Asia House: Bridging global culture

The Jakarta Post, Sri Owen, Contributor, London | Sun, 04/25/2010 1:22 PM

Asia House! It could be a hostel for Asian students. I’m sure a lot of Londoners would assume it’s either an embassy (but continents don’t have embassies) or a restaurant. I dare say you could find several eateries under the same name in the phone book. However, Google says the nearest is in Odense, Denmark.

London’s Asia House is essentially a cultural organization, but it is much more than that. I’d known about the place for years before I became seriously engaged with it. But once I started, I became more and more interested in its activities and eager to take part in them.

At first I thought it must be a quango, a “quasi non-governmental organization,” in other words, a semi-official body, with government backing but free to pursue its goals in its own way.

People take Indonesian food during an event at Asia House. (Courtesy of Sri Owen)

In fact, it’s completely independent and is financed entirely by members, some of whom are very wealthy, others – the majority, in fact – just plain folk; many, indeed, are students. In its own words, “Asia House is the leading pan-Asian organization in Britain”.

Its program of events aims to “promote appreciation and understanding of Asian countries, their arts, religions and economies, and to foster closer communication between the peoples of Asia and Europe, among others”.

Most of us ordinary members have no direct experience whatsoever of these lofty occasions, but there is always lots to do: art exhibitions, screenings of Asian films, social gatherings, visits to museums and art galleries: the list goes on.

Authors launch books here: I did it myself, in 2008, for my own most recent book, Sri Owen’s Indonesian Food.

But in the Indonesian cultural stakes, my friend Kestity Pringgoharjono was ahead of me; she introduced a deluxe English edition of the Serat Centhini, The Javanese Journey of Life, in 2006.

Musicians play, dancers dance, and in the basement there’s a gallery that puts on several exhibitions each year of work by Asian artists — I particularly remember an impressive and moving collection of pictures by a young Burmese artist, made over six years while he was a political prisoner in Myanmar, painting on whatever scraps of material he could find with any brushes and colours he could get or make in his prison cell.

Asia House was founded in 1996, and in its early years occupied premises in Piccadilly, a very prestigious address. Ten years later, it had outgrown its available space and acquired a long lease on a magnificent late-18th-century town house in New Cavendish Street, a block or two north of Oxford Street.

Asia House has refurbished its New Cavendish Street building in high but rather severe style, with palely-tinted walls and white woodwork. The principal rooms have great fireplaces with marble surrounds, and are still lit by massive crystal chandeliers.

I hope the coffee bar will be revived, but in any case I always enjoy my visits to Asia House functions. There are plans to extend conference suites at the rear of the building, and perhaps to add a fully-equipped auditorium-cum-cinema.

This is all very admirable, and I am sure these facilities will be put to good use, but at the moment I’m more interested in promoting my knowledge of Indonesia and of the aspect of Indonesian culture that I know best, and that is of course Indonesian food ... Cookery demonstrations? — Certainly!

I’ve done several over the past five years, including one which led into a sit-down lunch for thirty or so guests. In October 2008, as part of its ongoing “Connecting Cultures” program, Asia House staged a series of events under the title “Indonesia Inspired”: this included lectures on contemporary Indonesian design, fashion, and cinema, plus a talk on Indonesian culinary tradition by the country’s leading food celebrity, William Wongso; Pak William also created an impressive 10-day festival menu for the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park.

Of all the world’s continents, Asia surely has the longest, most varied, and most creative range of cultural traditions. Many people (and not just Asians) are convinced that Asia will lead the world through the 21st century.

An awful lot depends on Asia’s food supplies, the ways it gains them and the ways it uses them. The little I’ve been able to do, to make my Indonesian countrymen and fellow-Asians aware of how good our food is and how vital our food traditions are, seems almost pathetic: a few cookbooks, some teaching to small classes, a fair amount of travelling and meeting people, a lot of cooking and many dinner parties.

My most recent appearance at the House was a smaller, much less formal occasion. In February this year I had a non-starring role in Asia House’s Food of Asia Festival. Its stars were a young Chinese lady, Cheng He Huang, on “flavors of Chinese regions” and Datuk Chef Wan, on “Palace Food of Malaysia”. Both are big TV chefs, which I most certainly am not.

But I enjoy what I do — in this case, providing teatime treats for a small but appreciative audience.

Asia House is not only an excellent institution. It’s also a useful platform from which I hope to make my voice heard among a wider, more influential audience.