Yesterday, bombs and gunshots blasted the heart of Jakarta, capitol of Indonesia. 2 innocent victims died. 5 attackers that has been said linked to ISIS chain also taken down either by their own suicide bombs or Police's guns. It's shocking and sad for us. It took place only 2km away from where I work. We used to have meetings on the bombed Starbucks. I walked that same spot everyday for years when I was working at my previous company. The fear and terror are real. The tragedy will be even more devastating for family of the victims.
Indonesia is a great country and the people are just as amazing. We gain independence by a lot of physical and diplomatic battles in 1945 after centuries of colonization. Geographically, we are consist of 17,000 islands. Imagine how diverse our nation is. We do have the largest muslim population, around 90% of 250 million Indonesians are Muslims. Me and my family are also Muslims.
After the tragedy, Indonesian put up all their thoughts on social media just like anywhere in the connected world. The messages were clear. Deep condolences and condemn terror acts. We pray for the victims and everyone in the country. On top of those, we sent out strong message to the terrorists and everyone in the whole world that we are not afraid. We unite. We are strong. We will not lose to such inhuman act of terror. Yes we are concern with our safety but we are not afraid. Terrorist (as it names) has a goal of creating fear, makes you feel terrorized and leads to a conditions that will benefit their interests. No, we Indonesian and especially Jakartans will not submit to this agenda. We stay in our city. We live our life in this beautiful country. Whoever created this tragedy will not succeed. We won't let that happen.
We stay vigilante and figuring out the motives. Conspiracy and media diversion is not something impossible. Extremists are also something that we do have in our diverse country. Even if the attackers are Muslims, no way that we're going to condemn Islam. As you see, I'm a Muslim, and never in my mind that I have a thought of killing people. Yes some sick extremists will see the tragedy as a couragous act of martyrdom but no, that's definitely not what most of Indonesian feel.
A Satay street vendor keeps grilling his delicious food only few hundred meters away from the scene. Ojek and public transport drivers are bravely taking passengers through the surrounding streets. Those stories emerge on social media as our symbol of courage. It's not that we're not sad. It's just, terrorist don't have a place in our country. They will not succeed with their bigger plans. We are a strong nation build by strong people. We're still on track, even like literally. I'm writing this post on a train to go to work with hundreds if not thousands of other people.
I wrote this post in English because I want to address this to my friends from other places around the world and maybe they can share it to their friends. I may have a lot of grammatical mistakes but the main thing is to let everyone knows that I'm safe. We're going to work as usual but more cautious. We don't like terrorist and no way we're going to let them win. Especially not in our amazing Indonesia because WE ARE NOT AFRAID #KamiTidakTakut
