Exploring Our Children’s Potentials

[The banner basically says, ‘Use your voting rights! Let’s make this election a successful one’]

You may have heard about it.

Today is Indonesia’s Presidential Election Day, the day when you get to see thousands of Indonesian citizens head towards the Embassy to cast their votes.

It drizzled a bit and it was all balmy and humid, but people kept on coming in groups. They drove, walked, and took buses and taxis.

And just like the rest, we too were amongst the crowd! (the three of us went after Anya went off to school)

We got rain on our heads and joined the snake-like queue (to get our names registered) for about … an hour!

And as we waited, I observed everyone around, and it really was an interesting mix of people. I stood behind a young woman with tattoos on her neck and ears. I saw giggling teens in school uniforms, domestic helpers, well-dressed professionals, polished and posh women, parents with kids and even babies in prams.

And I thought to myself, regardless of what we do and who we are, we all have the same rights. Those who are materially better off, who socially are more ‘convenient’ than the domestic helpers for example, receive no special treatments. They all queued and they all voted.

I like that.

[Vai had to do quite a bit of standing around and he occasionally asked to be carried, which really wasn’t an easy thing for us since he now weighs 16.5kg!]

Anyway, after queuing and getting our names and details registered, the rest went fairly fast!

I think it took us less than 7 minutes, from the time we got our ‘voting ticket’ to the time we left the voting hall altogether!

Okay, now just in case you’re not familiar, this is us showing us our little inked pinky, THE (traditional) proof that you have indeed voted and that you can’t vote TWICE! (well, unless you can totally erased the purple ink off your fingers and nails!)

Haha … and this is Vai and his ‘clean’ little pinky. No ink yet, little guy … but if you’re still an Indonesian citizen in FOURTEEN years time, you’d get to vote too like Mommy and Daddy!

To top it all off, we had yummy Indonesian lunch with our friends at Ojolali Restaurant (at Lucky Plaza). We had Grilled Chicken, and Vai tried out their Chicken Noodle. Yummm …

And I like Vai’s little expression in that last shot! It’s as if he’s saying, ‘Errr … Mommy, is the chicken supposed to be THAT black?’ Hehe.

Anyway.

It felt good to have been part of the Presidential Election crowd today!