KAMPUNG INGGRIS IN A NUTSHELL

by Irsan Ardiyansyah

as ordered by my dad

Who doesn’t know Kampung Inggris lying in Pare, Kediri Regency? I am sure that most of students at least have heard Kampung Inggris. Before explaining about my experience when I was there, I am going to explain what Kampung Inggris actually is by telling its brief history.

In 1977, Kampung Inggris was founded by Mr. Kalend Osen, the founder of the first course in Kampung Inggris called BEC (Basic English Course). Mr. Kalend Osen was a student from Kutai Kartanegara who studied in Modern Boarding School Gontor, Ponorogo, East Java. Long story short, he left the school because he couldn’t afford the tuition. In that situation, his mate advised him to learn to KH Ahmad Yazid who mastered eight foreign languages. Afterward, he started to live and to learn in Darul Falah Boarding School, Singgahan Village, which is owned by KH. Yazid. Mr. Kalend started to teach when two students from IAIN Sunan Ampel asked them to learn English in order to pass their examination. Two months later, surprisingly the students reported that he passed their examination. After that success, people-to-people promotion happened and it became the beginning of the first class in the history of Kampung Inggris Pare.

Mr. Kalend has struggled for about ten years to organize BEC and at last in the 1990’s many BEC’s alumnus are motivated to found their own English course to accommodate a number of students that wanted to study in Kampung Inggris. The development of the courses increases more and more up to now.

Now, in Kampung Inggris, there are about 500 English courses teaching many skills of English such as grammar, speaking, pronunciation, etc. and also preparation for test such as TOEFL, IELTS, TOEIC, etc. And, each courses has different advantage in skill, and if you want to take programs there, you have to ask people who have experience and knowledge about some courses before. For example The Daffodils is a well-known course which has more competent in speaking skills. It is different from Kresna which has more competent in grammar skills.

Commonly, every courses obligates the students or members to speak English. And if you are in Pare, you can see many people presentating in the public space such us café, food stale, curb and other hustles in order to develop members’ self-esteem in english speaking skill.  

Because of its popularity, Kampung Inggris is able to open business opportunities for the locals so you can see foodstale, café/restaurant, camp, boarding houses built by the villagers around Kampung Inggris. Not only those business, but the locals also establish other needs of the comers such as bicycle and motorbike rent, souvenir store, and travel agent, etc. in order to support learning process and learning environment for the comers coming from various regions of Indonesia or even from other countries. All day long we can see people (commonly teenagers) travel to the course or their homestay by bicycle or on foot while bringing bag or just carrying books.     

When I arrived in Pare, at March 27^th, I felt confused. I have never gone to this kind of place while a lot of people learn and study to reach their dreams through learning English. It was about 9 months staying in Pare, Kediri Regency and I feel the time flies faster than usual. I met many friends from many regions of Indonesia, from Aceh to Papua with various backgrounds and various ages. Because of that meeting, I felt comfortable more and more.

When I was there, I didn’t stay in one place. I stayed in three different places because of my need. My first is Gaza Camp. My brother told me that Gaza Camp applies the strict rules for its member. There is 24 hours speaking area in every single place in that camp. As a Gaza Members, we have to obey the rules, so that if we are not obey the rules, we will get jumping into the river which is near from that camp or become “blacker” which means you have to do everything what your friends want such as making a cup of coffee, cleaning their room, etc. 

Otherwise, the Gaza Camp has two programs in a day, firstly after dawn prayer at 5 am and secondly after maghrib prayer at 6 pm. Everyday has different topic such as speaking, grammar, reading Quran in thursday night and gathering for all of camp’s members in friday night. Those activities are new for me because I’ve never felt those habitual before. I’m sure that those new activities are able to train us to be more discipline and more diligent.

I felt very different habitual between in my home and in the camp. In my home, most of the time I stay up in midnight for doing anything which not really useful for me such as watching football, watching youtube and many things. But when I came to Pare, time by time those habitual changed. In 11 pm I’ve already felt sleepy because many activities start from 5 am until 6.30 pm. Otherwise, I took morning program in course at 5.30 am, it means after waking up at 4 am, immediately I prepare for the my programs. And then sometimes I took a nap after morning program. I don’t know why I don’t like to take afternoon program. It’s very seldom for me to take program in afternoon because some reasons, such as the weather in Pare is hot so that make me lazy to have programs in afternoon. So, mostly I took programs around 5.30 until 12 am.

