Better planning needed for future festivals

Better planning needed for future festivals

Dewi Anggraeni, Contributor, Ubud

There is a first time for everything, and that first time often
determines whether the event will be a one-off affair or the
beginning of something big and beautiful.

Bali has just seen the inaugural Ubud Writers and Readers
Festival wrap up after running a week from Oct. 11 to Oct. 17.

The event was host to a broad audience, involving people from
across Indonesia, as well as participants of other countries such
as Australia, Canada, Denmark, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia, the
Netherlands, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, the United
Kingdom and the United States.

Organized by Janet de Neefe and Heather Curnow, the festival
received sponsorship and patronage from corporation and
organizations, including Garuda Indonesia, Ford Motors, the
Australia-Indonesia Institute and the Australia Council.

Local businesses such as Biasa Boutique, Pita Maha, Saritaksu,
Indus, Kori Ubud, Terazo and Bebek Bengil, as well as media and
publication firms -- such as Bali Advertiser, the Femina Group,
Good Reading, Hello Bali, Indonesiatera The Jakarta Post and Bali
Rebound -- also participated.

The event certainly had enough teething troubles to keep its
organizers and sponsors awake at night, but it was also a
bouncing and gorgeous baby that gave those around it a great deal
of fun and joy.

Being hosted in Ubud also had its advantages and
disadvantages. The most obvious advantages are, of course, its
natural beauty, pleasant weather and generally friendly
environment. Curiously, these advantages had accompanying
disadvantages.

People here, even those who originally come from the West, are
significantly less uptight than those who live elsewhere, having
absorbed the local ambience.

Consequently, they are not as scrupulous about organizational
details such as punctuality and a well-planned structure. This
relaxed approach hardly sits well in an event such as a writers'
festival, where good organization is a sine qua non.

For the organizers, especially the volunteers responsible for
the smooth running of each session at each venue every day, any
crack in the line of communication has the potential to be a
disaster.

For a program volunteer at the Ubud festival for instance, a
speaker who turned up late for a session, or failed to come at
all, meant having to find a replacement speaker extra-fast,
praying, no doubt, that the panel would run after all.

A mismatch might have caused little more than a shrug or a
"well, this is Bali" comment from locals or long-time residents
of Ubud, but might have displeased those who had come from
cultures where events like these are much more tightly organized.

Specifically for this festival, language proved to be an issue
needing better planning and consideration next time around. There
needed to be more integration and interaction between English and
Indonesian speakers. If interpretations and translations are
necessary to encourage people to attend certain panels, then they
need to be part of the plan.

At the debriefing session followed by a lavish dinner at Indus
on Monday night, when the volunteers -- over 30 all together --
gave their honest feedback, a Balinese volunteer brought up a
very important issue: For the festival to be a successful regular
event, the organizers would have to work harder in making the
Balinese feel that it belonged to them as well.

In this post-Bali bombing era, when everyone in Bali --
expatriates, migrants and Balinese alike -- is encouraged to
rethink their relationships with each other, this is indeed an
important suggestion. It certainly would be a challenge to make
the Ubud Writers and Readers Festival a Balinese fixture, rather
than an international affair taking place in Bali.

It is also important to note that all who cared enough to
write and offer their feedback expressed how much they enjoyed
the festival, which featured many excellent panels and rewarding
workshops.

A young theater producer from San Francisco was very impressed
with the palpable energy -- nervous and creative alike -- which
he saw and felt among the organizers, volunteers, speakers and
workshop presenters. An abundance of good faith was also evident
among the participants, whose sense of fun often offset any
glitches or shortcomings in a number of sessions.

One example of this was the poetry slam on Friday night at
Bebek Bengil restaurant, during which the poets used Indonesian,
Javanese and English -- and the audience seemed to enjoy them
all. No one was once heard complaining of not understanding a
particular poem declaimed and performed. Even in the following
days, people were still heard saying they had not had so much fun
in a long time.

We have to congratulate the organizers for having the courage
to embark upon such a big venture and coming out at the other end
without regret, as they are already speaking of next year's
festival.

Janet de Neefe, the festival director, is emphatic that the
festival will be an annual event, and is undaunted by the
realization that the task would be much more complicated the next
time.

At least we know that the Bali Police looked after our
security seriously.

It is hoped that this year's Ubud Writers and Readers Festival
is not a one-off affair, and that this baby will grow into a
strong and reliable individual who will not only attract talent
from throughout Indonesia and worldwide, but will also serve as a
bridge for mutual understanding.

The author, a Melbourne-based writer and journalist, was an
active speaker and participant at the festival. She is the author
of Who Did This to Our Bali?