Parody Website That Lets You ‘Thank’ Indonesia For 11 Months Of Clean Air Returns
After a few years of respite, the haze has returned to Singapore.
Last Saturday (7 Oct), the Pollutant Standards Index (PSI) showed that the air quality had entered the Unhealthy range.
Since then, there has been some improvement, with the PSI moving into the Moderate range yesterday (8 Oct).
However, bad air quality is not the only thing the haze has brought back, as a parody website that allows people to thank Indonesia for ‘clean air’ has also returned.
The website first went live in 2015 and has a red button that visitors can press to express their ‘gratitude’.
Indonesia has been ‘thanked’ for clean air over 22 million times on website
Users can visit the website at its straightforward URL: thankyouindoforthecleanair.web.app.
One look at the webpage immediately brings back memories of customisable Friendster profiles, thanks to the generous use of the Comic Sans font and jarring colour palette.
At the top of the page are three flags: Singapore’s, Malaysia’s, and, of course, Indonesia’s.
Below the flags is an intermittently flashing text that reads ‘Thank you Indonesia for the clean air!’ and a counter indicating Indonesia has been thanked over 22 million times.
However, the highlight of the webpage has to be the big red button visitors can click on to ‘thank’ Indonesia.
Below it is another counter that tells the visitor how many times they have personally thanked Indonesia.
Upon pressing the red button, a voice will yell ‘thank you’ and play what appears to be a horn cover of Indonesia’s national anthem.
Website was inspired by former Indonesian vice president’s controversial remarks
The website’s origins can be traced back to 2015 when then-Indonesian Vice President Jusuf Kalla reprimanded neighbouring countries for complaining about the haze.
Instead, he felt they should be grateful for being able to enjoy clean air most of the time.
According to The Straits Times (ST), he said, “For 11 months, they enjoyed nice air from Indonesia, and they never thanked us.”
The controversial statement led to the birth of the original website, which also allowed visitors to leave messages thanking Indonesia.
Interestingly enough, the website was also a giant walking billboard for N95 masks.
The website footer contained a copyright disclaimer stating that it was the work of the ‘Awesome Company’.
Furthermore, a clickable banner would lead visitors to an Amazon page for N95 masks.
Four years after its inception, the website went dark in 2019.
Thanking Indonesia For 11 Months Of Clean Air Is No Longer Possible Because The Website’s Down
New website was set up by an Indonesian
With the return of the haze, the website has now risen from the dead, and we have an Indonesian to thank for it.
Scrolling to the bottom of the page reveals that Indonesian citizen Dania Rifki is behind the relaunched version.
Aside from lacking a section for notes and a glaring advertisement, the website is faithful to the original for all intents and purposes.
She has also provided a link to the source code, which would likely enable other coders to keep it alive should this iteration go dark as well.
Fun and games aside, this is your daily reminder to mask up if you need to step outside today.
Hopefully, the haze will not stick around for much longer.
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Featured image adapted from thankyouindoforthecleanair.web.app.
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