FEATURE
Bringing Interpretation to Village Tourism in Indonesia
BEHIND THE ARTICLE
Several Bonjeruk Village interpreters are composing their part of the interpretive story at the cafeteria managed by the village community-based tourism organization. Photo by Kristanti Wisnu Aji Wardani.
As mass tourism suffocates popular destinations, the world looks for alternative forms of tourism—including village tourism—which are expected to be more sustainable. In the archipelagic country of Indonesia, village tourism has been encouraged and supported with various incentives since 2010. At the time of writing this article there are 4,796 villages listed on the Tourism Village Network website hosted by the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy.
Without adequate guidance, however, these enthusiastic initiatives can end up with many villages simply offering their resources, replicating other villages by building various kinds of selfie spots and providing basic facilities. Nothing to do with developing experiences. With the spreading power of digital information technology, some villages are experiencing a flashy but fleeting success of attracting local and domestic visitors, inundating these unprepared areas, and creating another version of mass tourism.
Many villages develop tourism for economic reasons and directly sell “tourism products” without realizing that creating tourism products is about creating tourist or visitor experience. Resources alone, and the mindless consumption of these resources by visitors, rarely create quality experiences, let alone interpretive ones.
However, creating interpretive experiences for villagers who never take part in such activities, and doing so in a country lacking many examples of interpretive experiences, is rather challenging. This article will share experiences in assisting some villages in crafting their interpretive experiences for visitors, thereby highlighting important activities in the process that have helped these village interpretive guides understand their tasks and roles and, therefore, perform their best.
Igniting the Sparks
While every step in the story development process is important, efforts to find the significance of the village have a great impact on the people involved and the process. This is achieved by preparing a history line, a record of chronological natural and cultural events, people, or programs of importance to the village, and then by identifying the significance of the village for the area, region, country, and even for the world. This step, which I learned quite long ago from the Public Use Planning process developed by Jon Kohl for the RARE Center for Tropical Conservation, plays a critical role in helping the village community, and particularly the tourism planning team and interpretive guides, generate new understanding and pride about their village.
In all cases I have worked with, studying the history line and finding each village’s unique significance depends on collaboration between the interpretive facilitator and the village planners and interpreters, who often have limited research and technological resources and skills. When the planners and interpreters need to conduct surveys and research in their village, the facilitator will work with them to prepare the survey/research framework, develop questions to be asked, schedule the processes, and show examples of expected results. This work usually requires the community to conduct surveys and pursue research by interviewing elders and other villagers.
Oftentimes, the survey conducted by the villagers reveals something they had never known before—and therefore were very surprised by what they found during the survey. Finding twenty-two springs and sixty-eight puras (Balinese Hindu religious places) from across the different eras of Bali Island—in a village of only three square kilometers—was beyond the Nyambu villagers’ expectations. In another instance, the Bajo Mola people interviewed elder fishermen in their village and learned that night sky objects were not only a navigation tool for sailing. Rather, night sky objects also were used for navigating the social and economic lives of their ancestors, and this finding fascinated the Bajo Mola people.
Mukmin and Aswin, a Bajo Mola fisherman and a teacher respectively, are sharing the result of their Star-telling team brainstorming process for story ideas. Photo by Wiwien T. Wiyonoputri.
Almascatie, a Labuan Bajo history enthusiast, is presenting his research on the history of the Komodo National Park and its surroundings to enrich the park naturalist guide perspective in the interpretive workshop. Photo by Kristanti Wisnu Aji Wardani.
Interpretive planning for village tourism also requires the facilitator to search extensively for relevant information, literature, and subject matter experts on the region's history, culture, geology, flora, and fauna significant to the place. It is necessary for the facilitator to coordinate this research effort due to the limited access of the villagers to technological resources.
For example, a presentation of a series of free old maps of Bangka Island obtained digitally by a history enthusiast made the Pelangas Village leaders and interpretive guides thrilled to know their village has existed at least since 1812. In another instance, a small note from the colonial era recently found behind the thick wall of the Bosscha Observatory library amazed everyone. This note confirmed a past Penyengat Island scholar’s skill, because he had accurately predicted the 8 July 1861 solar eclipse over the island.
In places where written historical records were not available, such as in Bajo Mola sea-farer community, collaboration between villagers and the facilitator even led to the first meeting of formal and non-formal leaders discussing such issues. Together, they built intergenerational communication in the community.
Across all examples, and in all cases I have worked with, it is a collaborative effort of the village team and the facilitators. The success in bringing the history line and supporting data and information on the village’s significance to the workshop table made the interpretive workshop easier and more productive.
From Sparks to Solid Ideas
In helping village guides develop their interpretive experiences, a 32-to-40-hour workshop dedicated to interpretation is a necessity, and I think most of us would agree that it should be delivered as interpretively as possible. This interpretive workshop is probably the first and only chance for the village guides to have an interpretive experience, as many of them usually never go beyond their village, island, or district boundary. Lots of local examples are important to show every task in the workshop is doable. At the beginning, I only had two “complete” simple interpretive talks as examples. Through the years, the result of each project became a valuable collection of local examples.
