NewsTracker Answers for week of Sep. 06, 2021

Q: Deprived of the food usually provided by the tourists who have been kept away by the coronavirus, hungry macaque monkeys are raiding villagers’ homes on the Indonesian resort island of Bali. Where is the Southeast Asian island nation of Indonesia?

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Q: The raiding macaques are coming from the nearby Sangeh Monkey Forest sanctuary, which relies on tourism. Indonesia banned all foreign visitors to Bali this year because of the pandemic. Bali attracts most of its foreign tourists from what large nation south of Indonesia?

A. Australia

B. China

C. India

D. Japan


A. Australians still make up most of Bali’s foreign tourists, but the numbers of Chinese visitors to the island have risen quickly. China, India and Japan are all well within the Northern Hemisphere. Indonesia straddles the equator and shares a maritime border with Australia to the south.


Q: Macaques and humans have lived in proximity since prehistoric times and are frequently found at religious sites throughout Southeast Asia, including one in the Monkey Forest. What is the majority religion on Bali?

A. Christianity

B. Buddhism

C. Hinduism

D. Islam


C. Bali is the only Hindu-majority province in Muslim-majority Indonesia, with 86.9% of the island population adhering to Balinese Hinduism. Ranking as the world’s fourth most-populous nation, Indonesia’s more than 17,000 islands have more Muslim residents than any other country in the world.


Q: Bali was one of the last islands of what is now Indonesia to be conquered and colonized by which European nation?

A. Britain

B. France

C. Germany

D. Netherlands


D. Dutch ships first came to the islands in the late 1500s, and the highly profitable spice trade led first to the Dutch East India Company and later the Dutch East Indies colony. The Netherlands had political influence over Bali, but it did not completely defeat the island’s royal Hindu rulers until 1908.


Q: Tourism has made Bali one of the wealthiest regions in Indonesia. Before the pandemic, what caused the biggest problem for tourism on the island?

A. Earthquakes

B. Bombings

C. Cyclones

D. Volcanoes


B. Islamist suicide bombers struck Bali in 2002 and 2005, severely reducing tourism and producing great economic hardship. Indonesia suffers frequent earthquakes and has 130 active volcanoes. Bali’s Mount Agung began erupting in 2017 and is considered a likely site for a massive eruption within the next 100 years.