” that the pair could return for the match at the Parc des Princes.

“I am more optimistic (than on Friday) because both did individual training today,” said Tuchel after his team’s win. “I hope they will be able to train with the whole team on Monday.”

Cavani ensured that their domestic dominance was consolidated when he expertly controlled a ninthminute knockdown after a period of scrappy play, then spun Toulouse defender Kelvin Amian with a neat flick before firing home the winner.

His goal put PSG a full 15 points ahead of second placed Lyon, who prevailed in a tight derby with SaintEtienne on Friday night thanks to Jason Denayer’s second half header.

On Sunday Lille can take back second place from Lyon with a win over Nice, while local rivals Montpellier and Marseille continue their battle for the Champions League places.

Rudi Garcia’s Marseille are sixth but would overtake Saint-Etienne should they beat lowly Amiens, while their fellow southern club Montpellier take on Rennes knowing a win would take them second should Lille stumble at Nice. (afp)

Atletico Madrid came within a whisker of their first league win over Barcelona in eight years on Saturday only for Ousmane Dembele to dash their hopes with a dramatic equaliser in injury-time.

Diego Costa looked to have decided a dreary contest at the Wanda Metropolitano when he headed in his first La Liga goal since February with 13 minutes left.

Atletico would have gone top of the table but instead, Barca produced another fightback as Dembele, on as a substitute, slid home a cool finish in the 90th minute to earn the visitors a 1-1 draw.

Diego Simeone was asked after the match what his team had lacked. “Four minutes,” he said, grinning.

Certainly, the relief was palpable in the celebrations of the luminous yellow shirts in the corner but perhaps just as grateful were Real Madrid, beaten 3-0 by Eibar earlier in the day.

Santiago Solari had proven the perfect caretaker but his debut as permanent coach ended in a disastrous, and deserved, defeat at Ipurua.

Madrid’s only consolation was that neither Atletico nor Barca were able to secure the win that would have pulled them a further three points away. Costa almost had it, scoring his first goal in 18 league games to surely end Atletico’s joyless run against Barca, which stretches back to February 2010.

But Dembele, dropped by coach Ernesto Valverde for the defeat to Real Betis before the international break, found some redemption with a clinical finish when it mattered most.

“It is not like in other years when Barca or Real Madrid had leads of 15, 20 points,” Simeone said.

“This is much more entertaining for the fans.”

For all the noise surrounding Dembele off the pitch, his goals have now given Barcelona seven points this season, more than any other player in the division. “He has things other players don’t have,” Valverde said. “We must help him

to get that talent out.”

The opening 45 minutes were almost entirely forgettable, distinguished solely by the fact it was La Liga’s only first half this season that had failed to witness a single shot on target.

Atletico wanted a penalty when the ball struck Arturo Vidal’s arm but the frustration spurred them on and in the 77th minute it paid, Antoine Griezmann’s corner drift-

ing its way to the back post, where Costa headed in.

But just as Dembele had instigated a comeback against Rayo Vallecano last month, he did so again here as the ball spilled out to the 21-year-old at the back post.

He took one touch inside, before firing it home.

If Solari was watching on he might have breathed a small sigh of relief. Four wins while in tem-

ANDER GILLENEA / AFP

Eibar’s Spanish forward Sergi Enrich (C) celebrates with teammates after scoring during the Spanish league football match between SD Eibar and Real Madrid CF at the Ipurua stadium in Eibar on November 24, 2018.

porary charge had earned him a contract until 2021 but against Eibar, Real reverted to the kind of chaotic display that earned Julen Lopetegui the sack.

Defeat also brought into focus the mindset of his players, after their captain Sergio Ramos faced allegations of an anti-doping violation on Friday night from German magazine Der Spiegel. Both the club and Ramos have denied any breach.

“It is not about finding people to blame,” Solari said afterwards.

“Everything is fixable. We had won four straight games, done some things very well, and we have to get back to that.”

Eibar were stronger, more aggressive and, worryingly for Solari, appeared clearer about the plan they wanted to execute. Marc Cucurella, brilliant down the left, was instrumental in all three goals, scored by Gonzalo Escalante, Sergi Enrich and Kike Garcia.

“We were not well-organised,”

defender Raphael Varane said. “We were not comfortable and we did not find any answers.”

Eibar, meanwhile, climb to eighth, a reward for their first ever victory over Real Madrid at the 11th attempt, inside their tiny 7,083-capacity stadium. “We could even have scored more,” said their coach Jose Luis Mendilibar.

Ramos attacked Der Spiegel´s claims as “lies” after the match but allegations he failed to declare the correct medication after the Champions League final in 2017, cannot have helped his side´s performance.

On their display, Ramos said: “When you don´t match an opponent, you become a bad team. You have to be critical when you lack intensity. Our game was reflected by the score.”

Solari must now rally his players ahead of Tuesday’s Champions League game against Roma, when the winner of Group G is likely to be decided. (afp)

8

Monday, November 26, 2018

Monday, November 26, 2018

‘Shameful’ Boca bus attack forces Copa Libertadores final postponement

Saturday’s “superclasico” Copa Libertadores final second leg between Argentine arch rivals River Plate and Boca Juniors was postponed until Sunday following a “shameful” attack on the Boca team bus that left players affected by smoke inhalation and broken glass.

Alejandro Dominguez, the president of competition organizers Conmebol told FOX television that the two teams had agreed to the postponement and the game will now take place at River’s Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires at 5pm (2000 GMT) on Sunday.

“I want to congratulate both club presidents because there has been a gentleman’s agreement between them,” said Dominguez, head of South American football’s governing body. “In these conditions the game was distorted. One team couldn’t play and the other doesn’t want to play against a rival that isn’t in the right conditions.”

Conmebol originally delayed the match more than two hours when Boca players were affected by tear gas and broken glass after their team bus was pelted with “pepper spray, sticks and stones” on the way to the stadium.

“It’s a very sad day, there are a few misfits at every club,” said Boca

president Daniel Angelici.

“This should shame us as a society and I find it very sad that we have to reschedule such an important match.”

His River counterpart, Rodolfo D’Onofrio added: “As an Argentine and as a football leader, I find this shameful.”

Despite the bus travelling through the streets of the upmarket Nunez neighborhood towards River’s ground under police guard, it came under fire from projectiles thrown by a group of the home side’s fans.

After the match was postponed, there were scuffles and several arrests outside the ground between as supporters clashed with police.

- ‘Attacked from everywhere’ -

After Conmebol’s original decision just to delay the match, Boca veteran Carlos Tevez spoke to Fox television and complained: “We’re not in a condition to play. They’re forcing us to play.”

JAVIER GONZALEZ TOLEDO / AFP

Security forces stand guard as supporters of River Plate leave the Monumental stadium in Buenos Aires after authorities postponed the all-Argentine Copa Libertadores second leg final match between River Plate and Boca Juniors until Sunday following an attack on the Boca team bus that left players affected by smoke inhalation and broken glass, on November 24, 2018.

Boca players were left coughing and teary eyed after the attack that shattered several of their bus’s windows.

“They attacked us from everywhere,” said Boca captain Pablo Perez, who was taken to a local hospital for treatment before returning to the ground.

“Pablo has just returned from hospital and has a bandage on his eye,” added Tevez, a former Manchester United, Manchester City and Juventus forward.

“Other team-mates have cuts.

We’ve only just been able to breathe well because we were affected by the gas. We can’t play like this,” said Tevez, who won the Copa Libertadores in 2003 during his first of three stints with Boca.

However, organizers later relented.

“It’s not easy to take this decision when there are 60,000 people in the stadium and the (television) rights have been sold to a ton of countries,” said Angelici.

“But the most important thing is to look after the physical and psychological condition of the team.”

D’Onofrio added: “It’s the right decision and we hope to be able to play in peace tomorrow.”

It is the first time ever two Argentine teams have contested the final of the Copa Libertadores, the South American equivalent of Europe’s Champions League and has been dubbed the biggest club match in the history of Argentine football.

The two sides are locked at 2-2 from the first leg two weeks ago at Boca’s iconic Bombonera stadium, which was also delayed 24 hours but due to the weather.

Conmebol had originally seemed to be insisting the game go ahead and a statement from its medical commission shown on television said some players had suffered “superficial cuts” and that there was no medical reason to postpone the match. (afp)

9

Atletico denied long-awaited win over Barca, Eibar stun RealWrap fbl | Liga | ESP

CHARLY TRIBALLEAU / AFP

Monaco’s French head coach Thierry Henry looks on during the French L1 football match between Caen (SMC) and Monaco (ASM) on November 24, 2018, at the Michel d’Ornano stadium in Caen, northwestern France.

Henry gets first Monaco win as PSG tighten grip on Ligue 1

Radamel Falcao secured Thierry Henry his first win as Monaco boss with a free-kick that would have made his manager proud as Paris Saint-Germain warmed up for Liverpool’s visit by strengthening their hold on Ligue 1 with a routine win over Toulouse without Neymar and Kylian Mbappe.

The Colombian striker struck with a dipping set-piece nine minutes after the break, and Henry could be seen smiling on the touchline as his players celebrated Falcao’s winner wildly.

“I’m happy for the team, all the fans, we needed that, even if it was not a match for the purists,” said Monaco coach Henry afterwards.

“Style is important, in general, but... we can think about style later.”

Falcao’s fifth league goal of the campaign secured Monaco’s first win in any competition since the opening day of the league season, a miserable run of form that has left them second-bottom in Ligue 1 despite Saturday’s win.

The victory came seven games into Henry’s reign at Monaco, where a host of injuries has further complicated an already difficult start to his tenure.

“This is only the beginning, there are still a lot of matches and battles to come. I happy for the team, for the hard work they put in that for a while was not rewarded.”

