The four of us went to VEISHEA‘s Cultural Festival and International Food Fair last week. It’s a good way to taste the globe in one day, without actually traveling. The admission was $3 per person or $8 per family plus 50 cents per food ticket. Most of the entree cost 4-5 tickets, while an appetizer or dessert is about 3, and the drink is 2. Hosted at the South Ballroom of Memorial Union, visitors need to pay the admission fee at the door. The food tickets were sold both outside and inside, and we purchased $20 worth of tickets.
Countries representated were Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, India, Japan, Brazil-Portuguese, Nepal, Chinese, Puerto Rico, Latin American, Egypt, Other African, Sri Lanka, Russia, and Argentina-Uruguay-Chile. Each country had a ‘booth’ and at least two items to sell. It’s a buffet style, so we got the food fairly quickly. The eating area’s big and nice, with a huge screen to display various video clips from each countries.
Even though the claim was to “Experienced food from around the world excellently prepared by International Student Council”, I knew better not to put our hopes high. Even though our little town has a lot of international restaurants with good food, doesn’t mean the international students could cook as good.
And I was right, unfortunately, starting off with Indonesia. Being an Indonesian myself, I was disappointed to find out that their only two dishes are not ‘presentable’. Their chiken rendang very soupy, almost like a lontong sayur, I thought it supposed to be like this. While their macaroni schotel was very dry and too salty. On the hand out flyers, the macaroni schotel cost 4 tickets, but one of the Indonesian girls told us it cost 8 tickets! Hubby told her, “I’m sorry but the flyer said it only cost 4 tickets.” The girl said while laughing weakly, “Oh. Yeah. Sorry.” Hubby looked at me with eyebrows raised and I gave him the same ‘lool’. As we were walking away, he asked me, “What’s up with that? The Indonesian girl tried to rip me off?” I said, “She better not. Maybe she got the wrong info or something.”
Our favorites was the Koshary, an Egyptian dish which is a mix of pasta, rice, lentil, chick peas, onion, garlic, and some chili sauce. This may sound horrible, but it was delicious. My son Dante was eating it like crazy, he went for second, even. Indian’s tandoori chicken was always good, a bit too spicy but not bad. Like the Argentinian empanadas, unhappy with the Chinese hot pot. Satisfied with the Egyptian hibiscus tea and Puerto Rican fruit punch, astounded by Indian’s Rooh afza or rose syrup. Delighted by Russian torta de bolacha, intrigued by Brazilian pastel de forno.
As we were getting full, I saw somebody had a plate of something which looked very familiar to me. “Hey… it’s klepon!” I shrieked. My daughter looked at me, “It’s a what pound?” I grabbed her hand and said, “No, no. Not what pound. Klepon. It’s an Indonesian dessert. Funny, I didn’t see that at the Indonesian booth.”
So we walked around to find where this is sold. Amazingly, it was at the Malaysian Student Association’s booth. Except, they called it Onde Onde, although it looks as green as Indonesian klepon, also with dried coconut shred on it. How bizarre. Davi was in line and a guy asked her, “What would you like to get?” Davi pointed at the klepon (or Onde Onde, I should say, because it’s their version). The other guy then said, “Oh, the Onde Onde! Good for you. It’s truly Malaysian.”
[Click on the picture to get a better view]
‘scuse me? Truly Malaysian? Not entirely true. Because that is also our (Indonesian) klepon. And I will be adamant about my klepon. Don’t be ignorant. Just like they’re claiming that Rasa Sayange folk song, the island of Bintan, wayang, and angklung is theirs. OK, maybe this klepon vs onde onde thing is not as harsh as the previous clash. And maybe they’re just ignorant students who don’t have a clue that their neighboring country has something similar. I sure hope this is the case. Because I’m getting tired of Malaysia’s claiming everything that is not necessarily our, but we have it too, as their only.
Geez!
So is this a uni student’s festival? Untung lo nggak disuguhin mie goreng instant di stall Indonesia. LOL!
As for the klepon…. whaaat?
It’s true …. the taste of food in such events depends on the cooking skill of the participating students. The cheap price makes it still worth it, though. Some decades ago, I took some short courses at a univ in New Orleans. I prepared Soto Ayam for an international food day. Guests loved it. My secret was the instant spiced I brought from Jkt. LOL.
