Thilma Komaling, adalah sahabat dekat saya yang sedang mengikuti summer course di LONDON, beberapa tahun yang lalu mima (panggilannya)pernah menjadikan saya objek untuk tugasnya, dan inilah tulisannya.. Thank you girl.
A cheat sheet for dreamers
Closing in on his tenth year in radio broadcasting industry, Anto Nugroho finds it compelling to share the stories of hundreds of people he had met, their sayings and achievements, as both entertainment and inspiration to his thousands of listeners.
Anto Nugroho, 29 was born and lives in Jakarta. He is a host of a lunch-hour music program which plays top-40 tracks for Motion Radio, a leading radio station in Indonesia under big media group named Kompas.
Seven years ago, he was just one undergraduate of Communication Studies who had his apprenticeship as program producer in Female Radio, Jakarta who happened to be the producer who had the liberty of having the-now-President of Indonesia to tell the story of him falling off a mango tree in a radio show.
On the morning of July 23rd 2003, when the presidential candidate, Mr. Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, came to studio of Female Radio Jakarta, at Ratu Plaza Office Building to speak as a guest at the stations’ Your Morning Coffee show – there was naturally a big hassle over security procedures.
Two days before the show, the offices of Ratu Plaza on Sudirman Street, Jakarta as home for more than 400 offices on the main business district, had to go through a vigorous security check whereupon all offices in the building were temporarily shut down while a group of presidential security personnel canvassed the area for any foreseeable threat. In effect, they also placed 2 snipers on the rooftop to ensure top level security.
Mr. Yudhoyono is known to be very selective in giving media interviews, especially when the subject concerns his personal life rather than the presidential office he currently serves. But that morning he had agreed to an interview at Female Radio Jakarta to honor Indonesia’s National Children Day. And he talked, at length, about his childhood.
“We were lucky,” says Anto Nugroho, the former producer of Your Morning Coffee show at Female Radio Jakarta.
It was the perfect opportunity for Mr. Yudhoyono, who was running for the presidential office (2004-2009), whose campaign had been very intense and outspoken toward the public, to reach out to his masses. But it wasn’t until he sat down for a talk Anto has prepared that he earnestly opened up to the public by answering candidly all the questions addressed to him. At the end of the show, the then would-be president even had chosen his own playlist.
Anto had never dreamed of being the first and only radio producer in the country to win Mr. Yudhoyono’s heart.
“He called me 30 minutes before the show aired to praise my children’s tales program at the station. He said he listened to it and liked it. I felt honored and proud,” Anto recalls one afternoon this week, while he was broadcasting.
At the age of 13, Anto wanted to become a singer. He formed an indie band with his junior school mates and got the chance to drop their demo cd to Prambors Radio – the number one youth radio station in Indonesia in the 90’s. Then he thought of working in radio station as the most sensible way to reach his dreams.
Finding a middle course to his vision, Anto broke up with his band and applied for an internship in Female Radio Jakarta in 2001. Later, he observed himself and found out that being a singer and an announcer had something in common. “It’s not just the music, it’s like storytelling. Ultimately I like to listen to people and be listened. The beauty of this profession is to be the first one to know”, explains the father of a 2-year-old girl.
“At my shows, announcer and interviewee; they had to listen to me, the producer. I’m the boss at that very hours, regardless their position and status; even the president.” he reaffirms.
Nevertheless, after nearly a decade of working in the radio industry, Anto is well-supplied with plenty of stories to tell. He had interviewed more than 300, from top CEOs to janitors, politicians to street performers. Most of his guests and interviewees are influential people, but some fall on the ordinary, though he admits all of them have made an inspiring feature to share.
“I have been very fortunate to have met with some of the most influential people in the country. And I’m proud to have learned from Mr. Ali Sadikin, the former Governor of Jakarta, who told me, ‘A coward will always be a coward to the day he dies, that to make a difference in this world is a difficult, yet worthwhile, thing to do,” says Anto.
Currently as an announcer and producer, Anto is running a 3-hour-show at Motion Radio from Monday to Friday, boasting an audience of more than 16,000 listeners a day.
He describes himself after 10 years of work, his life is like a thick book that contains stories, notes and opinions of people, and if it were the case, there will be a question of who would he dedicate the book to and why. He said, “I’d dedicate it to dreamers everywhere, as a cheat sheet.” He giggled.
© Thilma Komaling, January 2009
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