Something I realized this past summer, as I was galavanting around the country with Jon (and i wonder if you've noticed), is the fact that I have unintentionally but, nevertheless, consistently excluded writing about my experiences teaching here. I've relayed some humorous anecdotes from the pesantren, and I've hinted at the character of certain staff members at my current school, but I don't think I've even once mentioned what it's been like for a math major to suddenly change focus, submit the grades of 15 Jefferson Community College algebra finals, and only two days later leave the University environment altogether to begin teaching English in an Indonesian high school. This is my job here. I don't know how, but I guess sometimes I forget about that.
My intentions are not to convey that teaching is an unimportant part of my time hear, but it is apparent that I have chosen to embrace the ultimate goal of the Fulbright Program, rather than thinking of myself exclusively as an English teacher. It's easy to make all my experiences very much my own, especially since AMINEF does very little to monitor my progress or accomplishments. Last year I felt I was put into an almost impossible situation as a conversational English teacher, so I chose to focus on different aspects of the grant. I made life-long friendships with the people in my community and I know almost all the local foods, in which they take so much pride. I could have stressed about planning futile lessons with students who just don't speak English, and I could have taken relieving vacations every weekend; that would have been no problem and likely no less rewarding. My pesantren students very well could have been able to speak better English at the end of 10 months if that was the route I had taken. However, I relaxed, and I used my inherent influence as a foreigner in a village that hasn't seen a white resident since Dutch imperialism (which is very far from a joke). I made impressions in my own way. I coasted through my classes, acting like a clown, relying on my humor and facial expressions, and I passively improved my students' motivation to study English; however, I actively tried to increase their curiosity about life outside a traditional village. Last year, the role I played in Guyangan was very far from “English teacher,” but I felt that I maximized my experience, even though my prescribed title was “English Teaching Assistant.”
That being said, my situation this year is a far cry from what I went through last year. There are plenty of similarities, but I have to deliberately look for them because I'm already used to Indonesian high school norms. There are plenty of defining characteristics that almost all Indonesian schools possess simply because of culture. For example, neither of my schools have a cafeteria; both are built around a courtyard, and they have open-air classrooms, which are consequently subject to an number of regular disturbances. Educators in both environments tend to value quiet mouths, unconditional respect for teachers, and memorization more than they appreciate interactive environments, fostering independent thinking, and problem solving. That's just the culture of secondary education in this country. However, the organization and administration of St. Yoseph is much closer to that of an American high school than Raudlatul Ulum (YPRU), which never pretended to be anything other than a conservative madrasah. There are two assistants to the head master at St. Yoseph, one for curriculum and another who is the dean of students. They both have a significant amount of pull, and their suggestions to Sister Modesta are always taken into consideration. I've seen arguments between administrators arise and then be calmly and diplomatically resolved, leaving no party at any significant loss. At YPRU, I only saw consequences for those who intentionally (or unintentionally) “crossed” Mr. Humam.
Mr. Humam is a brilliant Individual, a moving public speaker, and a convincing politician. I found myself laughing at his speeches before I had any idea what he was saying. The fact of the matter is that he is a highly effective community and religious leader, who just so happens to own and operate a school. And it just so happens that he has some strong opinions on how that should be done. Ultimately, he had total control and no control over the school at the same time. He demanded the obedience of staff, teachers, and students, but he was constantly making presentations in Jakarta, Semarang, and Surabaya to various ministries of religion and local governments for grant money. His presence was seen only half the time at the pesantren, and when he was gone, problems simply went unresolved until his return. If an administrator or teacher were 95% positive that he could handle a dispute on his own, then that 5% of uncertainty was more than enough to forgo the risk of possibly disappointing the Kyai. Consequently, the curriculum was lacking, teachers' schedules constantly conflicted, and the key to the copy room remained in one man's possession, whether he was present that day or not. My students there were raised with the fear of Allah, and rarely did I have anything resembling a disciplinary issue, but the national examination at the end of the year was a collective and excused cheat-fest that I doubt excluded a single sole.
I don't know yet if rampant cheating is commonplace at my new school or not, as it seems to be pretty normal in most Indonesian high schools, but I can't imagine that it happens to the same degree at St. Yoseph as it does at most others. Of all the schools I've visited in this country, having had the opportunity to travel to other fulbrighters' sites, I've not yet seen a single other institution staffed with a workforce of entirely full-time employees. I've yet to see another school with mandatory time-cards. And I've never seen another teachers' office with personally assigned spaces and desks sporting ornamental name-plates. My fellow teachers all have college degrees and seem to be pretty motivated to plan lessons in advance. This is unfortunately not always (usually?) the case. When teachers put in effort, they are obviously more likely to be disappointed in students who don't take them seriously. But teachers who don't even put in time to plan their own classes don't have the right to be let down by a student's lack of motivation. In most cases, teachers in this country simply don't push their students because they, themselves, were never pushed to excel by their own teachers.
