Warung Bebas

Selasa, 15 Januari 2013

Asal Muasal, Fungsi, dan Makna Rumah Gadang

You'll Never Walk Alone - Rumah Gadang adalah rumah adat Minangkabau, yang merupakan salah satu khazanah arsitektur tradisional dari bumi Indonesia. Rumah yang merupakan tempat tinggal bersama ini menyimpan berbagai keindahan arsitekturial. Bentuk atapnya yang runcing dan menyerupai tanduk kerbau menjadi ciri penampakan luar yang khas dan mudah terlihat. Keindahan Rumah Gadang juga dapat dilihat dalam ukiran ornamen bermotif akar, bunga, daun, serta bidang persegi empat dan genjang yang menghiasi dinding bagian depan.

 
Di Minangkabau, rumah tempat tinggal dikenal dengan sebutan Rumah Gadang (Besar), atau kadang-kadang disebut juga dengan Rumah Bagonjong. Besar bukan hanya dalam pengertian fisik, tetapi lebih dari itu, yaitu dalam pengertian fungsi dan peranannya yang berkaitan dengan adat. Tingginya penilaian orang Minangkabau dengan rumah adatnya dikemukakan dengan kiasan atau perumpamaan berikut:

Rumah gadang sambilan ruang, salajang kudo balari, sapakiek budak maimbau, gonjongnya rabuang mambasuik, antieng-antiengnyo disemba alang, parabuangnyo si ula gerang, batatah si timah putiah, rusueknyo tareh limpato, cucuran atoknyo alang babega, saga tasusun sarupo bada mudiek. Parannyo si ula gerang, batata aie ameh, salo-manyalo aie perak. Jariaunyo puyuah balari, dindieng ari dilanja paneh, tiang tapi panague jamu......

Rumah Gadang didirikan di atas tanah kaum yang bersangkutan. Jika hendak didirikan, panghulu dari kaum tersebut mengadakan musyawarah terlebih dahulu dengan anak kemenakannya. Setelah dapat kata sepakat dibawa kepada panghulu-panghulu yang ada dalam persukuan dan seterusnya dibawa kepada panghulu-panghulu yang ada di nagari.

Untuk mencari kayu diserahkan kepada orang kampung dan sanak keluarga. Tempat mengambil kayu pada hutan ulayat suku atau ulayat nagari. Tukang yang mengerjakan rumah tersebut berupa bantuan dari tukang-tukang yang ada dalam nagari atau diupahkan secara berangsur-angsur.

Dilihat dari cara membangun, memperbaiki dan membuka (merobohkan) rumah gadang, ada unsur kebersamaan dan kegotongroyongan sesama anggota masyarakat tanpa mengharapkan balas jasa. Fungsi sosial sangat diutamakan dari fungsi utamanya. Walaupun suatu rumah gadang merupakan milik dan didiami oleh anggota kaum tertentu, namun pada prinsipnya rumah gadang itu adalah milik nagari, karena mendirikan sebuah rumah gadang didasarkan atas ketentuan-ketentuan adat yang berlaku di nagari dan setahu panghulu-panghulu untuk mendirikan atau membukanya.

Rumah Gadang berfungsi sebagai tempat tinggal dan tempat acara adat. Ukuran ruang tergantung dari banyaknya penghuni di rumah itu. Namun, jumlah ruangan biasanya ganjil, seperti lima ruang, tujuh, sembilan atau lebih. Sebagai tempat tinggal, rumah gadang mempunyai bilik-bilik dibagian belakang yang didiami oleh wanita yang sudah bekeluarga, ibu-ibu, nenek-nenek dan anak-anak.

Fungsi rumah gadang yang juga penting adalah sebagai iringan adat, seperti menetapkan adat atau tempat melaksanakan acara seremonial adat seperti kematian, kelahiran, perkawinan, mengadakan acara kebesaran adat, tempat mufakat dan lain-lain. Perbandingan ruang tempat tidur dengan ruang umum adalah sepertiga untuk tempat tidur dan dua pertiga untuk kepentingan umum. Pemberian ini memberi makna bahwa kepentingan umum lebih diutamakan daripada kepentingan pribadi.



The Tragic Case of Aaron Swartz: Unequal Justice for Web Activists vs Health Care Corporate Executives

The recent tragic case of the suicide of Aaron Swartz raises many issues, and has inspired an outpouring of news coverage and internet discussion.  Yet one issue it should raise that has not received much notice so far is that of how individuals and top executives are treated differently before the law.

Summary of the Case

Aaron Swartz was a prodigy who developed  helped develop the RSS system for disseminating updates on web-site contents, and who helped develop the Reddit web-site.  He was an advocate for information freedom, and more broadly, according to Matt Stoller, "a political activist interested in health care, financial corruption, and the drug war."  Furthermore, he "recognized that politics is a corrupt money driven system, but also that it could be cracked if you spent the time to understand the moving parts."

