You'd never know it, but just above Darwin and sort of to the left, around Bali, there are 17,000 islands floating in the Indian Ocean with roughly 240 million people living on them. Grouped together, this rising economic powerhouse and cultural kaleidoscope is called 'Indonesia', and it's the fourth largest country in the world. In fact, Bali is part of this 'Indonesia' place.
I mention this, and the archipelago's vague location, because Australia seems to have forgotten that Indonesia exists, and that there's more to it than Bali, Balibo, Bintangs, and bombings. We forget Indonesia at our own political and economic peril, not to mention at great loss to our culture.
Indonesian Vice President Boediono flew home to Jakarta on Monday after a five-day state tour of Australia that made a negligible blip in the Australian media. The neglect is not surprising. While Australia is a daily staple of Indonesian political and media discussion, back in our great barren land Indonesia rarely rates a mention.
It can be hard to understand why such a cultural and political silence surrounds all things Indonesian. After all, Indonesia is important to us in myriad ways. It's tipped to become one of the world's ten biggest economies by 2015 if growth continues apace.
Beyond the current Australian stock of investment of around A$4.8 billion, Indonesia has the potential to push forward drastically in the ranks of our most important trading partners in coming years. Not to mention the 13,990 Indonesian students who bring close to A$500 million into the economy annually.
Indonesia is also a transit country for asylum seekers heading for our shores. While Australia talks 'off-shore' solutions and pours funds into Indonesian detention centres through international organisations, the Indonesian government struggles daily with the flow of people fleeing Iraq and Afghanistan, where Australia is busy waging the wars that asylum seekers are desperate to escape.
It's no coincidence that Australia's diplomatic mission to Indonesia is the biggest we have in the world, and the archipelago is rightly the largest recipient of Australian aid: an estimated A$458.7 million went there for the 2010–2011 period alone.
Despite Tony Abbott's clumsy attempts to cut the aid flow, Australia has a deep and abiding interest in promoting Indonesian development and education, especially as it moves to consolidate its new democracy. Our nearest neighbour, the world's third largest democracy, and the biggest Muslim one, Indonesia is a vibrant example to developing countries everywhere.
But in