Tourism in Cisarua Changes the Culture of Local People:

Study of Culture Acculturation between Local Community and

Arab Tourist in Cisarua

Suzy Azeharie and Eko Harry Susanto

Faculty of Communication, Tarumanagara University, Jln. S. Parman No. 1, Jakarta, Indonesia

Keywords: Tourism, Cisarua, Culture, Arab Tourists.

Abstract: International Organization for Migration placed boat people from Vietnam in Cisarua, Puncak, West Java

Province in late 1970s. Afterward, the refugees from in-conflict countries such as Afghanistan, Syria and

Iraq are also placed in Cisarua. Since the early of 1990s one by one tourist from Arab countries have come

to Cisarua. They come from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and others. The numbers have risen

day by day and some get married with local women. In general, they stay in Cisarua for two or three

months. To meet the needs of Arab tourists, slowly, the indigenous people who are ethnically Sundanese

and traditionally live from the agricultural sector, turned into service providers. They run kiosks and stalls

which provide the daily needs of the tourists. Local residents also open barbershop, stalls selling telephone

credits, Arabic food store, and car rental. They also become goat sellers, maids, chauffeurs and many more.

This paper will discuss how Arab tourists in Cisarua change the culture of local people.

1 INTRODUCTION

Tugu Utara Village in Cisarua, Bogor District, West

Java Province, is known as the tourism destination

for tourists from Saudi Arabia and some Arab

countries as well as tourists from African countries.

Refugees from conflicting countries, such as Iraq,

Syria and Afghanistan also settled there. According

to kompas.com, there are 1,000-1,500 tourists

recorded to visit the village per day. Of the number,

90% come from Saudi Arabia (Triana, 2016).

The visit of Arabian tourists makes great change

and the local people are very responsive to take

advantage of the opportunity. Tugu Utara Village

right now is known as "Arab Village."

This article will see how the visit of Arab tourists

has changed the culture of local people in Cisarua.

2 LITERATURE REVIEW

One of the researches carried out in Kampung Arab

is a research conducted by Mia Amalia. She

examined the Criminal Acts of Prostitution in

Connection with Moral and Efforts to Overcome at

Cisarua area.

She revealed that with the arrival of immigrants

and Arab tourists, the prostitution business also

grew. Therefore, the government should be more

active in seeking solutions to this problem, such as

eradicating prostitution bravely in brothels (Amalia,

2016).

Other studies were carried out by Siti Sarah

Maripah on the phenomenon of contract marriages

in Bogor. She said that in the last two decades there

had been a phenomenon that makes the practice of

marriage as deviant behavior. The phenomenon is a

marriage between Middle Eastern tourist with a local

woman accompanied by specified period agreements

or so-called marriage contract in Puncak (Jurnal

UPI, vol 6 no.2, 2016).

2.1 The History of the Arab Village in

Cisarua

A reason why Tugu Utara Village becomes Arab

village, according to the interview with Village

Head Asep Ma'mun Nawawi, was for the placement

of immigrants under the management of the

International Organization for Migration (IOM) in

Cisarua. The organization has been operating in

Indonesia since 1979 when Vietnamese refugees

Azeharie, S. and Susanto, E.

Tourism in Cisarua Changes the Culture of Local People: Study of Culture Acculturation between Local Community and Arab Tourist in Cisarua.

DOI: 10.5220/0008488400760080

In Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Entrepreneurship and Business Management (ICEBM Untar 2018), pages 76-80

ISBN: 978-989-758-363-6

were forced to flee their homes by war. By boat,

they arrived in Tanjung Pinang, Riau in massive

number. Some of refugees were placed and trained

in English language in Tugu Utara Village before

they were allocated to third countries. Currently

activities of IOM have been moved to their offices in

Tangerang Selatan, Banten Province.

2.2 Tugu Utara Village

Kampung Sampay or known as Arab Village is

located in Tugu Utara Village, Cisarua, Bogor

District with total population of 12,000 people

consisting of 5,683 men and 5,344 women. There

are 3,250 household heads and of them 120

household heads are single parents. The domestic

product from Tugu Utara Village comes from the

sector of agriculture and trade, hotel and restaurant

(Prodeskel, 2017).

The arrival of Arab tourists occurred in 1990s. In

the beginning, there were a few tourists who visited

Cisarua. The Arab people can be distinguished in

two categories. The first is those from Saudi Arabia,

Qatar, United Arab Emirates and other countries in

Arab peninsula. The second is immigrants who

become refugees from in-conflict countries such as

Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.

One can easily differentiate them physically

because the first category of the tourists will walk

together with their wives and children. The wives

wear dark color dress with purdah. The mode of

transportation they used when they stay in Cisarua

area is rented cars. And they rented these cars for

months.

Meanwhile, the second category is immigrants.

They usually walk on foot in a group of people.

Their skin is lighter if compared to other Arab

tourists. After living in Cisarua for long period of

time, generally immigrants dressed more casually,

wearing t-shirt and short pants.