Although apparently very well known among internet activists and computer scientists, Mr Swartz did not attract a lot of mainstream media attention, at least until 2011 when he was arrested "on a series of felony counts including wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer and recklessly damaging a protected computer," according to the New York Times.  His alleged crime was that he downloaded thousands of scientific scholarly articles from the site JSTOR, and was accused of intending to make them publicly available for free.  Note that the articles were already publicly available, but only online through expensive subscriptions.  At the time, the US Department of Justice took this to be a very serious crime:

'Stealing is stealing, whether you use a computer command or a crowbar, and whether you take documents, data or dollars,' the United States attorney for Massachusetts, Carmen M. Ortiz, said last week in a statement about the case. 'It is equally harmful to the victim whether you sell what you have stolen or give it away.' 

The charges Ms Ortiz filed lead to Mr Swartz's arrest

on a series of felony counts including wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer and recklessly damaging a protected computer. If convicted on all counts, the Justice Department said he could face up to 35 years in prison and $1 million in fines. 

Yet Mr Swartz certainly was not accused of either violence or of planning to personally profit from his alleged crimes.  At the time of his arrest, the severity of the allegations baffled many:

 'This makes no sense,' said David Segal, executive director of Demand Progress, an organization Mr. Swartz founded to rally support online for an open Internet. 'It’s like trying to put someone in jail for allegedly checking too many books out of the library.'

JSTOR got the hard drives that contained the articles in question back from Mr Swartz, and planned no further action:

Asked if it was pleased that someone misusing the service could be brought to justice, a spokeswoman for Jstor wrote in an e-mail response: 'We wanted the content back, and we were able to secure it and ensure it wasn’t distributed. We were not interested in further legal action around this incident. We have no comment on the prosecution or how they have chosen to characterize it.'

Since 2011 the case got little notice until Mr Swartz ended his own life this month.  After his death, his family and partner issued a statement, as reported by the Guardian:


In a statement released late Saturday, Swartz's parents, Robert and Susan, siblings Noah and Ben and partner Taren Stinebrickner-Kauffman said the Redditt builder's demise was not just a 'personal tragedy' but 'the product of a criminal justice system rife with intimidation and prosecutorial overreach'.

They also attacked the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) for not supporting the internet activist in his legal battles and refusing to stand up for 'its own community's most cherished principles'.

And according to the New York Times (via CNBC), Harvard Professor Larry Lessig, Director of the Safra Center for Ethics, where Swartz had been a fellow protested

the idea that he could have seen serious prison time was infuriating. Lawrence Lessig, the Harvard Law professor who founded Creative Commons to advocate greater sharing of creative material online, called the prosecution's case absurd and said that boxing in Mr. Swartz with an aggressive case and little ability to mount a defense ''made it make sense to this brilliant but troubled boy to end it.'

 Hounding Swartz but Failing to Pursue Health Care Corporate Executives

The Daily Beast just ran a story that suggests that Swartz should have known better to have done something that would have attracted the wrath of one of the toughest federal prosecutors, but one who is also a "liberal's dream."  It opened its piece on US Attorney Carmen Ortiz thus:

 Until she was accused of driving the 26-year-old cyber wunderkind and public-access activist Aaron Swartz to suicide, the top federal prosecutor in Massachusetts was a liberal’s dream.

 Not for nothing was United States Attorney Carmen Ortiz championed by the late Sen. Edward Kennedy and appointed by President Obama nearly four years ago.

Then, it suggested how tough Ms Ortiz really is:

She is Hispanic and was raised in a New York housing project, and after her husband died of cancer she raised two daughters on her own. She has taken on political corruption, and she has been so aggressive against white-collar crime that her office collected more in forfeitures and fines than any other jurisdiction in the country.

Her avowed motive in becoming a prosecutor was because 'there’s a greater chance for justice.'

that is a pretty amazing summary.  However, it seems decidedly at odds with Ms Ortiz's record dealing with misdeeds by health care corporations, as discussed on Health Care Renewal.  Ms Ortiz, whose harsh views of Swartz appear above, has been quoted at least three times about three different cases on this blog.  In all instances, her quotes were in the context of legal settlements she made with large health care corporations.

Forest Pharmaceuticals

In September, 2010, how Ms Ortiz led the pursuit of a settlement with Forest Pharmaceuticals became apparent (look here).   The company was accused of promoting its anti-depressant Celexa for use in adolescents and children.  Such drugs have since been shown to increase the risk of suicide by such young patients, and this drug was only approved for adults.  At the time, Ms Ortiz said, "Forest Pharmaceuticals deliberately chose to pursue corporate profits over its obligations to the F.D.A. and the American public."  Although the offense may have lead to use of the drug by many adolescents and children, and hence may have lead to some of them attempting or committing suicide, the case was settled only with fines.  As is usual in such legal settlements, no individual corporate executive who authorized or lead the off-label and potentially dangerous marketing of the drug was arrested, or accused, and none suffered any negative consequences.

GlaxoSmithKline

In October, 2010, how Ms Ortiz led the pursuit of a settlement with GlaxoSmithKline became apparent (look here.)  The company was accused of selling drugs that were not what they appeared to be, apparently because the wrong drugs were put in labelled containers.  Obviously, taking one drug, like Paxil, GSK's anti-depressant which has a number of known adverse effects, including suicide risk for adolescents and children as noted above, when a patient is supposed to be taking a wholly different drug could lead to patient harm.  At that time, Ms Ortiz said, "We will not tolerate corporate attempts to profit at the expense of the ill and needy in our society -- or those who cut corners that result in potentially dangerous consequences to consumers."   Again, while the settlement involved a guilty plea by a GSK subsidiary, again no individual corporate executive who had authority over the drug manufacturing was arrested or accused, much less suffered any negative consequences.

