Indonesia is a beautiful place filled with wonderful people.

If you’ve ever been, you’ve probably felt the same way. But have you told them so?

Foreigners aren’t expected to make any effort to learn Indonesian, particularly not in international hotspots like Jakarta and Bali. However, learning just enough of the language to complete everyday interactions and compliment your hosts is a very doable goal that will make your time in Indonesia much more special.

Further than that, though, you also need to learn about the culture of Indonesian compliments. How do things work? What might be considered going too far, and what might be expected of you in various interactions?

Learning this information and using it well will not only grease the wheels of your social interactions—motorcycle rental prices will go down, extra fried bananas will appear on your plate, and so on—but it will also make you fit in more during longer stays, so much so that people will feel comfortable with you and treat you as a social equal, not an “other.”

If that sounds like a good goal to you, follow along!

Table of Contents

1. Complimenting Looks
2. Complimenting in the Office
3. Complimenting Achievements
4. Complimenting Skills
5. Sincere Compliments and Responses
6. Conclusion

1. Complimenting Looks

The first thing you probably think of complimenting is a person’s looks. In the United States, people compliment each other’s looks all the time.

One huge cultural difference is that men complimenting women, or vice-versa, can actually be seen in Indonesia as far more forward than it is in the United States.

Men and women who want to avoid flirting accidentally should keep their Indonesian compliments simple and away from appearance.

• Mantap bro!
  “Keep it up, man!”

The word bro has fully entered the Indonesian language. People know it’s slangy and English, but where it may bring to mind frat boys on college campuses for English speakers, it simply means “man” in Indonesian.

But let’s say you do want to be forward. Something as crude as catcalling is strongly frowned upon in Indonesia, but outright flirting, of course, still happens among younger people.

• Kamu kelihatan bugar!
  “Looking fit!”

In Indonesia, men and women don’t normally wear tight-fitting clothes or show off their bodies. If you say this to someone, it means that you’re paying attention to what’s normally kept hidden.

• Cantik sekali!
  “Beautiful!” (to a woman)
• Kamu lucu! (or just Lucu!)
  “You’re cute!”

Note that this one is rather ambiguous and it’s quite possible for it to simply mean “funny.” “Cute” in English has a bit of a flirty connotation, but around most of Asia, that connotation isn’t always attached.

• Aku merasa aman ketika bersamamu.
  “I feel safe when I’m with you.” (to a man)

Men in Indonesia are expected to be providers for and protectors of women, and so when a woman says that she feels safe, it means he’s doing the right thing.

2. Complimenting in the Office

Not too many Indonesian companies hire foreign staff, but it might very well transpire that your company from overseas opens up an office or a partnership with an office in Indonesia.

Lots of Indonesians in international companies speak English relatively well, at least in Jakarta. But whether you have another shared language or not, complimenting the work of your Indonesian coworkers in Indonesian will be a very welcome surprise.

When it comes to the workplace, you could start by simply saying that you’re pleased with the results of the work.

• Semuanya berhasil dengan sempurna.
  “Everything worked out perfectly.”
• Proyek ini sudah baik sekali.
  “This project is already very good.”

However, another aspect of Indonesian culture is the desire, at least professionally, to never rest on one’s laurels. Therefore, it’s a good idea to show that you’re satisfied with the work by encouraging new work of the same standard in the future.

• Tetaplah membuat kemajuan!
  “Keep making progress!”
• Kerja bagus, maju terus dengan kliennya!
  “Good job, keep making progress with the client!”
• Luar biasa, semangat terus!
  “Outstanding, keep the pace strong!”

Some of these Indonesian compliments are easier than others to break down! The root maju means “progress.” In the first phrase, it came with the affixes ke…an to specifically mean the noun form. In the second one, the root was left bare.

That’s a very typical colloquial shortening, and you can seem more down-to-earth with colleagues in the same organizational level if you leave off some affixes like that.

The word terus is also very useful, as it means “straight ahead” or “continue.” As you can imagine, it’s also quite useful when giving directions in Indonesian.

3. Complimenting Achievements

Much like the last section, the overall sentiment for achievements is “Keep it up!”

You can also use the word semoga (“hope for” ) to outline a specific outcome, fitting for the situation. Suppose someone had a good job interview?

• Luar biasa! Semoga kamu mendapatkan pekerjaannya.
  “Outstanding! I hope you get the job.”

Congratulations may also be in order if we’re talking about a major life event.

• Selamat atas pernikahanmu.
  “Congratulations on your wedding.”

Here’s another chance to bust out specific vocabulary so that you can say what, in particular, you liked about something.

• Bunga-bunganya indah sekali!
  “The flowers were gorgeous!”

And finally, in order to compliment someone who’s working very hard at school, you can return to the word semangat.

• Kamu pintar banget! Semangat!
  “You’re super smart! Keep it up!”

Semangat is hard to translate in a Western context, but it makes perfect sense to people from Eastern cultures. It’s an all-purpose “Let’s go!” “Keep it up!” “Yeah!” kind of encouraging word, meant to give energy and spirit to whoever’s on the receiving end.

4. Complimenting Skills

If you ever walk around a university town or near a university campus in Indonesia in the evening, you might notice that lots of people are singing or playing music out in public with their friends. This seems to happen more in Indonesia than it does in the West.

Your high-quality Indonesian skills will almost certainly land you in a music circle at some point, though of course, there will be no pressure to play. Here’s the perfect place for a well-timed compliment about the music.

• Saya mau bermain gitar dengan sebaik kamu.
  “I want to play the guitar as well as you.”

Is someone a good conversationalist over dinner? Compliment their knowledge.

• Kamu tahu banyak tentang ….
  “You know a lot about…”

Let’s now say that you’ve stopped into a warung and gotten a plate of nasi goreng telur (“fried rice with egg” ) that was so good you want to write home about it. Compliments to the chef are unexpected yet very warmly appreciated in Indonesia. Here’s a phrase you can use to offer the chef a compliment in Indonesian.

• Wah, ini enak banget!
  “Wow, this is super-tasty!”

Here, we’re using wah as a way to say “wow,” but the waduh in the title of this article works just as well. These little nuances are very important for coming across as authentic!

The word banget here is another intensifier just like sangat or sekali. It’s rather informal, though, so using this phrase in a fancy restaurant to impress the waiter might make them stifle a chuckle. Save it for the warung.

5. Sincere Compliments and Responses

One thing that we can’t stress enough here is to be genuine when you give compliments to others. This is true for every culture, but particularly so for Indonesian.

Indonesian communication relies a great deal on what’s unsaid. Failing to give expected compliments is one thing, but when the situation doesn’t match what you’re saying, a compliment can fall flat.

Imagine you’re back in that host family’s house and you’re trying to choke down something bony and gristly. Obviously, they’ll be able to tell you don’t like it, and you’re not expected to immediately love every bit of Indonesian cuisine.

If you say something like…

• Makanan ini terbaik di Indonesia, Bu.
  “This meal is the best in all of Indonesia.”

…then it’s painfully obvious that you’re lying.

All you need to do is be honest and say “I’m not quite used to it yet.”

• Saya belum terbiasa dengan makanan Indonesia.
  “I’m not yet used to Indonesian food.”

Direct and clear, shifting the responsibility on yourself and making yourself humble in front of your guests. Perfect!

6. Conclusion

How great would it feel to get complimented in Indonesian by native speakers?

To be honest, you’ll probably hear one last compliment all the time:

• Bahasa Indonesiamu sudah lancar!
  “Your Indonesian is already fluent!”

Some people can start hearing beautiful words like that after just a couple of months. Others give up and never get there.

You’re probably already aware of how easy it can be to learn Indonesian through lots of examples. Did you know that with IndonesianPod101.com, you can get lessons in Indonesian with transcripts in both Indonesian and English?

By listening to the lesson, studying the transcript, and listening again a few more times, you’ll build that base of vocabulary and grammar that you need to be a comfortable, confident speaker of Indonesian.

A free basic lifetime account is waiting for you. Sign up today and feel your Indonesian rise to dazzling heights in no time!

Getting angry in Indonesian is a difficult subject to talk about.

Indonesians are, by and large, well-known for not getting very angry. The country often seems to tourists like a literal land of smiles.

A very important word in Indonesian is santai, meaning “relaxed” or “at ease.” If you’re stressed or frustrated, and very clearly not santai, then you’re probably going to alienate others.

How about on TV, though?

Have you ever seen Indonesian sinetron soap operas? They’re filled with angry outbursts and furious rants at the world.

So even though you might not see or hear it much in real life, Indonesian angry words and phrases definitely exist. If you want to take your Indonesian to the next level, you’d better learn them.

Table of Contents

1. Discussing Your Angry Feelings
2. Telling Others to Scram
3. Sending Warning Signals
4. Ordering Others Around
5. Play the Blame Game
6. Everybody Calm Down
7. Put Up Your Dukes
8. Say You’re Sorry
9. Conclusion

1. Discussing Your Angry Feelings

When you want to talk about your feelings in Indonesian, you can use the word merasa, meaning “to feel.” The root rasa by itself means “feeling” or “flavor,” so when you add the verbal prefix to it, it describes experiencing such a feeling.

If you haven’t yet, take a look at our vocabulary resource for talking about feelings in Indonesian.

As a cultural note, Indonesians are alright with talking about angry feelings, but actually going beyond that to blaming others or even rebuking them is rarely seen.

This is the most basic way to say you’re angry in Indonesian:

• Aku merasa marah.
  “I feel angry.”

To tell the truth, you don’t even need merasa. This works too:

• Aku marah.
  “I’m angry.”

That’s definitely a less formal way of putting things, but it’s not rude either. It’s simply a shortened version of the first phrase, just in the same way that the Indonesian verb adalah doesn’t always need to be explicitly said.

The Indonesian language allows us to be a little more creative with that root word marah. We can turn it into verbs, like so:

• Aku memarahi dia.
  “I was angry with him.”

The word memarahi (“to anger” ) is a little bit formal, so in colloquial speech and writing, you’ll hear the following sentence structure which is rather similar to the English version.

• Itu membuat aku marah.
  “That makes me angry.”

You can also come up with questions and explanations for this feeling, depending on how much detail you want to go into. It all comes from that single word!

• Mengapa kamu begitu marah?
  “Why are you so angry?”
• Aku marah karena kamu memukulku.
  “I’m angry because you hit me.”

Interestingly, there are only a couple of synonyms for “angry” in Indonesian. Marah covers pretty much everything. There are some words that come from Malay, such as bergelora or geram, but those are totally unused in everyday language.

2. Telling Others to Scram

This is one of the few times it’s reasonably acceptable to raise your voice and publicly get angry at someone in Indonesia. Just like in every country, there are some people who will harass others and refuse to take no for an answer.

If there’s somebody being pushy, you can use this first phrase. The actual feeling conveyed is going to be totally different with a different inflection. Speak seriously and firmly just like you would in English.

• Aku tidak mau.
  “I don’t want (it).”
• Pergilah dari sini!
  “Get out of here!”
• Aku tak mau lagi mendengar keluh kesahmu!
  “I don’t want to hear you complain!”

3. Sending Warning Signals

• Awas kau!
  “Watch out, you!”

The word awas usually appears on warning signs. Kau is another way to say kamu, and it’s a very familiar variant. If you don’t know a person well, calling them kau is pretty weird and perhaps even insulting.

• Sini, aku layani!
  “I’m ready to fight!”

Melayani is simply the verb “to fight” in Indonesian, and so this is a way to say “I’m ready for action.”

• Sudah selesai?
  “Are you done talking?”
• Sudah kubilang berkali-kali.
  “I’ve already said it several times.”

This is an interesting feature of Indonesian called “reduplication.” The word kali by itself means “time,” as in “one time, two times.” If we add the ber- prefix and reduplicate it, it gives the word a sense of “countless times,” including the implication of exasperation.

• Cukup! or Sudahlah!
  “That’s enough!”

The word sudah fills several grammatical functions in Indonesian. It literally means “already,” and so it functions often as a past tense marker. Here, adding the -lah suffix shows that we’ve really had it, and that there’s absolutely nothing else we want to hear!

• Aku tidak akan memaafkanmu.
  “I’m not going to forgive you.”

In Indonesian culture, “forgive and forget” is the way things get done. If you come out and directly say that you’re not going to forgive what someone else has done, that might scare them straight.

As luck would have it, Indonesian has an idiom about getting angry that’s awfully close to what’s said in English.

• Awas, dia akan naik darah.
  “Watch out, he’s going to blow up.”

Naik means “to raise” and darah means “blood.” “Raising your blood” seems quite similar to “raising your temper,” or perhaps something about high blood pressure. In either case, it should be easy to remember.

4. Ordering Others Around

We’ve already seen how, in Indonesian, you can make a verb into a polite or neutral request by adding -lah to the end.

• Berdirilah.
  “Stand up, please.”

Now is not the time for polite requests. Now is the time for demands.

By simply saying the verb in a forceful tone of voice, you’re communicating exactly the same thing you would with a request, just much ruder.

Here are a couple more great Indonesian angry phrases—normally if you’re shouting at someone like this, there are only a couple of things that you’re likely to say.

• Tutup mulutmu!
  “Shut your mouth!”
• Jangan bicara! Dengar!
  “Don’t talk! Listen!”
• Dengar kataku!
  “Listen to what I’m saying!”

5. Play the Blame Game

Anger usually has a reason behind it. With these phrases, you’ll let people know exactly what they did to cause your frustration.