- Disjointed PSG -

Earlier on Saturday Uruguay striker Edinson Cavani saved a disjointed performance from runaway leaders PSG to maintain their 100 percent start to the season ahead of the crunch Champions League clash with Liverpool on Wednesday.

Neymar and Mbappe were both injured during friendlies in the international break, and PSG are sweating on their recovery for the huge Group C clash with the Parisians just a point behind the Reds and Napoli and gunning to qualify from the competition’s tightest group.

Shorn of their two stars, PSG dominated possession but struggled to create chances against 15thplaced Toulouse.

However coach Thomas Tuchel said that he was “optimistic” that the pair could return for the match at the Parc des Princes.

“I am more optimistic (than on Friday) because both did individual training today,” said Tuchel after his team’s win. “I hope they will be able to train with the whole team on Monday.”

Cavani ensured that their domestic dominance was consolidated when he expertly controlled a ninthminute knockdown after a period of scrappy play, then spun Toulouse defender Kelvin Amian with a neat flick before firing home the winner.

His goal put PSG a full 15 points ahead of second placed Lyon, who prevailed in a tight derby with SaintEtienne on Friday night thanks to Jason Denayer’s second half header.

On Sunday Lille can take back second place from Lyon with a win over Nice, while local rivals Montpellier and Marseille continue their battle for the Champions League places.

Rudi Garcia’s Marseille are sixth but would overtake Saint-Etienne should they beat lowly Amiens, while their fellow southern club Montpellier take on Rennes knowing a win would take them second should Lille stumble at Nice. (afp)

Atletico Madrid came within a whisker of their first league win over Barcelona in eight years on Saturday only for Ousmane Dembele to dash their hopes with a dramatic equaliser in injury-time.

Diego Costa looked to have decided a dreary contest at the Wanda Metropolitano when he headed in his first La Liga goal since February with 13 minutes left.

Atletico would have gone top of the table but instead, Barca produced another fightback as Dembele, on as a substitute, slid home a cool finish in the 90th minute to earn the visitors a 1-1 draw.

Diego Simeone was asked after the match what his team had lacked. “Four minutes,” he said, grinning.

Certainly, the relief was palpable in the celebrations of the luminous yellow shirts in the corner but perhaps just as grateful were Real Madrid, beaten 3-0 by Eibar earlier in the day.

Santiago Solari had proven the perfect caretaker but his debut as permanent coach ended in a disastrous, and deserved, defeat at Ipurua.

Madrid’s only consolation was that neither Atletico nor Barca were able to secure the win that would have pulled them a further three points away. Costa almost had it, scoring his first goal in 18 league games to surely end Atletico’s joyless run against Barca, which stretches back to February 2010.

But Dembele, dropped by coach Ernesto Valverde for the defeat to Real Betis before the international break, found some redemption with a clinical finish when it mattered most.

“It is not like in other years when Barca or Real Madrid had leads of 15, 20 points,” Simeone said.

“This is much more entertaining for the fans.”

For all the noise surrounding Dembele off the pitch, his goals have now given Barcelona seven points this season, more than any other player in the division. “He has things other players don’t have,” Valverde said. “We must help him

to get that talent out.”

The opening 45 minutes were almost entirely forgettable, distinguished solely by the fact it was La Liga’s only first half this season that had failed to witness a single shot on target.

Atletico wanted a penalty when the ball struck Arturo Vidal’s arm but the frustration spurred them on and in the 77th minute it paid, Antoine Griezmann’s corner drift-

ing its way to the back post, where Costa headed in.

But just as Dembele had instigated a comeback against Rayo Vallecano last month, he did so again here as the ball spilled out to the 21-year-old at the back post.

He took one touch inside, before firing it home.

If Solari was watching on he might have breathed a small sigh of relief. Four wins while in tem-

ANDER GILLENEA / AFP

Eibar’s Spanish forward Sergi Enrich (C) celebrates with teammates after scoring during the Spanish league football match between SD Eibar and Real Madrid CF at the Ipurua stadium in Eibar on November 24, 2018.

porary charge had earned him a contract until 2021 but against Eibar, Real reverted to the kind of chaotic display that earned Julen Lopetegui the sack.

Defeat also brought into focus the mindset of his players, after their captain Sergio Ramos faced allegations of an anti-doping violation on Friday night from German magazine Der Spiegel. Both the club and Ramos have denied any breach.

“It is not about finding people to blame,” Solari said afterwards.

“Everything is fixable. We had won four straight games, done some things very well, and we have to get back to that.”

Eibar were stronger, more aggressive and, worryingly for Solari, appeared clearer about the plan they wanted to execute. Marc Cucurella, brilliant down the left, was instrumental in all three goals, scored by Gonzalo Escalante, Sergi Enrich and Kike Garcia.

“We were not well-organised,”

defender Raphael Varane said. “We were not comfortable and we did not find any answers.”

Eibar, meanwhile, climb to eighth, a reward for their first ever victory over Real Madrid at the 11th attempt, inside their tiny 7,083-capacity stadium. “We could even have scored more,” said their coach Jose Luis Mendilibar.

Ramos attacked Der Spiegel´s claims as “lies” after the match but allegations he failed to declare the correct medication after the Champions League final in 2017, cannot have helped his side´s performance.

On their display, Ramos said: “When you don´t match an opponent, you become a bad team. You have to be critical when you lack intensity. Our game was reflected by the score.”

Solari must now rally his players ahead of Tuesday’s Champions League game against Roma, when the winner of Group G is likely to be decided. (afp)

10

Destination

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Durant scores season-high 44 as Warriors edge Kings

LOS ANGELES - Kevin Durant delivered a seasonhigh 44 points as the Golden State Warriors needed a wild finish to hold off the Sacramento Kings 117-116 on Saturday night.

DENPASAR - Sakenan Temple or ‘Pura Sakenan’ as referred to by locals, is an important temple in the southern region of Bali, located on the north-western shore of Serangan, a small island located 10km south of Denpasar. Once strong for its unique feature of pilgrimages during the 210-day piodalan temple anniversary celebrations with processions leading to the Serangan Island on foot or by traditional wooden boats, reclamations in the 90s have changed the ways, as well as the natural landscape of

the island.

Sakenan Temple was built in the tenth century by high priest Mpu Kuturan, who arrived in Bali in 1001AD before the fall of the Majapahit Kingdom, on a mission to restructure the socio-religious aspects of the Balinese communities. The temple is comprised of two significant areas, the largest having undergone renovation except for its antique walls around the temple grounds, and a smaller part that retains its olden features. The old temple was built of limestone and corals sourced from the surrounding

coastal reefs. Within and around the temple grounds are large and towering trees that are silent witnesses of the temple’s past. Given the infusion of dynamism in Balinese Hinduism, these trees are adorned with chequered cloths and are regarded as dwellings of guardian spirits of the temple grounds. Hundreds of pilgrims from the various village temples in southern Denpasar flock to the Sakenan Temple for its 210-day piodalan temple anniversary celebrations which coincides with the holy day of Kuningan, 10 days after the

Galungan Day celebrations, another major Balinese Hindu observation.

Before the reclamations that took place in the 90s pilgrims would carry ancient heirlooms and sacred temple objects at low tide by foot through mangrove forests towards Serangan.

At high tide, traditional outriggers taxi the crowd over the waters. Now, the land mass is easily reachable by automobiles via a 110m bridge, making the colourful and unique boat rides memories of the past. Upon arrival, devotees proceed towards the Pura Susunan Wadon, a temple separate from the main Sakenan Temple grounds, located an approximate half kilometre to the east. Then prayers continue at the Pura Susunan Agung, and then the Pura Dalem Sakenan close to the westernmost shore of Serangan Island.

Good to Know Pujawali or the grand celebrations and the piodalan or temple anniversary of Sakenan Temple falls on every Kliwon Kuningan Saturday, the day of the Kuningan observation in the Balinese 210-

day Pawukon calendar and is held over three days with the height of the revelries on the Sunday. Access to the Sakenan Temple and the Serangan Island is easy via the bridge. However during the threeday temple celebrations, entrance fees apply to both pilgrims and visitors on cars and motorcycles.

Fees range from IDR 2,000-5,000 and are collected by the village officials for the community’s fund.

Several exceptional ritual dances are performed during the height of the piodalan celebrations, usually over the Kuningan weekend. These range from Barong dances to various Tari Topeng or mask dances, and all provide rare, spur-of-themoment photo opportunities. As with any Bali temple visit, you may enter in proper temple attire, that is, a simple sarong and waist sash.

Try to walk around offerings placed on the ground instead of stepping over them. Try not to obstruct a line of procession in progress.

Also, women must remember not to enter temples during their periods.

(IBP/net)

Two-time reigning NBA finals MVP Durant also had a seasonhigh 16 free throws on 17 attempts for the Warriors, who won their second straight after snapping a four-game losing skid on Friday by beating Portland.

Klay Thompson got the winning basket with a put back of his own miss with five seconds remaining in the fourth.

“I don’t know if I got fouled, but who cares I got the putback,” Thompson said. “You’ll take a game-winner any way you can get it I don’t care how ugly it is.”

The Kings made the Warriors work for the victory as De’Aaron Fox made two free throws with 26 seconds remaining to put Sacramento ahead after Thompson missed a 33-footer moments earlier. Durant converted two free throws with 1:27 left and also had 13 rebounds and seven assists, while Thompson wound up with 31 points.

Thompson shot 12 of 26 with five three-pointers as Stephen Curry missed his ninth straight game because of a strained left groin.

Curry, the two-time MVP, was re-examined Saturday and is expected to resume practising next week with a good chance he would return to game action during an upcoming five-game road trip.

“He’s doing much better and we’re just going to keep taking it day by day,” Kerr said.