St Jude Medical

In January, 2011, Ms Ortiz led the pursuit of a settlement with St Jude Medical (look here).  The company was accused of paying kickbacks to doctors to implant its cardiac defibrillators (ICDs) and pacemakers.  Obviously, providing kickbacks to doctors may have lead them to plant devices in patients who did not really need them, yet the devices and the implantation procedures can have adverse effects.  At that time, Ms Ortiz said, "The United States alleges that St Jude solicited physicians for the studies in order to retain their business and/or convert their business from a competitor's product."  Again, as is usual, the settlement did not require any executive who authorized or directed the activities leading to the kickbacks suffered any negative consequences.

So in summary, in three major cases involving unethical practices by big health care corporations that could have put patients at risk, US Attorney Carmen Ortiz provided strong words, but did not apparently seek any punishment of any form of any of the corporate leaders who authorized or directed the bad, and potentially dangerous behavior.  Yet in the sorry case of Aaron Swartz, Ms Ortiz charged a gifted computer activist whose alleged crimes certainly did not put any individuals at risk of adverse medical effects or any bad physical outcomes with crimes that if proven would have lead to years in jail and millions in fines for him as an individual.

Equal Justice Under the Law?

So it seems ironic, or worse, that the main narrative of the Swartz case has become: well meaning but reckless hacker versus implacably tough law enforcer.  As noted above, Ms Ortiz's office appeared anything but tough when dealing with misdeeds by big pharmaceutical and device companies.  So the real question is why she went after Mr Swartz so relentlessly, when his alleged crime was non-violent and physically hurt nobody, when she failed to pursue corporate executives who enriched themselves while leading companies whose unethical practices likely harmed a lot of patients.

In that light, the dark imaginings of Matt Stoller do not seem so far-fetched.  On Naked Capitalism he wrote,

 As we think about what happened to Aaron, we need to recognize that it was not just prosecutorial overreach that killed him. That’s too easy, because that implies it’s one bad apple. We know that’s not true. What killed him was corruption. Corruption isn’t just people profiting from betraying the public interest. It’s also people being punished for upholding the public interest. In our institutions of power, when you do the right thing and challenge abusive power, you end up destroying a job prospect, an economic opportunity, a political or social connection, or an opportunity for media. Or if you are truly dangerous and brilliantly subversive, as Aaron was, you are bankrupted and destroyed.


I did not know Aaron Swartz, but am very sorry that we have lost someone so intelligent and imaginative.  I hope one question that his untimely death raises is what has become of the idea of equal justice under the law, and how its apparent demise has enabled the dysfunction of our health care system, and our whole society. 

New York Times: "In Second Look, Few Savings From Digital Health Records", and AMA Med News on EHR Harms

This post should perhaps be entitled "I told you so."

A letter I wrote in response to the Wall Street Journal's "A Health-Tech Monopoly", Feb. 11, 2009 was published Feb. 18, 2009 under the header Digitizing Medical Records May Help, but It's Complex.

I wrote:

Dear Wall Street Journal,

You observe that the true political goal is socialized medicine facilitated by health care information technology. You note that the public is being deceived, as the rules behind this takeover were stealthily inserted in the stimulus bill.

I have a different view on who is deceiving whom. In fact, it is the government that has been deceived by the HIT industry and its pundits. Stated directly, the administration is deluded about the true difficulty of making large-scale health IT work. The beneficiaries will largely be the IT industry and IT management consultants.

For £12.7 billion the U.K., which already has socialized medicine, still does not have a working national HIT system, but instead has a major IT quagmire, some of it caused by U.S. HIT vendors.

HIT (with a few exceptions) is largely a disaster. I'm far more concerned about a mega-expensive IT misadventure than an IT-empowered takeover of medicine.

The stimulus bill, to its credit, recognizes the need for research on improving HIT. However this is a tool to facilitate clinical care, not a cybernetic miracle to revolutionize medicine. The government has bought the IT magic bullet exuberance hook, line and sinker.

I can only hope patients get something worthwhile for the $20 billion.

Scot Silverstein, M.D.
Faculty, Biomedical Informatics
Drexel University Institute for Healthcare Informatics
Philadelphia

I also had penned essays on the need for a moratorium on HITECH (Nov. 2008, "Should The U.S. Call A Moratorium On Ambitious National Electronic Health Records Plans?" and Jan. 2009, "I Ask Again: Should The U.S. Call A Moratorium On Ambitious National Electronic Health Records Plans?").  My theme was that the issues with implementation of good health IT and elimination of bad health IT, and the issue of how to implement most efficiently, needed to be better understood before a national rollout.  Hold off multi-billion dollar national initiatives "until we know how to get HIT right", I wrote.

Now the New York Times has this, citing a new RAND paper:

In Second Look, Few Savings From Digital Health Records
By REED ABELSON and JULIE CRESWELL

January 10, 2013

The conversion to electronic health records has failed so far to produce the hoped-for savings in health care costs and has had mixed results, at best, in improving efficiency and patient care, according to a new analysis by the influential RAND Corporation.