If you say these strongly enough, then they might feel so bad that they back down and apologize by themselves.

• Kamu tidak pernah menghargaiku.
  “You never appreciate me.”
• Semuanya adalah kesalahanmu.
  “Everything is your fault.”

Now here are some good rhetorical questions. If you hear these, there’s not really any explanation you can give—just try and ride out the storm.

• Mengapa kau begitu?
  “Why are you like this?”
• Apa maksud semua ini?
  “What’s the meaning of this?”

6. Everybody Calm Down

There’s one last chance for things not to get crazy. When tempers are flaring, you can use a couple of well-timed phrases to remind everyone to take deep breaths and maybe set aside the issue.

The word for “calm” is tenang. When you’re trying to calm somebody down who’s upset, especially if you don’t know them, you should absolutely use polite pronouns when you address them.

• Tenang dulu, Pak!
  “Take it easy, mister!”

In Indonesian culture, offering a refreshment is one of the most basic fundamentals of hospitality. If there’s a water cooler nearby or even an unopened bottle, you can offer that to the affronted party.

• Ini diminum dulu, ya.
  “Here, drink this.”

There are a few more tricks going on with language here. The word dulu literally means “first,” and so by saying “drink first” or “calm down first,” you’re acknowledging that their complaint is valid and that you want to hear about it—once they’re in a better state of mind.

• Oke, saya dengar.
  “Alright, I’m listening.”
• Saya mengerti ada kesalahan.
  “I understand there’s a mistake here.”

Again, these phrases make it easy for the other person to feel respected and valid, and that takes a lot of the force out of somebody’s anger.

7. Put Up Your Dukes

Now it’s time for the real meat of this topic: the insults. You couldn’t calm down the situation, so instead you’ve got to bring it down to their level.

It might be surprising, but Indonesian doesn’t have an incredibly rich variety of swear words. There are some that we won’t print here because they’re too vulgar in English. But the list as a whole isn’t actually too long.

The most common insult in Indonesian might surprise you.

• Anjing!
  “Dog!”

That’s…not really an insult in English. Maybe in a movie about pirates? But not these days. It’s vaguely rude, sure, but it’s just not used!

Not so in Indonesian. As a majority-Islam country, Indonesian people believe dogs are unclean. You won’t see many pet dogs or stray dogs in Indonesia for that reason. And that’s why calling somebody a dog is taken so seriously. In some situations, you might even see it self-censored, like anj*ng.

• Anak haram!
  “Illegitimate child!”

In Indonesian culture, specifically in Islam, having a child out of wedlock is a strong taboo. Therefore, calling somebody an anak haram is extremely serious as it insults their entire family.

• Bajingan!
  “Lowlife!”

Literally, bajingan is a street criminal, a petty thief, or a pickpocket. Crimes like that don’t happen often in Indonesia, and people are likely to take offense if you call them this word.

The rest of these are pretty standard and interchangeable—insults that work in English and Indonesian. As you can see, these normally wouldn’t be used in complete sentences.

• Gila kau!
  “You’re crazy!”
• Sialan!
  “You’re trash!”
• Bodoh sekali!
  “So stupid!”
• Kurang ajar!
  “You’re losing it!”

One thing to note here, on a social level: Learning insults in other languages is a lot of fun.

But that’s only because you lack the social upbringing to really know what it feels like to be called sialan or kurang ajar. You might know intellectually that they’re serious words, but you don’t really hold that feeling in your heart.

So the advice here is to rarely, if ever, joke around with insults or angry words in another language. Even if you’ve been immersed for years, all it takes is just one mistake for people to think you’re too touchy and rude to be friends with.

By the way, if you’re wondering “Is that it?” then, no, it’s not. There are other things that go beyond the severity of what we’ve discussed here, but they’re too obscene to print (in this article, at least).

Keep your eyes peeled for a special members-only offering of the juiciest Indonesian curse words, here at IndonesianPod101!

8. Say You’re Sorry

So did you end up going too far? It’s probably going to be alright. Indonesians are tolerant and forgiving of people’s mistakes, and you should definitely learn to be the same if you want to fit in.

In fact, we have a whole lesson on how to say sorry in Indonesian, so we won’t repeat everything here. But imagine yourself all heated up after having traded insults back and forth.

• Aku minta maaf.
  “I’m very sorry.”
• Aku salah.
  “I was wrong.”
• Aku tidak akan melakukan ini lagi.
  “I won’t do this again.”
• Aku minta maaf karena membuat kamu marah.
  “I’m sorry for making you mad.”
• Aku harap kamu bisa memaafkanku.
  “I hope you can forgive me.”

If you didn’t screw things up too badly, and your apology was genuine, then you may be lucky enough to hear these phrases.

• Ayo kita lupakan saja.
  “Let’s just forget about it.”
• Tidak apa-apa.
  “It’s alright.”

9. Conclusion

Hopefully by this point, you’ve gotten a satisfying glimpse into the dark side of Indonesian anger. Keep in mind that so much of how these words are used and received has to do with the tone of voice.

If you turn on a TV show (or more likely, a web series, thanks to broadcast regulations), you’ll probably hear words like this thrown around very frequently between friends.

You have to read the room and know your audience well if you want to speak like them—and that goes far beyond just insults.

At IndonesianPod101, we give you that extra insight into Indonesian culture to give you a sense of understanding. With our lessons, articles, and flagship podcast, you’ll naturally learn what’s right and wrong to say, every time.

Before you go, drop us a comment and let us know which of these Indonesian angry phrases is your favorite. What are common angry phrases in your language? We look forward to hearing from you!

There’s a lot to be said for being able to make good small talk in another language. Conversations can start up and keep going indefinitely with the right people.

But what can you talk about? Perhaps you’ve tried talking about the weather and didn’t end up getting terribly far.

Or perhaps you’ve already met someone in Indonesia and gotten along with them, but you don’t know what to talk about whenever you hang out.

When something big happens in their life, you’ve got the perfect opening. For example, wishing them a happy birthday in Indonesian is a good way to open up new conversation topics (like what they want to do during this next year of their life, if they have special plans, etc.).

Well-wishes, or ucapan in Indonesian, are an important part of any culture. Knowing the right thing to say, whether it’s good news or bad, is the cornerstone of any interesting conversation.

In this article, you’ll learn about phrases of congratulations in Indonesian, as well as how to offer Indonesian condolences when they’re needed. Let’s get started.

Table of Contents

1. Birthdays
2. Holidays
3. Christmas
4. Babies
5. Graduation
6. Weddings and Anniversaries
7. Bad News in General
8. Good News in General
9. Conclusion

1. Birthdays

Indonesians definitely celebrate birthdays, meaning that wishing someone a happy birthday in Indonesian is much appreciated. The word for “birthday” is hari kelahiran (literally “day of birth” when translated), but instead of using that construction, there’s a set phrase you should use.

• Selamat ulang tahun!
  “Happy Birthday!”

In very formal contexts, like when an important person is celebrating their birthday as a large public event, the word dirgahayu is used. Generally, dirgahayu is used for Indonesian Independence Day—so it has the same connotation as the birth of a country!

If you’re writing a card, you should also include some of these excellent phrases for wishing long life, happiness, and success.

• Semoga permohonanmu terkabul.
  “May your wishes be granted.”
• Semoga selalu sejahtera.
  “Keep staying prosperous.”
• Semoga panjang umur.
  “May your life be long.”

In English, we have one typical birthday song that everybody knows (perhaps two, if you count He’s a Jolly Good Fellow). In Indonesian, though, people don’t really sing the song. Only in the case of celebrating a foreigner’s birthday would a song be sung, and then it would just probably be the same tune as the English Happy Birthday to You.

2. Holidays

Wishing someone a happy holiday in Indonesian can be a bit uncertain if you’re new to the country.

For example, when you’re living in Indonesia and everything starts closing up early during the holy month of Ramadan, if you’re not a Muslim you may not be clear on how to wish other people a “Happy Ramadan.” To be honest, it’s not really done with the kind of fervor that, say, Americans tend to use when they wish every stranger in sight “Merry Christmas.”

That said, a holiday greeting in Indonesian is normally appreciated. Here are a couple of examples:

• Selamat menunaikan ibadah puasa.
  “Wishing you a blessed Ramadan.”
• Selamat Idul Fitri. Minal aidin wal faidzin.
  “Happy Eid Mubarak. Please forgive any wrongdoing.”

These two phrases can function as a sort of conversation, in that if somebody greets you with one, you can reply with the other.

From dawn to dusk, Indonesian Muslims fast during Ramadan. As the word for “fast” is puasa, you can say Selamat puasa! to others to wish them a happy fasting period.

After the month of Ramadan is over, the fasting period is broken with the celebration of Eid al-Fitr, or as it’s known in Indonesian, Hari Raya Idul Fitri. During this time, there are public holidays known as Lebaran, where everybody takes time off to be with family.

3. Christmas

When it gets past November, the Christmas spirit is alive and well in big shopping centers and near churches. (You’ll get past the incongruity of seeing Christmas trees next to palm trees.) But because most people you meet aren’t likely to celebrate Christmas, it’s a good idea to refrain from sending out season’s greetings to ordinary people on the street.

With people you know better, you can certainly tell them Merry Christmas in Indonesian:

• Selamat Hari Natal!
  “Merry Christmas!”

In a casual context, the ubiquitous word selamat can be shortened to simply met.

Lastly, for a holiday greeting in Indonesian that says both Merry Christmas and Happy New Year in Indonesian, you can do exactly what we do in English:

• Selamat Hari Natal dan Tahun Baru!
  “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!”

The New Year isn’t the largest holiday of the year, by far, but you’ll definitely hear fireworks. People celebrate all through the country. If you can, try to get up to the top of a building in a residential area and watch the fireworks go off all around you. A great way to ring in the new year!

4. Babies

The arrival of a new baby is a joyous time for anyone. In Indonesia, the equivalent of a “baby shower” can take many forms. In some places, it’s held in the seventh month of a woman’s pregnancy, and is a time for a woman’s closest friends and relatives to give their blessings.

In other places, there’s no ceremony until after the baby is born, at which time they’re welcomed into the world with an enormous feast and party.

No matter what the ceremony looks like, you can’t go wrong by wishing the mother or the father congratulations with this phrase:

• Selamat atas kelahiran bayi!
  “Congratulations on the birth of a new baby!”

Naturally, you can be more specific with your Indonesian congratulations by being more descriptive with your words.

• Selamat atas kelahiran sosok yang begitu menakjubkan.
  “Congratulations on finding something so magical.”
• Nikmatilah petualangan sebagai orang tua!
  “Enjoy your journey into parenthood!”
• Aku sangat bahagia dengan kelahiran si kecil dalam keluarga kalian.
  “I’m overjoyed at the arrival of the little one in your family.”

A quick note on Indonesian usage: That little word si is actually kind of like a title. Here it’s being used in a very cute way to say “the little one,” but it could just as easily fit before any adjective: si gemuk, meaning “the plump one,” or si manis, meaning “the sweet one,” for example.

5. Graduation

More and more students are graduating from Indonesia’s top schools every year. But that doesn’t mean graduating isn’t a big deal. If you know someone who’s graduating (or if you yourself are), then you should definitely study up with these phrases.

• Selamat wisuda!
  “Happy graduation!”

In a card, you can send these more formal wishes for the future:

• Aku bangga denganmu.
  “I’m proud of you.”
• Saya berharap kamu selalu sukses.
  “I hope you achieve success.”

The word berharap here implies both a hope and an expectation—so no pressure!

• Kamu sudah bekerja keras untuk lulus.
  “You’ve worked hard for this graduation.”

One interesting thing is that, since a lot of young people are studying English or speak it very well, plenty of Indonesians will just use English to congratulate each other on graduating. It’s almost seen as more formal than Indonesian.

6. Weddings and Anniversaries

If you’re lucky enough to be invited to an Indonesian wedding, you should make your best effort to be present. Unlike in the West, where you can send a gift or card if you’re unable to make it, people in Indonesia generally give out invitations to their close friends with the expectation that they’ll be able to come.

There are two very common wedding congratulations or set phrases in Indonesian.

• Selamat ulang tahun pernikahan!
  “Happy Wedding Day!”
• Semoga bahagia sampai tua.
  “Wish You Happiness Until Old Age”

Doesn’t quite roll off the tongue in English, but it will be very well appreciated, particularly if you know the bride or groom well.

In addition to these set phrases, you can use some of these example sentences to create your own more personalized Indonesian wedding congratulations.

• Selamat, dan harapan yang indah untuk kalian berdua di hari pernikahan ini.
  “Congratulations, and warm wishes to both of you on this wedding day.”
• Selamat untuk kawanku! Semoga selalu bahagia dan keluargamu sehat.
  “Congratulations my friend! I wish you happiness and good health for your family.”

As many weddings are held within religious traditions, it’s very common to send spiritual blessings or doa, which are “prayers,” during a wedding as well.

• Aku berdoa agar Tuhan memberkati kalian berdua dengan pernikahan yang indah.
  “I wish to God to bless the two of you with a beautiful wedding day.”
• Semoga Allah memberi berkah kepadamu dan atasmu serta mengumpulkan kamu berdua dalam kebaikan.
  “May Allah bring blessings upon you and gather the two of you together in kindness.”

Those are just two examples of the highly formal style of language you can expect for doa (and in Islamic weddings, these prayers are often delivered in Arabic outright). Many people actually consult religious scholars to provide them with prayers that fit the situation, and the bride and groom, exactly.