- Timberwolves beat Bulls Meanwhile, Karl-Anthony Towns had 35 points and 22 rebounds, Derrick Rose came off the bench to score 22 points and the Minnesota Timberwolves beat the Chicago Bulls 111-96.

Jeff Teague added 18 points for Minnesota, which pulled away late to win for the fifth time in seven games since trading Jimmy Butler to Philadelphia.

Both the Timberwolves and Bulls were playing the second game of a back-to-back and their third game in four nights.

“We want to make the right plays, play to each other’s strengths, cover up each other’s weaknesses and play tough,” Minnesota coach Tom Thibodeau said.

“On the nights in which you don’t shoot well, hopefully your rebounding and your defense can carry you through.”

Zach LaVine scored 28 points and Jabari Parker had 27 as the Bulls lost for the sixth time in seven contests. Both players have reached 20 points in the past three games.

Justin Holiday had 14 points and 11 rebounds for the Bulls.

In Cleveland, rookie Collin Sexton scored a season-high 29 points and the Cleveland Cavaliers overcame 40 points by Houston’s James Harden to defeat the Rockets 117-108. (afp)

Copyright 2018 NBAE Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images/AFP

Kevin Durant #35 of the Golden State Warriors handles the ball against the Sacramento Kings on November 24, 2018 at ORACLE Arena in Oakland, California.

Bivol beats Pascal to retain WBA light-lightweight belt

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It is for Job Vacancy, Property, Selling or Buying Please contact Gugiek : 08123840500

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The 27-year-old Bivol (R) cruised to victory in the third defense of his title as he won almost every round against the heavy underdog Pascal.

LOS ANGELES - Russian Dmitry Bivol retained his WBA light heavyweight crown with a unanimous decision over Canada’s Jean Pascal at the Hard Rock Hotel in Atlantic City on Saturday.

The 27-year-old Bivol cruised to victory in the third defense of his title as he won almost every round against the heavy underdog Pascal.

Two judges scored it 119-109 and the other had it 117-111 in favor of Bivol.

Bivol landed a hard right hand in the fourth round to the side of Pascal’s head which wobbled the challenger. Bivol kept up the attack throughout and landed a total of 217 punches to just 60 for Pascal.

He had Pascal backpedaling through most of the fight and the only thing he didn’t do was get the knockout.

“Every time you shoot for the knockout but sometimes you can’t.

But I showed my boxing skills,”

said Bivol who improved to 15-0 with 11 KOs. The 36-year-old Pascal has been in the ring with some of the best in his 13-year boxing career.

But he looked rusty in his first serious fight since losing a decision to Canelo Alvarez in June 2017.

In his most recent fight in July he knocked out a former minor league hockey player, Steve Bosse, in the eighth round of a novelty bout. (afp)

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Monday, November 26, 2018

W

International

RLD

From parcel delivery to security, Singapore bets big on drones

SINGAPORE - Hi-tech Singapore is planning to roll out a swarm of drones for tasks that include delivering parcels, inspecting buildings and providing security, but safety and privacy concerns mean the initiative may hit turbulence.

Companies have already started testing the devices for commercial use, mainly in an area of over 200 hectares (500 acres) dotted with high-rise buildings and shopping malls, specially designated by the government for the trials.

It is part of the affluent city’s drive to embrace technological innovation, as well as an effort to tackle a manpower shortage in a country of just 5.6 million, which relies on foreign migrant workers in many low-paying sectors.

Commercial use of unmanned aerial vehicles is already taking off around the world, in areas as diverse as crop-spraying and surveying for insurance claims, but Singapore’s push represents a particularly ambitious bet on the technology.

Singapore’s civil aviation authority has got behind the project, saying it recognises the potential for drones “to transform mobility and logistics”, and is working with industry players as it seeks to shape regulations

for the sector.

During recent tests, a drone buzzed through the air, snapping pictures of a tower block’s facade, trials for a system that could see laborious human inspections of the city’s ubiquitous high-rises replaced by automated checks.

“Today’s existing building inspection process is extremely slow, expensive, tedious, prone to accidents, fatigue and human error,” said Shawn Koo, chief technical officer of H3 Zoom, a unit of the firm H3 Dynamics, which is behind the tests.

Such inspections are typically carried out by workers from South or Southeast Asia, who hang precariously outside buildings on platforms suspended by ropes.

The new system will see high-resolution images taken by drones and analysed to check for defects, with inspections taking a few days rather than a few weeks, as they do at the moment. H3 Zoom hopes to fully launch the inspections next year.

- Robotic guards -

Drones are also being tested as robotic guards by local firm ST Aerospace.

At its command centre, screens show a simulated security breach in a fence. A black drone is deployed, which chases an intruder while transmitting live images that direct security officers towards him to make an arrest.

Tests have also been carried out for drone parcel delivery while a hospital operator plans to use the devices to transport blood samples and specimens between its hospitals and central laboratory.

But transforming the futuristic vision into reality faces hurdles. The prospect of having a drone suddenly whizz by your apartment or office has sparked privacy concerns in the landscarce city.

Angry Singaporeans called for police to investigate after a video circulated on social media in September showing a recreational

drone flying close to a residential building, while some private condos have banned the devices.

K o o f r o m H 3 Z o o m co nceded that many people still

had “misconceptions” about drones: “Some might view it as a spying vehicle, others might think drones are out there to do harm.” (afp)

Clashes...

From page 1

But Le Pen rejected that accusation saying she had “never called for any violence whatsoever” and in turn accused the government of “organising the tension” and seeking to make her a scapegoat.

Meanwhile, opposition parties on both the right and left accused the government of trying to reduce the protests to just the sporadic scenes of violence, and turning a deaf ear to the demonstrators’ grievances.

Roslan RAHMAN / AFP

This photo taken on September 9, 2018 shows staff members of Singapore technology firm H3 Dynamics preparing to fly a drone to inspect a building facade in Singapore.

of the sprawling capital’s railroads.

Passengers save time and money -- paying just 10 pesos (20 US cents) a trip -- but must face the constant risk of being crushed by a passing locomotive if they or the trolley boys don’t move fast enough.

“Our job here is very dangerous, you need to know what time the train will pass by,” said 57-year-old Rene

Vargas Almeria, who has been at it for nearly 20 years.

Commuter trains travel nearly two dozen times a day along this 1.2-kilometre (one-mile) stretch of rail in the Santa Mesa district, where authorities grudgingly tolerate the carts due to their popularity. The trolley boys also ply a few other stretches of Manila’s battered rail system, that carries an

average of 45,000 passengers a day.

Incredibly, casualties are relatively rare. Police do not keep statistics, but said they couldn’t remember the last time a fatality occurred.

The same cannot be said of close calls -- anyone who spends time pushing or riding the carts seems to have a hair-raising story to share.

Rodolfo Maurello’s scariest near-

Jean-Luc Melenchon, leader of the radical left France Unbowed party who attended a separate march Saturday protesting violence against women, tweeted that the action on the streets was “a mass protest of the people” which signalled “the end for Castaner”.

The “yellow vests” hail overwhelmingly from non-urban areas of France. They feel overlooked and penalised by policies they see as being pushed through by elitist politicians in Paris.

Former investment banker Macron was elected on a pledge to put more money in workers’ pockets.

But the effects of his pro-business reforms on unemployment and purchasing power have been limited so far.

Many of the often low-income “yellow vest” protesters are particularly incensed at his decision to hike anti-pollution taxes on

diesel, while scrapping a wealth tax on the rich.

“I’m not just fighting against the price of fuel. It’s about tax, what we pay,” protester Catherine Marguier told AFP near the village of La Gravelle in northwest France.

Meanwhile, in a separate protest in the southern city of Marseille, police fired teargas at bottle-throwing demonstrators upset by the “gentrification” renovation work on the town’s biggest square.

Around 1,200 demonstrators took part and two were arrested.

- Rural frustrations -

A week ago, two people died and over 750 people, including 136 police officers, were injured in sometimes violent demonstrations that have shone a light on frustrations in many rural areas and small towns of France.

Monday, November 26, 2018

11

Abused Hong Kong maid Erwiana “disappointed” after employer’s early prison release

A former Indonesian domestic worker in a high-profile abuse case said Thursday she was “sad and disappointed” after her employer, who was jailed for starving and beating her, walked free before finishing her sentence.

Dodging traffic, and death, on Manila’s railway carts MANILA - As soon as the train rumbles past, the men heave their home-made pushcarts back onto the tracks and passengers hop aboard -cheating death and beating Manila’s notorious traffic. Scores of commuters in the city of about 12 million are propelled to their destinations daily by so-called “trolley boys” pushing metal carts that ply a few segments

International

- ‘Gap between rich and poor’ -

miss in almost two decades as a trolley boy came when he failed to notice the train behind him as he was pushing a cart packed with passengers.

“The train was just metres away,” the 60-year-old said, recalling how he turned around with only seconds to spare and waved it to a stop.

“The sound of its brakes screeching was very loud.” (afp) Revolts against taxes have been a feature of French public life for centuries. Citizens still pay some of the highest in Europe as a percentage of GDP, and fuel-price protests are a common modern occurrence.

Previous rounds pitting the government against drivers took place in 1995, 2000, 2004, and 2008, often when tax increases coincided with high oil prices -- as they have this year.

A poll by the Odoxa research group for Le Figaro newspaper this week found that 77 percent of respondents described it as “justified”. (afp)

Erwiana Sulistyaningsih became the face of abused maids in Hong Kong, after pictures showed how she was imprisoned, starved and violently beaten by her former employer.

Law Wan-tung was sentenced to six years in prison in 2015 for grievous bodily harm, assault, criminal intimidation and failure to pay wages, and was ordered by a court last year to pay more than $100,000 in damages.

But Law secured an early release from prison a few months ago, the South China Morning Post reported Wednesday, citing a lawyer from the city’s justice department.

