Since the past month, the hashtag #kaburajadulu has been circulating widely on social media, especially X. This hashtag voices the desire of Indonesian netizens to move abroad. Many discussions using this hashtag have revealed tricks for obtaining work visas, job vacancy information, and comparisons of living costs.
As did Yoel Sumitro, an Indonesian citizen who now lives in Berlin, Germany. At the end of January 2025, he tweeted content comparing working at technology companies in Singapore, Amsterdam, Tokyo, Berlin and Dubai. He also includes visa opportunities, salary, living costs, job opportunities and food. Don’t forget, the hashtag #kaburajadulu is included.
When contacted by Kompas, Thursday (6/2/2025), from Jakarta, Yoel, who used to work at a well-known online travel agency in Jakarta, admitted that he had lived in Germany since September 2022. He took a resident/high skilled worker visa under the Blue Card policy. The Blue Card policy is intended for highly qualified foreign workers.
“Living and working abroad was not in my childhood dreams. However, when I grow up, I want to experience and gain the skills to lead teams from various countries,” said Yoel, who comes from Surakarta, Central Java.
Yoel actually still wants to return to Indonesia and has dreams of working again in Indonesia. However, every time there is news about the Indonesian government’s policies or executions that are lacking and frustrating, he feels like he has lost hope of returning to Indonesia again. He gave an example of the policy for private employees who have to contribute to Tapera.
“It’s hard, because on one hand, I still love and have hopes for Indonesia, but on the other hand, I feel like my love for Indonesia is often unrequited. Worse than unrequited love. It’s like we want to care for one person, but in return we get beaten up by the person we love,” he said.
Yoel, who participated in the #kaburajadulu discussion, said that the hashtag showed frustration over government policies and socio-economic conditions in Indonesia. Based on his observations, every time there was a blunder in the government’s policy discourse, the hashtag became popular again.
Another Indonesian citizen, Ardianto Satriawan, is currently applying for a permanent residence visa to the South Korean Government. As a doctoral researcher, he feels that living and working in South Korea has more advantages than disadvantages. He then gave an example, his child had a high fever and almost lost consciousness so he needed to be treated in the emergency unit (UGD). The treatment was fast and his social security has been integrated with his identity card, taxes, and salary.
Another example, when his wife was pregnant and gave birth, the South Korean government provided subsidies for pregnancy check-ups and the delivery process. This subsidy reduced the costs he had to pay.
The cost of living is still reasonable, only 30 percent of the local monthly regional minimum wage (UMR). A very decent wage with the same working hours enjoyed, while still having plenty of time with family.
“With the same skills, the same working hours, and the same effort, working abroad gets more decent facilities and wages. Lecturers who are doctoral graduates in Indonesia can be paid below the minimum wage, while abroad their skills are highly valued. It is natural that people want a better life by shouting #kaburajadulu,” said Ardianto.
Another Indonesian citizen, Ibrahim Arief or familiarly called Ibam, who has moved five times, feels that amid the hype of the hashtag #kaburajadulu, moving and living abroad needs to be viewed in a balanced way. According to him, not always living abroad automatically has a better impact than living in Indonesia.
“Throughout my career, I have moved five times, so I feel that moving to another country always requires careful consideration and is not just about whether or not I can get any job offers. In the past, I helped a friend apply for a job as a software scientist in the Netherlands. However, when it was time to sign, he withdrew because he felt it was hard to be separated from his family,” said Ibam, who was Vice President of Engineering at Bukalapak in 2016-2019.
Furthermore, Ibam continued, after the Covid-19 pandemic, the technology industry “winter” phenomenon occurred so that the demand for digital talent globally decreased. On the other hand, there is a trend of technology companies implementing remote work so that foreign employees do not need to migrate.
Kitabisa Co-Founder and CEO Vikra Ijaz, who had lived abroad for eight years, said that every country has policies that can be better or worse than in Indonesia. At that time, he and his family applied for a resident visa to study.
“There are many testimonies and opportunities that are open in other countries that are considered more promising to provide a better quality of life for oneself and one’s family. Meanwhile, in Indonesia, there are symptoms of public frustration towards government policies that are considered not on their side or not present to protect the people. I observe that this situation is the trigger for the birth of the hashtag #kaburajadulu,” said Vikra.
According to Visiting Senior Fellow Yusof Ishak Institute (ISEAS) Singapore Yanuar Nugroho, the #kaburajadulu phenomenon is a response from a number of Indonesian citizens, especially young people under the age of 40, who feel that the living situation and conditions in Indonesia are getting worse, more difficult, uncertain, and unclear.
Such emotional responses are triggered not only from an economic perspective, such as the difficulty of finding work, the lack of job security/guarantee/certainty, and poor social protection systems, but also social, political and environmental issues.
“This young generation feels that the glue of living together or social fabric is no longer there. They consider the situation in Indonesia to be increasingly individualistic, selfish, and increasingly seeking their own security. As a result, they feel there is no sense of security, even for living normally,” said Yanuar.
From an environmental perspective, he observed, the younger generation of Indonesia is actually increasingly sensitive and critical of environmental issues, ranging from pollution, environmental damage, to waste. They are disappointed because the quality of life in Indonesia from an environmental perspective is very bad. All of that culminates in the political aspect.
The election did not produce the leaders they had hoped for. Yanuar suspects that some young people may have chosen the current political leaders, but the results of their choices were disappointing. For example, policies that are burdensome but fickle, there are policies that tend to be wrong, political promises that burden everyone, and even bureaucratic approaches that are nonsensical such as budget cuts without thinking, which disrupt the performance of ministries/institutions and public services.
All of these disappointments accumulated and made these young people fed up with continuing to live in Indonesia. In addition to the hashtag #kaburajadulu on X which has recently been trending, he observed that memes have actually been circulating for quite some time with the words “why was I born in the Republic of Indonesia”.
“The point is the same, that is, they can no longer stand all the absurdity of life in Indonesia. Moreover, when they know that many rich countries need new citizens because their populations are aging, such as Japan and several Scandinavian countries. Many have tried their luck there,” said Yanuar.
The phenomenon of a number of citizens of a country fleeing abroad is not new. Other developing countries, such as India, Pakistan, Vietnam, and several African countries, have experienced similar phenomena, especially when the country was still in a difficult situation until the late 1990s. The motivation to leave at that time was to seek a better and safer life.
“Meanwhile, currently, from those countries that have developed and are more advanced, the motivation of young people to go abroad is more to seek new experiences and opportunities, besides there are still political motives. In the United States, after Donald Trump was re-elected as president, there was also a phenomenon of a number of young people choosing to flee, especially to Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and the European region,” he said.
Lecturer of International Relations at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, University of Indonesia, Suzie S Sudarman, added that a number of students in her class now also have an orientation to want to go abroad in line with the #kaburajadulu discussion at X. According to her, the trigger is the elite struggle that is not for the sake of improving the living conditions of the Indonesian people, but only wants to seize positions in order to collect money.
The phenomenon of power that does not empathize with others began abroad, which was hit by a fiscal crisis in the 1980s. At that time, all social assistance was cut by the authorities because the system that provided welfare was considered a burden on the government.
“The same condition is now happening in the United States. If it has become a style in Western countries and we follow it, even though it is not the right time, it will lead to a decline in welfare levels,” said Suzie.
He added that the #kaburajadulu discussion and phenomenon were not entirely related to the war between socio-economic classes. Most Indonesian citizens who decided to leave Indonesia simply wanted to enjoy fair laws.