My new colleagues are an entirely different breed from the devout group who sat and lectured endlessly at my old school. I see so much more of a community within the teachers' lounge here. There were over 120 instructors in Guyangan's only high school, and some of them showed their faces just once a week. Few friendships were made in the teachers office at YPRU, only continued.
That's more than a slight contrast to the perpetual “open mic' night”, that is the first door on your right on the ground floor of St. Yoseph Catholic High School. There is always an empty guitar case on top of the history bookshelf, and that's not because the music instructor has stubbornly avoided returning its contents. I can safely say that every single day I will be serenaded in either a tradition Batak tune, Indo-pop, or a common Indonesian rendition of “Hotel California,” which has somehow come to necessitate a three-part harmony. The people of North Sumatra are admired by the entirety of an already musically inclined culture. My counterpart, Mrs. Simbolon, sang a traditional song at our orientation in August, when all the counterparts arrived, and I heard comments circulating the room about this requisite talent of Batak people. I was duly impressed by my students in Guyangan, who could put together an impressive ensemble with virtually no time to practice, but it should tell you something that I no longer even have a reaction when the communal guitar gets passed randomly to the biology teacher (whom I hadn't before even seen whistling to herself), and she breaks out “Bohemian Rhapsody,” while the Chemistry teacher is singing “Unchained Melody” a cappella. People tell me that if I just sang louder, I would impress everyone in the room, including myself – I assure them that my barely audible volume is more than appropriate.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Monday, October 6, 2008
Spaghetti Really Takes You Places in this Country
I don't think I ever painted a picture of my life in a madrasah, in a small and conservative town away from all things western, as a grim experience; you already know it was quite the opposite. However, there were aspects of my personality that I had to constantly highlight, alter, or even omit altogether in order to assimilate harmoniously in Guyangan. It was never really easy. I didn't feel that I was ever being dishonest with myself or with the people who lived around me, but I soon realized that to reveal certain aspects of my character would not only be shocking , but it would be downright inappropriate considering the circumstances. If I wanted to convey a self image comparable to the open, friendly and joking person I try to be in the U.S., then there were certain behaviors I would have to change, in order to fit in with the local culture. I wasn't really Kenneth Scott Moore in Guyangan, but while I was there, I at least tried to be the equivalent of Kenneth Scott Moore, if that makes sense.
That being said, I have come to enormously value my experience there, and I've come to value it in a number of ways. Today however, I want to discuss only one aspect in which I now appreciate what was an overtly restricted life in Central Java. That aspect is the extent to which my time there has allowed me to relish in the sweet fruits of my now almost totally unencumbered life in North Sumatra! Don't get me wrong; I'm not running a muck every weekend. If fact, I've so far been to only one bar in this entire city, and by no means could they consider me a regular. However, I have been making up for last year's repression in other ways. When female Fulbrighters came to visit me in Guyangan, we were not allowed to walk from the school to the dining hall side-by-side. And of course, they were highly encouraged to wear head scarves, which all of them did except on one occasion earlier in the year before I had truly realized the intensity of my situation. Nothing about my stay in Medan even remotely compares to the severity of Kiayi Humam's rule over his small kingdom within the regency of Pati. So, for a change, I've been spending a completely different kind of quality time with my new headmaster – headmistress actually.
Sister Modesta is perhaps one of the kindest and most benevolent individuals I have ever known. She has been responsible for such efforts as making sure that Mr. Monang is on hand to keep me company at any time when she has the slightest inkling that I might be lonely; going beyond the owner of my house to have the school's repairman fix the leak in my roof; sending bushels of fruit to my doorstep when I was sick; regularly calling me to her office during my breaks so she can get in as much English practice as possible, and frequently making rounds in the school to make sure it is being run in a proper manner. This is one of the those times when I won't even bother to compare my two principles, head-to-head, as far as their effectiveness as educators. Nevertheless, Sister Modesta has taken a keen liking to me and is always thinking up some reason why I should come visit her. My arm has been burned and braised with twist marks, as I've been relentlessly forced to spend hours of my free time within the confines of the all-female boarding house at St. Thomas Catholic University.