7. Bad News in General

Not every life event is all sunshine and roses. If somebody’s going through a tough time or has received bad news, you should extend some heartfelt words of sympathy.

Many Indonesians use the word “sorry” in English (some spell it sori). To foreign ears, this can sound rather dismissive, but it’s not rude. Even for relatively serious things, you might hear someone say sori ya but mean it with respect and gravity.

However, this is somewhere where you can’t totally rely on simple set phrases. If somebody thinks that you’re not sincere in your words—just reciting something memorized—then it’ll hurt more than if you hadn’t said anything. And as a foreigner learning Indonesian, using just your own language might seem like a bit of a cop-out.

So keep that in mind as you look at these following phrases, and if you ever have to use them, do your best to speak more specifically about the actual situation.

1- Death or Funerals

Funerals are a bit complicated here, as they’re highly personal events that are still celebrated in literally hundreds of different ways throughout Indonesia. Remember, the Indonesian language, as a national language, is only about two or three generations old, and cultural roots go way deeper than that.

First, the basic phrase for expressing sorrow is turut berduka.

• Turut berduka atas ayahmu.
  “I’m very sorry about your father.”

When giving condolences in Indonesian, it’s common to refer to someone’s death in a sensitive way, just as in English we might say that someone “passed away.”

• Saya sangat kaget mendengar bahwa dia telah tiada.
  “I am very sorry to hear that she has passed away (literally: that she is not here).”

The most common condolence messages for funerals in Indonesia take the form of reminders about the person’s afterlife. Although not all Indonesians are devoutly religious, the vast majority believe strongly in a creator and an afterlife, and these thoughts are very comforting for someone who has lost a loved one.

• Semoga Tuhan memberinya tempat yang terbaik.
  “May God give them the finest place.”
• Dia akan mendapatkan tempat terbaik di surga.
  “He will receive the finest place in heaven.”
• Ingatlah kebahagiannya untuk bertemu dengan Sang Pencipta.
  “Think of her happiness in meeting the Creator.”

Aside from that, condolences often come with gifts of flowers. You should deliver them personally if possible, along with words like these:

• Tetap kuat dan ingat bahwa kamu memiliki banyak orang yang peduli denganmu.
  “Remain strong and remember that you have a lot of people who care about you.”
• Kami selalu mendoakanmu.
  “We’re always praying for you.”

2- Poor Health

If you were suffering from an illness, wouldn’t it feel great to know that your friends and family were thinking of you? It’s always a great gesture of kindness to send nice thoughts to someone who’s feeling under the weather, whether it’s serious or just an ordinary bug.

First, the all-purpose phrase:

• Semoga cepat sembuh!
  “Get well soon!”

But when you’re really feeling awful (think day three or four of tropical fever), the concept of “getting well” might seem awfully far away. In that case, you’ll want to hear encouraging messages of support, both from the perspective of friendship and of spirituality.

• Jangan merasa sendiri. Aku akan selalu bersamamu.
  “Don’t feel alone. I’m always with you.”
• Jangan pernah menyerah!
  “Never give up!”
• Doaku selalu untukmu.
  “My prayers are always with you.”

10. Good News in General

And in order to end on a happy note, let’s look at just a few more quick phrases you can use for any kind of catch-all good stuff. Someone’s cat had kittens? Promotion’s coming up? These are perfect responses.

• Keren!
  “Awesome!”
• Bagus sekali!
  “Fantastic!”

What about when somebody’s about to take on a challenge, or they’re not sure whether the outcome will be good or bad? In that case, you can quite literally “wish them success” with this phrase:

• Semoga sukses!
  “Best of luck!”

11. Conclusion

Now that you’re armed with all of these great phrases, you should be able to connect with other people on a totally different level than before.

Seriously, there’s a big difference between letting some foreigner know about your upcoming graduation and getting into an interesting conversation with them about it. If you can make yourself into a foreigner who’s capable of having that kind of conversation, your life in Indonesia will be all the richer for it.

I hope you enjoyed learning about Indonesian life event messages, and that you took away something valuable from this article. Before you go, let us know how you feel about holding conversations in Indonesian using these phrases! Are there any life event messages you still want to know about? We look forward to hearing from you. 🙂

Right now, in just five minutes, you can give your Indonesian vocabulary a super-size boost.

In just one regular-sized article, we’ve prepared for you a fantastic overview of popular Indonesian adjectives, plus the top 100 Indonesian adjectives you need for any situation. Looking for an example of Indonesian adjectives at work? We have plenty of those, too.

With the isolating grammar of the Indonesian language, simply reading a lot of example sentences with these popular Indonesian adjectives is a great way to naturally assimilate syntax and vocabulary.

Table of Contents

1. A Quick Overview of Indonesian Adjectives
2. List of the Top 100 Indonesian Adjectives
3. Modifying Adjectives
4. Conclusion

1. A Quick Overview of Indonesian Adjectives

If you haven’t already realized it by now, the way adjectives work in Indonesian grammar couldn’t be easier. The words simply don’t change at all. The adjectives simply come directly after the noun phrase, the opposite of where they go in English.

There’s also no word to directly connect an adjective to a noun like “is” can be used in English. You either directly say the adjective or use a ber-verb.

• Gedung ini besar.
  “This building is big.”
• Kopi saya berwarna hitam.
  “My coffee is colored black.” (My coffee has-the-color-of black.)

However, one potential downside of this is that, because there’s no such thing as “adjective endings” or declension in Indonesian, it may be hard at first to figure out which words in the sentence are adjectives to begin with.

Take a sentence like this for example:

• Saya bekerja di kapal besar.
  “I work on a big boat.”

The adjective there is besar, meaning “big,” but that just has to be memorized.

Fortunately, the more example sentences you read and internalize, the better your sense will be for how adjectives work syntactically in Indonesian, and the more you’ll start to remember as well.

Ready to learn Indonesian describing words? Let’s get started with our list of the top Indonesian adjectives.

2. List of the Top 100 Indonesian Adjectives

1- Describing Colors

The most basic adjectives you can learn in any language are the words for different colors. For some reason, a lot of textbooks leave out “gray” and “brown”—two of the most common colors anywhere! Here’s our list of the Indonesian top adjectives for colors.

1. putih – white

• Tas ini putih atau abu-abu?
  “Is this bag white or gray?”

2. hitam – black

• Matanya warna hitam.
  “Her eyes are black.”

3. merah – red

• Langitnya merah, dan aku takut.
  “The sky is red, and I’m scared.”

4. biru – blue

• Anda harus membawa pulpen biru atau hitam.
  “You have to bring a blue or black pen.”

5. hijau – green

• Di sana semua pohon hijau.
  “All the trees are green there.”

6. kuning – yellow

• Apakah kamu suka ayam kuning?
  “Do you like yellow chicken (a Javanese dish)?”

7. coklat – brown

• Rambutku berwarna coklat.
  “My hair is brown.”

8. merah muda – pink

• Aku tidak suka pakai pakaian merah muda.
  “I don’t like wearing pink clothes.”

9. abu-abu – gray; ash-colored

• Waktu hujan, langit berwarna abu-abu.
  “When it rains, the sky is gray.”

10. oranye – orange

• Jeruk sunkist biasanya berwarna oranye.
  “Orange juice is usually orange.”

2- Describing Taste

Indonesians love flavorful food. Go into any restaurant, from the smallest warungs to the biggest restos, and you’ll find people who are experts at making food taste great, making it essential to know words for taste when you learn Indonesian adjectives.

11. asin – salty

• Orang Tiongkok suka telur asin.
  “Chinese people like salted eggs.”

12. manis – sweet

• Kamu suka es teh manis?
  “Do you like sweet iced tea?”

13. hambar – bland

• Nasi putih hambar.
  “White rice is bland.”

14. segar – fresh

• Di mana susu segarnya?
  “Where is the fresh milk?”

15. busuk – rotten

• Duren di koper Anda busuk!
  “The durian in your suitcase is rotten!”

16. pahit – bitter

• Pare rasanya pahit.
  “Bitter gourd tastes bitter.”

17. enak – delicious

• Mie goreng di warung ini enak!
  “The fried noodles at this restaurant are delicious!”

18. lezat – delicious (used in advertising)

• Super lezaaat!
  “Super tastyyyyy!”

19. sedap – delicious (used in advertising)

• Ada Mie Sedap di sini?
  “Do you have Mie Sedap (an instant noodle brand) here?”

20. pedas – spicy

• Saya tidak suka makanan pedas.
  “I don’t like spicy food.”

Note that for pedas, you may hear it pronounced and written as pedes, an alternate usage that comes from Javanese influence.

3- Describing Personality

Now let’s look at some ways to describe different people, outside of what they may look like. When you learn Indonesian adjectives, knowing how to talk about personality is of great importance, as in any language.

21. baik hati – warmhearted

Pak Rektor adalah orang baik hati.
“The university president is a warmhearted person.”

22. rendah hati – humble

• Lebih baik rendah hati hari ini.
  “It’s better to be humble today.”

23. sombong – arrogant

• Mengapa dia sangat sombong?
  “Why is he so arrogant?”

24. pintar – clever

• Orang muda masa kini sangat pintar.
  “Young people today are very clever.”

25. jelek – rotten; no-good

• Kain baju ini kualitasnya jelek. Baru dua hari sudah robek.
  “The cloth quality of this shirt is bad. It’s only been two days, and it’s ripped already.”

26. nakal – naughty; badly behaved

• Anak-anak di sekolah tidak nakal.
  “Children at school are not naughty.”

27. egois – selfish; egotistical

• Dia tidak suka menyumbang uang karena dia egois.
  “She doesn’t like donating money because she’s selfish.”

28. malas – lazy

• Jangan malas! Ayo pergi!
  “Don’t be lazy! Let’s go!”

29. mager – lazy (slang word meaning “too lazy to move.” )

• A: Kok tidak ke KTV?
  B: Mager sih.
• A: “How come you’re not going to karaoke?”
  B: “Too lazy to move, y’know?”

30. sopan – polite

• Kamu harus sopan waktu kamu berbicara.
  “You have to be polite when you speak.”

4- Describing Feelings

When anybody asks “How are you?” you can either give a neutral response such as baik, meaning “good,” or be a little more exact. Be honest about your feelings in Indonesian!

31. capek – exhausted; tired (note the possible alternate spelling cape)

• Saya bekerja, terus capek.
  “I work, and then I get tired.”

32. sedih – sad

• Ini novel sedih.
  “This is a sad book.”

33. senang – happy

• Saya senang sekali bisa bertemu denganmu.
  “I’m very happy to meet with you.”

34. bersemangat – excited; energetic

• Apakah kamu bersemangat hari ini?
  “Are you excited today?”

35. cemas – nervous

• Jangan cemas, hanya interview saja.
  “Don’t be nervous, it’s just an interview.”

36. santai – relaxed; calm

• Sulit santai kalau dikejar tenggat.
  “It is hard to be relaxed/calm when you’re being chased by a deadline.”

37. tenang – patient; calm

• Mengapa dia masih tenang?
  “How come he’s still calm?”

38. marah – angry; furious

• Saya akan menjadi marah.
  “I’m going to get angry.”

39. mabuk – queasy

• Apakah kamu merasa mabuk?
  “Do you feel queasy?”

40. sakit – sick; in pain

• Mata saya sakit.
  “My eyes hurt.”

41. nyaman – comfortable

• Helm saya terlalu kecil, jadi tidak nyaman.
  “My helmet is too small, so it’s not comfortable.”

5- Describing Appearance (People)

Let’s not be rude here, but you’ve always got to be able to talk about what people are like in addition to how they act.

42. kaya – rich

• Tidak ada banyak orang kaya di kota tua.
  “There aren’t a lot of rich people in the old city.”

43. tinggi – tall

• Adik saya semakin tinggi setiap hari.
  “My little brother is taller every day.”

44. pendek – short

• Orang pendek biasanya tidak suka main bola basket.
  “Short people usually don’t like basketball.”

45. rajin – studious; focused

• Saya tidak pernah melihat mahasiswa rajin seperti kamu.
  “I’ve never seen a student so focused like you are.”

46. miskin – poor

• Ada banyak orang miskin di negara ini.
  “There are a lot of poor people in this country.”

47. muda – young

• Semangat waktu muda habis waktu tua.
  “Energy when one is young is gone when one is old.”

48. tua – old

• Wanita berumur suka minum teh manis.
  “Old women like to drink sweet tea.”

49. gemuk – fat

• Kok, kamu sudah gemuk!
  “Whoa, you’re already fat!”

50. langsing – slim

• Di mana semua cowok-cowok langsing?
  “Where are all the slim guys?”

51. cantik – beautiful; pretty

• Tetapi kamu masih cantik.
  “But you’re still beautiful.”

Note that this word can also describe Indonesia!

52. berotot – muscular

• Bapakmu berotot atau langsing?
  “Is your dad muscular or slim?”

53. lemah – weak

• Jantung saya lemah, jadi saya tidak bisa pergi ke gym.
  “My heart is weak, so I can’t go to the gym.”

6- Describing Time

Indonesian doesn’t distinguish between adjectives and adverbs, so some of these fall into the “adverb” category in English. That means when it comes to describing time, these will do double duty.

54. cepat – fast

• Hari ini cepat selesai.
  “Today was over fast.”

55. lambat – slow

• Dia bicara terlalu lambat.
  “He speaks too slowly.”

56. awal – early

• Kami mulai awal minggu depan.
  “We’re starting early next week.”