Optimistic predictions by RAND in 2005 helped drive explosive growth in the electronic records industry and encouraged the federal government to give billions of dollars in financial incentives to hospitals and doctors that put the systems in place.

“We’ve not achieved the productivity and quality benefits that are unquestionably ["unquestionably?" why?- ed.]  there for the taking,” said Dr. Arthur L. Kellermann, one of the authors of a reassessment by RAND that was published in this month’s edition of Health Affairs, an academic journal.

Noted is the provenance of the 2005 report that created the windfall for the electronic records industry:

RAND’s 2005 report was paid for by a group of companies, including General Electric and Cerner Corporation, that have profited by developing and selling electronic records systems to hospitals and physician practices. Cerner’s revenue has nearly tripled since the report was released, to a projected $3 billion in 2013, from $1 billion in 2005.

A retraction:

The report predicted that widespread use of electronic records could save the United States health care system at least $81 billion a year, a figure RAND now says was overstated. The study was widely praised within the technology industry and helped persuade Congress and the Obama administration to authorize billions of dollars in federal stimulus money in 2009 to help hospitals and doctors pay for the installation of electronic records systems ... But evidence of significant savings is scant, and there is increasing concern that electronic records have actually added to costs by making it easier to bill more for some services.

In my Feb. 2009 WSJ letter, I'd written that "it is the government that has been deceived by the HIT industry and its pundits. Stated directly, the administration is deluded about the true difficulty of making large-scale health IT work. The beneficiaries will largely be the IT industry and IT management consultants."  It appears I was correct.

Officials at RAND said their new analysis did not try to put a dollar figure on how much electronic record-keeping had helped or hurt efforts to reduce costs. But the firm’s acknowledgment that its earlier analysis was overly optimistic adds to a chorus of concern about the cost of the new systems and the haste with which they have been adopted.

Not mentioned are harms that bad health IT is creating.

The recent analysis was sharply critical of the commercial systems now in place, many of which are hard to use and do not allow doctors and patients to share medical information across systems. “We could be getting much more if we could take the time to do a little more planning and to set more standards,” said Marc Probst, chief information officer for Intermountain Healthcare, a large health system in Salt Lake City that developed its own electronic records system

A "little more" planning?  How about several years' worth, to ensure the technologies are safe, effective and properly vetted, along with a system for post-market surveillance as exists in other healthcare sectors?

Technology “is only a tool,” said Dr. David Blumenthal, who helped oversee the federal push for the adoption of electronic records under President Obama and is now president of the Commonwealth Fund, a nonprofit health group. “Like any tool, it can be used well or poorly.” While there is strong evidence that electronic records can contribute to better care and more efficiency, Dr. Blumenthal said, the systems in place do not always work in ways that help achieve those benefits.

Dr. Blumenthal seems to be triangulating from his earlier 2010 NEJM statement that:

... The widespread use of electronic health records (EHRs) in the United States is inevitable. EHRs will improve caregivers’ decisions and patients’ outcomes. Once patients experience the benefits of this technology, they will demand nothing less from their providers. Hundreds of thousands of physicians have already seen these benefits in their clinical practice.

Meantime, in the real world signs of my expressed concerns about a quagmire are appearing:

... Late last year, a physician practice in Panama City, Fla., filed a lawsuit against the health care technology firm Allscripts after the company stopped supporting an electronic records system called MyWay that it had sold to 5,000 small-group physicians at a cost of $40,000 per physician. The lawsuit said that the system had problems and that the physician group was unable to meet the criteria for federal incentive money. A spokeswoman for Allscripts said it would defend itself vigorously.

A clue as to the candidness of the new report:

... The new analysis was not sponsored by any corporations, said Dr. Kellermann, who added that some members of RAND’s health advisory board wanted to revisit the earlier analysis.

Finally, this from the horse's mouth:

Dr. David J. Brailer, who was the nation’s first health information czar under President George W. Bush, said he still believed tens of billions of dollars could eventually be squeezed out of the health care system through the use of electronic records. In his view, the “colossal strategic error” that occurred was a result of the Obama administration’s incentive program.

I repeat my admonition from 2009 that I can only hope patients get something worthwhile for the $20 billion, which by now is probably many times that amount.

Finally, I note the American Medical News cites me in a Jan. 14, 2013 article as follows:

... Other experts on health IT said the Pennsylvania [PA Patient Safety Authority] study probably underestimates the extent of health IT safety problems. They say that is because the research is based on voluntary reports and that health professionals are unaware that a patient safety incident was caused by an EHR failure.

“These systems are incredibly complex,” said Scot M. Silverstein, MD, a consultant in medical informatics at Drexel University in Philadelphia. “They’re not just huge filing cabinets, they are enterprise resource management systems. There are many ways that things can go wrong that may not be seen as the computer having caused the mess-up in the first place.”

For example, he said, it would be difficult for a practicing physician to detect when data are missing from a record or that an alert failed to pop up.

Yet the title of the article is "EHR-related errors soar, but few harm patients" with a table at the bottom labeled "How rarely EHR problems harm patients." More evidence that EHRs always receive special accommodation. 

I was an invited reviewer of the PA Patient Safety Authority report, and wrote about the major deficiencies of its dataset at my posts Dec. 13, 2012 post "Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority: The Role of the Electronic Health Record in Patient Safety Events" and a follow-up Dec. 19 post "A Significant Additional Observation on the PA Patient Safety Authority Report -- Risk."

