21 Foreign Citizens Win Indonesian Language Contest at FHI

The Festival Handai Indonesia (FHI) 2024, an Indonesian language contest for foreign nationals, has wrapped up with 21 winners of different categories announced at the pinnacle of the event in Bali on Aug. 31, 2024.

The week-long event took place at The Patra Bali Resort and Villas in Bali, from Aug. 25 to Aug. 31, 2024.

The 2024 FHI, themed “Celebrating Friendship” featured seven competitions that tested participants’ skills in using the Indonesian language in various forms of arts and literacy. The competitions covered speech, storytelling, reciting poetry, singing, creating and reciting pantun (rhyme), news reporting and letter writing.

Every competition was designed to allow participants to show off their skill in using Indonesian and their capability to understand and appreciate the language.

FHI 2024 involved 549 participants from 78 countries and was held in stages: an elimination round, through which the participants sent their work and contested online, and a final round, in which the participants took part in the competition in Bali.

Following the verification and assessment of their works by a panel of judges made up of experts in the Indonesian language, literature, arts and culture, 105 participants from 44 countries have been assessed in the final round of which 21 contestants won the different categories (see table below).

The annual FHI was organized by the Education, Culture, Research and Technology Ministry through the Language Strengthening and Empowerment Center (Pustanda) of the Language Development and Cultivation Agency (Badan Bahasa).

Badan Bahasa chairman Aminudin Aziz was upbeat about the great enthusiasm shown by the global community to join FHI 2024 as evidenced by the participation of 78 countries from the target of 50 countries.

He mentioned the active role that the Foreign Ministry played to help promote FHI overseas. “The decision to officially acknowledge Indonesian as an official language of the UNESCO General Conference in 2023 also had a positive impact and was another contributor,” he said.

He added that the participants’ great interest in Indonesian had shown that the government’s efforts to popularize the language globally through developing a program to teach Indonesian to foreigners, called Bahasa Indonesia for Foreign Speakers (BIPA) had run effectively.

According to him, participants from 43 countries in the final round have shown incredible skill in using Indonesian as displayed when they gave speeches and read poetry, among other things. “We should maintain friendship with them,” he said.

FHI served as a medium that brought global citizens closer to Indonesia as they could see Indonesia directly, interact with Indonesians, taste local food and appreciate the country’s culture, represented by Bali, he said.

On top of the competitions, the participants joined cultural activities designed to enrich their experience during their stay in Indonesia. All of the participants visited Taman Budaya Garuda Wisnu Kencana (GWK) on Aug. 29 to provide them with an in-depth introduction to Indonesian cultural heritage.

The participants also partook in a yoga class and various lomba Agustusan (competitions typically held to celebrate Indonesia’s Independence Day) held within the hotel area on Aug. 30.