Archive for the ‘indonesia’ tag
Mud Volcano #
The Big Picture has some pictures of a phenomenon I’d never heard of.
Two years ago now, on 28 May 2006, gas company PT Lapindo Brantas exploring for gas in Sidoarjo, in East Java, Indonesia, drilled a borehole. At 5 AM, a secondary stage of drilling began and the drill string went about 9,300 feet down, after which the first small eruption of water, steam and a small amount of gas occurred at a location just southwest of the well. Several other eruptions followed over the next few days. The flow of hot mud has not ceased since.
Fourteen people have been killed and 30,000 people have been evacuated from the area. At least a dozen villages, with more than 10,000 homes have been destroyed while schools, offices and factories have also been wiped out and a major impact on the wider marine and coastal environment is expected.
Best Advertising Ever? #
It’s a pretty clever idea: rather than wasting money for adspace in periodicals or buses, drop that money from the sky and take advantage of the free coverage that brings.
(via Passport)
Islam and Democracy #
The Economist takes an admirable look at the complex issues that underpin the struggle for the coexistence of Islam and open democracy, finding the difficulty of dissent at home to be its biggest obstacle.
Vali Nasr, a professor at America’s Tufts University, terms “Muslim Democracy” a newish and potentially decisive force in the non-Arab parts of the Muslim world. In his view, the recent experience of Turkey, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Indonesia all points to a single truth: wherever they are given the chance, Muslim Democratic parties (which are responsive to public opinion and thrive in an open political contest) can prevail over harder-line and more violent varieties of political Islam. […]
There are, in short, many interesting things to say about Islam and democracy. The pity is that they are mostly being said in the West, not in Islam’s heartland.
Relatedly, this week’s edition of the newspaper (to use their term) also has interesting looks at the “soft Islam” of Indonesia and the general malaise across the Arab world.