The Myth of Progress

This piece was commissioned by the Ubud Writers & Readers Festival 2025 — spoken word performance written for a time thick with uncertainty. Here, there’s no sugarcoating. Instead, it confronts the pressing question: What Do We Do Now? Through unflinching narratives and piercing insight, it seeks to carve out pathways of hope, reminding us that even in the darkest hours, light is never just a flicker.

They told us that the future would be brighter,
that if we studied hard enough, worked long enough,
spoke English well enough,
we could catch up.

Catch up to what, though?
To who?
To that cousin who’s somehow always in Japan?

Because here we are,
scrolling through linkedins,
building portfolios that no one reads,
trying to stay creative while rent climbs,
cigarettes become more expensive
and the city floods right around next month.

We were raised on slogans — Generasi Emas 2045,
but gold feels heavy when you’re carrying debt,
anxiety, and a dream that keeps changing its shape.

They said progress means glass towers and bullet trains,
but I see more of us walking instead,
not out of poverty, but out of exhaustion.

Leaving offices to grow little green chillies in our parents’ backyards,
starting collectives,
selling tote bags with slogans about healing.

Building from what’s broken.
Because maybe hope isn’t forward.
Maybe it’s around.

In the small circles we build
bird races in open fields,
film screenings under flyovers,
thrift markets where every tag has a story.
and every playlist has Hindia somewhere in it.

We’re not rejecting the world
we’re redrawing it.

With slower strokes,
with hands that still believe in craft.

We still believe in something better
just not the version they sold us.

Maybe progress isn’t about being the next Singapore.

Maybe it’s about being the first Indonesia
that listens to its youth,
to its farmers,
to its forests,
to its teachers.
to its women.

What we do now
is refuse to be rushed.

We plant, we repair, we rest.

We send one last invoice.

We make meaning again.
not just money.

So when they ask, “What are you doing with your life?”
we can say,

“We’re learning how to live it.”