My major point was that one simply cannot know what one cannot know, when using a very incomplete dataset gathered in a setting of systematic impediments to accuracy and completeness.  For instance, as I wrote in those earlier posts, through my work I personally know of cases of harms up to and including death that should have been in the PA database, but apparently are not - and I'm just one person.

We simply don't know in 2013 how many EHR errors harm patients, and the effects of increasing adoption by organizations and physicians less technology-able than current adopters.  I hope the magnitude of harms is truly small, but hope is not enough; this study and report was just a 'dipping of the toes into the water' towards understanding the realities.

Incidentally, we also don't know how severely the known toxic effects of bad health IT might affect care in times of duress, e.g., an epidemic.  However, I am certainly not sanguine about EHRs in their present state as robustly facilitating national emergency preparedness.

My dreaded prediction for the future?  A 2016 AMA News story entitled "Known EHR-related harms soar."

-- SS

Negara Jepang

You’ll Never Walk Alone (BackPacker) – Jepang adalah sebuah negara kepulauan di Asia Timur. Letaknya di ujung barat Samudra Pasifik, di sebelah timur Laut Jepang, dan bertetangga dengan Republik Rakyat Cina,Korea, dan Rusia. Pulau-pulau paling utara berada di Laut Okhotsk, dan wilayah paling selatan berupa kelompok pulau-pulau kecil di Laut Cina Timur, tepatnya di sebelah selatan Okinawa yang bertetangga dengan Taiwan.

Jepang terdiri dari 6.852 pulau yang membuatnya merupakan suatu kepulauan. Pulau-pulau utama dari utara ke selatan adalah Hokkaido, Honshu(pulau terbesar), Shikoku, dan Kyushu. Sekitar 97% wilayah daratan Jepang berada di keempat pulau terbesarnya. Sebagian besar pulau di Jepang bergunung-gunung, dan sebagian di antaranya merupakan gunung berapi. Gunung tertinggi di Jepang adalah Gunung Fuji yang merupakan sebuah gunung berapi.

Penduduk Jepang berjumlah 128 juta orang, dan berada di peringkat ke-10 negara berpenduduk terbanyak di dunia. Tokyo secara de facto adalah ibu kota Jepang, dan berkedudukan sebagai sebuah prefektur. Tokyo Raya adalah sebutan untuk Tokyo dan beberapa kota yang berada di prefektur sekelilingnya. Sebagai daerah metropolitan terluas di dunia, Tokyo Raya berpenduduk lebih dari 30 juta orang.

Menurut mitologi tradisional, Jepang didirikan oleh Kaisar Jimmu pada abad ke-7 SM. Kaisar Jimmu memulai mata rantai monarki Jepang yang tidak terputus hingga kini. Meskipun begitu, sepanjang sejarahnya, untuk kebanyakan masa kekuatan sebenarnya berada di tangan anggota-anggota istana, shogun, pihak militer, dan memasuki zaman modern, di tangan perdana menteri.

Menurut Konstitusi Jepang tahun 1947, Jepang adalahnegara monarki konstitusional di bawah pimpinan Kaisar Jepang dan Parlemen Jepang. Sebagai negara maju di bidang ekonomi, Jepang memiliki produk domestik bruto terbesar nomor dua setelah Amerika Serikat, dan masuk dalamurutan tiga besar dalam keseimbangan kemampuan berbelanja. Jepang adalah anggota Perserikatan Bangsa-Bangsa, G8, OECD, dan APEC.

Jepang memiliki kekuatan militer yang memadai lengkap dengan sistem pertahanan moderen seperti AEGIS serta suat armada besar kapal perusak. Dalam perdagangan luar negeri, Jepang berada di peringkat ke-4 negara pengekspor terbesar dan peringkat ke-6 negara pengimpor terbesar di dunia. Sebagai negara maju, penduduk Jepang memiliki standar hidup yang tinggi (peringkat ke-8 dalam Indeks Pembangunan Manusia) dan angka harapan hidup tertinggi di dunia menurut perkiraan PBB. Dalam bidang teknologi, Jepang adalah negara maju di bidang telekomunikasi, permesinan, dan robotika.

Negara Inggris


You’ll Never Walk Alone (BackPacker) - Inggris adalah sebuah negara yang merupakan bagian dari Britania Raya. Negara ini berbatasan denganSkotlandia di sebelah utara dan Wales di sebelah barat, Laut Irlandia di barat laut, Laut Keltik di barat daya, serta Laut Utara di sebelah timur danSelat Inggris, yang memisahkannya dari benua Eropa, di sebelah selatan. Sebagian besar wilayah Inggris terdiri dari bagian tengah dan selatanPulau Britania Raya di Atlantik Utara. Inggris juga mencakup lebih dari 100 pulau-pulau kecil seperti Isles of Scilly dan Isle of Wight.

Wilayah yang saat ini bernama Inggris pertama kali dihuni oleh manusia modern selama periode Paleolitikum, namun nama England ini berasal dari kata Angles, yang merupakan salah satu suku Jermanik yang menetap di sana pada abad ke-5 dan ke-6. Inggris menjadi negara yang bersatu pada tahun 927 M, dan sejak Zaman Penjelajahan yang dimulai pada abad ke-15, Inggris telah memberikan pengaruh budaya dan hukum yang signifikan ke berbagai belahan dunia. 

