LUMPUR Sidoarjo - The Hot Mud flow Sidoarjo
Twisted Tourism Lapindo Mud Spill East Java
"... Holiday in misery other ... "
John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten), Sex Pistols
" And you have to go see Lumpur Lapindo! "is what my colleague told me when I asked him what I should do on my visit to East Java.
" Really? Can you go see it? As a tourist? " I asked.
" Yes, go see it. " There was a must.
Among the many catastrophes that surround us every day there is the added insult disaster and rubber-necking, the human tendency to flock to a tragedy simply let their jaws hanging open and watching. Very often the gorier the better. In some cases, the tragedy is not such that can be cleaned overnight. It might be as rest for a month, a year, or say seven years in this case. And when such a long-term tragedy persists addition, the human desire to gawk spawns this thing that can accurately be described as the twisted tourism.
In May 06, the company Lapindo during the drilling of natural gas wells, was greeted with a surprise; a mud volcano, a geyser of steam and hot mud shooting 0 meters into the air. As I heard from reliable sources, the immediate reaction of the company was of course trying to hide it. They built temporary walls and small samples as fast as they could, but the mud kept flowing and flowing and flowing and flowing. When you go one day it will still be fluid. Experts predict that it will be running for 30 years. So far it has consumed 16 Desa (villages) and three kecamatan (districts), the displacement of thousands of families and businesses.
Knowing all this information did not prepare me for what I encountered when I finally arrived. The main road that connects directly south of Surabaya, RT. 1, or the room temperature. 23 or Jl. Gempol Malang, going right along the western edge of the Lapindo mud plain solid. When you get there, you are first struck at the sight of this colossal gabion wall 10 meters high, towering over you, built to retain the mud. It extends as far as the eye can see in both directions.
At the top of the wall, I was immediately greeted by ojek , one after another, who offered to take me out, around and closer to the place where the steam geyser is still spewing into the air. Some were selling DVD of the mud volcano. I was tempted by the DVD but not the ojek. I never feel comfortable on a motorcycle taxi and I doubt not comfortable with the idea of riding on the back of a beat-up, old bebek to through a casting active hot bubbling mud.
top of the gabion were common Indonesian refreshments for tourists: Aqua of all sizes teh Botol , peanuts, Bungkus nasi , etc. And there were other foreign tourists there, too. I'm sure they had good reason to be there (students geology doctoral or something) unlike me.
Also atop the giant gabion there is a "monument", a tombstone in fact, as a reminder and promise never to forget the false promises made to pay compensation to thousands of displaced families. A stone's throw of the monument there is an effigy of Aburizal Bakrie appropriately dressed in his bright yellow jacket Golkar, shiny with presidential aspirations. It was obvious he had been mercilessly dilempar lumpur spotted with mud balls and glasses had been knocked askew. Maybe this happens on a regular basis, when the moon is full and the mud is right. I'm glad I got to see him there, standing in the mud. Made the trip even more interesting.
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