Because the interpretive workshop is for beginners who are learning to compose their first draft of their interpretive stories, the workshop covers a rather extensive range of topics. The workshop begins with an Introduction to Interpretation session, which allows the workshop participants to enjoy one rather full but simple example of an interpretive talk. Then, the workshop moves into a series of sessions on interpretive
principles and quality, interpretive experience planning, and the structure of interpretive presentation, and the session closes with dozens of useful interpretive techniques with real examples, videos, and practices. This stage is followed by the participants’ intensive work on composing their interpretive narratives. The aforementioned simple examples were delivered bit-by-bit and revisited here and there in accordance with the story development steps.
Most of the workshops take place casually in a multi-purpose room provided by a village institution at the chosen time agreed upon by the workshop participants. Since most participants work in the morning, workshops usually start at 1 or 2 PM, and then run until very late as many villagers love to stay awake and gather at night. However, workshops funded by the government, such as the workshops for the communities of the small historic town of Muntok and those for Komodo National Park naturalist guides recruited from villages within and near the park, were conducted formally in paid venues and during working hours (although, practically, the workshops were extended into overtime).
A Komodo National Park naturalist guide is sharing his team result of brainstorming process for story ideas. Photo by Kristanti Wisnu Aji Wardani.
Interpretive workshop participants are a combination of people who were chosen by their village heads and individuals who were interested in joining the program. Each workshop trains twelve to twenty-five participants; however, usually only 50-80% of participants become interpreters, because some participants would just like to be involved in the making of the stories and some participants find it too difficult to speak in public.
Each place produced different numbers of interpretive products or experiences depending on the number of workshop participants, their capacity, their determination, and the number of facilitators involved in the workshop or the program. For example, Nyambu Village in Bali Island, Bayan Village and Bonjeruk Village in Lombok Island, and Pelangas Village in Bangka Island each produced two interpretive products, while the communities in Muntok Town in Bangka Island created three interpretive programs. The Bajo Mola people in Wakatobi National Park and the Komodo National Park naturalist guides each came up with four interpretive programs. Meanwhile, Penyengat Island interpreters crafted eight interpretive programs consisting of one interpretive tour
interpretive tour of a historic building, two interpretive tours, and five interpretive talks, workshops, and culinary experiences.
Documenting the process of producing those interpretive programs provides rich examples, both for facilitators and villagers, of many aspects of developing interpretive products and experiences, such as: the brainstorming process, interpretive theme development, interpretive objectives formulation, and application of interpretive techniques in the body of the narratives, the transition, the opening and the closing of interpretive program, etc.
However, it is important to note that this interpretive workshop does not stand alone. Several basic workshops or activities to assess the potential of the village and develop potential experiences have usually been conducted prior to interpretation development. Furthermore, whenever resources allow, workshops on developing monitoring and evaluation programs, as well as on developing Standard Operating Procedures, usually follow the interpretive workshop.
From Ideas to Stories
Writing the first draft of narratives is probably not necessary for an experienced interpretive guide; however, it is a critical part of the interpretation workshop for village guides. At first, this activity seems to burden the village guides. However, when many of us were still in school, writing down important things (such as mathematical formulas) repeatedly in order to memorize them worked well. The benefit of writing and repeated writing in learning is also true in the case of preparing interpretive narratives. It does not mean that the guide needs to write it repeatedly, yet writing something often strengthens memory.
Writing down narratives or stories with a lack of writing habit and skill can be hard. Still, with interpretive techniques introduced, some encouragement, and sufficient time allocation, guides find it possible to fill in their working form/template. We do not expect the village guides to produce narrated storylines of subject matter expert quality. We just try to move from “Knowledge Telling“ to “Learning and Understanding,” as described in Yujie Zhu’s “The Ladder of Heritage Interpretation,” or from the superficial, partial “Pre-interpretive” theme to the consensus perspective of “Introductory Interpretation,” as described in Jon Kohl’s “Four Levels of Interpretive Development as Based on Tilden’s Principle of Wholeness.” Results like this alone are highly appreciated by visitors, especially the special interest ones.
Written drafts are also effective media for a guide to communicate their ideas to others, including the facilitator, and these written drafts work best if written on big papers—such as flipcharts, for everyone to easily pop up and comment while the guide is composing the narratives. This might not seem as time efficient, since someone eventually has to type them all in a digital file. Yet, in a village where a computer is still a luxury item, starting with paper copies is unavoidable.
In this beginner-level workshop, three to five interpretive guides would work together to develop one interpretive program. They would work together up to the outline development, and then each of them would have to develop the narratives either for one or two stopping points of a tour, or for one or two sub-themes of a talk, demonstration, or workshop. This small group of guides would then combine all their individual narratives, and they would prepare the closing and opening together again.