Indonesia and Malaysia are like siblings fighting all the time. You’re right, Dyn, those students don’t know a thing. Their ‘onde-onde’ might be theirs as much as our klepon. I just wish their government were not as ignorant as themselves.
Typo …’spiceS’ not ‘D’.
But Dante was having fun, no?
We had the same thing last Thursday. In a smaller scale of course. It was an Asia Pacific day and there was free buffet from all the participating booths (China, Nepal, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Japan etc – could you guess how fast the sushi were gone?)
beuh… malingsiah… cape de yaaa mba.
@katadia: ih enggak deh… mie goreng instant mah gue bisa bikin ndiri. about the klepon story, i know! interesting, eh?
@santi d: he he, instant spice rocks! evidently, the younger generation is not taught that the neighboring countries might have cultural/food similarities too.
@melly: yes. my always-hungry son did have fun 😉
@the writer: japan did have the longest line. they only offered sushi and [free] green tea. but man, they were busy!
@ichi: cape benerrr.
Din,
Actually Onde-onde is a Chinese dessert. The chinese version has different fillings, not only with kacang ijo, but also white beans, black beans etc.
Nevertheless, it is unbelievable that Malaysians dare to call our Kelepon as onde onde (oh my, just typed the word onde onde in Google and searching for some pics. What came up were numerous pics of Kelepon marked as Onde onde). How did it taste anyway?
Later on, the Malaysians would call ongol ongol as Kelepon. Bingung kan? ahhhh..
@Lorraine: ‘yen, I’ve tried the Chinese version of Onde-onde. It’s not so bad, actually 🙂 The Malaysian version of Onde-onde was not :p
I wonder why the Indonesian students’ booth served macaroni schotel? It doesn’t sound Indonesian at all. They should be ashamed to see Malaysia ‘love’ Indonesia’s stuffs more than they do 😛
Indonesia has loads of mouthwatering dishes like cakalang fish+sambe dabu-dabu, empek-empek, arsik and many more to pick.
Pity
oh dear, oh dear, oh dear … reading your rendang, okay, it’s forgiven. at least based on my experience, din. orang sini juga lucu kalo bikin [maksudnya aku, karena pake susu ;)] but klepon? errrr … excuse me! but, proudly let you know, our dagger a.k.a keris a.k.a kris already enlisted in unesco’s world heritage. sounds great apa nggak? aku bangga banget 🙂
Klepon? People in my home town also call it Onde-onde, I found out about Klepon when I lived in Bandung. Then I guess we (malaysian and central sumatera people) share this delicacy since -maybe- hundred years ago. It might be hard to claim truly malaysian/central sumatera cuisine and culture, but angklung and rasa sayange are definitely not malay’s.
This makes me wonder, how could we exclusively protect our own products (cuisine, cultures, etc)? Once back then, I noticed that Japan also has the same delicacy with ours: tingting. In another occassion, I noticed that Colombia also has typical delicacy like Indonesia does: cassava snack and fried banana.
klepon? people in my home town also call it onde-onde. I found out about klepon when I lived in Bandung. then I guess we (malaysian & central sumatera people) share this delicacy since -maybe- hundred years ago. it might be hard to claim truly malaysian/central sumatera cuisine & culture, but angklung and rasa sayange are definitely not malay’s.
this make me wonder, how could we exclusively protect our own products (e.g. cuisine & culture)? once back then, I noticed that Japan also has the same delicacy with ours: tingting. in another occasion, I found out that Colombian also has cassava snack & fried banana.
Diny .. there is a present for you waiting on my blog!!!
santid: aww… you shouldn’t have. really. now i have to write something about it, thanks to you :p
in retrospect, how do we know that klepon does actually belong to indonesia? hehe sbaiknya kita sama si negeri jiran sama2 gausah saling klaim deh.. mungkin sharing aja
(dont get me wrong, aku ga belain mereka juga yah.. cuma bersikap fair aja dikit. aku jg ga suka malingsia kok. hahaha)
well toshi, i’ve never suggested that klepon is definitely ours. i understand there’s no way to ‘brand’ it. it’s almost possible to officially label stuff like that. cuma menyayangkan, kalo ini benar, kurang gencarnya pendidikan -formal or informal- cultural studies. mungkin juga lack of interest… prinsip “ah, whatever” sayangnya lumayan kuat di generasi muda. kecuali situ, tentunya 😉
I’m not surprised about those Malaysian students claiming things that aren’t even theirs. They’ve never been totally creative with their culture, they have to steal ours.