Bahasa Inggris, Gereja Anglikan, dan hukum Inggris-yang menjadi dasar sistem hukum umum bagi negara lain di seluruh dunia-berasal dan dikembangkan di Inggris, dan sistem parlementer negara ini juga telah banyak diadopsi oleh negara-negara lain. Revolusi Industri yang dimulai pada abad ke-18 menjadikan Inggris sebagai negara industri pertama di dunia. Royal Society Inggris juga berperan penting dalam meletakkan dasar-dasar sains eksperimental modern terhadap ilmu pengetahuan dan teknologi.

Topografi Inggris sebagian besar terdiri dari perbukitan dan dataran rendah, terutama di Inggris bagian tengah dan selatan. Dataran tinggi terdapat di bagian utara (misalnya, pegunungan Danau District, Pennines, serta Yorkshire Dales) dan di barat daya (misalnya Dartmoor dan Cotswolds). Ibu kota Inggris dahulunya adalah Winchester, kemudian digantikan oleh London pada tahun 1066. Saat ini London merupakan daerah metropolitan terbesar di Britania Raya dan zona perkotaan terbesar di Uni Eropa berdasarkan luas wilayah. Penduduk Inggris berjumlah sekitar 53 juta jiwa, atau sekitar 84% dari total populasi Britania Raya, sebagian besarnya terkonsentrasi di London, Inggris Tenggara, dan kawasan-kawasankonurbasi di Midlands, Barat Laut, Timur Laut dan Yorkshire, masing-masing wilayah ini dikembangkan sebagai daerah industri utama selama abad ke-19. Sedangkan kawasan padang rumput terdapat di luar wilayah kota-kota besar.

Kerajaan Inggris (setelah tahun 1284 juga termasuk Wales) adalah sebuah negara berdaulat sampai tanggal 1 Mei 1707. Kemudian Undang-Undang Kesatuan yang menyatakan bahwa Kerajaan Inggris dan Kerajaan Skotlandia disatukan secara politik untuk membentuk Kerajaan Britania Raya disahkan pada tahun 1707. 

Pada tahun 1801, Britania Raya bersatu dengan Kerajaan Irlandia dengan disahkannya Undang-Undang Kesatuan 1800 dan kemudian namanya berganti menjadi Kerajaan Bersatu Britania Raya dan Irlandia. Pada tahun 1922, Negara Bebas Irlandiaberdiri sebagai suatu domini yang terpisah, namun enam county di Irlandia Utara tetap memilih untuk menjadi bagian dari Britania Raya, yang kemudian membentuk Kerajaan Bersatu Britania Raya dan Irlandia Utara, yaitu konteks Britania Raya yang dikenal hingga sekarang ini.

Negara Mesir


You’ll Never Walk Alone (BackPacker) – Artikel pertama dari benua Afrika Saya akan memposting tentang Mesir. Mengapa? Karena Mesir adalah Negara yang pertama kali mengakui kemerdekaan Indonesia. Republik Arab Mesir atau lebih dikenal sebagai Mesir adalah sebuah negara yang sebagian besar wilayahnya terletak diAfrika bagian timur laut. Mesir juga digolongkan negara maju di Afrika.

Dengan luas wilayah sekitar 997.739 km² Mesir mencakup Semenanjung Sinai (dianggap sebagai bagian dari Asia Barat Daya), sedangkan sebagian besar wilayahnya terletak di Afrika Utara. Mesir berbatasan dengan Libya di sebelah barat, Sudan di selatan, jalur Gaza dan Israel di utara-timur. Perbatasannya dengan perairan ialah melalui Laut Tengah di utara dan Laut Merah di timur.

Mayoritas penduduk Mesir menetap di pinggir Sungai Nil (sekitar 40.000 km²). Sebagian besar daratan merupakan bagian dari gurun Sahara yang jarang dihuni.Mayoritas penduduk negara Mesir adalah Islam.

Mesir terkenal dengan peradaban kuno dan beberapa monumen kuno termegah di dunia, misalnya Piramid Giza, Kuil Karnak dan Lembah Rajaserta Kuil Ramses. Di Luxor, sebuah kota di wilayah selatan, terdapat kira-kira artefak kuno yang mencakup sekitar 65% artefak kuno di seluruh dunia. Kini, Mesir diakui secara luas sebagai pusat budaya dan politikal utama di wilayah Arab dan Timur Tengah.

Negara Australia


You’ll Never Walk Alone (BackPacker) - Australia adalah sebuah negara di belahan selatan yang terdiri dari daratan utama benua Australia, PulauTasmania, dan berbagai pulau kecil di Samudra Hindia dan Samudra Pasifik. Negara-negara yang bertetanggaan dengannya adalah Indonesia,Timor Leste, dan Papua Nugini di utara; Kepulauan Solomon, Vanuatu, dan Kaledonia Baru di timur-laut; dan Selandia Baru di tenggara.

Kira-kira 40.000 tahun sebelum pendudukan bangsa Eropa pada akhir abad ke-18, Australia telah dihuni oleh Aborigin, yang menggunakan salah satu dari 250 kelompok bahasa.