57. tepat waktu – on time

• Mengapa hari ini Anda tidak tepat waktu?
  “Why weren’t you on time this morning?”

58. terlambat – late

• Jangan terlambat besok.
  “Don’t be late tomorrow.”

59. ketinggalan jaman – outdated; outmoded

• Mobil orang tuaku ketinggalan jaman.
  “The car my parents have is outdated.”

60. modern – modern (note that there’s a hidden e in between the r and the n in Indonesian: it’s pronounced moderen)

• Apakah kamu suka lukisan modern?
  “Do you like modern paintings?”

61. kuno – ancient

• Lihatlah jalan-jalan kuno di kota.
  “Look at the ancient streets in the town.”

62. kontemporer – contemporary

• Mereka sangat suka bermain musik kontemporer.
  “They really like playing contemporary music.”

7- Describing Appearance (Things)

Naturally, there are different words in Indonesian used to describe objects as opposed to people.

63. mahal – expensive

• Yang ini terlalu mahal.
  “This one is too expensive.”

64. tebal – thick

• Dia pakai jilbab tebal.
  “She wore a thick jilbab.”

65. indah – beautiful

• Laut dan pantai di Indonesia indah sekali.
  “The sea and beaches in Indonesia are very beautiful.”

66. tipis – thin

• Cuci yang tipis dulu.
  “Wash the thin ones first.”

67. besar – big

• Ada piring lebih besar?
  “Are there bigger plates?”

68. kecil – small

• Sepatuku terlalu kecil.
  “My shoes are too small.”

69. panjang – long

• Saya mau tempat tidur lebih panjang.
  “I want a longer bed.”

70. lebar – wide

• Rumah mereka tidak mahal, tapi lebar.
  “Their house isn’t expensive, but it’s wide.”

71. luas – wide; broad (used for landscapes & open spaces)

• Dari atas bisa melihat lingkungan luas.
  “From the top, you can see the wide surroundings.”

72. berat – heavy

• Kotak-kotak ini berat.
  “These boxes are heavy.”

73. baru – new

• Dia punya motor baru.
  “He has a new motorcycle.”

74. lama – old

• Jangan pakai pakaian lama.
  “Don’t wear old clothes.”

8- Describing Weather

Weather in Indonesia is usually one thing, and it’s not “cold.” If these words aren’t enough for you, we actually have a whole separate resource just for weather words and phrases!

75. panas – hot

• Cuaca panas hari ini.
  “The weather’s hot today.”

76. dingin – cold

• Di atas gunung cuaca lebih dingin.
  “The weather is colder on top of a mountain.”

77. berawan – cloudy

• Selalu berawan di musim hujan.
  “It’s always cloudy during the rainy season.”

78. berkabut – foggy

• Dekat pantai cuaca berkabut.
  “The weather is foggy near the beach.”

79. cerah – sunny

• Waduh, hari ini cerah dan indah!
  “Wow, today is sunny and beautiful!”

80. berangin – windy

• Kota Jakarta bukan kota berangin.
  “Jakarta is not a windy city.”

81. hangat – warm

• Masih hangat di sore hari.
  “It’s still warm in the evening.”

This has just been a taster. If you’re looking for more ways to talk about the weather in Indonesia, head on over to our dedicated blog post.

9- Describing Texture and Touch

This section is slightly different than describing what objects look like. Sure, they overlap, but texture is separate from appearance. And yet both are important categories to understand.

82. basah – wet

• Pakaiannya masih basah.
  “The clothes are still wet.”

83. kering – dry

• Semennya sudah kering belum?
  “Is the cement dry or not?”

84. keras – hard

• Kelapanya terlalu keras; tidak bisa dibuka.
  “The coconut is too hard; it can’t be opened.”

85. halus – smooth

• Bahasa Jawa di Yogyakarta lebih halus.
  “The Javanese spoken in Yogyakarta is smoother.”

86. kenyal – bouncy; springy

• Ranjang di Asia tidak kenyal.
  “Beds in Asia are not bouncy.”

87. berbulu – furry; hairy; feathered

• Burung kecil halus dan berbulu.
  “The little bird is soft and feathery.”

88. rapuh – brittle; fragile; flimsy

• Jangan meletakkan barang rapuh dekat tangga.
  “Don’t put fragile things near the stairs.”

89. licin – slippery

• Awas, lantai licin.
  “Be careful, the floor is slippery.”

90. pecah – broken; cracked

• HPku pecah!
  “My phone is cracked!”

91. lengket – sticky

• Ada sesuatu lengket di rambutku!
  “There’s something sticky in my hair!”

10- Describing Concepts

This section is a goldmine for when you’ve got to talk about a tough problem or question you’re dealing with, or when you need to explain something to somebody else. Obviously, our list of top Indonesian adjectives wouldn’t be complete without words to describe concepts.

92. sederhana – simple

• Itu adalah cinta sederhana.
  “It was a simple love.”

93. mudah – easy

• Belajar bahasa Indonesia lebih fasih daripada belajar bahasa Jawa
  “Studying Indonesian is easier than Javanese.”

94. sulit – difficult

• Ujian akhir semester sulit.
  “The end-of-semester test is difficult.”

95. susah – complicated; difficult

• Tata bahasa bahasa Inggris susah.
  “English grammar is complicated.”

96. penting – important

• Surat di atas meja penting.
  “The letter on the table is important.”

97. salah – wrong; incorrect

• Semua yang kamu katakan salah.
  “Everything you say is wrong.”

98. benar – true

• Tidak semua di televisi benar.
  “Not everything on TV is true.”

99. palsu – false

• Itu segala-galanya palsu.
  “That’s completely false.”

100. resmi – formal; official

• Anda harus mengisi formulir pengaduan resmi.
  “You have to fill in a formal complaint form.”

3. Modifying Adjectives

So already up to this point, we’ve learned how to say the top 100 Indonesian adjectives. Let’s go ahead and expand that number—with only a couple more words.

To intensify adjectives in Indonesian, you can add banget or sekali after that adjective. Both mean “very” or “really,” though banget should only be used in informal situations.

• Aiii, mie goreng ini pedas banget!
  “Ahh! These fried noodles are super spicy!”

In much the same way, we can add sangat in front of the adjective. This is a little bit weaker than sekali, and it can be used in formal or informal situations.

One more set of useful modifiers is kurang, meaning “too little; lacking,” and terlalu, meaning “too much.” These also go in front of the adjective in question.

• Saya tidak mau yang ini, terlalu mahal.
  “I don’t want this one, it’s too expensive.”

4. Conclusion

Did you learn something new? Are there any words we missed on our Indonesian adjectives list you still want to know? Let us know in the comments.

I bet if you read this same article tomorrow, and maybe even the next day, these words will stick in your memory for a surprisingly long time. That’s what the science says, at least. In other words, to learn Indonesian adjectives and really learn them, don’t stop after the first read or the first lesson. Keep going!

By the way, to take your learning to the next level, check out the Indonesian content here on IndonesianPod101.com, with tons of additional wordlists and vocabulary resources waiting for you!

Read a couple of pop culture articles in English, and you’ll notice right away that Netflix is a pretty indelible part of Western entertainment these days.

It’s almost like if you take a break from catching up on shows and movies, everybody will be speaking a totally different language when you come back.

When you study a language, you’re going to be hard-pressed to avoid the pop culture that goes along with it. And on Netflix, Indonesia has tons of movies and TV series for you to enjoy already.

But one of the biggest obstacles to people teaching themselves languages is convenience. Try to sign up for an Indonesian streaming service using an American bank card (and with shaky knowledge of Indonesian, at that) and you might want to just throw up your hands in despair.

Fortunately for you, and for millions of people around the world, Netflix is already well on its way to capturing the streaming market worldwide. And of course, that includes Indonesia.

Table of Contents

1. Does Netflix Work in Indonesia? Is it Worth the Netflix Indonesia Price?
2. Netflix Indonesia Film List: The Best Indonesian Stuff on Netflix
3. Experience Your Favorite Show Through Indonesian Eyes
4. Using Audio Descriptions to Get More Indonesian Per Show
5. Conclusion

1. Does Netflix Work in Indonesia? Is it Worth the Netflix Indonesia Price?

So, does Netflix work in Indonesia? If you happen to be in Indonesia at this very moment, you may have noticed an uncomfortable fact: some Indonesian ISPs straight-up block Netflix.

They’re within their rights to do so under Indonesian law, but it’s a total pain for people who are used to the particular selection that Netflix has to offer.

In that case, it may be worth it to shell out for a VPN, or do some research on which ISPs or mobile providers in your area don’t have this block.

Otherwise, whether in-country or out, you may also notice that there isn’t a whole lot of diversity when it comes to Netflix Indonesia content available. That’s because the Indonesian market is one that Netflix is currently expanding into—meaning that the selection is certain to grow with time. So, the answer to “Does Netflix work in Indonesia?” is “Sometimes, and hopefully more in the future.”

2. Netflix Indonesia Film List: The Best Indonesian Stuff on Netflix

1- Kuntilanak

Do you like horror movies? I sure hope so, because Indonesians definitely do. Kuntilanak is the name of a ghost in traditional Indonesian and Malay folklore, and this is one of the best Indonesian horror movies on Netflix at the moment.

A young woman named Samantha moves to a creepy old boarding house in Jakarta. Even though the landlady specifically tells her the ghost stories related to the house, and that nobody is allowed to go to the second floor, Samantha doesn’t mind.

As the supernatural events unfold, you’ll get a great rundown of Indonesian spiritual folklore, specifically Javanese folklore related to ghosts.

2- Merantau

Remember that iconic moment in The Matrix when Morpheus fought Neo to test his skills? Everyone, on and off the screen, gets such a thrill from seeing a teacher prove their excellence. In Merantau, a martial arts teacher does just that—at least at first.

Soon after arriving in the big city, he’s thrown into a criminal underworld where he must use his wits and his fists to fight for justice, and to save his own skin. Here, you’ll learn a ton of fast-paced street slang in Indonesian—just don’t try it out in the classroom unless you’re as good at fighting as he is! If you’re looking for an excellent Indonesian action movie, Netflix has you covered with this one.

3- Surga Yang Tak Dirindukan

This is one of the best Indonesian dramas on Netflix in the past few years, both critically and in terms of audience reception. That may be due to the way it treats love and marriage—with a challenging and unique viewpoint for a country that largely maintains conservative social values.

Arini and her husband Pras have a healthy, trusting, and happy marriage. But one day, Pras unexpectedly encounters a woman trying to end her own life after finding out about her fiance’s infidelity. What can Pras do when this woman starts making advances toward him, at the same time that he learns about the infidelity issues in Arini’s family?

4- Soekarno

Indonesia, in case you weren’t aware, was a colony of the Netherlands for more than a century. Thanks largely to a spirit of nationalist unity in the early twentieth century, the Dutch ended up recognizing Indonesia as an independent country in 1949.

That process, many argue, would not have been possible without the leader Soekarno (spelled Sukarno after orthographic reform). This Netflix Indonesian film tells his story. Since it’s an Indonesian film and Soekarno is still very widely revered in the country, you can imagine that it’s a very positive portrait.

Interestingly enough, the film was briefly banned from showing in Indonesia due to criticisms about creative liberties taken with historical accuracy. Open Netflix in Indonesia, watch the film to practice your Indonesian, but check out a textbook if you want to really learn what happened!

5- 3 Srikandi

It’s 1988 and the world of sports is gearing up for the 24th Olympics in Seoul. Do you remember who won silver in women’s team archery? Take a wild guess based on what language you’re reading about.

It was, in fact, Indonesia’s first-ever Olympic medal, obtained by a truly outstanding effort on the part of the contestants and their coach. This Indonesian Netflix movie tells the story of a coach brought out of retirement to turn these women into world-class athletes, despite the pressures they face from their communities and the world stage. Not a whole lot of sports films come out of Indonesia, but this is one of the best, so open Netflix in Indonesia and start watching!

6- Cahaya Dari Timur: Beta Maluku

Another one of the best Indonesian movies on Netflix and very highly-regarded, this drama and sports film stands out by being centered far from the urban nexus of Jakarta.

Ambon is a relatively small island in Maluku Province, in the eastern part of the Indonesian archipelago. There, religious conflicts are liable to erupt between the Christian and Muslim populations, as well as ethnic conflicts between different migrant groups. It is there that one youth soccer coach had the idea to bring young people together through sports. Is that idea destined for success, or doomed for failure?

7- Laskar Pelangi

Though this might count as an “older” film by modern streaming standards, this 2008 film still holds up extremely well. Every Indonesian knows it, and it even sparked an explosion in tourism to the shooting locations.

This too is an inspiring story about changing the lives of children in need. A small school in rural Belitung (eastern Sumatra) is about to close due to lack of enrollment. When one more student arrives, the ten students and their teacher become close friends and all earn each other’s respect over the course of the school year. Many people see this film as a love letter not only to rural Indonesia, but also to young people persevering in adverse circumstances.

8- Filosofi Kopi

Indonesia is a rapidly developing country, and no matter what city you go to, you’ll see little coffee shops and bakeries opening up all over the place.

This Indonesian film on Netflix captures that spirit while also putting an edge on the importance of friendship and money on it. It was well-received, too—just like how Laskar Pelangi fueled tourism to Belitung, if you go to Yogyakarta today and ask around for the places where they shot Filosofi Kopi, there’ll still be people taking selfies.