Erwiana expressed her disappointment Thursday and said the six-year sentence was not enough “for the terrible crimes that she committed against me and the other victims”.

“I feel very sad and disappointed when I learned that my former employer Law Wan-tung was released from jail earlier than the actual imprisonment that she had to serve,” she said.

“She.. tortured me, held me captive, denied me rest and refused to pay me any wages,” Erwiana told reporters.

“It is my hope that Law Wan-tung can admit to her wrongdoings, apologise to the victims and resolve to never do the same thing to anyone ever again,” she added.

Tutik Lestari Ningsih -- another former maid from Indonesia of Law -- said the news made her feel “very unsafe” because Law had previously threatened to kill her.

The Correctional Services Department said in a statement to AFP that due to privacy regulations they would not disclose specific details.

Prison inmates can receive a one-third sentence reduction on good behaviour, although Law had not yet served adequate time of her sentence for this to apply.

More than 340,000 domestic helpers work in Hong Kong -- mostly from the Philippines and Indonesia -- often performing menial tasks for low wages while living in poor conditions. (afp)

In this file photo taken on February 27, 2015, former Indonesian domestic helper Erwiana Sulistyaningsih (C) looks on as a supporter (R) speaks to the press in front of the District Court following the sentencing of her former employer Law Wan-tung in Hong Kong.

Britain gives visa free visit for Indonesian business people

Government sets priority to develop human resources

JAKARTA - The Government of Britain offers visa free visits for Indonesian business people representing 23 selected companies.

“The most important criterion is that the companies have big contribution to the economic relations between Indonesia and Britain,” says British Ambassadors to Indonesia Moazzam Malik here on Thursday.

Indonesia is the third country in Asia Pacific receiving the “Selected Business Scheme” after China and India. “This means we see it important the business potentials in Indonesia , beneficial to Britain and Indonesia,” Malik said.

Dominique Hardy, the Director

of British Visa Department for Asia Pacific said at present there are only 23 companies selected but it is not impossible that the number would increase as Britain would make regular evaluation.

“The 23 companies deserve to be included in the list as so far their staff and families have traveled to Britain regularly,” Hardy said.

The companies to receive the SBS facility are British companies having branches in Indonesia and Indonesian companies having units in Britain such as PT Bank HSBC, PT Standard Chartered, PT Sinar Mas Grup, and PT Astra Zeneca Indonesia. (ant)

Anthony WALLACE / AFP

JAKARTA - The government has set a development priority to improve human resources in the coming five years, a senior minister stated.

“The development of human resources is important, so the target is the two relevant sectors of education and health,” Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan stated on Wednesday.

According to Pandjaitan, the government will allocate 20 percent of the state budget for development of the education sector.

In the meantime, the state budget allocation for the health sector will

account for some five percent.

“The budget allocation for education will be directed at building polytechnics and vocational schools, as currently, the numbers are very small,” the minister revealed.

Pandjaitan said that in five years, the government will build massive polytechnic schools.

“Alike infrastructure development, we will also build massive polytechnics,” Pandjaitan stated.

The coordinating minister for maritime affairs further noted that in addition to increasing the capacity of human resources, the government will continue

with the development of infrastructure, bureaucratic and legal reforms, and industries having added value.

In the health sector, the government is committed to reducing the rate of stunting.

“Indonesia is a vast country, and it is certainly not easy to solve the problem of stunting in a short time,” Pandjaitan noted.

“Stunting,” or chronic malnutrition, is common among children in their growing years.

Symptoms of stunting usually arise due to low access to health services, clean water, and nutritious food. (ant)

12

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

Bali News

International

BUSINESS

Monday, November 26, 2018

5

Bali Named Best Wedding Destination 2018 by T + L India

JORGE GUERRERO /

This file photo taken on October 16, 2018 Picture shows Gibraltar Rock from La Linea de la Concepcion near the southern Spanish city of Cadiz on October 16, 2018. Spain’s prime minister reiterated his threat to vote against the draft deal on Britain’s exit from the European Union at the weekend unless it guarantees Madrid’s veto over Gibraltar’s future status.

Gibraltar: Tiny, rocky outcrop risks derailing Brexit deal

As Britain heads for a weekend summit designed to seal its impending departure from the European Union, Spain is threatening to throw a last-minute spanner in the works over the tiny peninsula of Gibraltar.

Madrid, which has long laid claim to the overseas British territory attached to the Spanish mainland, is threatening to derail the whole Brexit process over the status of “The Rock” -- population barely 30,000.

Spain fears the withdrawal deal does not explicitly hand it a postBrexit veto on future relations between the EU and Gibraltar, which in a 2002 referendum voted overwhelmingly against shared sovereignty between London and Madrid. After Britain and the EU agreed to a draft Brexit declaration on Thursday, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez repeated a threat to scupper the deal.

“After my conversation with (British Prime Minister) Theresa May, our positions remain far away.

My government will always defend the interests of Spain,” he wrote on

Twitter. “If there are no changes, we will veto Brexit.” Gibraltar’s chief minister had earlier accused Spain of seeking to force an issue which has regularly driven a wedge between London and Madrid.

Fabian Picardo told parliament that Spain, the eurozone’s fourth largest economy, “does not need a whip to get the smallest economy in Europe to sit around the table with it and have a meaningful discussion about cooperation.”

- ‘Verges on insanity’ The geography of Gibraltar -- a 2.6-square-mile (6.8-square-kilometer) rocky outcrop on Spain’s southern tip -- meant that there was no shortage of reasons to cooperate with Spain, he added.

Spain wants to negotiate directly with London on all issues related to Gibraltar, which was ceded to the

British crown in a peace treaty in 1713, after Britain leaves the EU. This had been provided for, initially, in a clause to the draft withdrawal agreement that effectively gave Madrid a veto on any Gibraltar-related agreement between the block and the UK. The clause has, however, disappeared from the final draft. And while Spain threatens to derail the entire Brexit deal over this omission, Gibraltarians say they are being used as pawns in a struggle for power. For Hamish Thomson, a 44-year-old anaesthetist, “it verges on insanity that a country (Spain) of half-a-million square kilometres with a population of 46 million and profound internal issues spends so much of its energy on a three-mile square outcrop of limestone with 30,000 people on it.”

Elton Moreno, also 44 and

a manager at a Gibraltar-based gaming company, said: “I’m not surprised. I’m surprised anyone is surprised that we’re being used in this tug of war. I’m just feeling tired that we always seem to be in the news.

“And I’m angry that our currency keeps on fluctuating because of incompetence in the UK government.” Gibraltarians voted by 96 percent to stay in the EU in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

- ‘Hardly surprising’ Prime Minister Sanchez on Wednesday said that “we are defending the interests of the Spanish nation and shall do so to the end”.

In 1969, Spanish dictator Francisco Franco ordered the border between Spain and Gibraltar closed after Gibraltarians voted overwhelmingly in 1967 to retain links to Britain. The border only reopened 13 years later, seven years after his death. As tensions rise once more, barrister Moses Anaho-

ry, 48, complained it was “wholly unacceptable for the Spanish Government to threaten to exercise its veto over the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement at the eleventh hour.

“Unfortunately, while unacceptable, it’s hardly surprising for Spain to raise the ‘Gibraltar issue’ at the last minute,” said Anahory.

“It certainly does nothing to create an atmosphere locally that Spain can be trusted to respect agreements it has signed up to,” including a 2006 tripartite cooperation accord. Owen Smith, 41, a barrister, said: “Like the vast majority of Gibraltarians I voted to remain and I’d be happy to see the Brexit process derailed if remaining in the EU was the outcome.

“But I don’t see the current row about Gibraltar as one capable of derailing the Brexit process. Spain is applying pressure to achieve last minute concessions in respect of Gibraltar. I hope they don’t succeed -- but I’m worried they might.” (afp)

Bali was named the Best Wedding Destination International 2018. This best award predicate was given in the Travel + Leisure (T + L) India’s Best Award 2018. Status as the Best Wedding Destination International of Indian version of T + L was handed over on Tuesday (Nov. 13) local time at ITC Maurya, New Delhi, India.

VITO of India, Sanjay Sondhi, stated the best title of T + L India is increasing the value of Bali tourist destination. “This award is very prestigious. Bali will continue to rise. This award further emphasizes Bali as the best destination for Indian tourists,” said Sanjay on Wednesday (Nov. 14).

To be the Best Wedding Destination International 2018, Bali had a long way to go. The Island of the Gods must compete against many

destinations from other countries.

Moreover, this T + L India’s Best Award 2018 was voted openly to the public and closed on Tuesday (Oct. 30). This voting was done online by involving visitors through https://travelandleisureindia.in.

Entering its seventh year, the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 totally featured 50 categories. Other than Best Wedding Destination International, there are categories for Best Honeymoon Destination, Best City,

Best Emerging Destination, and Best Heritage Destination. There are also Best Food Destinations, Best Airline-International, and many others.

Sanjai said that Bali has some competitors including Tuscany.

However, Bali was chosen because of its popularity and exoticism.

There are many conveniences provided by Bali, even without sacrificing quality. The more important is the ease of connection and public

understanding.

By using the ‘India’s Best in Class’ theme, the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 is very prestigious. Its score is in line with “World’s Best Awards” belonging to the T + L edition of the United States. And, over time, the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 is highly developed because the first edition of this award in 2011 only presented 42 categories.

Minister of Tourism, Arief Yahya, explained the T + L India’s Best Award 2018 is very prestigious.

This Best Wedding Destination International 2018 for Bali has many positive sides because this best recognition is given internationally.

With this predicate, we are optimistic that the movement of tourists to Bali will be increasingly positive, especially those from India.

