Writing Feedback / The recognized greatness of a political leader is coming from his ability to take up the challenges [2]

TASK: The perceived greatness of any political leader has more to do with the challenges faced by that leader than with any of his or her inherent skills and abilities.

Recent years, few political leaders are being spotlighted by media from over the world. They are known from their success on their program to overcome problems of each country. Their perceived greatness of that leader is, some of them believe, coming more from their ability to take up the challenges than their personal traits like inherent skills and abilities.

Foremost, society wants the real actions from political leader to solve their problems. Consequently, they will look on whether the leader is succeeded on their duties or not. Thus, people will not look at the leader's personal traits as the benchmark to indicate the successfulness of that leader. Beside that, taking up the society's challenges requires a lot of experiences. The experience to tackle such problems wil be gained as the matter of time. Furthermore, maturity also comes as the factor of the greatness of leader. The ability to control emotion and to look from other perspectives will help the leader to solve the problem in an acceptable way. This also will lead to create trust from society to the leader. So that, it is not all about their traits that influence their performance but the experiences do.

On the other hand, inherent skills and abilities are only part of factors that create good political leaders. Generally speaking, these traits are only a basis of making desicion and should be molded by time and experience. If we can not upgrade that skills, we will be seen as "a trapped man in the box". As this is only the basis, leaders should have more experience on facing problems, be able to tolerate more on different type of people and also need to meet more and more people to increase their ability on negotiation. Again, there is a factor that may exceed how people see the greatness of political leaders.

In conclusion, we can say that it is truly believed that challenges faced by political leader make more role on their perceived greatness of leader than their inherent skills and abilities. These can be logically proved by these days many political leaders such as Barack Obama, Angela Merkel, and Joko Widodo, the president of Indonesia, are being well perceived by their people because they can tackle some problems their people face, such as how Angela Merkel can save Germany from Europe Financial Crisis, how Obama can improve US economy, and how Joko Widodo can solve infrastructure problem in Indonesia.

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Writing Feedback / [IELTS Task 2] Working Parents: Discussing Effects on Additional Income and Parents' Absence [2]

In today's competitive world, many families find it necessary for both parents to go out to work. While some say the children in these families benefit from the additional income, others feel they lack support because or their parents' absence.

Discuss both these views and give your own opinion

I need some advices for responding these problems. I am afraid that I am not addressing all the problems on the body so my task response will be low.

Nowadays, lifestyle can be so consuming. Some families in middle class society try to catch up that kind of lifestyle. As consequence, the parents of that families decide to work, both of them. Regarding to this, some say that the children will enjoy the additional income while others say that they will lack of the absence of parents. This essay will discuss on both views and try to give opinion about that.

Some people may think that children will enjoy the additional income from their parents. Then, children will have better facilities, such as gadgets, books, accommodations, and etc. So that children will feel more comfortable and easy to live. However, money does not guarantee children's happiness as children need attentions from adult. In addition, children may feel so lonely with all that facilities and try to find attentions from others in both positive or negative ways.

For others who think that working parents will lack of control from parents, this will have benefit and drawback as well. By lack of parents' absence, children will be more independent since they decide everything by themselves. This should be encouraged to prepare our children to face the reality. In contrast, this also may lead to uncontrollable children so that parents do not have ability to give advices or to correct their children's behaviour.

In nutshell, working parents leads to two views to be discussed, namely beneficial effect of additional income and lacking of parent's absence. Children of working parents will benefits better facilities but that facilities does not always define the happiness of children. Therefore, by looking of parents' control, children will be more independent but parents may find it difficult to advise and to control their children. In my opinion, both of parents should work nowadays but they should coordinate each other to take care of children so that parents will show their good ability in parenting.

Writing Feedback / [IELTS Task 2] Expressing Ideas by Creative Artists: Freedom and The Role of Government [2]

Creative artist should always be given the freedom to express their own ideas (in words, pictures, music, or film) in whichever way the wish. There should be no government restrictions on what they do.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?

Some countries in this world control their artists to express their idea, like North Korea, to strengthen their ideology. In the other hand, some democratic countries let their artists to exhibit their works. By these facts, some people believe that creative artists should express their ideas freely in words, pictures, music, or film and let them do it without government's restrictions. Regarding to this issue, I believe that it is the right way to let them expressing their idea without any limitations.