A businessman places a wager on a struggling coffee shop that could prove an amazing boon. But when two friends are running a business together, it’s not always a great idea to bring either crazy ideas or big winnings into the mix. Spoiler alert—things work out well enough for there to be a Filosofi Kopi 2.

9- Single

Young people all over the world can sometimes feel an enormous pressure on them to find a relationship. Once you reach a certain age, if it hasn’t happened yet, it can become all-consuming.

Ebi is a young man in Jakarta, relatively aimless in life and without any elements of support. When his successful younger brother announces his wedding day, Ebi realizes that to appear without a girlfriend at the wedding would be to invite ridicule from everyone he knows. What does it mean for him to start looking for love, and will he find it in time?

10- The Night Comes for Us

If you wanted a marker of how seriously Netflix takes the Indonesian market, look no further than this. Netflix acquired the distribution rights in Asia shortly after its premiere, and for good reason. This Netflix Indonesian action movie is yet another brilliantly done film set in Southeast Asia.

Action superstars Iko Uwais and Joe Taslim star as elite fighters for a notorious drug triad. After a moral dispute, things get heated and stay heated. It’s not a movie for the squeamish, but connoisseurs of Asian action cinema will go wild.

3. Experience Your Favorite Show Through Indonesian Eyes

So, you’ve looked into Netflix Indonesia prices, VPNs, and our list of great Netflix Indonesian movies. But how can you actually use this to learn Indonesian?

Some people like dubbed foreign films, and others go for subtitles every time. In general, Indonesians tend to only dub media for children. It’s tough to find imported DVDs with Indonesian audio tracks—pretty much the only way is to catch the broadcasts on the kids’ TV channels.

But you’re in luck—tons of international Indonesian Netflix series for kids have audio tracks.

If you’re familiar with these shows from having watched them in another language before, then you’ve just found one of the smoothest and easiest ways to get started with watching native-level content in Indonesian.

And it’s not necessarily because kids’ shows are “simpler.” Often, the wordplay and fast-paced banter can be just as complex as a show meant for adults.

Instead, dubbed shows are easier because they were probably written by people from a cultural background that you’re more familiar with. The overall plot and storyline is likely to resonate with you more than something from a purely Indonesian cultural background.

When it comes to optimizing Netflix for language learning, things definitely don’t stop with dubbing.

4. Using Audio Descriptions to Get More Indonesian Per Show

Ever tried turning on those audio descriptions in the audio/subtitles menu?

They’re originally meant for vision-impaired people. These audio tracks simply use the space between dialogue lines to let you know what’s going on in the scene through additional narration.

In case you run off and check right this instant, keep in mind that they only show up in whatever language you have your Netflix interface set to. Change that to Indonesian in your profile settings—in fact, you should probably do that anyway! Definitely a smart addition to your Indonesian Netflix series-watching!

So what difference does this extra audio track make for learning Indonesian?

You get to hear how Indonesians would describe scenes naturally, for other Indonesians. You might have a scene of two guys talking over coffee, and one of them takes a long drink.

Anybody knows how to say “he takes a long drink” in their own language, but that kind of specific wording isn’t something you’re likely to pick up from a textbook or from watching shows.

Right now, audio description in Indonesian is only available for a handful of movies, and, apart from The Night Comes for Us, they’re all Indonesian horror on Netflix. But the more you watch with it on, the more Netflix’s algorithms report that it’s in demand—and the more you’ll get in the future! So do be sure to start using this whenever you can while binging your favorite Indonesian Netflix series or movies!

5. Conclusion

Ready to watch Netflix in Indonesian? As a very last resort, you can still use subtitles in Indonesian to improve your language ability.

Switch the audio track to something you don’t understand (or turn it off completely) and try to follow the plot just from reading the Indonesian dialogue. It’s not as great a solution as the other stuff on this list, but it sure beats not learning Indonesian at all.

And that’s really the main point here. You don’t have to rearrange your life around studying Indonesian (though that would certainly be an interesting challenge), but as long as you’re doing something in Indonesian whenever you can, you’re going to be making progress.

The fastest way, in fact, would be to use this sort of immersive learning as a healthy supplement to a regular course of study. When you learn a new word or phrase through ordinary lessons and then run across it immediately in “real-life Indonesian,” it supercharges that memory. Plus it’s a great feeling!

Language just requires some getting used to. The more relaxed you make your journey, the more permanent your knowledge will be.

So, reader, which of these Netflix Indonesia movies do you want to watch first, and why? Are there any other Netflix Indonesian movies we missed? Let us know in the comments!

Many Indonesian learners who study Indonesian on their own forget—or rather, never learn—a certain conjunction despite its importance. Conjunctions in Indonesian (or any language, really) aren’t usually a topic of interest to many learners.

Usually, they become accustomed to using alternate phrasings without having to take advantage of a conjunction. In fact, I’ve personally noticed that I tend to use one particular structure in all the foreign languages I study.

But when writing a formal letter or trying to contact a local university in Indonesia, you’ll always have to go as fluff-free in your writing as possible—which is something you can’t fully accomplish without the use of conjunctions.

It just goes to show that if you skip out on learning Indonesian conjunctions, you’re setting yourself up for a surprise moment of panic in the future!

Table of Contents

1. What is a Conjunction?
2. Similar Thoughts (And; Or)
3. Cause and Effect (Because)
4. Contrasts (But)
5. Conditions (If)
6. Consequence (So; Therefore)
7. Purpose (In order to; That)
8. Correlation (Not only, but also)
9. One More Correlation (Both)
10. How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Master Indonesian Grammar

1. What is a Conjunction?

A conjunction, as you may already know, connects two things in discourse. That’s kind of abstract, but we use them constantly in any language. They’re some of the most common words.

If we take two ideas like “he jumped” and “he fell,” we can use the conjunction “and” in English to say “He jumped and fell.” Or we can contrast two states with “but,” such as in “I want it, but I don’t have it.”

Interestingly enough, you can’t say that one particular concept is a conjunction in every single language. Different words are used for different parts of speech across languages.

And there are a number of Indonesian conjunction words that are only used in formal speech. But once you start breaking down some of them, the rest follow similar and logical patterns. In this article, you’ll learn all the basics you need to know about the conjunction in Indonesian and how it works. So let’s get started!

2. Similar Thoughts (And; Or)

Let’s begin with the most basic of all, the concept of “and.” This word is dan in Indonesian. It works for verbs:

• Setiap hari saya menyapu dan mengepel lantai.
  “Every day, I sweep and mop the floor.”

And it works for nouns.

• Ia punya sebuah gitar dan sebuah ukulele.
  “He has a guitar and a ukulele.”

The word atau, meaning “or,” works very similarly as it does in English as well.

• Saya mau minum es jeruk atau es lemon teh.
  “I want to drink orange juice or iced lemon tea.”

Unlike in English, it’s not considered acceptable in formal Indonesian writing to begin a sentence with Dan.

3. Cause and Effect (Because)

Another useful construction to have in your arsenal is to be able to say why something is a certain way. That explanation requires the word karena, meaning “because.”

The best part is, it works precisely like its English equivalent. If you can make a sentence with “because,” you can do it in Indonesian too with karena.

• Aku tidak suka bubur karena hambar.
  “I don’t like congee because it’s bland.”
• Karena dia orang istimewa, dia punya satpam pribadi.
  “Because she’s an important person, she has private security.”

In that first example, we did see a slight difference with Indonesian: that you don’t need any linking word between “because” and an adjective. A slacker’s favorite excuse: karena malas or “because [I was] lazy!”

4. Contrasts (But)

The word for “but” has three forms, but they all work almost exactly the same way. Check this out:

• Dia mau tidur, tapi tidak bisa.
  “She wants to sleep, but (she) can’t.”

We can lengthen tapi into tetapi, and in fact, we should if we’re going to use the language in a formal way. We can even turn it into two words:

• Saya mau pergi, akan tetapi motor saya rusak.
  “I want to go, but my motorcycle is broken.”

This akan tetapi usage simply adds the meaning of “unfortunately” to your sentence. So it wouldn’t work to use it in a phrase like “I thought I won twenty dollars, but I actually won a hundred dollars!” Use the other two choices for that, and congratulations!

5. Conditions (If)

Now let’s give you the advantage I didn’t have.

Indonesian has two ways to express “if,” and those are jika and kalau.

• Jika dia tidak sampai, kita tidak bisa mulai.
  “If she doesn’t arrive, we can’t begin.”

We could swap out kalau here and it would have the same meaning. So what’s the difference? Well, you can also use kalau as a way to say “As for X…” You can’t do this with jika and keep the same meaning.

• Kalau Adi, kami tidak mau berbicara dengannya.
  “As for Adi, we don’t want to talk with him.”

Again, there’s a slight difference in formality here, where jika is the more formal/more often written of the two.

Jika can also be paired with the word maka to make an if/then statement. Kalau can’t.

• Jika ada kesempatan maka saya akan bicara dengannya.
  “If there’s an opportunity, I’ll talk with them.”

6. Consequence (So; Therefore)

Let’s mention if and then a little bit more here. As we’ve seen, we can have “if” (kalau) without any “then” (maka). What about the other way around?

For that, we’ll need the word jadi which means “so.”

• Saya sampai lebih awal, jadi saya tidak stres.
  “I arrived early, so I wasn’t stressed.”

We can use another word, sehingga, with this same meaning and a little bit of formality. But here’s where things start to get a little bit further away from English.

The word sehingga can also mean “as a result” or “to the extent that…”

• Mohon untuk menyapu lantai sehingga bersih.
  “Please sweep the floor until it’s clean (so that it becomes clean).”
• Dia makan ayam goreng setiap hari sehingga gemuk.
  “He eats fried chicken every day until he’s fat (to the extent that he becomes fat).”

7. Purpose (In order to; That)

And that meaning sort of overlaps with our next category of “in order to.” The most common word here in Indonesian is untuk, which we’ve actually seen already in this article in the set phrase mohon untuk, or “please.”

• Saya sedang belajar bahasa Spanyol untuk mencari kerja di Meksiko.
  “I’m studying Spanish in order to look for work in Mexico.”

However, the word untuk can also simply mean “for” in the sense of designating a recipient of an action, such as when giving a gift.

• Bunga-bunga ini untuk Anda.
  “These flowers are for you.”

Have a look at a new couple of words here, kepada and bahwa.

Kepada can change freely with untuk in its second sense, designating the recipient of some action.

• Aku sudah minta maaf kepada bos.
  “I already apologized to the boss.”

Bahwa is slightly more removed from English. It’s similar to the word “that” when you’re adding extra information to something. If you learn it in this particular context, it’s easy to keep in your mind:

• Dia memberitahu saya bahwa dia tidak akan lulus.
  “He told me that he wouldn’t be able to graduate.”

Non-native speakers of English should find this a welcome relief. In English, you have to change the verbs to past tense to report what someone said, but this one little conjunction is all you need in Indonesian!

8. Correlation (Not only, but also)

Fortunately, the “not only, but also” conjunction set works great when we translate it directly into Indonesian. Have a look:

• Bukan hanya Denny tapi juga Rere tiba terlambat.
  “Not only Denny, but also Rere, arrived late.”

The word juga means “also” in a broad sense, and can be used with nouns and verbs.

• Saya juga mau bicara dengan manajernya.
  “I also want to talk to the manager.”

Where English limits you from using “also” at the end of a sentence, there’s no problem with doing so in Indonesian.

• Saya mau makan dan tidur juga.
  “I want to eat and sleep as well.”

9. One More Correlation (Both)

For our last section, let’s look at the rather intricate ways that Indonesian can express the concept of “both.”

First, the way closest to English uses the word kedua-duanya, literally “the two of them.”

• Mereka kedua-duanya suka coklat.
  “They both (the two of them) like chocolate.”

But that’s not really a conjunction because we’re not connecting two sentences or clauses. For that, we’ll up the ante and use the two-parter baik…maupun.

It works the same as the English phrase “both…and”:

• Baik Ina maupun Palak suka menonton film horor.
  “Both Ina and Palak like to watch horror movies.”

This construction is stricter than in English, in that you’re limited to naming the subjects of different clauses. So that means you can’t take a sentence like “He likes both basketball and football,” and translate it with baik…maupun. You’ll need to use tidak hanya… tapi juga in that case.

• Dia tidak hanya suka bola basket, tapi juga suka sepak bola.
  “He doesn’t just like basketball; he likes football too.”

10. How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Master Indonesian Grammar

Effectively using conjunctions in Indonesian can feel like a superpower, albeit a small one. Indonesian is said to be an easy language, but all that means is that you can rapidly learn how to build sentences.

With each of the conjunctions you’ve learned today, you can build dozens of sentences with each one.

Competency in a language isn’t always expressed by how precise your vocabulary is—it’s more about how you’re able to express your ideas with the words you have. If, for some reason, you’ve forgotten how to say “if,” that expression isn’t easy!

The more you listen to and read Indonesian in your daily life, the more naturally these conjunctions and their sentence patterns will come to you. It’s all about getting used to a language. And when you do, there will be no limit to what you’re capable of.

Let us know which of these conjunctions you feel ready to start using, and which ones you’re still struggling with. We’d love to hear from you!

Author: Yassir Sahnoun is a HubSpot certified content strategist, copywriter and polyglot who works with language learning companies. He helps companies attract sales using content strategy, copywriting, blogging, email marketing & more.

It’s 9 AM.

You drive your motor scooter up to your favorite noodle soup place for breakfast, but with a cry of despair you find that it’s tutup—”closed.”

Scrawled on the sign is a phrase that you manage to make out as being “closed for national holiday.” A national holiday? How were you supposed to know?