The minister successfully bringing the Ministry of Tourism to achieve No. 1 and become the #TheBestMinistryTourism2018 in the Asia Pacific in Bangkok added that this T + L India’s Best Award 2018 strengthens the 3C aspects of the Island of the Gods. Confidence and credibility of Bali as a whole will rise. More importantly, the calibration becomes the evidence on the quality of the Island of the Gods when compared to other destinations in similar categories. (kmb)

Sate Lilit, Unique Menu of Balinese People

Satay … satay… do you like to eat satay? Try to taste this Balinese delicious sate lilit or twisted satay. This kind of satay does not only offer delicious taste, but also

beauty in terms of appearance and presentation. Whether being realized or not, other than requiring patience and high skills, the making of twisted satay also requires a

beautiful artistic spirit.

The process starts from concocting spices, processing the meat and then making it by twisting (sticking and twisting) on ??the bamboo satay stalk in a flat shape. During the process of making satay, it is also an opportunity to strengthen kinship because anyone can twist satay.

Twisted satay has such a distinctive taste. Moreover, the roasting process will appear so tempting.

Children are easily tempted, so they really want to taste it. For those having teeth but not strong enough to chew, it will be better to eat this smooth and sticky twisted satay.

In the past, twisted satay used ingredients in the form of chicken or pork. Twisted satay is made as a means as ritual paraphernalia of mecaru (exorcism rite) to maintain harmonious relationship between

humans and nature. Now, twisted satay is also sold as a complement to local menus where in a portion it is served with rice and other delicacies.

In strategic places such as tourist attractions, the corner of the city and traditional markets are very easy to find the twisted satay merchants.

Hotels, restaurants and food stalls will surely provide this twisted satay. However, the ingredients used are marine fish, such as snapper, tuna or others. Similarly, the type of stalk used is lemongrass.

At hotels or restaurants, the twisted satay is neatly packed and the spices are adjusted to the tourists’ appetite, so that anyone can enjoy it. The presentation is also neatly arranged in order to look appealing. If you enjoy satay, it will be better to be accompanied with

special chili sauce.

How to make twisted satay?

First of all, slice the fish meat into small pieces and then refine by using a blender so that it really turns smooth. The seasonings use authentic Balinese spices such as, garlic, ginger, coriander, turmeric, candlenut, salt, coconut oil, bay leaves and optionally can be added with grated coconut.

Balinese style twisted satay has flavors that are not inferior to satay in general. When coupled with its unique appearance, it will attract more eyes to taste it. Eating twisted satay can create a unique experience during your excursion on the Island of the Gods. It will be better to taste while remaining warm after being roasted. Twisted satay is the hallmark of Balinese cuisine. (kmb)

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Bali News

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

International

Mepeed tradition on Puputan Margarana Memorial Day

Thai rubber farms stretched as US-China trade war saps demand

Thanking for heroes’ services by oblation ANNIVERSARY of the Puputan Margarana Memorial Day falling every November 20 is not only commemorated with flag raising ceremony but also with religious ceremony. In the process of Dewa Yadnya ceremony, there is a name called Mepeed tradition where housewives bring an offering in the form of fruits or canang gebogan arranged high and carried over their heads. The women who are residents of Klaci customary village walked from hamlet hall to the Margarana National Memorial Park (TPB) as a form of holy journey. The canang gebogan in the mepeed tradition is an expression of gratitude for the customary villagers of Klaci for the services of the Heroes.

No one knows exactly when this Mepeed tradition was carried out first. According to chief of Klaci customary village, Nyoman Suamayasa, since he was born, this tradition has already existed. “I was born in 1967 and already existed.

Nobody knows when this tradition was carried out,” he said.

The parade of canang gebogan carried out by PKK housewives of Klaci customary village marched to Margarana Memorial Park. Suarmayasa said it involved each family of Klaci customary village. At present, there are 209 households registered in the Klaci customary village. So, there are 209 pieces of gebogan. “These families deliver food. However, they go hand in hand outside the temple priest and oblation makers. Since they are on duty when the ceremony takes place, the oblations have been placed in the memorial park first,” he explained.

After delivering the canang gebogan carried in tandem, the PKK housewives from Klaci customary village then danced the Rejang

Renteng dance. “Presenting an offering in the form of dance performance adds to devotional works while at the same time it increases the enthusiasm of the housewives in their devotional faith to those residing at this place,” explained Suamayasa.

He added that religious ceremony held to commemorate the Puputan Margarana is quite unique. If religious ceremonies in Bali are usually carried out every six months, the religious ceremonies at the Margarana Memorial Park are conducted once a year or every commemoration of the Puputan Margarana Day falling on November 20.

Preparations for the religious ceremony are carried out all the way to the exact date of November 17 from preparation, carrying out the renewal ceremony, melasti until finally Ida Sesuun is being enthroned and Ngantep Pujawali set at 13:00 on Tuesday (Nov. 20). Even though funding is limited, Suarmayasa said there is always a blessing from Ida

Rodger BOSCH / AFP

A worker tends to young plants in a banana farm close to the town of Caxito, set up by Angolan agro-livestock group Novagrolider, on November 14, 2018, in Bengo Province, about 60Km from the Capital, Luanda.

IBP/kmb24

Mepeed tradition where housewives bring an offering in the form of fruits or canang gebogan arranged high and carried over their heads.

Sesuunan for customary villages of Klaci so that they can always fulfill their duties and obligations properly.

He continued that mapeed tradition carried out every year in this memorial service gives the

meaning that customary villagers of Klaci regardless of the victims of war could fight and rise from trauma and showed off devotion and gratitude to the sacrifices of the Heroes. ”The area of Klaci customary village was destroyed

by the Puputan (all out) war.

All the citizens experience deep trauma. However, it can rise and enthusiasm in faith. This is the meaning of the mepeed tradition,” explained Suamayasa. (kmb24)

Tourist visit declines in October, China remains ranked first

Yanus Suprayogi

IBP/kmb

MANGUPURA - Tourist arrival from China during October 2018 decreased by 7 percent or 9,141 people compared to September. Despite the decline, China remains the largest tourist contributor to Bali amounting to120, 138 people in October.

From January to October, a total of 1,221,859 Chinese tourists travelled to Bali. Moreover, the dominance of Chinese tourists still persists in the percentage of 23.47 percent for the total number of visits. In the second and third ranks of the largest tourist contributors until October 2018 are still occupied by Australia and India, where they respectively had a total of 991,032 people and 293,300 people.

According to the General Manager of Ngurah Rai International Airport, Yanus

Suprayogi, the increase in tourists continues every month up to October 2018.

There is an increase of 6.58 percent or as many as 321,370 foreign tourists this year when compared to last year. As many as 5.2 million foreign tourists are recorded to enter Bali through Ngurah Rai International Airport during January to October 2018. “Tourist visits from China declined in October, but still dominated, followed

by Australia and India,” he concluded.

Based on data recorded from January to October, several countries included in the top 10 experienced an increase compared to last year. One of them which experienced a significant increase is the United State of America (USA) with an increase of 50.83 percent or 6,653 foreign tourists compared to last year. A big event held in October such as the IMF-World

Bank Annual Meeting 2018 and Our Ocean Conference 2018 completed in Bali is one of the factors increasing the arrival of foreign tourists.

“The big event last October, especially the IMF-World Bank Group Annual Meeting 2018 is a factor that can contribute to the increase in foreign tourists, although October is not included in the peak season for foreign tourist arrivals to Bali,” said Yanus.

Until now, said Yanus. Bali is still faced with low season conditions. However, the increase is expected to continuously grow until December 2018. “We are optimistic, the arrival of foreign tourists through Ngurah Rai International Airport will reach 6.27 million according to the target set by the Ministry of Tourism,” he assured. (kmb23)

13

‘Green fuel’: Bananas to help wean Angola off oil

CAXITO - Boxes of still-green bananas were shifted one-by-one from a towering stack of crates into a refrigerated shipping container.

Stamped “From Angola, with love”, the fruit is shipped to consumers 6,000 kilometres (3,700 miles) away and are part of Luanda’s drive to diversify its economy and wean itself from its dependence on oil. Novagrolider, a privatelyowned company, produces several dozen tonnes of bananas every week to be shipped to Portugal.

The firm, founded 10 years ago with Portuguese investment, has become a poster child for the economic transformation that the Angolan government is seeking.

At Novagrolider’s Caxito 600hectare (1,500-acre) plantation 60 kilometres northwest of Luanda, the banana plants, protected with blue plastic bags, bend under the weight of their fruit.

In a nearby hangar with a corrugated iron roof, two staff delicately dip the freshly-picked bunches into vast washing pools.

The bananas are meticulously sorted after being washed and weighed with as many as 4,000 boxes prepared daily.

The best-looking fruit is earmarked for dispatch to foreign markets with the rest kept for sale locally.

“We have two grades -- domestic

and export,” said supervisor Edwin Andres Luis Campos as he watches the production line closely.

“Domestic will be sold here in Angolan supermarkets in about four or five days. Export will be shipped to Europe in refrigerated containers that will arrive in Europe in between 20 and 25 days.”

Novagrolider’s output has grown exponentially in recent years and its parent company, Grupolider, which has interests in transport and property as well, employs 3,500 people.

It grows mangoes, pineapples and watermelons as well as bananas on its four fruit farms in Angola.

After a cautious start, company boss Joao Macedo’s appetite and ambition grew rapidly.

“Two years ago we started exporting to the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo -- but that wasn’t viable because of the state of the roads,” said Macedo in his airconditioned office in Luanda.

- Bananas, our ‘green fuel’ “Despite competition from South America, the quality of our products nonetheless allows us to sell in Portugal and Spain. And that’s not all.”

Macedo hopes to double produc-

tion to 170,000 tonnes annually and establish a foot-hold in the lucrative South African market.