Arab tourists like to stay in Desa Tugu Utara

because the place has cool air, lush with many green

trees and lots of rain. These are things that cannot be

found in the country tourist origin.

3 RESEARCH METHODS

The research method used in the research is

qualitative method, i.e. the researchers will focus on

their attention to the process and not just to the

outcome or product (Yin, 2008:1). The research

method can be grouped through proper method uses

in analyzing the research object depending on

(Nazir, 2005:66), i.e. the type of research question,

controlling the researcher to do to behavior events to

be researched and focused on the research

phenomenon. The phenomenon is divided into

contemporary phenomenon that occurs and the

historical phenomenon, which is phenomenon in the

past or those that have occurred for many years ago.

Data collection methods used in this study are in-

depth interviews with two key informants,

observations directly to Cisarua, and literature study.

4 DISCUSSION

Since the 1990s Arab tourists began to arrive at

Cisarua. The arrival of Arab tourists slowly began to

change the lives of local people who are Sundanese.

Cisarua is located in the valley of Mount Gede

Pangrango. Therefore, the land is very fertile.

Accordingly, the villagers are farmers and live

from the sector of agriculture. Before Arab tourists

visit their village, majority of local people have the

livelihood source from the sector of agriculture.

They plant tomatoes, cabbages and beans as the

favorite foodstuff in the village.

Along with the time and also with the increasing

number of Arab tourists coming to their area, the

local people slowly change their livelihood system

into service providers.

Figure 1: Travel agent office with arabic language.

Various kiosks and stalls are built to meet the

needs of Arab tourists such as barber shops,

restaurants, internet stores, the live goat selling,

rented cars and many more. Local people also

provide "hadamah" or maids who will assist the

daily activities of the Arab tourists.

After having intense interaction with Arab

tourists, the hadama learn Arabic in a self-taught

way. They are able to speak Arabic very well and

will work as long as the tourists stay in Indonesia.

They work for Arab tourists for 10 days to two or

three months depending on the length of tourists’

Tourism in Cisarua Changes the Culture of Local People: Study of Culture Acculturation between Local Community and Arab Tourist in

Cisarua



stay. Their wage is around Rp. 250,000 per day or

equivalent with $ US 17.

As has been said above, there is a change in the

lives of Cisarua people. Changes not only happen to

the livelihood system but also to other cultural

elements, for example in the use of language.

It is not difficult to meet people who can speak

Arabic. Local people who open kiosks or stalls

speak Arabic. They learnt Arabic in a self-taught

way. It is seen when I asked a peddler to mention

names of food in his kiosk in Arabic. He was able to

speak fluently the names of foods sold in Arabic

such as omelet, stir-fry beans, stews tofu, fried

tempeh and others.

Almost all kiosks in Tugu Utara Village have the

nameplate of their kiosks and stalls in Arabic. This

is in line with Samovar opinion which stated

language is another feature that is common to every

culture. The importance of language makes Samovar

say that without the capacity to understand complex

language then the human culture as it is known

today will not exist (Samovar et al., 2010).

According to Asep Ma'mum Nawawi, almost

99% mosques in Desa Tugu Utara built from the

donation from Arab tourists. Donations come from

individuals or foundation. It ranges from Rp. 500

million to 1.5 billion. The donor may request the

existing mosques to be demolished and the new

mosque was built in the place of origin of the old

mosque.

In addition to the emergence of shops, what

interesting is the rise of local residents who sell

goats intended to meet the needs of Arab tourists

who really like side dishes from lamb.

Goat sellers can be found easily in the street of

Tugu Utara Village. They build goat cages in the

street bank. Arab tourists will buy and eat goat every

day.

When the research was carried out, there were

some cars stopped in front of the live goat sellers

and bought some goats in Ciburial area where

tourists from Middle East mostly stay.

I could see goat cages built and the tourists could

see the cages effortlessly. For Arab people, they

only eat goat meat while its offal is discarded. It

differs from local people who process the goat offal

as soup or “gule”.

At a kiosk that sells foodstuff, maryam bread, the

Arabian bread, was sold. Roti maryam is usually

served with kari kambing (mutton curry). Besides,

candy onion boxes can be seen easily in front of the

kiosk. Arab people like to eat candy onion. We can

also see shisha, the multi-stem instrument for

vaporizing and smoking Arabian tobacco (dokha)

exposed at the kiosk.

Figure 2: Arabic language nameplate in kiosk.

Moreover, along the street in Cisarua, there are

many Arabian cafes. The activities in the cafes make

heavy traffic jam in the area every day. Therefore, to

facilitate the mobility of Arab tourists who live in

Cisarua, the villagers build roads in the village in

self-support way.

This is in line with the opinion of Stewart L

Tubbs and Sylvia Moss who say that because

intercultural communication is increasingly

prevalent and widespread therefore the effects of this

cultural contact take place even more quickly (2005:

259-260).