This kind of situation is pretty common in Indonesia for foreigners. And one major cause can be traced to simple ignorance—not knowing how to talk about dates in Indonesian.

It’s an easy skill to overlook when you’re juggling a bunch of Indonesian resources to get a handle on the different vocabulary words that seem to fill the air wherever you go. But it’s no less important for day-to-day life, and as it turns out, just a little bit of studying can get you everything you need.

So without further ado, let’s look at a crash course for mastering dates in Indonesian. By the end of this article, you’ll be a step closer to giving the date in Indonesian like it’s nothing.

Table of Contents

1. Dates on Paper
2. Reading Years
3. The 13 Most Important Months in Indonesian
4. Days of the Week in Indonesian
5. Saying Dates in Their Entirety
6. Special Days
7. How to Use Dates in Conversation
8. Conclusion: How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Master Indonesian

1. Dates on Paper

Before we concern ourselves with actually reading the dates aloud, let’s make sure that we know how to recognize dates when we see them, and how to write dates in Indonesian.

Indonesia is host to an enormous variety of local languages, many of them with elaborate traditional scripts like Javanese, Balinese, and Sundanese. You’ll see these scripts around town, but you can rest easy knowing that most Indonesians are significantly more comfortable with the Latin-based Indonesian alphabet, and by extension, its Arabic numerals.

So unless you’re a specialist, you don’t have to worry about learning dates in several alphabets. (Though you should, because they’re beautiful!)

Instead, dates are written day-month-year in Indonesian, like so:

• 10-10-1910
  October 10, 1910
• 3-12-2014
  December 3, 2014

Just knowing these basic formats will significantly help you with dates in Bahasa, Indonesia and elsewhere!

2. Reading Years

Any year is read out as if it’s a large number. This may be one of the most challenging things about reading dates out loud—they’re long words!

The way you end up differentiating between numbers and dates is pretty simple. It’s mandatory to say the word tahun, or “year,” to let your listener know you’re talking about dates.

So the dates below end up being pronounced as follows:

• 1970
  tahun seribu sembilan ratus tujuh puluh
• 2015
  tahun dua ribu lima belas

Also, you may notice that tahun, or “year,” is a noun and not a preposition. Indonesians rarely add prepositions before mentioning years, like English speakers would. But when they do, they would use pada which roughly translated to “on”:

• Saya lahir tahun 1992.
  “I was born in 1992.”
• Saya lahir pada tahun 1992.
  “I was born in 1992.”
• Tahun itu Olimpiade diadakan di Barcelona.
  “In that year, the Olympic games were held in Barcelona.”
• Pada tahun itu, Olimpiade diadakan di Barcelona.
  “In that year, the Olympic games were held in Barcelona.”

To talk about certain decades, Indonesians simply add -an (a suffix that turns words into nouns) to the year.

• Saya anak 90-an (sembilan puluhan).
  “I’m a child of the 1990s.”

And what about talking about ancient history? Well, you’ll find that a lot of Indonesian texts use the acronyms CE/AD and BCE/BC. Those are read out just like normal letters—see our page on the Indonesian alphabet for that.

However, there are also common phrases for these eras, called Masehi for “AD/CE” and Sebelum Masehi for “BC/BCE.” The word Masehi is related to the word “messiah” in English, so it’s just another way of expressing the same concept.

• 250 BC
  tahun dua ratus lima puluh sebelum Masehi

3. The 13 Most Important Months in Indonesian

Thirteen? Yes, actually. It’s not on the calendar, but there’s one month here that’s very important in Indonesian culture. I bet you’ll be able to recognize it right away.

Here are the months in Indonesian.

The holy month of Ramadan occurs at slightly different times each year because it’s based on the Islamic lunar calendar. But no matter your religion, in Indonesia you’ll know when it’s Ramadan, thanks to the prominent advertisements, banners, and TV specials. Not to mention the fact that so many places close down!

By the way, don’t let the similarity of these months lure you into thinking you don’t need to learn them. If you say “August” instead of Agustus, no matter how loudly and slowly, it’s probably going to take the other person a little while to understand you, since the sounds and rhythms of the two words are different. Don’t ignore accent here!

In English and many European languages, we have to specify an ordinal number when we’re saying a day of the month. Not so in Indonesian—simply say the day and then the month, and you’re good to go. However, just like with the year, you’ll want to say tanggal, which means “date,” to specify you’re not just talking about a number.

• Saya pergi pada tanggal enam Agustus.
  “I’m leaving on the sixth of August.”

4. Days of the Week in Indonesian

Days of the week are next in our guide to dates in Indonesian. The Indonesian names for the days of the week are based on the Arabic names, so if you’ve ever studied Arabic in the past, these will be a breeze.

Naturally, the names of the days have short forms for ease of writing—better have a look at those too.

The word minggu also means “week” itself. The days are always capitalized, so you know that it’s just the ordinary noun if it appears in lowercase.

There are two commonly used words for “the weekend.” First we’ve got akhir minggu, which makes a lot of sense because it’s literally “the end of the week.” But people also use akhir pekan, for a reason you might not find in your Indonesian dictionary.

Pekan is interchangeable with minggu nowadays, but it originally came into use because in traditional Javanese and Balinese culture, a minggu wasn’t always fixed at seven days. With pekan, you always knew how many days you were dealing with.

5. Saying Dates in Their Entirety

Let’s briefly review by putting what we’ve learned all together in one phrase.

We’ll start with the day, and we’ll add the word hari meaning “day” for the sake of clarity. The word pada is the equivalent of the English word “on” when referring to dates.

• Pada hari Sabtu…
  “On Saturday…”

Then the date, the month, and then finally the whole year.

• Pada hari Sabtu, lima belas Februari, tahun dua ribu enam belas.
  “On Saturday, the fifteenth of February, in the year 2016.”

All that gets written out numerically as 15-2-2016.

6. Special Days

As we’ve seen, the word for “day” is hari. Whenever there’s a special date on the Indonesian calendar, it’s likely to be called hari something-or-other. Here are a handful of examples:

• Hari libur
  “Vacation day/day off”
• Hari raya
  “Day of celebration/holiday”
• Hari kemerdekaan
  “Independence Day”
• Hari Kartini
  “Kartini’s Day” (a famous fighter for women’s rights in Indonesia)

Whether you’re in school, on vacation, or at work in Indonesia, these days will affect you in some way. Businesses are often closed, for example, and it’s tough to know exactly when that’ll happen unless you’ve got an idea of when the libur days are on the calendar.

You can use these phrases to figure things out more precisely:

• Apa ada hari libur bulan ini?
  “Are there days off this month?”
• Apa toko ini buka pada hari kemerdekaan?
  “Is this shop open on Independence Day?”

During Ramadan, many shops have reduced hours, so you’d better find out:

• Jam berapa tutup di bulan Ramadan?
  “What time do you close during Ramadan?”

7. How to Use Dates in Conversation

So how do people end up talking about dates in real life? What are the situations and phrases you’ll need?

• Hari ini hari apa?
  “What day is it today?”

Note with the above example that you might want to use the word mana meaning “which,” but instead, it’s correct to say apa meaning “what?”

• Hari kelahiran saya tanggal satu April.
  “My birthday is April 1.”
• Idul Fitri hari apa tahun ini?
  “What day is Eid al-Fitr this year?”

Lastly, let’s briefly discuss talking about “this,” “next,” and “previous” days and weeks. It’s a total piece of cake.

Essentially, the words besok meaning “tomorrow,” and kemarin meaning “yesterday,” also function as markers for days in the future and past, respectively. So by saying “Thursday tomorrow,” depending on the context, you could also mean “next Thursday.”

• Boleh kita bertemu pada hari Jum’at besok?
  “Can we meet next Friday?”

For months and weeks in general, we’ll use the words depan meaning “future” and lalu meaning “already past.”

• Saya lihat dia di sekolah minggu lalu.
  “I saw her at school last week.”

The word besok has a particular meaning in Indonesian culture. Much like if a child wants something and the parent says “we’ll see,” saying that an activity can happen besok is kind of shorthand for “who knows when it’ll happen.”

• A: Boleh kita pergi ke Bali?
  B: Mungkin besok.

  A: “Can we go to Bali?”
  B: “We’ll see.”

8. Conclusion: How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Master Indonesian

There’s simply no better way to learn something tough than to practice it. Frequently making yourself actually sound out the dates that you see written on paper is the number one thing that will rocket your learning to the next level.

One little tip for when you can work date-study into your everyday life: when you’re handling money. Glance at the date on the bill or the coin and think “What year is this in Indonesian?” You’ll be an expert in no time.

What’s the most valuable thing you learned in this lesson? Let us know, and how you plan to use it! And to practice, write today’s date in Indonesian. 😉

And as always, check out our Indonesian Blog for more resources coming out regularly! Also keep in mind that by upgrading to Premium Plus, you can take advantage of our MyTeacher program and learn Indonesian with your own personal teacher!

Any language student is going to recognize this assignment:

Write a paragraph about your family. Say how old each person is and give their names.

Perhaps it’s a ho-hum writing prompt, but it serves a really important purpose. As it turns out, people talk about their families all the time—and they definitely ask others about theirs.

In Asian cultures, the family usually plays a much more important role than it does in Western cultures. This makes it practical to know how to talk about the family tree in Indonesian, fluently. Are you aware of all the vocabulary and usage that you’ll need in order to truly understand how Indonesians talk about their Indonesian family tree? Below you’ll find all the information you need about Indonesian family terms and the family culture in Indonesia!

Table of Contents

1. The Family in Indonesian Culture
2. Describing Your Immediate Family
3. Your Extended Family
4. New Family Members: Indonesian Love and Marriage
5. Using Family Words with Ordinary People
6. How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Learn Indonesian Well

1. The Family in Indonesian Culture

When it comes to family values in Indonesian culture, Indonesian families tend to be closer to eahc other than those in Western countries. It’s very likely that people living in a larger house might have three generations under one roof.

Also, families tend to be bigger. The average household size for the USA was 2.6 people in 2018, while in Indonesia it was 3.9 in 2013. However, more and more parents are choosing to have just two children, particularly in urban areas.

The notion of a family representing a close bond is so strong in Indonesian, that a few hundred years ago, the polite way to address someone on the street was saudara ini—literally “this sibling!”

Children are expected to be respectful toward their elders, and that respect holds true even if some family members work overseas, which many do. The sense of connection that an overseas Indonesian has to his or her own family “back home” is quite strong, and many people will make the choice to forego extra savings in exchange for being able to physically travel back to Indonesia when they can.

2. Describing Your Immediate Family

Even if we limit ourselves to just what most Westerners consider a family, don’t be surprised to find that there are quite a few more words here than you’d expect.

Let’s start with parents. A mother is called ibu and a father, bapak. I’m going to put most of the new words in this article into simple sentences so you get an idea of how these words actually work in context.

• Nama ibu Fitri, dan nama bapak Hary.
  “The mother’s name is Fitri, and the father’s name is Hary.”
• Bapak berusia 40 tahun, dan ibu berusia 39 tahun.
  “The father is 40 years old, and the mother is 39 years old.”

Now for “children,” or anak.

• Saya punya dua anak kecil.
  “I have two small children.”
• Anak saya suka susu.
  “My child likes milk.”

As is quite common in languages around the world, Indonesian doesn’t have separate words for male and female children. Thus a son is a “male child” (anak laki-laki), and a daughter is a “female child” (anak perempuan).

Indonesian words for family also describe older and younger siblings with different words. Note the words for “male” and “female” making an appearance again.

That’s about it for the nuclear family in Indonesian. But English doesn’t stop there, and neither does Indonesian.

3. Your Extended Family

The first thing most people think of as “extended” family is the grandparents. The word for “grandmother” is nenek and “grandfather” is kakek. Be sure not to confuse kakek with kakak!

Local languages all over Indonesia have their own words for grandparents, which we won’t get into. But in urban Jakarta, the words are actually opa and oma, instead of kakek and nenek. They’re holdovers from the Dutch colonial times, when certain words filtered down into the Indonesian language. Indonesian is a flexible language! Check out some of the slang words for family members when you’ve got a moment.

• Nenek di mana?
  Di belakang rumah.

  “Where’s Grandmother?”
  “In the back of the house.”

Then we naturally have “grandchildren,” or cucu. Naturally, you can add laki-laki and ­perempuan here to be more specific as well.

• Saya punya tiga cucu—dua laki-laki dan satu perempuan.
  “I have three grandchildren—two boys and one girl.”

The word for “cousin” is sepupu, and it doesn’t change based on age or gender. Any child of your parents’ siblings is a sepupu.

Lastly, in Indonesian you would call your “aunt” your bibi and your “uncle” your paman. Here there are again shades of Dutch influence, because some people continue to call their “aunts” tante and their “uncles” oom instead.

• Tante Rere bekerja di mana?
  “Where does Aunt Rere work?”

Now let’s take a quick look outside the family…

4. New Family Members: Indonesian Love and Marriage

What do you call your sweetheart in Indonesian?

Many things, probably, though one of the most common pet names is Sayang. Strangely enough, it also means “unfortunately”! Trust me, the two meanings never overlap.

When you’re in a relationship, you call your significant other your pacar, and occasionally you’ll also see the word pasangan meaning “romantic partner.” Neither of these terms is gendered, keeping with the rest of the Indonesian language.

After the wedding (the pernikahan), the two parties are suddenly called suami meaning “husband” and istri meaning “wife.” This is often considered the moment when a person becomes an adult in Indonesian culture.

