Indonesia Language

The official language in Indonesia is Bahasa Indonesia, which is similar to the Malay language, but has been influenced by Sankrit, Tamil and Chinese because of interactions with these cultures through trade in centuries past.   People who speak Indonesian can generally understand people who speak Bahasa Malayu (from Malaysia ), but there are differences in pronunciation, spelling and volcaburary between the two national languages.

The Indonesian words are written in the Roman alphabet.    
Many among the population also speak the dialect or language of their own region, such as Sundanese, Balinese and Javanese.   It has been said that there are as many languages and dialects as there are ethnic groups in the country, and Indonesia has over 500 different ethnic groups. 

The existence of different dialects and languages is the result of the historical development of the country, which has for several thousand years been made up of regional kingdoms under rulers from different cultures and these kingdoms often traded with different outsiders.