Thought

I grew up in a place where dreams were not something people chased. They were something people learned to live without. My childhood was shaped by routines that revolved around staying afloat, keeping up in school, and helping my family manage whatever came next.

For years, discussions about mangrove restoration along the Indonesian coastline have been guided more by intuition than investigation. We hear familiar claims repeated almost with ritual certainty: mangroves protect our villages, guard our shores, and must be planted everywhere before coastal damage becomes irreversible.