In fact, there’s a common question that people ask in Indonesia that would be rather rude in Western cultures.

• Sudah menikah?
  “Are you married yet?”

Culturally, the only two acceptable answers to this are belum meaning “not yet” or sudah meaning “yes, already.” It’s either happening sometime or it already has—it would really throw people off to answer directly in the negative. Indonesians who are used to attending family reunions understand that this question comes left, right, and center.

In English, there are, of course, new names for parents after marriage—namely, the “in-laws.” Indonesian actually has words that map pretty directly onto the English equivalents, so you don’t have to do any memory games or mental gymnastics to figure these out.

One’s “parents-in-law” are known as mertua, regardless of whether they’re on the bride’s or groom’s side. And then “siblings-in-law” are known as ipar, with the same sort of freedom.

To be specific about their gender, you do the same thing we did above to describe siblings and children: add laki-laki for men, and perempuan for women. For parents-in-law, use bapak and ibu respectively instead, but you have to put them before the word mertua. Let’s clear this up with a couple of examples.

• Ibu mertua saya tidak suka kue.
  “My mother-in-law doesn’t like cake.”
• Saya punya dua ipar laki-laki.
  “I have two brothers-in-law.”

You’ll note that the structure of these words is different for each category: ibu mertua is literally talking about “a type of mother” while ipar laki-laki, since the word order is switched, means “a male sibling-in-law.”

Better get used to these family words for talking about your family in Indonesian, because they’re not going away…

5. Using Family Words with Ordinary People

Okay, here’s an extremely important part of speaking Indonesian that we’ve kind of glossed over up until now.

It’s a very normal part of polite Indonesian to use the words bapak and ibu when addressing or speaking to others.

• Permisi, Bapak?
  “Excuse me, sir?”

But building off of that, you actually use these words instead of the pronoun Anda or “you.” Generally, you’ll use a very truncated form, where bapak becomes pak and ibu becomes bu.

• Apakah Ibu mau lihat?
  “Do you (polite, female) want to see?”

And although this article is about Indonesian, we can’t bring up this point without introducing a tiny bit of Javanese. The largest of Indonesia’s cities are all on the island of Java, so people living there usually grow up bilingual in Indonesian and the local variety of Javanese (a related but different language).

Two words from Javanese appear quite constantly in Indonesian: mbak and mas. These mean “sister” and “brother” respectively, and they’re used with young people the same way ibu and bapak are used with older people.

• Halo Mas, dari mana?
  “Hey man, where are you from?”

These words are also the accepted way to call servers over at a restaurant.

• Permisi Mbak, minta bill.
  “Excuse me, ma’am, I’d like the bill.”

6. How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Learn Indonesian Well

Now you might be thinking: If you don’t personally have a handful of bibi and a couple of cucu laki-laki running around, what good is it to know all this vocabulary?

Well, for one thing, you certainly don’t need it to simply get by. Besides somebody asking if you’re an only child (anak tunggal) or not, you could live a fruitful life in Indonesia without ever talking about a sister-in-law.

But here’s the thing—Indonesians use these words like second nature. Any TV dramas, folktales, or epic poems that you’re interested in? They’ll be using these words all the time. “So and so’s brother betrayed so and so’s father, and I had to band together with my cousin to stop them!”

As I mentioned before, Indonesian family winds through Indonesian society. Being in good graces with somebody’s family is a fantastic social lubricant—they like you, you like them, everything just seems to go right when you’re together.

That can happen without knowing the language, of course. But when you go the extra mile to really understand the culture, it opens doors you could only dream of.

To learn more about the culture in Indonesia, and of course the language, visit us at IndonesianPod101.com. Read our insightful blogs posts, listen to our podcasts, and even upgrade to Premium Plus and take advantage of our MyTeacher program to learn Indonesian with your own personal teacher.

Your hard work will pay off, and you’ll be speaking Indonesian like a native before you know it! Let us know how this article helped you, or contact us with any questions.

Everybody knows about the beautiful beaches and temples of Bali. Millions of people flock there every year, and the island is developing at an incredible speed.

Did you know, though, that there’s a whole lot more to Indonesia—frequently referred to as the country of 1,000 islands—than just Bali?

And the beautiful thing for the tourist who wants to see it all is that the effort to promote the national Indonesian language has been enormously successful. The vast majority of Indonesians are perfectly bilingual in at least one local language as well as standard Indonesian.

So the visitor with Indonesian phrases for travelers under their belt gets to avoid the hassle of learning multiple local languages, and instead gets to experience the benefit of using the national language wherever they go.

And the benefits of knowing basic Indonesian travel phrases are many.

Table of Contents

1. What it’s Like Speaking Indonesian in Indonesia
2. Top Useful Travel Phrases to Get You All Around Indonesia
3. Conclusion: How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Learn More Indonesian

1. What it’s Like Speaking Indonesian in Indonesia

Before you learn travel phrases in Indonesian, there are a few things you should know.

Many language learners tend to complain that the locals switch to English instead of speaking their native language. Nobody wants that—it’s embarrassing and makes you feel like you don’t know anything at all.

It’s true, though, that if you’re in Jakarta or Denpasar and you approach someone in a Starbucks and speak broken Indonesian to them, they’re probably going to use English with you just to save time and effort on your part. Can’t blame them.

English ability is considered very trendy in Indonesia. Not only are a lot of people actively studying English at school, but popular culture in English is commonplace.

You may be wondering, then, why you should learn travel phrases in Indonesian at all! But hope isn’t lost for the learner of Indonesian. Venture outside of a built-up area and you’re likely to meet plenty of people who are far more comfortable speaking Indonesian than English.

Even in Bali, a quick motorbike ride outside the cities will bring you to small towns where you’ll have to speak Indonesian to ask for directions or get a bite to eat.

And if you speak Indonesian confidently and competently, even fluent speakers of English are likely to continue in Indonesian with you from small topics to big ones.

In particular, if you can speak some Indonesian in touristy cities, you’ll set yourself apart from the crowds of English-only visitors and bring a smile to some faces.

Now that you know a little background and context on the topic, let’s get to our list of essential travel phrases in Indonesian!

2. Top Useful Travel Phrases to Get You All Around Indonesia

1- Greetings

Naturally, when you’re going around Indonesia, you won’t want to just barge into a conversation without starting it off politely.

The most common greetings in Indonesia are based on the time of day, or more accurately, the times between different calls to prayer (known as azan, which change very slightly month to month). However, they line up pretty nicely with English equivalents, and are some of the most useful Indonesian travel phrases (everyone’s happier after a nice greeting!).

• “Good morning!”
  Selamat pagi!
• “Good afternoon!”
  Selamat siang!
• “Good evening!”
  Selamat sore!
• “Good night!”
  Selamat malam!

Once you’ve met someone multiple times, the selamat gets dropped, and just saying the time of day is adequate. You’ll notice that the vowel sound usually gets stretched out for this.

• “Good eveniiiiing!”
  Soreeeee!

When you’re just trying to get someone’s attention, the greeting isn’t necessary—just say “excuse me” and add the correct pronoun.

• “Excuse me, sir…”
  Permisi, Pak…
• “Excuse me, ma’am…”
  Permisi, Bu…

Pak and Bu are short forms of bapak and ibu, meaning “father” and “mother” respectively. The short forms are used as polite pronouns for people older than you.

If you and the other person are both young (or you’re much older), then you should use mas for men and mbak for women.

• “May I ask…”
  Bolehkah saya tanya…
• “Goodbye!”
  Sampai jumpa!

2- Shopping

Indonesia is developing fast, and in any city you go to, you’ll have a choice between shopping at smaller markets and shopping at enormous malls. Generally speaking, people working in malls have better English, but definitely don’t count on it.

In any case, it’s incredible how far you can get with just a few simple words.

• “This one, please.”
  Yang ini.
• “Thank you! Thanks!”
  Terima kasih! Makasih!
• “Thank you very much!”
  Terima kasih banyak!

Seriously, the phrases and Indonesian words for travellers above are the bare bones of any commercial interaction. What if you want to expand a little bit on what you’re trying to say?

• “I really like this!”
  Saya sangat suka yang ini.
• “This is so beautiful!”
  Ini cantik sekali!
• “Do you have a bigger size? / Do you have a smaller size?”
  Apakah Anda punya yang lebih besar? / Yang lebih kecil?
• “I’m looking for jeans size 32/34.”
  Saya mau jeans dengan ukuran tiga puluh dua/tiga puluh empat.
• “Can you make it any cheaper?”
  Boleh sedikit lebih murah?
• “Okay, I’ll take it!”
  Oke, saya ambil yang ini.

3- Dining Out

The same general advice about English ability applies to restaurants as well as other shops. The smaller and more out-of-the-way the place—and the older the person behind the counter—the less likely it is that they’ll be able to speak English to you.

You may be glad to hear that lots of menus actually have English on them, even outside of tourist areas; this fits with English being a trendy language.

The simplest way to order is to simply point at the menu. Indonesians like to put pictures on their menus, so even locals are used to pointing. When you do so, say something like this:

• “One of these, and two of these.”
  Ini satu, dan ini dua.
• “Do you want it spicy? / Do you want peppers? / How many (peppers)?”
  Mau pedas? / Pakai cabe? / Berapa?

I enjoy spicy food, but I strongly recommend that you try one or even “half” (setengah) before confidently saying that you want several peppers. The Indonesian peppers are something else!

The word pakai here is occasionally pronounced as paké, especially in Javanese-speaking areas. It literally means “to wear” and it’s used when you’re asking or answering a question about what you’d like included with your food. You’ll often hear it with the yes-no tag question, like so:

• “Add rice, right?”
  Pakai nasi, nggak?

One of the biggest tests of your listening skills is the following question, usually delivered at breakneck speed on account of its frequency:

• “For here or to go?”
  Makan di sini atau dibungkus?

After you order, the most common thing is for the cashier to simply say the price, instead of saying, for example, “the price is…” beforehand.

• “Twenty-three thousand.”
  Dua puluh tiga ribu.

Here’s an all-purpose compliment you can use after your meal, practically guaranteed to win a smile:

• “The food was excellent!”
  Makanannya enak sekali!

Suppose it wasn’t so good, though? Lots of Indonesian food isn’t far from what’s normal in Western countries, but sometimes you may be offered a particular concoction of hot peppers and marinated eggs that you’d prefer to pass on. The polite way to decline is as follows:

• “Maybe next time.”
  Mungkin lain kali.

Some people might also say Mungkin besok, where besok literally means “tomorrow.” But it’s important to know that Indonesians more often than not use it to mean “any time in the future.” This is also true of its counterpart kemarin meaning “yesterday.”

• “The restaurant that we went to yesterday (or before) was better!”
  Resto yang kita pergi kemarin lebih bagus!

4- Transportation

Taxis are becoming less and less common in Indonesia as more and more people use ride-sharing apps.

Instead of Uber, the two main ride apps are called Grab (a Singaporean company) and Go-Jek (a homegrown Indonesian venture). Both offer car rides as well as much cheaper and faster motorbike rides.

Foreigners can easily download these apps and simply pay with cash instead of using an e-wallet.

However, you may not be comfortable ordering a ride by yourself with a new app and having to communicate with the driver. In that case, simply ask someone nearby to order one for you on their phone. Better do this politely!

• “Can you help me order a Grab/Go-Jek?”
  Bolehkah Anda membantu saya memesan Grab/Go-Jek?
• The word Grab is written the same as its English counterpart, but pronounced gréb.
• “I want to go to the Hotel Omah.”
  Saya mau ke Hotel Omah.

If you’re going back to a place you know well, but your driver does not, then you’ll have to direct them a little bit.

• “Turn left here, then make a U-Turn.”
  Di sini belok kiri, terus putar balik.

There’s a great line dance song, actually, which is perfect for memorizing kiri (left) and kanan (right). It’ll stay in your head for a loooong time!

Public transit is, unfortunately, not as developed as the rideshare economy. Many bus stops are poorly marked, and it can be quite uncomfortable to wait in a bus while an endless stream of motorbikes cuts your driver off.

But they sure are cheap! Long-distance bus rides can take advantage of the new highways that are frequently being opened across Java, cutting transit time to big cities to a fraction of what it used to be.

• “Does this bus go to…?”
  Apakah bis ini pergi ke …?
• “Where can I buy a ticket?”
  Di mana bisa beli tiket?
• “I want two tickets to … please.”
  Saya mau dua tiket ke …

Remember to include a “thanks” (makasih) after even little transactions like this one!

5- Emergencies

Indonesian cities usually have a “police station” (kantor polisi) in every district, as well as police boxes on major intersections. Officers don’t tend to patrol, though speed traps are pretty common. “Private security” (satpam) is pretty common, and they may be able to help you contact authorities in times of need.

• “Where is the police station?”
  Di mana kantor polisi?
• “I have to call the police.”
  Saya harus menelepon polisi.

Each medium-sized city will have a number of “hospitals” (rumah sakit) and “clinics” (klinik), and usually at least one “International” hospital, which generally has some English-speaking staff or translators. Don’t count on this in smaller cities, though.

• “I’ve got to get to the hospital!”
  Saya harus ke rumah sakit!

At “pharmacies” (apotek) you can describe your symptoms and get “over-the-counter medicine” (obat), no problem. The most important word is sakit which means “pain,” or “painful.”

• “My head hurts.”
  Saya sakit kepala.
• “Do you have medicine for a sore throat?”
  Ada obat untuk sakit tenggorokan?