Pada tahun 1606, imigran Eropa yang datang ke Benua Australia adalah orang-orang Belanda. Namun, di akhir abad ke-18, Inggris menduduki benua ini dan menjadikannya sebagai tempat pembuangan para pelaku kriminal. Pada pertengahan abad ke-19, ditemukan tambang emas di Australia sehingga benua itu pun ramai didatangi para imigran. Sejak itu pula, mereka memperjuangkan kemerdekaan untuk mengatur sendiri Australia, terlepas dari kontrol Inggirs. Hingga kini, Australia tergabung dalam Persemakmuran Inggris.

Setelah ditemukan oleh penjelajah Belanda pada 1606, paro timur Australia diaku sebagai milik Britania pada 1770 dan mulai diduduki sejak penentuan koloni tahanan di New South Wales, yang secara resmi didirikan pada 7 Februari 1788 (meskipun kepemilikan formal baru dinyatakan pada 26 Januari 1788). Populasi bertambah secara statis selama beberapa dasawarsa; benua ini dijelajahi dan setelah itu didirikanlah lima Koloni Mahkota lagi yang berpemerintahan mandiri.

Pada 1 Januari 1901, keenam koloni ini berubah menjadi federasi dan didirikanlah Persemakmuran Australia. Sejak zaman federasi, Australia telah memelihara sistem politik demokrasi liberal yang stabil dan menjadi bagian dari dunia persemakmuran. Populasinya sebanyak 22 juta jiwa, yang hampir 60%-nya terpusat atau berada di dekat pusat-pusat pemerintahan negara-negara bagian di daratan utama; yakni Sydney, Melbourne,Brisbane, Perth, dan Adelaide. Ibu kota negara ini adalah Canberra, di Teritorial Ibu Kota Australia. Hampir 56% populasi Australia menetap di Victoria atau New South Wales, dan hampir 77% menetap di pantai timur daratan utama.

Sebagai sebuah negara maju yang makmur, Australia adalah ekonomi terbesar ke-13 di dunia. Australia berperingkat tinggi dalam banyak perbandingan kinerja antarbangsa seperti pembangunan, mutu kehidupan, perawatan kesehatan, harapan hidup, pendidikan umum, kebebasan ekonomi, dan perlindungan kebebasan sipil dan hak-hak politik. Australia adalah anggota Perserikatan Bangsa-Bangsa, G-20 ekonomi utama,Negara-Negara Persemakmuran, ANZUS, Organisasi untuk Kerjasama dan Pengembangan Ekonomi, Kerjasama Ekonomi Asia Pasifik, Forum Kepulauan Pasifik, dan Organisasi Perdagangan Dunia.


Negara Brasil


You’ll Never Walk Alone (BackPacker) - Republik Federal Brasil atau lebih dikenal Brasil (bahasa Portugis: República Federativa do Brasil) adalah negara terbesardan paling banyak penduduknya di Amerika Selatan. Negara ini merupakan negara paling timur di Benua Amerika dan berbatasan dengan Pegunungan Andes dan Samudra Atlantik. Nama Brasil diambil dari nama kayu brasil, sejenis kayu lokal. Brasil merupakan tempat pertanian ekstensif dan hutan hujan tropis. Sebagai bekas koloniPortugal, bahasa resmi Brasil adalah bahasa Portugis. Selain itu, Brasil juga sebagai penghasil kopi terbesar di dunia. Dan Brasil adalah negara yang telah berhasil menguasai persepakbolaan dunia dengan torehan 5 trofi Piala Dunia.

Brasil dibatasi oleh laut di sebelah timur yaitu Samudra Atlantik. Negara-negara yang berbatasan darat dengan Brasil adalah UruguayArgentina,ParaguayBoliviaPeruKolombiaVenezuelaGuyanaSuriname dan département Guyana Perancis; seluruh negara di Amerika Selatan kecualiEkuador dan Chili.

Di bagian utara Brasil terdapat Hutan Amazon dan semakin terbuka ke arah selatan dengan bukit-bukit dan gunung kecil. Daerah selatan merupakan pusat populasi dan agrikultur Brasil. Beberapa pegunungan terletak di pesisir Samudra Atlantik yang mencapai 2.900 meter dengan puncak tertinggi Pico da Neblina setinggi 2.994 m. Sungai-sungai yang terdapat di Brasil antara lain Sungai AmazonParaná, dan Iguaçu di mana terdapat Air Terjun Iguaçu.

Badai Siklon Catarina, badai siklon tropis pertama di Samudera Atlantik bagian selatan, terjadi pada 2004. Iklim Brasil adalah tropis karena terletak di khatulistiwa dengan sedikit variasi. Di selatan, iklimnya lebih sedang, namun kadang mengalami salju. Curah hujan sangat tinggi di daerah Amazon sedangkan daerah yang lebih kering bisa ditemukan di daerah timur laut.

Kota-kota penting di Brasil antara lain BrasíliaSão Paulo dan Rio de Janeiro. Sebagian besar wilayah Brasil berupa dataran tinggi, dan pegunungan. Dataran tinggi paling luas adalahdataran tinggi Brasil (dibagian timur). Di sebelah timur terdapat pegunungan Brasil. Dibagian tengah terdapat dataran tinggi Mato Grosso dan bagian selatan terdapat dataran tinggi Panama.


