Twenty years ago, I had naver imagined that water would had been capitalized. At the time, people could use water freely without buying at all. They could use it for drinking, washing, cooking, taking a bath, or irigating the farm. They were united by consensus had to obey  that water belong to public. So, they had to use the water wisely.

I still remembered, ancient people also put “gentong” at the street beside their house to share water with other people that needed it just to drink. When I was childhood I looked at almost every house put it . Every one passing the street was freely to drink water when they were thirsty. That was  the example of  “the real civilization”. I mean civilizing the water.

Now, everything has changed. Human being is more mature in thinking but not in feeling. He/She just think how make something to be profit indivually. Water is not belong to public anymore but belong to individual having capital.

So it is common today villager buy water to drink. Even, in some area villager also buy water for washing or taking a bath.

The problem is modern people claiming “civilized people” really are failure in civilizing the water.

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Some women in my vilage formed “the mom community” . They gather every week to pray to God special for the sucsesful of their children. They read The Koran, Surah Yasiin and Surah al Insyirah. Before reading alqur’an they read Surah Alfatihah “addressed” to Rasullullah, and then to their children.
All the women following this “weekly gathering” are the moms that the childern are still in The Kindigerten and Elementary School. They are intrested forming the mom community to response their worriness for the future of their children. They predict, in the future the problems that will give negative effect for their childeren will be complex, especially for the development of children’s spiritual. So, solving the problem phisically is not enough. They must try so hard find the way spiritually. Praying is the answer.
Afther praying together, they sometimes share how to educate their children well. For example, they discuss how to build the fairness character for their children, what are the negative effect of television, how to build “heaven” at home for their children, how to educate the children become “anak shaleh”, and so on.
Sucsesful here doesn’t merely means material but also spiritual. They believe praying can give positive effect for their children’s life in the future, although it is not seen directly and phisically.
My be it is difficult to understand by rational or modern men that always measure something materially. So, they just look at something artificially and they fail catching deep meaning from their life in this world.
for the villagers, educating children is not only be done by the rational and phisical way but also spiritual ones. It is really smart response, I think.

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I am happy living in small village where people are very hamble and very strong in keeping their tradition. They never put tradition vis a vis religion. They believe, Islam –as religion— can dialoque with thier tradition. They can enrich life. They become life peacefull and harmony.
Although not registrated, but all people in my village is NU’s follower. NU— as the bigest religious organizations in Indonesia— is known as moderate orginization. Its follower is spread out on this country especially in vilages. For them, life is very “simple”. It is not rigid like radical religius groups that always interprete religion literally. So, their Interpretation is always out of the context.
As villagers they are councious that “good traditions” must be kept as long as not contrast with islamic teaching. It is not simplification. It is believed as heritage developed by ulama al shaleh a long time ago. They are counciuous that they are not expert. So, it is very rational if they follow those are expert in islamic teaching. It is different with radical religious groups. They teach Islam over convidently. Although they know little, they confident claims as ustadz. Unfortunetly, they always interprete Islam literally and fall in rigid and radical understanding.
For villagers, life is very simple. They just lay their life on God. They only do live so hard but the final result depend on God. What ever they do based on God’s consiousness that is known in Islam as iman. Living in this world is planting amal shaleh and we will get “the benefit” of it tomorrow after.
They assume, tradition does not mean “primitive” like the view of western society . It also can not be catagorized as bid’ah like the view of wahabi. For them,tradition means the life vitalizer or bases for transformation of their culture. To be civilized they must not addopt “other culture”. They can be civilized by transforming their tradition and their culture themselves. How smart they are!

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