My pronunciation tutor, Mr Nurmahmudi told me that, You could get at least three things in Kampung Inggris. Firstly, you will meet many friends because a lot of people come from many regions. One period in Kampung Inggris is two weeks and every period you will meet and will acquainted with other people. So, it means I have met hundreds of people when I was there. With many friends, I could share one another about our programs, homestay, purposes and many things. Secondly, you will definitely get new knowledge, not only about English but also experiences because of your meeting with other people from other regions and other backgrounds.  Thirdly, you will get new habitual. Common transportation to mobilize in Kampung Inggris is a bicycle. I used to see many people move and travel by cycling to run their activities. Bicycle is a common transportation that is used by every single person to travel from one place to another place. That is what I did as well. To afford a bike, you should rent it with various prices by paying around Rp 50.000 to Rp 150.000. It depends on bike condition or bike type. There are three types of bike namely sepeda kumbang (having a basket in its frontage and used commonly by the students), fixie bike (having little wheel) and mountain bike.

I was lucky. When my brother, Reza, was in Kampung Inggris, he bought a second fixie red bike for Rp 500.000 in the bike rentals. So I did not rent a bike as my brother gave me his bike to me. Although the distance between my camp to my course is so far, I liked cycling, because in my opinion, cycling can make me healthier.

During staying in Pare, I took many programs in many courses. The program I took when I first came to Pare is Grammar in Kresna. Grammar is highly significant for basic learner because it is basic from all English skills such as speaking, writing, reading and listening. In my opinion, it  is useless if you just directly study about speaking or other skills before understanding grammar first. To make a foundation the other skills, firstly I focused on grammar for 4 months having 4 levels started gradually from Basic, Pre-Intermediate, Intermediate and Advanced. After I spend 4 months in grammar, I continuously took speaking programs in many courses in the Daffodils with directly taking intermediate speaking class. I was feeling lucky because I stayed in camp obligating all members to speak English so I am able to practice my speaking skill by using methods and theories I got form the speaking programs. To improve my speaking skill, I used to learning by myself through movies, youtube and music. Those are the common ways that every tutor usually suggests in order to make his or her students understand more easily.  

  After finishing my speaking program, I focused on TOEFL program in Elfast. At that time, I took TOEFL Camp program facilitating its students to stay in Elfast’s Camp so that the students are totally able to focus to the program. Because I have studied grammar, it was not too difficult for me to grasp the TOEFL’s structure materials. I just had to learn more about listening and reading comprehension.

Then, I spent my last month to take private writing class. For me, writing skill is the important one which can be highly needed for long term learning process. If you go overseas for your post-graduate or work, you definitely need this skill to support your career. This writing class was taught by Mr. Musa. He is a well-known tutor in Kampung Inggris in writing skills. It is proven that some people said that he reached band score 9 in IELTS’ writing section.

In Pare, you will be faced with the best tutors having finished their post-graduate in overseas universities. For example Miss Jun having been teaching grammar for writing, TOEFL and IELTS for fifteen years. Even though she is an alumnus from one of United States’ universities, instead she made her own course. She prefers to teach rather than to work in the other place. And she always imagines someday her students can go overseas for studying like she used to do.

Another tutor I have met is Mr. Ahdan. He is a Sundanese having passed his master degree in Leiden University, Netherlands. Due to his work hard and motivation, he was able to continue his master of law there. It can inspire many people specifically his students in Leiden Institute, the course he made. Although he is a master of law, with his passion, he is also able to master various English skills. The good thing that he has is recommending his students to use many book as reference in order to make his students compare the books and avoid misconception in learning English process. The more references we read, the more understand we are.
When I needed time to refresh, sometime I used to travel to Malang because I have a cousin living there. The weather of Malang is colder than that of Kediri. Malang is surrounded by four big mountains such as Mount Bromo, Mount Arjuna Mount Kawi and Mount Semeru. Because it lies in mountainous area, Malang and Batu have many tourism places to be visited. We can say Malang is the favorite one for whoever wants to refresh and to calm down their mind.   

By this writing, I try to ask people wanting to study at least more than 6 months. You should sacrifice your time to do this thing in order to be focus in learning process. If you just spend less than six months, you will get less English knowledge also. Then, because of the supporting environment, it is highly recommended for all circles or all backgrounds wanting improve their English skill to reach their dreams such us continuing the study, looking for better job or even just refreshing.

That is all of my short story or short review about Kampung Inggris. Hopefully this short review is able to be beneficial for all. Thank you.