Back in Caxito, the province’s top agriculture official shares Macedo’s enthusiasm.

“We’re financially encouraging small-scale farmers to increase the size of the areas they cultivate,” said Eliseo Mateos.

“Until now they’ve mostly used their production for subsistence, but now we want them to grow more so they can sell their crops at market.

“Bananas are our ‘green fuel’ -here we have one possible way of diversifying the economy.”

In the decade that followed the bloody 27-year civil war that ended in 2002, Angola enjoyed strong double-digit growth fuelled by oil, which accounts for 90 percent of Angola’s exports and 70 percent of government revenues.

But the slump in the price of crude in 2014 shook the economic model of the country, which is one of the poorest in Africa, locking it into a vicious cycle of economic contraction.

Unbridled inflation, recession, soaring debt and mass unemployment all followed. (afp)

BANGKOK - They work in the pre-dawn gloom tapping trees for the “white gold” that has made their country the world’s top rubber producer -- but as prices plunge due to the US-China trade war, Thai farmers are giving up the sap.

Thai latex makes everything from tyres and condoms to baby pacifiers and surgical gloves, the fruit of the rubber trees cultivated across endless acres of the country.

But the rubber trade is at a crossroads as a bitter dispute between the world’s two biggest economies ricochets across Southeast Asia with unexpected consequences.

Countries like Vietnam are benefiting as manufacturers migrate from China to avoid punishing tariffs on exports to the US. But in Thailand, the price of rubber has slumped twenty percent since June, as those same tariffs bite hard on demand from factories in China -- the market for more than half its latex exports.

Some of Thailand’s rubber workers are being forced to abandon their plantation jobs for factory work.

“I couldn’t feed my children anymore,” said Annita, who used to work 10 hours a day harvesting latex in Chiang Rai, northern Thailand, making just $7 a day, less than the minimum wage and half the going rate several years ago.

So she has taken a job at a packing plant earning around $9 daily.

“Nobody wanted to stay. The plantation owner can’t find workers anymore -- the work is too difficult for the wages,” she told AFP. While the plight of US soybean farmers hit by the tariffs has

grabbed the headlines -- they face a 25 percent levy to access China, the world’s biggest soybean market -- other troubles are quietly brewing across the world.

The bottom has fallen out of the once-booming industry as Thai rubber prices plummet to about $1.21 a kilogram -- they were five times that in 2011.

- Too much rubber Around one third of all the rubber in the world comes from Thailand’s forests, where latex is harvested at night or before dawn by tappers who make an incision and collect the sap as it bleeds out.

The country currently produces about 4.6 million tonnes of rubber a year and the sudden drop in Chinese demand has compounded a longer term global oversupply crisis to push prices off a cliff.

“A climate of uncertainty” pervades the industry after US tariffs hit nearly half of all Chinese imports, according to Karako Kittipol, marketing manager at Thai Hua Rubber.

“Chinese companies don’t want to have too much rubber in stock,” he told AFP. The value of the yuan against the US dollar has also dipped, making rubber more expensive for Chinese manufacturers to buy.

Thailand is a bystander in the trade war between the world’s two largest economies.

But the ruling junta is trying to address the supply-side issues and is aiming to reduce the area under cultivation for rubber by more than 60,000 hectares per year over the next five years. (afp)

Jonathan KLEIN / AFP

In this picture taken on October 17, 2018 a woman cuts out stains from a raw rubber sheet at a factory in Rayong Province, Thailand.

14

Monday, November 26, 2018

Traveling

International

Exploring Austria’s Wine Routes

VIENNA - “Imagine the harmony of an orchestra, with no single instrument heard above another, this is what we aim for with our Weiner Gemischter Satz wine,” states Fritz Wieninger from his winery, in the sleepy outskirts of the Austrian capital.

The vintners of Austria are a very passionate breed. They are a new generation of wine makers producing high quality products. They are represented across the four main wine regions of Niederosterriech (Lower Austria); Burgenland; Steiermark (Styria) and Vienna.

Wrapping a metaphorical arm around the eastern shoulder of the country these regions are defined by very diverse landscapes, microclimates and outstanding grape varieties, such as the signature Grüner Veltliner, the dominant grape of Austria and revered by restauranteurs and sommeliers.

Along with this reputation, comes a new wave of “terroir” tourists, ready to explore a wine history dating back to the Celts and Romans but also in search of Austria’s variations of grapes, producers and wineries.

Vienna – a wine-producing capital city

With around 700 hectares of vineyards, Vienna is the only major wineproducing capital in the world, whose vineyards are all within the city-limits.

Viennese vintners such as Weininger and Mayer am Pfarrplatz are mixing tradition with innovation and most importantly, the grape varieties, to make the capital’s defining blend – Weiner Gemischter Satz (DAC) – a wine that has global prominence. The DAC is a designation of protected origin, given to a wine produced by a regional grape native to a particular area.

“Weininger” and winery “Mayer

am Pfarrplatz” both have plots on the Nussberg Hill, a standout vineyard location commanding spectacular views over the capital.

The rows of vines drop downwards before merging with Vienna’s dramatic cityscape; the Gothic spire of St. Stephen’s Cathedral, the Riesenrad Ferris Wheel and the Danube River, all visible.

Many wineries own and run a ‘Heuriger’ (translated as “this year’s wine”) referring to an Austrian wine-tavern. It was Emperor Joseph II’s decree of 17th August, 1784, that granted every individual the privilege of selling “foodstuffs”, wine and cider produced in-house throughout the year, that has evolved into today’s Heuriger’s, such as that owned by Mayer am Pfarrplatz, and aptly named ‘Heuriger Beethoven’.

It was home to the Maestro in 1817.

The Wachau Valley – An UNESCO World Heritage area

The sinewy Danube feeds, nourishes and passes numerous vineyards, but also provides an easy escape from Vienna by boat or bike, as a pleasant way to delve into Austria’s wine culture.

Vienna’s neighbouring wine regions offer a diverse vinicultural experience, driven by varying landscapes and climates; none more so than the Wachau Valley, an UNESCO World Heritage site since the year 2000, alongside the nearby Kamptal and Kremstal regions, all brimming with old-world charm. Just 1-hour’s drive from Vienna, the steep sided valley, stretches for 21 miles from Spitz to Loiben and creates numerous micro-

climates at every turn of the snaking and grand Danube River, upon which flows a steady stream of tourists.

The main producer here is Domäne Wachau, a winery located in the village of Dürnstein, home to just 200 inhabitants, yet a co-operative representing 250 vintner families, producing some 2.5 m bottles a year.

The Kellerberg vineyard rises up on a mosaic of terraces behind the winery, renowned for producing superior Reislings and Grüner Veltliners. Harvest can only be done by hand, but those with the arduous task are rewarded with dramatic vistas across the valley.

Immediately below, the modern winery stands next to the “Baroque Cellar Palace”, built in the early part of the 17th Century, whilst high above them both are the ruins of the Dürnstein Castle, in which Richard the Lionheart was held captive in 1192. Etchings and frescos circle the stately rooms. Below stairs, a 1km subterranean cellar network, turns grape to wine reflecting the unique Wachau Valley terroir.

Alongside a series of oak barrels a bust of ‘Ambassador Leopold Figl’ stands proud. He was a regular visitor to the cellar during negotiations that led to the State Treaty for the reestablishment of an Independent Austria after the Second World War. The cellar also offers up more surprises, as an experimental playground, with one corridor devoted to what they call Backstage wines that explore new styles of Grüner Veltliner, prepared in “Concrete eggs” and even a handcarved granite cask.

A short distance north-east of the Wachau Valley in Wagram, the Winery Fritz Salomon has had wine and viticulture present at their historical Manor ‘Oberstockstall’ since the beginning of the 12th Century. The Salomon family have owned the estate for the past 150-years and grow their grapes in some of Wagram’s oldest vineyards, according to biodynamic principles. The ancient cellar produces a diverse range of grape varieties, from Grüner and Reisling to Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir.

Wine and Architecture

At the centre of the Kamptal region in Lower Austria, on the edge

of the picturesque town of Langenlois is the Loisium – world of wine – a visitor centre, vinotheque (wine shop) and museum.

It is a totally immersive wine experience, which combines tastings with tours and housed in a modernist cube-like structure designed by architect Steven Holl. The building’s steel cladding reflects the sunlight and the Kamptal regions regular warm days and cool nights, which produce beautifully balanced white wines.

The wine centre’s geometric lines, cleverly follow the neat rows of vines, sloping gently south towards the town’s historic rooftops and church spire. It also points in the direction of the subterranean wine cellars whose tunnels date back some 900 years and tell the story of the winemaker’s life in a bygone era, and also the modern production of both wine and sparkling wine.

Another renowned wine dynasty is the House of Esterházy known the world over, a wine producer whose modernist winery is in clear view of the Esterházy Palace dating to the 17th Century, a link between family heritage and the future. And their immediate future is on the Leithaberg range of hills, with a new south-facing vineyard being prepared to produce Chardonnay.

Austria’s wine innovators

Natural wines have been growing in popularity and Austria is producing some of the best. Winery Meinklang in Burgenland has embraced biodynamic wine production since 2001, buying into the intimate relationship

between organic farming processes, the production of wines and keeping that close production circle tightly spinning. This includes filling cows’ horns with fresh manure and using it as the basis for natural fertiliser, as well as adhering to the cosmic calendar.

Niklas Peltzer of Meinklang Winery says that “artificial yeasts and artificial fermentation kills the original terroir” and Meinklang’s ethos is to give the wines an “honesty and authenticity in order to make a handcrafted product” without chemical manipulation.

