www.kompasiana.com/Gaganawati

Gaganawati Stegmann

Gaganawati

Gaganawati

Gana Stegmann was born in Semarang. As a fifth daughter to an artist’s couple; a wayang-puppet shadow player (Dr. Drs. KRMH Setyadji Pantjawidjaja Sastraningrat) and a sinden, Javanese traditional singer (Dwi Suharsini, S.Pd), she gets a talent and chances to dance some traditional dances time to time. Therefore, she has travelled to 20 countries and organized some Indonesian nights in Germany in 2013 and 2016, some photos exhibitions in Indonesia in 2013, 2015 and 2016.

Her unforgettable 11 years experience in life was as a radio broadcaster at Jatayu FM and Smart FM. Both were situated in Semarang. Those radios let her learning how to read, talk and write.

Actually, she had already started to write articles in a regional buletin since she was 19 year old. Her first book “I Can Run (Part I)“ was published in 2001. Later, she moved to Germany with her family and still looked for a chance to continue her writing as a hobby.

Finally, this full time housewife has more passions to write articles and books. Since 2011, she has been writing a lot of articles. At least 5 from around 1075 articles were posted in Freez-a supplement to Kompas daily newsletter. Moreover, she was nominated as “the best citizen journalist in 2013“, as “the best citizen journalist“ and a “Kompasianer of the year 2014“. Kompasianival Award is an annualy program organized by Kompasiana.com and the members. What a lucky time!

The alumni of Post Graduate Programe-State University of Semarang was luckier. In 2014, her application as a teacher to a Volkshochschule in Tuttlingen, South of Germany was accepted. It makes her enjoying more times with German community and let her really settled in Germany. However, Indonesia is always in her heartbeats.

Life isn’t always going to be rainbows and butterflies. Her scripts were ever refused by a major publisher, Gramedia. One day, one of them was rewritten by Budi Maryono and published as “Bertahan di Ujung Pointe“ in 2015. Her new releases in 2016 are “I’m Happy to Be 40“ and a tour guide book “Exploring Germany“. She is also collaborated with some communities in Kompasiana (Kutubuku, Fiksiana Community, Rumpies) to write 15 antologies. “Together, we are strong.“