Should Foreign Reporters Learn Bahasa? · Global Voices
Mong Palatino

DC Guy observes that most foreign correspondents in Indonesia have little knowledge of the local situation:
They can't understand the TV. They can't understand the radio. They can't read local blogs, websites, or newspapers. All they have is the English language sources.
It's why the Western wires were obsessed with Bird Flu whilst ignoring current epidemics such as Malaria or Dengue Fever…It's also why they're obsessed with terrorism when traffic jams and bad hospitals are more of a threat to most of the population.