Several Bonjeruk Village interpreters are composing their part of the interpretive story at the cafeteria managed by the village community-based tourism organization. Photo by Kristanti Wisnu Aji Wardani.
The evaluation session of the development of interpretive experiences in Rinca Island Komodo National Park was carried out on a boat on the way back to the main island. Photo by Agus Elang.
LEFT: The Penyengat Island Village Historic Tour team discuss the storyline narratives during the field workshop. Photo by Alfi Rizwan.
RIGHT: One of the Nyambu Village interpreters, Dewi Darmini, practices her part for the first time. Photo by Wiwien T. Wiyonoputri.
From Stories to Experiences
Having complete narratives of interpretive story lines turned out to be useful when it came to field workshops: taking the draft into the field to check out the suitability of the narratives to the resources interpreted and the visitors targeted. It was also very useful when measuring the progress of the guides during trials and, lastly, it was helpful in regenerasi: the process of refreshing an organization with new (and usually younger) people, as newly recruited guides could first learn from the documents and then by watching their predecessors in action.
As the saying goes, “Practice makes perfect,” so an interpretive workshop is an appropriate time to introduce, practice, and enforce the expected attitude of an interpretive guide. Participants of the workshop are continuously reminded by the facilitator and their colleagues to be on time, project their voice, maintain, and use positive body language and facial expression when asking questions, delivering group presentations, and performing other tasks.
The practice of building habits and attitudes continues as the guides practice presenting an interpretive program. While most of the time we can expect expert interpretive guides to practice by themselves, practice sessions accompanied by facilitators produce notable improvement of village guides. Accompanied sessions ensure that the guides practice and perform with the expected attitude. In these sessions, the guides can receive motivating praise and feedback for their progress. As the guide practices
and more deeply understands the story, it is not uncommon for the guide and facilitator to discuss different techniques during this practice session, resulting in a more engaging interpretive program.
However, there is no point in practicing if you never actually perform. Therefore, trials are essential. We invite a small number of real visitors, mostly locals who have interest in the village or can benefit from this trial and are willing to contribute their thoughts for improvement. Trials participants include tourism officials, local NGOs' staff, neighboring villages’ tourism groups, etc.
During the first trial, the guides usually struggle with their self-confidence to speak before the public, and as a result, 20-30% of their interpretive story is delivered in a disorganized way. However, those who make it through the first trial have often overcome confidence issues and are ready to move on.
While in the first trials the guide delivers the program in a team, with each member delivering a narrative they had developed, the following trials require a smaller team to deliver. It, therefore, challenges the guides to deliver parts developed by others. The following trial usually takes the guides some time to prepare. We usually can expect the guide to deliver 50% and 70-80% of their story during the second trials and the third trials, respectively.
Alfi, a Penyengat Island interpreter, leads the LiteraTour during his second trial. Photo by Wiwien T. Wiyonoputri.
In a few cases, the guide reached quite impressive progress, such as the case of naturalist guides of Rinca Island Komodo National Park where they were able to deliver 70-80% of the story/experience in the second trial. This was possible because these guides are already used to guiding visitors. However, such leaps can also be seen from inexperienced guides after they participate in a well-designed study visit.
Asking these village guides to create an interpretive program through given steps is like asking a chef to cook an exotic dish they have never tasted before based on a recipe. Study visits give these guides an opportunity to “taste” several good and not so good interpretive programs comparable to theirs. The timeless challenge is to find appropriate interpretive programs that fit a community-based project budget, calling for the facilitator to search for such gems in the nearby towns or cities.
Village guides can have references by watching others deliver interpretive programs and decide what works for theirs. To be able to see leaps in progress, the study visit is best done between the first and second trials, when the guides have already had the experience to lead their program and still have another trial to apply what they learn from their study visit.
For example, a high school graduate who led the Gurindam Experience in Penyengat Island modified her presentation significantly and added some musical elements to it for her second trial. The result surprised everyone. A local tourism officer who always observed the trials asked me, “Is that the same girl that led the program two weeks ago?” While the power of artistic presentation had been introduced months before during the interpretive workshop, only direct experiences moved her to do that. (The same direct experience once moved me to study interpretation.)
The development of interpretive experience in village tourism takes quite some time. It requires a long-term facilitation process beyond the interpretive workshop to include planning and research prior to the workshop and coaching process following the workshop. In Indonesia, we call this process pendampingan.
Agus, a Komodo National Park naturalist guide, shares his knowledge about the snake in the park during the second trial. Photo by Wiwien T. Wiyonoputri.
The interpreters of the Penyengat Island are trying out an interpretive Malay coffee experience during their visit to Kopi Sekanak, a coffee shop, in the nearby capital town. Photo by Nurfatilla Afidah.
Three interpreters of Bajo Mola Canoeing experience leading the program during their third trial. Photo by Ayi Noe.