Winery Gruber Röschitz, located in the Western part of the Weinviertel region (Austria’s biggest wineproducing area) is owned and run by a trio of siblings. They are young, ambitious and proud of their family’s agrarian roots stretching back 200-years and wine cultivation since the 1950s. Ewald Gruber, the eldest of the siblings is a firm believer in the organic production of wine; “the wine should be made in the vineyard not the cellar” he says pointing to healthy soils and vines.

Austria’s wine regions consist of so many family-owned estates, who still embrace ancestry, tradition and nature. And maybe Pulker’s Heuriger in Rührsdorf, an unassuming road-side wine tavern, best encapsulates it all. After a scenically spectacular drive along the southern bank of the Danube, visitors and locals can stop for a hearty farmer’s style lunch of succulent pork with crackling, washed down with a ‘Staubiger’ wine; an unfiltered smoky white wine that pairs perfectly with the food, rustic ambiance and Austria’s vinicultural landscape. (IBP/net)

Bali News

International

Monday, November 26, 2018

3

Provincial govt finalizes contributions of travelers

DENPASAR — The plan to collect a ten-dollar levy per tourist will soon become apparent because the provincial government of Bali is currently finalizing the academic draft as a legal instrument. This contribution will be used for cultural and environmental preservation. Meanwhile, tourists will get services along with insurance while in Bali.

“Tourists coming to Bali need good quality service as well as a safe, comfortable and peaceful condition. We need to provide good transportation, we need health insurance, we need protection, and we will give all these to tourists,” said the Governor of Bali, Wayan Koster, after attending a work meeting at the Bali House of Representatives on Monday (Nov. 19).

Koster added that tourists coming to Bali cannot only enjoy tourist attractions but all of their activities are also protected. This service improvement certainly requires costs that will be covered by tourist levies. This kind of contribution has actually been applied by several countries. Meanwhile, in Bali itself, it will form a body to manage, but still under the government.

“It can be managed by an accountable and transparent body, and its designation is meant to improve the quality of tourism implementation as a whole. The body is owned by the state, not a private sector,” he explained.

According to Koster, the 10-dollar levy per foreign tourist remains in a discourse. Similar levy will also be applied to domestic tourists, but the amount is planned to be IDR 10,000 per tourist. He is optimistic that tourists will accept this policy in the interest of preserving Balinese culture. They will not feel objections because it is not too expensive.

“We will first make the rules in the form of regional regulations (Perda). It can be directly collected at hotel and the airport. It will be inputted into the system, while the use is determined to be a source of local revenue. The potential almost reaches IDR 1 trillion. Travelers can get insurance, health insurance and services at all points while in Bali,” he explained.

Koster explained that tourists receive services since arriving at Ngurah Rai Airport by improving

MANGUPURA — Some time ago, a member of the Kuta Police came to Villa Impiana, Seminyak, Kuta, and then arrested Liam Connor Leppin, 21.

The arrest is related to cases of theft of safety boxes and active speakers.

“The crime scene of the theft is at the villa as well where the perpetrator stayed in room number

immigration and customs service so as to be faster without queuing for hours. Then, as soon as getting out of the airport, tourists will be escorted by good travel agency and through good road infrastructure.

At each point security personnel will also be alerted in collaboration with the police to create a safe atmosphere for tourists. “In tourist destinations, for tourists that will dive or climb, as being prone to accidents, they will be protected and all are covered,” he added.

In addition to contributions of tourists, Koster will also target

CSR funds as a source of revenue.

As per the rules, 5 percent of the CSR funds must be allocated to foster environmental programs. It will formulate a local regulation in order to be able to manage some of the funds, so that the allocation can be directed. For example, it is used for priority programs in the fields of culture, health, education, or tourism.

“Suppose that we can only manage a half of it through local regulations by an accountable and transparent body, this can be put into the Regional Budget through region-

ally generated revenue (PAD), and this is a big source for me. We’ll get hundreds of billions,” he said.

A member of PDI-P Faction in the Bali House of Representatives, I Ketut Kariyasa Adnyana, stated that such levies had been previously drafted, but for airport service users only. The draft was not approved by central government.

“The rules have been made, but crossed out. With this idea (tourist’s levy—Ed), if the Bali House of Representatives, governor, and Balinese people can agree, we are sure that it will run well. Now, we just need to convince central government,” he said.

According to Kariyasa, the management will not be contrary to the law and does not cause legal

Governor of Bali, Wayan Koster

Australian steals safety box

47. According to his confession, the perpetrator works as a bricklayer in his country,” said Chief of Kuta Police, Teuku Ricki Fadlianshah, accompanied by Chief of Criminal Investigation Unit, Putu Ika Prabawa, on Tuesday (Nov. 20).

The disclosure of this case, said Ika, began with the report from

I Wayan Jayendra, 39, related to the incident. At first, Jayendra was called by his co-worker, Kadek Nurawan, that the safety box in Housekeeping was lost. The safety box contains a watch, cellphone, iPad, power bank and gold earrings.

Besides, the active speakers inside the villa are also missing. “Jayendra

said the losses due to the incident are worth IDR 15 million,” he said.

After receiving the report, the Operation Team of the Kuta Police Criminal Investigation Unit, led

by Putu Budi Artama conducted the crime scene investigation.

When checking the CCTV footage installed around the scene, the

problems. The current constraints are still concerning regulations.

Actually, it is the same as the governor, Kariyasa is confident that foreign tourists will be enthusiastic about this contribution. This idea is in harmony with several foundation institutions in a number of countries engaged in environmental and cultural conservation wishing Bali to be sustainable and ready to spend money on it.

“They are afraid that Bali will disappear and become a memory only. This tourism has a negative impact like that. With the existence of economic growth, technology will make some regions exotic, which are rare on this earth as many have also been missing,” he explained. (kmb32)

IBP/kmb

perpetrator was recorded to carry active white speakers. Then, police arrested and took the perpetrator to police station, including the active speakers. When being interrogated, the perpetrator admitted to have had taken the items. “At present, we are still developing and looking for other evidence,” he said. (kmb36)

2

Monday, November 26, 2018

Bali News

Released Bali Nine drug-smuggler returns home to more legal woes

An Australian woman held in Indonesian prisons for 13 years for being part of the “Bali Nine” drug-smuggling gang returned home Thursday, facing more possible jail time for alleged crimes committed before her overseas ordeal.

Renae Lawrence, 41, arrived in Brisbane shortly after dawn and then flew on to her home town of Newcastle in New South Wales state. She is the only member of the group to find freedom.

Lawrence was met by a large crowd of reporters, photographers and TV cameras at both Brisbane and Newcastle airports, but ignored their questions.

She ran from the Newcastle terminal and jumped into a waiting vehicle to escape the media swarm and was driven off.

Police want to question Lawrence about outstanding arrest warrants dating from before her ill-fated departure for Bali in 2005, but did not prevent her from leaving the airport with family members.

Australian media reports said Lawrence faces two outstanding charges relating to a high-speed chase involving a stolen vehicle.

It was unclear if Newcastle police would pursue the charges, but federal Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton argued that she should not be given “credit” for her time in Indonesian prison.

“If you’ve committed offences in our country, you need to face the justice system here,” he said prior to her return.

Lawrence, the only female member of the Bali Nine, was caught with 2.6 kilograms (5.7 pounds) of heroin strapped to her body as she tried to board a flight back to Australia from Bali.

She was initially handed a life

term, but her sentence was later reduced to 20 years and then further cut due to good behaviour.

Of the nine in the original group, ringleaders Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan were executed by firing squad in 2015, sparking a diplomatic row between Australia and Indonesia, which has some of the world’s strictest drug laws including the death penalty.

Another member, Tan Duc Thanh Nguyen, died in prison in June from stomach cancer, while the remaining five are currently serving life sentences.

Some critics have lashed out at the Australian police for tipping off their Indonesian counterparts about the gang and putting its members at risk of execution in Indonesia. (afp)

SONNY TUMBELAKA / AFP

Renae Lawrence (C) of Australia is escorted after being released from Bangli prison in Bangli regency on Bali island on November 21, 2018. The first member of the “Bali Nine” herointrafficking gang was released from prison on November 21 after serving 13 years, in a case that caused a huge diplomatic rift between Indonesia and Australia.

International

International

Activities

Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center

Monday, November 26, 2018

15

Awarded the Highest iAudit Score Food & Beverage Service 2018 IBP/net

“Bali weekend” performance in Leiden museum amazes dutch public

LONDON - Barong Dance was brought by the Indonesian Ambassador to the Kingdom of the Netherlands, I Gusti A. Wesaka Puja, with the accompaniment of Swara Shanti from Amstelveen received a standing ovation from the audience at the Bali Weekend event.

Held at the Volkenkunde Museum , Leiden, weekend, Swara Shanti Gamelan opened the performance by singing Sinom Ladrang which brought viewers to the atmosphere of daily life in Bali, an official of Social Affairs of the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture of the Indonesian Embassy in The Hague, Renata Siagian, told Antara London on Tuesday.

The cultural performance also featured the Kembang Girang dance by the Dwi Bumi dance studio and Rangda dance which is part of the “Bali Weekend” which was packaged as part of the Bali Grand Exhibition series “Welcome to Paradise” which was held since last October.

Ambassador I Gusti Agung Wesaka Puja after the performance said Bali is a well-known tourism destination in the Netherlands, therefore participation is to give appreciation to the Dutch community through the Balinese Barong dance. Hopefully visitors will be entertained with what is served and can strengthen relations between the two countries especially in the tourism and cultural sectors, “he said.

A similar hope was conveyed

by Anak Agung Bagus Krishna Sutedja, gamelan coach Swara Shanti, who had just completed his master`s program at Codarts Rotterdam, and Aafke, one of the Dutch citizens of Balinese cultural activists. At the end of this week,

Aafke also provides Balinese dance workshops to Dutch children visiting Volkenkunde.