In the case of asking for things in a shop, you wouldn’t use the construction apakah Anda punya or “do you have,” but instead the construction ada…? which means “is there…?”

6- Compliments

Why are you in Indonesia, why are you learning Indonesian, and how come you speak it so well?

You’re definitely going to get questions like these. Fortunately, you can use the same stock answers every time and nobody will ever know—plus, you’ll get so good at delivering them that people will be more and more impressed!

• “I really like Indonesian food.”
  Saya sangat suka makanan Indonesia.
• “I’m interested in the culture of Indonesia/Southeast Asia.”
  Saya tertarik dengan budaya Indonesia/Asia Tenggara.

Remember that, in Indonesian, you’re interested “with” something instead of interested “in,” as in English. What would interest you so much that you’d want to learn the language?

• “I like learning languages.”
  Saya suka belajar bahasa-bahasa.
• “Indonesian is very beautiful!”
  Bahasa Indonesia indah sekali!

To be honest, compared to other Asian languages, Indonesian isn’t particularly difficult to pick up the basics in.

For that reason, locals don’t tend to lavish praise on foreigners who can speak it. Instead, the foreigner with some linguistic ability will often hear this phrase:

• “Have you been in Indonesia long?”
  Sudah lama di Indonesia?

To which you can answer:

• “No, only a few weeks.”
  Tidak, hanya beberapa minggu.

3. Conclusion: How IndonesianPod101 Can Help You Learn More Indonesian

And for those few weeks, it’s amazing what you can end up learning to say in Indonesian!

Do you feel more prepared to travel in Indonesia with these Indonesian travel phrases? Or are there still some you’re struggling with? Let us know in the comments!

Why stop here with these simple phrases? You’ll absolutely be welcomed if you stop at a little warung or “small restaurant” and ask about the food—particularly if you tell them it’s delicious.

There are plenty of foreigners who have lived in Indonesia for a long time, and just slowly picked up the language without the need for much study.

Of course, if you’re into puzzles, learning the nuances of the prefixes and suffixes hinted at in this article is a challenge for anyone.

All that goes to show that travel phrases are really just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to language knowledge.

There’s no time like the present to dive deeper, especially if you commit to a reliable and engaging language-learning program such as IndonesianPod101.

Author: Yassir Sahnoun is a HubSpot certified content strategist, copywriter, and polyglot who works with language learning companies. He helps companies attract sales using content strategy, copywriting, blogging, email marketing & more.

I remember that one of the hardest things for me when I was actually living in Indonesia was using numbers automatically.

Anybody can count through the numbers to ten in Indonesian—you can pick that up on the plane ride over.

When you actually have to use these Indonesian numbers, though, things are probably a bit more tight. It’s probably hot, and there’s probably somebody behind you in line who doesn’t care at all that it’s your first time in an Indonesian restaurant.

Can’t you just feel their gaze on the back of your head?

Well, probably not, because Indonesians are famously polite and patient. Nevertheless, it’s not a situation you want to be in. You want to have those numbers down pat.

And the best way to learn numbers in Indonesian is to have a good solid review. So, what are the numbers in Indonseian and how can you use them?

Let’s go over numbers in Indonesian, starting from square satu.

Table of Contents

1. The Number System – Zero to Ten
2. Numbers 21 – 99
3. Bigger and Bigger Numbers
4. Ordinal Numbers in Indonesian
5. Phone Numbers
6. Prices
7. Using Prices and Numbers as Conversation Starters
8. Conclusion

1. The Number System – Zero to Ten

If you’re new to Indonesian numbers, you’ve got a lovely surprise coming. The counting system in Indonesian is extremely simple and regular, perhaps more so than the vast majority of systems around the world.

Indonesians use the Arabic numerals widely seen all over the world, even in a traditional script like Javanese or Balinese. Only in the most formal or ritualistic occasions will you ever have a chance to see the traditional numbers in Indonesian written out, and so we won’t cover them here.

Here’s how to count in Indonesian:

Now let’s have a look at counting in Indonesian beyond that. First we’ll look at the names for the numbers themselves, and then we’ll examine something that can trip up a lot of first-time learners.

So go back and look at “ten” there, sepuluh. Look familiar?

In Indonesian, when we count “one of” something, we almost always use the prefix se- instead of saying satu in front of that thing.

And instead of having unique words for most numbers like in English, or saying the equivalent of “six ten four” (64) like in Chinese, Indonesian is actually counting how many of each “digit place” you have. Let’s look at an example.

So the root behind “ten” is puluh, and therefore when we have “one ten” we’ll say sepuluh. Belas is a little harder to find an analogue in English. If you want, you can think of it like “one ‘tens place’” but to be honest, simply memorizing these words may be just as effective.

The important thing is that you keep sepuluh or “ten” and sebelas or “eleven” separate in your mind. That should be easy once you take the next step:

2. Numbers 21 – 99

You’re now ready to make all the numbers in Indonesian up to 99. They follow a simple pattern, best explained through example:

• tiga puluh — “thirty”
• tiga puluh satu — “thirty-one”
• empat puluh dua — “forty-two”
• enam puluh enam — “sixty-six”
• delapan puluh lima — “eighty-five”
• sembilan puluh sembilan — “ninety-nine”

As you can see, we’re now counting puluh, so “four ten two” is the way to say “forty-two.”

That’s all we have to do all the way up to 99, and even beyond!

3. Bigger and Bigger Numbers

Remember that satu puluh and satu belas always combine into sepuluh and sebelas. This pattern continues all the way to a billion! The second pattern of simply stating the numbers in order also continues uninterrupted.

• seratus — “one-hundred”
• seratus dua puluh sembilan — “one-hundred twenty-nine”
• seribu — “one-thousand”
• seribu tiga ratus empat puluh lima — “one-thousand three-hundred forty-five”
• sejuta — “one-million”
• semiliar — “one-billion”

Remember that miliar is much, much bigger than “million” in English. After miliar, Indonesian borrows internationally-used words for the absurdly large numbers.

Since they’re not as widely used, you don’t need to turn satu into a prefix anymore. Simply say satu quintilliun and people will understand perfectly. For writing numbers in Indonesian for all of the rare and huge numbers out there, go ahead and check this handy guide for the spelling rules.

English uses “millions” or “hundreds” as shorthand for saying the exact number when something is “a lot.” How can you do that in Indonesian if words don’t have plural forms?

All you need is the suffix -an. Observe:

• Ratusan orang di Bandung tinggal di Jalan Srikandi.
• “Hundreds of people in Bandung live on Srikandi Street.”

The equivalent of “dozens,” then, is puluhan, literally “tens.”

• Puluhan mahasiswa mengisikan jalan-jalan Jakarta.
• “Dozens of students are filling the streets of Jakarta.”

That’s not the only thing we can fix to Indonesian numbers.

4. Ordinal Numbers in Indonesian

Ordinal numbers (first, second, third, etc.) are an absolute breeze in Indonesian. Let’s get “first” out of the way first:

pertama — “first”

This word can comfortably fit after any noun, like so:

• Ini mobil pertama yang saya punya.
• “This is the first car I’ve had.”

After that, we simply add ke- as a prefix to any other number and get the ordinal form. Here’s a full list.

When writing out numbers in text, especially big ones, that ke- is attached to the digit with a hyphen.

• Ini abad ke-21. (kedua puluh satu)
• “This is the twenty-first century.”

5. Phone Numbers

The phone number system in Indonesia is quite different from that of Western countries. Many people have two phones, or a phone capable of dual SIM cards. You keep one number for actually placing calls, and have another phone for data. Then you swap out your data card every few months with a new one after it expires. Don’t worry, this is simple and easy at any phone store.

Phone numbers begin with the country code +62, then a city/region code, then a personal phone number that can vary in length. Some are ten digits, and some are eleven, depending on when you got your number and if it’s a mobile or landline.

Enough cultural notes for now, though. Let’s look at the language.

The first big difference in how to say numbers in Indonesian is that the number “zero” is read as kosong (literally “empty” when translated) when reading out phone numbers.

The second is that “eight” (delapan) is often truncated to lapan. If you’re not expecting it, it can really throw you off!

Here are a couple of phrases you can use to ask people for their numbers.

• Apa nomor teleponmu?
• “What’s your phone number?”

• Nomorku kosong empat lima…
• “My number is zero four five…”

• Maaf mbak, satu kali lagi — kosong empat lima apa?
• “Sorry miss, one more time — zero four five what?”

Unlike in English, each number is read out individually, not combined into two-digit numbers.

English and Indonesian have a couple of false friends when it comes to talking about phones. A “SIM card” in English is not a “SIM” in Indonesian; that’s what they call a driver’s license. To buy a SIM card, you’ll need to ask for a kartu ponsel.

Similarly, a mobil in Indonesian might sound a lot like “mobile phone” in English, but it’s the word for “car.” A cell phone is called HP, read as if you’re simply reading out the letters. It’s also known a little more formally as a ponsel, short for telepon selular or “cellular telephone.”

6. Prices

Indonesia uses the rupiah, which is currently at around 14.000 to the US dollar. There are coins and bills, divided into several sizes as follows.

• seratus rupiah — “100 rupiah”
• dua ratus rupiah — “200 rupiah”
• lima ratus rupiah — “500 rupiah”
• seribu rupiah — “1.000 rupiah”
• dua ribu rupiah — “2.000 rupiah”
• lima ribu rupiah — “5.000 rupiah”
• sepuluh ribu rupiah — “10.000 rupiah”
• dua puluh ribu rupiah — “20.000 rupiah”
• lima puluh ribu rupiah — “50.000 rupiah”
• seratus ribu rupiah — “100.000 rupiah”

What a list! It might seem overwhelming now, but it’s the same numbers we’ve been working with all through the article.

When you go shopping or ask for the bill in Indonesia, people say these numbers fast. Interestingly, it’s just as common for people to say the equivalent of “thirty-five” as it is for people to say “thirty-five thousand rupiah.” Some people will be explicit and some not, but you’ll pick it up fast enough to avoid being confused for too long.

By the way, it would be a good idea for you to practice speaking that list aloud at natural speed, just so that when the opportunity to talk about money comes up, you won’t feel lost for words. Here are some phrases to help you along:

• Berapa harganya?
• “How much is it?”

• Harganya seratus tiga puluh enam ribu.
• “The price is one-hundred and thirty-six thousand.”

• Berapa?
• “How much?” (a little more informal)

• Kok mahal!
• “Whoa, that’s expensive!”

• Bisa lebih murah tidak?
• “Can it be made cheaper?”

• Bagaimana kalau seratus ribu dua puluh?
• “How about one-hundred and twenty thousand?”

• Delapan puluh, boleh tidak?
• “Eighty-thousand, how about it?” (informal)

One more word you should be aware of is pas. It means “just right” or “exactly.” You’ll hear it more often than you use it, which is when you give exact change. Have a look at this exchange:

Clerk: Enam puluh ribu lima ratus rupiah, mbak.
“Sixty-thousand and five-hundred rupiah, ma’am.”

You: Enam puluh ribu… ah, punya lima ratus.
“Sixty-thousand…ah, I’ve got a 500.”

Clerk: Pas, ya?
“Exact change.”

You’ll notice that I threw in a little mbak there, which is essential to understand when you deal with people in the service industry. It’s a little filler word used for politeness, and even though I’ve translated it as “ma’am,” it isn’t nearly as formal as the English equivalent.

The intricacies of these pronouns deserve a lesson all of their own, but I’ve included them here because they may confuse you if you’re listening intently for numbers and nothing else.

In short, men will hear bro, mas, or pak, and women will hear sis, mbak, or kak depending on their ages and locations in Indonesia. You should do your best to match that polite pronoun when speaking in return.

7. Using Prices and Numbers as Conversation Starters

There’s a lot to be said for language practice in unlikely places. When I lived in Indonesia, I used convenience stores as one of my main sources of conversation practice—without wasting anybody’s time.

In Indonesia, you’ll probably find yourself in convenience stores a lot because they’re air-conditioned and they have cold drinks. Usually, there’s a sale on with a big MURAH! or “cheap” sign next to it.

Your mission is to ask about the terms of the sale, especially if it might be something you’re interested in. Can you buy water bottles by the case? Is one brand of toothpaste deeply discounted? Ask about these things in Indonesian!

Then, to really get numbers in your mind, think out loud as you weigh the pros and cons of participating in the sale. Not only does this give you more time in the air conditioning, it also gives the clerk an opportunity to check your math.

You: Empat puluh ribu, lima kotak, jadi sepuluh ribu sekotak.
“Forty-thousand, five boxes, that’s ten-thousand a box.”

Clerk: Maaf pak, sebenarnya delapan ribu sekotak.
“Sorry sir, that’s actually eight-thousand a box.”

8. Conclusion

The single best way I’ve found for actually learning the meanings of numbers in other languages is to force myself to use them. I know it’s really, really easy to just skip over them when you read, and automatically convert the digits to your native language in your head.

When you do that, you’re robbing yourself of the practice you need.

All it really takes is a couple of minutes of practice every so often—probably the only part of language-learning that can be so described!

As you go through your IndonesianPod101 lessons, ask yourself what the lesson numbers were in Indonesian. As you browse through Indonesian news or Twitter, check the dates of the articles, if not the numbers in the articles themselves.

Every little bit helps, and the more you do it, the better you become.

Are there any Indonesian numbers or number-forming rules you’re still confused about? Let us know in the comments, and we’ll do our best to help you out!