Should I find myself already on her campus when a slight shower begins to drizzle from passing clouds, the harem of 35 women will do anything to keep me from leaving and risking getting a cold. But yesterday afternoon, as I had promised to bring 11 pounds of tomatoes and six boxes of pasta to cook spaghetti for everyone, I was pitilessly urged to just put on my raincoat and ride through a torrential downpour. I arrived 15 minutes later at the university kitchen with Indonesia's acid rain dripping from every inch of my body, and I was greeted by two eager nuns and four smiling girls from the English department. I removed all the ingredients and supplies from my over-sized, mountaineering backpack, and we quickly began to mince onions, peel tomatoes, and boil water. It turned out to be a monumental success, as I just let the enormous pot of sauce simmer, while I repeatedly taste-tested it to make sure the proportions of garlic and Italian seasoning hadn't gotten out of hand through the madness of preparing enough food to feed an army.
As all the students made their way down to the kitchen, I climbed the stairs to eat my meal with the eight or nine sisters who were present (Sister Modesta actually didn't make it because she was visiting a friend in the hospital). We joked around, while making comments about how this would have to become a weekly event, and once again, I felt my arm being squeezed red with friction. I was promised the opportunity next week to dine in the student-canteen with the girls if I came back to learn the traditional cooking methods of a Batak dish with the same crew.
...And now the story of Sir Galahad, the pure.
That being said, I have come to enormously value my experience there, and I've come to value it in a number of ways. Today however, I want to discuss only one aspect in which I now appreciate what was an overtly restricted life in Central Java. That aspect is the extent to which my time there has allowed me to relish in the sweet fruits of my now almost totally unencumbered life in North Sumatra! Don't get me wrong; I'm not running a muck every weekend. If fact, I've so far been to only one bar in this entire city, and by no means could they consider me a regular. However, I have been making up for last year's repression in other ways. When female Fulbrighters came to visit me in Guyangan, we were not allowed to walk from the school to the dining hall side-by-side. And of course, they were highly encouraged to wear head scarves, which all of them did except on one occasion earlier in the year before I had truly realized the intensity of my situation. Nothing about my stay in Medan even remotely compares to the severity of Kiayi Humam's rule over his small kingdom within the regency of Pati. So, for a change, I've been spending a completely different kind of quality time with my new headmaster – headmistress actually.
Sister Modesta is perhaps one of the kindest and most benevolent individuals I have ever known. She has been responsible for such efforts as making sure that Mr. Monang is on hand to keep me company at any time when she has the slightest inkling that I might be lonely; going beyond the owner of my house to have the school's repairman fix the leak in my roof; sending bushels of fruit to my doorstep when I was sick; regularly calling me to her office during my breaks so she can get in as much English practice as possible, and frequently making rounds in the school to make sure it is being run in a proper manner. This is one of the those times when I won't even bother to compare my two principles, head-to-head, as far as their effectiveness as educators. Nevertheless, Sister Modesta has taken a keen liking to me and is always thinking up some reason why I should come visit her. My arm has been burned and braised with twist marks, as I've been relentlessly forced to spend hours of my free time within the confines of the all-female boarding house at St. Thomas Catholic University.
Should I find myself already on her campus when a slight shower begins to drizzle from passing clouds, the harem of 35 women will do anything to keep me from leaving and risking getting a cold. But yesterday afternoon, as I had promised to bring 11 pounds of tomatoes and six boxes of pasta to cook spaghetti for everyone, I was pitilessly urged to just put on my raincoat and ride through a torrential downpour. I arrived 15 minutes later at the university kitchen with Indonesia's acid rain dripping from every inch of my body, and I was greeted by two eager nuns and four smiling girls from the English department. I removed all the ingredients and supplies from my over-sized, mountaineering backpack, and we quickly began to mince onions, peel tomatoes, and boil water. It turned out to be a monumental success, as I just let the enormous pot of sauce simmer, while I repeatedly taste-tested it to make sure the proportions of garlic and Italian seasoning hadn't gotten out of hand through the madness of preparing enough food to feed an army.
As all the students made their way down to the kitchen, I climbed the stairs to eat my meal with the eight or nine sisters who were present (Sister Modesta actually didn't make it because she was visiting a friend in the hospital). We joked around, while making comments about how this would have to become a weekly event, and once again, I felt my arm being squeezed red with friction. I was promised the opportunity next week to dine in the student-canteen with the girls if I came back to learn the traditional cooking methods of a Batak dish with the same crew.