Negara Korea


You’ll Never Walk Alone (BackPacker) - Korea adalah sebuah semenanjung yang di Asia Timur (di antara Tiongkok dan Jepang). Korea terbagi menjadi dua negara, yakni Republik Korea (Korea Selatan) dan Republik Rakyat Demokratik Korea (Korea Utara) setelah Perang Dunia II pada tahun 1945.

Korea Selatan kemudian berkembang menjadi negara demokratis sementara Korea Utara berhaluan komunis. Bendera Persatuan Korea sering digunakan untuk merepresentasikan Korea pada ajang olahraga internasional, namun bendara tersebut bukan merupakan bendera resmi kedua negara.

Karena zaman dinasti-dinasti bersejarah sudah berakhir, istilah Korea saat ini didefinisikan berdasarkan gabungan 2 entitas yang terbagi oleh Garis Demarkasi Militer pararel 38, yakni Korea Utara dan Korea Selatan. Semenanjung Korea di sebelah utara dibatasi oleh Republik Rakyat Cina dan Rusia di sebelah timur laut, serta Jepang di sebelah tenggara yang dipisahkan dengan Selat Korea.

Asal Mula Nama Korea
Sebutan "Korea" diambil dari nama dinasti Korea yang terkenal, yaitu Goryeo (935-1392). Goryeo sendiri menamai negerinya dari kependekan nama salah satu Tiga Kerajaan Korea, Goguryeo (37 SM-668 M). Dalam bahasa Tionghoa dilafalkan "Gao-li" dan penyebutan itu menyebar ke para pedagangTimur Tengah, dan lama kelamaan menjadi "Korea". Kata "Korea" secara umum di dunia internasional saat ini digunakan untuk menunjuk kedua negara Korea. Dalam Bahasa Korea di Korea Selatan, "Korea" berarti "Han-Guk" (Korea Selatan; kependekan dari "Dae Han Min Guk") sedangkan "Chosŏn" digunakan oleh Korea Utara untuk menyebut nama negara mereka.

Istilah "Korea" digunakan pertama kali oleh Percival Lowell (1855-1916), seorang penulis, petualang dan astronom Amerika yang mengunjungi Korea sekitar 100 tahun yang lalu. Nama tersebut merupakan interpretasi literal dari kata Chosǒn (Joseon, 조선 / 朝鮮, 1392-1910), nama negara yang ia kunjungi di akhir abad ke-19. Lowell menganggap nama tersebut cocok untuk kerajaan yang tertutup terhadap dunia luar tersebut.[4] Korea pada saat itu tak dikenal di dunia barat, namun pada masa sebelumnya, Dinasti Goryeo telah dikenal oleh dunia barat dan dari negara itulah kata Korea berasal.

Bahasa Korea
Bahasa Korea (한국어/조선말) adalah bahasa yang paling luas digunakan di Korea, dan merupakan bahasa resmi Korea Selatan dan Korea Utara. Bahasa ini juga dituturkan secara luas di Yanbian di Cina timur laut. Secara keseluruhan terdapat sekitar 78 juta penutur bahasa Korea di seluruh dunia termasuk kelompok-kelompok besar di Uni Soviet, AS, Kanada dan Jepang. 

Klasifikasi resmi bahasa Korea masih belum disetujui secara universal, namun dianggap oleh banyak orang sebagai bahasa isolat. Beberapa ahli bahasa memasukkannya ke dalam kelompok bahasa Altaik. Bahasa Korea juga banyak mirip dengan bahasa Jepang yang status kekerabatannya juga kurang jelas.

Sistem penulisan bahasa Korea yang asli — disebut Hangul — merupakan sistem yang silabik dan fonetik. Aksara-aksara Sino-Korea (Hanja) juga digunakan untuk menulis bahasa Korea. Walaupun kata-kata yang paling umum digunakan merupakan Hangul, lebih dari 70% kosakata bahasa Korea terdiri dari kata-kata yang dibentuk dari Hanja atau diambil dari bahasa Mandarin.

Huruf ini dikenalkan oleh Raja Sejong pada abad ke-15, dikenal sebagai Hunmin Jeongeum. Namun istilah Hangul baru dikenal pada permulaan abad ke-20. Setelah Hangeul digunakan pun, Hanja masih tetap dipakai, sedang Hangeul dipakai oleh orang-orang tidak berpendidikan, wanita dan anak-anak.

Namun pada perkembangannya, Hangeul makin banyak digunakan bahkan pada abad ke-19 dan permulaan abad ke-20, penggunaan Hangeul dan Hanja seimbang. Namun kini, Hanja hanya dijumpai pada tulisan-tulisan akademik dan resmi, sedangkan hampir semua papan nama, jalan, petunjuk, bahkan tulisan-tulisan informal ditulis dalam Hangeul.

Bahasa Korea pada dasarnya memiliki dialek-dialek yang saling bertalian satu sama lain. Setiap wilayah dapat memahami dialek lainnya, kecuali dialek Pulau Jeju yang dianggap kurang bisa dimengerti dari dialek-dialek provinsi lainnya.



 

ZOOM UNIK::UNIK DAN UNIK Copyright © 2012 Fast Loading -- Powered by Blogger