In addition, the system of knowledge that local

people have also changed. For example is on the

food aspect. As many restaurants sell Middle East

food, such biryani rice or kabsa rice, local people

start to like the Middle East food. Biryani rice is a

delicious savory rice dish that has wonderful taste. It

is habitually eaten with mutton roast or baked meat

with pickles, raisins and fried onions. Furthermore,

there is kabsa rice as well. It is cooked from rice

imported specially from India named basmati rice.

The Kabsa has reddish form from tomatoes. It is

usually eaten with mutton roast. Some restaurant

chefs in Cisarua come from Turkey.

Figure 3: Kiosk that sells shisha.

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Asep Ma’mun Nawawi admits that he himself

like the Middle East food after he ate the food.

People are also getting used to providing biryani rice

when they hold a celebration.

What William A. Haviland says is true that

culture is a learning outcome and not a biological

heritage (1999:338). The situation shows that the

process of cultural acculturation occurs in local

communities. Acculturation can be defined as a

process of cultural change from the result of contact

between groups of people with certain cultures with

gradual and continuous stages without losing the

element of their own culture or the personality of the

culture (Koentjaraningrat, 1990).

The religion system does not seem to have any

changes. Apparently, local people and Arab tourists

embraced the same religion that is Islam. It means

that religious values they obey are similar and their

religious practices are also similar.

In the aspect of arts, there is no Arab culture as

the part of acculturation in Kampung Sampay.

Therefore, there is no form of arts from Arab

impacted to the Sundanese arts. It is due to

Sundanese values their local form of arts highly.

Different things happen to the Muslim

community of Jaton, Tondano, North Sulawesi.

Because they are categorized as a minority group in

the North Sulawesi Christian community, the culture

they embrace is the culture of North Sulawesi

(Azeharie, 2017: 3).

After visiting Cisarua, the tourists will continue

their journey to Lombok. They like to visit Lombok

because Lombok is known as a destination for halal

tourism.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Since the arrival of tourist from Arab countries to

Cisarua in early 1990s, gradually some cultural

changes have occurred in Sundanese-ethnic

community in Cisarua. The influence of Arab

tourists is apparently strengthening of local people's

economic activities.

Acculturation occurs between local community

and Arabs with the main reason related to economic

needs. In addition, because of the religious similarity

between them, the local people make tourists feel at

home in Desa Tugu Utara.

The arrival of Arab tourists to Kampung Sampay

causes the economic growth in the village. It also

opens new jobs and replaces the existing livelihood

system in the village.

ACKNOWLEGMENT

I would like to thank the village head of Tugu Utara

Village Asep Ma’kmun Nawawi who has been

providing lots of data.

REFERENCES

Amalia, Mia (2016). Analisis Tindak Pidana Prostitusi

Dihubungkan Dengan Etika Moral Serta Upaya

Penanggulangan di Kawasan Cisarua.

Azeharie, Suzy (2017). Enkulturasi Budaya pada

Masyarakat Jaton, paper presented at Conference on

Media, Communications and Sociology, Atmajaya

University, Yogyakarta.

Haviland, William. A (1999). Antropologi, Penerbit

Erlangga, Jakarta.

Maripah, Siti Sarah (2016). Jurnal Hukum Mimbar

Justitia, Fakultas Hukum, Vol.2, No.2. Universitas

Suryakencana.

Moh. Nazir. (2005). Metode Penelitian, Jakarta: Ghalia

Indonesia.

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http://print.kompas.com/baca/metropolitan/2016/01/12

/Negeri-Timur-Tengah-di-Puncak-Raya.

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Website IOM:

https://www.iom.int/countries/indonesia.

Koentjaraningrat. (1990). Sejarah Teori Antropologi II.

Jakarta: Universitas Indonesia.

Prodeskel Desa Tugu Utara, 2017.

Samovar, Larry A, Richard E. Porter, and Edwin R

McDaniel. (2010). Komunikasi Lintas Budaya (edisi

tujuh). Jakarta: Salemba Humanika.

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Communication: Prinsip-Prinsip Dasar.Bandung:

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Jakarta: PT Raja Grafindo Persada.

APPENDIX

Suzy Azeharie was born in Jakarta, Indonesia

November 8

1959. She graduated from Padjadjaran

University, Bandung Indonesia in the field of

Communication and then continued her studies at

ISS in The Hague, Netherlands and got a Master of

Arts degree in the field of Woman and

Development. Then she continued to Murdoch

University in Australia with research in the field of

Humanities and received a Master of Philosophy

degree.

Tourism in Cisarua Changes the Culture of Local People: Study of Culture Acculturation between Local Community and Arab Tourist in

Cisarua



Eko Harry Susanto was born in Pekalongan,

Indonesia on April 4

1958. Graduated from Gadjah

Mada University in the field of Social and Political

Science. Master degree from University of

Indonesia, Jakarta Indonesia in the same field then

continued to Padjadjaran University, Bandung

Indonesia and received a Doctor of Political and

Social Science degree.

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