I'm John Dutchel with my good colleague Gordon Chang at Gordon G. Chang, and we're visiting

with Charles Ortel, who's been our colleague for many years. He now lives on the island of

Penang in Malaysia, a series of islands through between the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. He is traveling in

Indonesia. And when we move from Malaysia, 35 million people to Indonesia, 285 million people and

growing, we're dealing with a scale that is critical to understand. Charles, your measure of the last 12 days for Indonesia, which has a nascent and prospering

manufacturing sector, I believe, but also a very demanding population.

Is the story different from Malaysia Malaysia or is it the same?

Well, I think Malaysia, and I'm sorry, Indonesia, which I've now spent some time traveling

through over the last 12 months, is a very exciting place that to me harkens back to America, let's say, after 1945 or in the early 60s.

This is, as you point out, a large population.

I've been to remote places.

I've been to big cities.

The population is growing.

Manufacturing, you're absolutely right, is coming into Indonesia in force.

There are many attractive, duty-free, and relaxed tax zones scattered across this vast country of many islands.

On the other hand, there are a large swaths of Indonesia are barely discovered at this point.

So there's a thriving tourist industry. There's a beginning to be the kind of real estate investing

that you like to see people moving out of environmentally challenged places into new developments

where the price points are low enough that workers can actually

rent and or buy.

So, you know, I think Indonesia is set to take off now.

It has immense natural resources.

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