During the weekend visitors not only visit the exhibition, but also watch cultural performances and attend various workshops and presentations about Bali include cooking Balinese food demonstrations, preparing offerings, making art items by processing them.

The Bali exhibition themed “Welcome to Paradise” was officially opened at the Volkenkunde Museum, Leiden, the Netherlands

by Ambassador I Gusti Agung Wesaka Puja and Mayor of Leiden and General Director of the Volkenkunde Museum, Stijn Schoonderwoerd attended by hundreds of visitors.

One of the keys to Bali`s success being one of the world`s tourist destinations is because Bali is known for its natural beauty, people`s warmth and harmony. Balinese people also always keep the teachings of religion emphasizing how between fellow life in harmony and peace.

The Balinese people under Tri Hita Karana teaches the concept of harmonious relations between Man and God, Fellow and with the Environment.

The Volkenkunde Museum located 19 KM from the city of The Hague has the largest collection of Bali outside Indonesia, in addition to collections of various countries such as Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

At lease 250 collections of Balinese artwork are displayed in the “Welcome to Paradise” Exhibition which runs until May 26 next year.

More than 200 thousand Dutch people travel to Bali every year. (ant)

 Founder : K.Nadha,  General Manager :Palgunadi Chief Editor: Gugiek Savindra  Editors:Agus Toni, Daniel Fajry, Mawa, Sueca, Denpasar: Dira Arsana, Giriana Saputra, Subrata, Sumatika, Asmara Putra.

Bangli: Suasrina, Buleleng: Mudiarta, Gianyar: Manik Astajaya, Karangasem: Bagiarta, Klungkung: Sosiawan. Jakarta: Nikson, Hardianto, Ade Irawan. NTB: Agus Talino, Izzul Khairi, Raka Akriyani. Surabaya: Bambang Wilianto.  Office: Jalan Kepundung 67 A Denpasar 80232. Telephone (0361)225764, Facsimile: 227418, P.O.Box: 3010 Denpasar 80001. Bali Post Jakarta, Advertizing: Jl.Palmerah Barat 21F. Telp 021-5357602, Facsimile: 021-5357605 Jakarta Pusat. NTB: Jalam Bangau No. 15 Cakranegara Telp. (0370) 639543, Facsimile: (0370) 628257. Publisher: PT Bali Post

Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center, the biggest convention facilities in the area, recently awarded the Highest iAudit Score Food & Beverage Service 2018 by Archipelago International, a leading Indonesiabased hospitality management company.

The iAudit held twice a year to 130+ hotels managed by Archipelago International, and the auditor was Made Sumardika – West & East Area Corporate F&B Manager. The main aim of it are, to follow and implement the standards set by Archipelago International, both in terms of service standards, cleanliness, and tidiness in the area of food and beverage.

The main assessment to win in the iAudit are, restaurant with buffet service, ala carte service, BAR, room service, banquet service, manager role, grooming, and Food & Beverage Golden Rules. And Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center meets all of those categories, therefore, they got score 97.26% on the first iAudit on June 12th, 2018 and 98% score on the second process on August 28th, 2018.

“This is a teamwork achievement, and the appreciation can be a motivation to continue to provide the best service to our guests, and hopefully, we can maintain it in subsequent audits.” Said Sony Bambang Suryo as the General Manager of Aston Denpasar Hotel & Convention Center on General Manager Conference at Aston Tropicana, Bandung on November 15th, 2018.

I N T E R N A T I O N A L

16 Pages Number 240 10th year

I N T E R N A T I O N A L

Price: Rp 3.000,-

Monday, November 26, 2018

‘Africa’s Grammys’ celebrate the hits of the continent LAGOS - After a 15-year career in banking and marketing, Nigerian Mike Dada was looking for a platform to “communicate the strength of Africa to the rest of the world”.

He decided to set up Afrima -- the All Africa Music Awards -- Africa’s equivalent of the Grammys, whose fourth edition takes place this weekend in Ghana’s capital, Accra. In 2014, penniless but passionate about music, he worked with private sponsors in Nigeria and a partner in Kenya.

Together, they organised the awards ceremony to “create jobs” and “make Africans proud”, he told local media, earning the backing of the African Union.

In four years, Afrima has managed to carve out a space as a platform to showcase the bubbling, innovative and prolific African music industry that has exploded in the past decade.

In Accra, it’s not World Music the continent is going to celebrate.

Instead, it’s Afropop, the Nigerianborn style which mixes Congolese soukous, Ivorian coupe-decale, Ghanaian Highlife and Jamaican dancehall that has got Africa’s youth dancing.

“Music is a bridge,” said Olivier Laouchez, chief executive of Trace TV, a French music channel popular

e-mail: info_ibp@balipost.co.id online: http://www.internationalbalipost.com. http://epaper.internationalbalipost.com.

Monday, November 26, 2018

on the continent.

“In Senegal, we listen to Nigerian hits in nightclubs and South Africa’s kwaito (afro-house) is exported to all radio stations on the continent.

“Today, what is bringing Africa together... is sport and music.”

- Diaspora One category has been dedicated to artists from the vast diaspora.

This year, the contenders include Franco-Malian Aya Nakamura and the surprising Afrotronix, an artist of Chadian origin who dresses like Daft Punk and makes house music with Sahelian rhythms and lyrics in Spanish.

Maître Gims, who comes from Democratic Republic of Congo and is repeatedly played on French radio, has racked up more than 200 million views on YouTube with “J’me Tire” (“I’m outta here”) and is Afrima’s most nominated artist this year.

The rapper is as much of an unknown to English-speaking Africa as Nigeria’s Davido is to French audiences, despite his 100 million-plus views on YouTube. “Thanks to Afrima we get to know musicians from all over the continent,” Oris Aigbokhaevbolo, a journalist with the Music in Africa website, told AFP. (afp)

French-Lebanese trumpeteer Ibrahim Maalouf

XAVIER LEOTY / AFP

Star trumpeter Maalouf convicted over schoolgirl sex assault

PARIS - Star trumpeter Ibrahim Maalouf, famed for his with his parents -- both musicians award-winning film soundtracks and mixing of eastern and -- during the country’s 15-year-civil western sounds, was handed a suspended prison sentence for war and settled in France.

He plays a four-pistoned instrusexual assault on Friday by a French court.

IBP/net

In four years, Afrima has managed to carve out a space as a platform to showcase the bubbling, innovative and prolific African music industry that has exploded in the past decade.

Maalouf, 37, was found guilty of assaulting a 14-year-old schoolgirl who was doing work experience at his music studio in a suburb southeast of Paris in 2013.

The girl, now aged 19, testified in court that he had kissed her and grabbed her without her consent.

Maalouf denied the allegations and portrayed her as an infatuated fan who was bitter after being rejected. The court in Creteil, a southeastern suburb of Paris, handed him a 20,000-euro ($23,000) fine as well as the suspended prison term.

Born in Lebanon, Maloouf fled

ment invented by his trumpeter father in the 1960s, as well as playing the piano, composing and teaching.

He has played with Sting and Elvis Costello among other music stars and last year won French cinema’s highest award, a Cesar, for the soundtrack of the film “In the Forests of Siberia”. (afp)

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A picture taken on November 25, 2018 on the Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris shows a tag reading “Down with the state, the cops and the nazis” a day after a rally by yellow vest (Gilets jaunes) protestors against rising oil prices and living costs. Security forces in Paris fired tear gas and water cannon on November 24 to disperse protesters. Several thousand demonstrators, wearing high-visibility yellow jackets, had gathered on the avenue as part of protests which began on November 17, 2018.

Clashes on Champs-Elysees as French protesters rage against taxes

Anti-government protesters clashed with French police on the Champs-Elysees in Paris on Saturday, leaving the area cloaked in tear gas and smoke from fires on a fresh day of demonstrations against President Emmanuel Macron.

Demonstrators wearing the yellow, high-visibility vests that symbolise their movement threw projectiles at police preventing them from moving along the famed shopping avenue, which was decked out in twinkling Christmas lights.

They also built barricades in some spots, and tore down traffic lights and street signs, creating riotous scenes reminiscent of France’s 1968 civil unrest, or street insurrections in the mid-19th century immortalised in paintings and movies.

Police arrested 130 people, 69

of those in Paris, and 24 people were injured, five of them police officers including one who suffered burns to his groin, the city police department and Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said.

Elsewhere, protesters took over highway toll booths to let traffic pass for free, or held go-slow vehicle processions, underlining one of their core complaints of escalating taxes on car fuel, especially diesel.

Macron, targeted by protesters’ calls that he resign, took to Twitter to thank police.

“Shame” on those who assaulted

or intimidated citizens, journalists and politicians, Macron said.

“There is no place for violence in the (French) Republic.”

Calm returned to the streets of the capital after midnight on Saturday, with the Champs-Elysees reopening to traffic. The clean-up operation also got under way as garbage trucks were deployed and workers removed barricades along the famous avenue.

- Smaller than a week ago The violence was on a smaller scale than a week ago when the

“yellow vest” movement staged its first nationwide protest.

“We’re not here to beat up cops.

We came because we want the government to hear us,” said one protest spokeswoman, Laetitia Dewalle, 37, adding that the largely spontaneous movement denounced “violence by pseudo-protesters” on the fringes.

“We have just demonstrated peacefully, and we were teargassed,” said Christophe, 49, who travelled from the Isere region in eastern France with his wife to protest in the capital.

The interior ministry counted 106,000 protesters across France on Saturday, with 8,000 in Paris, of whom around 5,000 were on the

Champs-Elysees. That was far less than the national tally of 282,000 in the November 17 protests.

Castaner said after the tumult died down that damage on the Champs-Elysees was “small”. The French government cast blame for the unruly protests on far-right politician Marine Le Pen, claiming she egged them on.

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