Played last night in a long-g-g-g  line-up of local groups in Semarang, Indonesia. Sponsored by a very interesting organization called Hysteria. Hysteria seems to be part of a young generation of Indonesians who are creatively searching for ways to create social spaces for activism and art in a conservative country with a repressive state. Hysteria began as a small group of literature students doing readings, and then grew into a collective  who organize concerts, do web work for different social groups, do documentation for community organizing efforts in slums threatened by runaway urban development, organize farmers to defend their lands, and various other stuff. All very small scale and humble, but super super cool.

Thank you especially to Riska Farsonalia, Purna Cipta who was the central organizer of the event, and Adin Mbuh, the founder of Hysteria and who, unfortunately, had to suffer through one of the few times in this crazy year when I failed to keep my calm in the face of the accumulated frustrations of all this travel. Thank you Adin!

Here is Adin’s personal blog about Hysteria (for all of you who read Indonesian!)