One of the prominent reason is that expressing idea freely is a form of basic human rights, freedom to speak. This right has been included in many bills around the world. In Indonesia, its constitution has guaranteed the freedom to speak for all Indonesians. By restricting creativity, innovation will be inhibited and development of every aspect will be stuck in the middle. Regarding to these logics, it has been a role of government to preserve human right and they should respect each person's right, especially freedom to speak for creative artists.

Another reason is that expressing ideas can be a tool of controlling governments. Usually, artists get inspiration for their works from the voice of people, trying to expressing what people want from government. In Indonesia, Iwan Fals, a singer, used his songs to shout out the criticisms to Soeharto regime. Pramoedya, a writer, did the same by using his novels. It is believed that these actions can be valued as balancing power of government so that government will not do anything necessary.

To conclude, I personally strongly agree that artist should express their ideas freely without any restrictions from government due to some reasons, such as the basic human right and efforts for balancing the power of government. In addition, we should encourage the actions to be a freer world for any kind of expressions and take actions to fight back the restrictions towards creating creative works.

Writing Feedback / Cars Ownership and Traffic Jam: Examples and Measures - [IELTS TASK 2] [2]

Car ownership has increased so rapidly over the past thirty years that many cities in the world are now 'one big traffic jam'.
How true do you think this statement is?
What measures can governments take to discourage people from using their cars?

In several decades, the structure of society is becoming more complex than we can ever imagine. This phenomenon leads to the increasing of mobility of society. Consequently, the need of private car is booming. Moreover, many cities are suffering from 'one big traffic jam'. Regarding to these issues, I believe that the statements are true and government should take some measures to overcome this problem.

Looking at car ownership, developing countries experience high growth of sales of cars in recent years. Obviously, by the low growth of road construction, there will be worse traffic in big city, like Jakarta. In Jakarta, people everyday face traffic congestion on peak hours. Around the globe, the same situation happens in Beijing and Mexico City. By these examples, we may say that the rapid growth of car ownership leads to horrible traffic congestion.

If we take a look on the measures that government should make, I personally propose the measures that will give disincentive on buying a new car or an additional car. Logically, government may charge tax to the company so the price of the car will be higher. The alternative option is to tax the owner of the car, taxing for the initial car or for the additional car. In the other hand, government may regulate the price of gasoline higher so that the maintenance cost of having cars is relatively high. These kinds of effort will be disincentives for citizens on having cars.

To sum up, there are many proofs that the increase of car ownership has consequence on traffic congestion. To solve this problem, government may have three options, including charging tax on company, on the owner of car, and rising up the cost of maintenance of having cars. If this problem is not solved soon, this will seriously get worse year by year.

Writing Feedback / [IELTS Task 1] Analysing Map of School from 1950 until 2010 [4]

The pictures illustrate the changes of West Park Secondary School from the initial construction from 1950 until 2010. We can see that changes occurred a lot in sixty years but the school remained the same.

In 1950, the school was constructed near the main road in the right side of the map. In the left side of the school, three typical houses stood there. Behind the houses, there was a farmland. Thus, the playground was behind the school and on the right side of the farmland.

In 1980, there were few changes in the surrounding of the school. The school building in 1950 became the main building of school in 1980. The houses changed to science block and car park. In precisely left side of the main building, there was a squared science block and the rest was car park. Moreover, the farmland turned into sport field and the playground remained the same.

In 2010, few changes occurred if we compare to situation in 1980. The car park was larger, taking over the sport field in 1980. Then, the sport field was moved to the right side of previous one, replacing the partial of playground. Consequently, the playground was narrower than of that in 1980. For the main building of school and the science corner, they were the same as in 1980.

Writing Feedback / [IELTS Task 1] Consumer Spending on Several Items (Cambridge IELTS 7) [2]

The table illustrates the consumer spending on different items in several countries in Europe, 2002.

Looking at Ireland, that citizens consumed food/drinks/tobacco nearly one-third of their total spending, followed by clothing/footwear and leisure/education for the least, and Turkey did as well. Italy, Spain, and Sweden allocated their spending on refreshments below 30%. Each countries shared their spending on fashion and leisure/education less than 10% and 5%, respectively.

From the perspective of items, Turkey spent the most for refreshment and leisure/education among the five countries. Moreover, Italy loved fashion the most regarding to the highest share of their spending than that of other countries.

All in all, each countries spent the most on refreshment, continued to fashion and leisure/education for the least. Therefore, Turkey was the highest spending on refreshment and leisure/education while Italy did on fashion, compared to other countries.

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