...And now the story of Sir Galahad, the pure.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Motorcycle Madness
I love driving. I don't know what it is, but I whole-heartedly enjoy the activity. Destination is secondary if I am behind the wheel. As a kid, I must have regularly complained about mowing the lawn, but when I look back at all my memories of actually sitting on the riding mower, I don't think I have a single negative one in store. I used to humor myself by trying to mow soccer-field-like stripes in the front lawn; I had strategies to trim our amorphously shaped yard in a path that was as symmetrical as possible, even though it undoubtedly took longer; I was thrilled to mow a walkway in our overgrown field one summer when many relatives planned to visit us; it killed me to share the mower with my cousin when it came time to cut down the cornstalks in my grandfather's garden; I begged incessantly for at least a couple years to have a go-cart. And when I was finally given a golf cart, it took only months for it to be driven to an anticlimactic death of smelly electrical smoke.
It's times like yesterday when individual qualities such as this, which have been engrained and nurtured for years, come in markedly handy. My motorcycle trip to Lake Toba, which started only on Monday and ended promptly on Tuesday consisted of over 12 hours of driving. It was supposedly a 4 hour trip in either direction, but as I've discussed before, estimates of time, distance, and speed are seldom accurate here. Indonesian people will consistently underestimate distance and time, but they will always exaggerate speed. This undoubtedly means that the more questions you ask about any particular destination (concerning the three variables mentioned above), the more your travel plans will differ from the reality of your actual trip.
For example, I'd like to share an excerpt from the pre-travel-coordination conversation I had with my friend Chris the night before we left for Lake Toba. Distances have already been converted to miles for your convenience.
“So, how far would you say we're going to be riding tomorrow?”
“It's right around 60 miles”
“Great, how long do you think that will take?”
“It's usually around five hours, but if we tried to average 60 miles per hour, we could easily do it in four.”
“I'm sorry, could you repeat that?”
“Yeah, if we average 60 miles per hour, then we could make the trip in four hours.”
“...and how far did you say it was again?”
“60 miles”
“So... it's going to take four hours to get there?”
“Sure, but only if we average 60 miles per hour”
“Alrighty then.”
You can see the logic just completely break down right in front of you if you ask too many questions, and I honestly don't know why I still bother. First of all, I'd like to note that we likely traveled over 100 miles in each direction. And secondly, there's no possible way anyone could average 60 miles per hour riding on mo-peds in Indonesian traffic. I've never even gotten my mo-ped up to 50 miles per hour going down hill, and if I could, I wouldn't have any desire to do so. To make a lazy comparison, driving in Indonesian is like a constant game of Frogger – a game of Frogger in which the roles are reversed, and instead of a frog trying to avoid many cars, it's a motorcycle trying to avoid an amalgam of other motorcycles and a plethora of other randomly shifting objects. There are four chief differences, though, that add four new dimensions to the game. The first is that driving here is, in fact, not a game at all, which tends to amplify the gravity of the situation. The second is that actual gravity does, indeed, play a role. Helmets are flying off people's heads, shoes are coming off people's feet, and unsecured furniture is falling off people's trucks. Next is that, contrary to frogger where individual lines of traffic move at constant speeds, people in Indonesia are always accelerating, decelerating, and switching lanes altogether, at totally unpredictable times. And hey, what am I saying? There never really were lanes here to begin with. And lastly, in Frogger, you only have to worry about cars moving perpendicular to your path. In Indonesian traffic, you must avoid drivers who commonly head the wrong way down one-way streets, pedestrians crossing at inopportune times, carrying gigantic, vision-obstructing boxes of tofu, and let's not forget stray farm animals of all sizes, running in all directions.
I can't imagine how naturally adept at games like Need for Speed Indonesian children must be. When driving here, my awareness peaks, and I feel like I've inherited some sort of Spiderman-like super power, where I know exactly what's happening behind me as I follow multiple other simultaneous events in front and on either side of my motorcycle. I've always been one to analyze my soccer game, and even at age 23 and not playing on a team, I still can't help but do it. The last few times I've played pick-up games in Medan, in some aspects, I've been playing better than ever before. This made no sense to me until I started writing this entry, but I'm now pretty sure that even though I hardly played in Pati after Christmas, and though I didn't play when I went home this past summer, I have had numerous grueling practice sessions on Indonesian streets. It's not that I'm running faster or doing any impressive ticks, but my concentration on the ball and on my teammates has jumped to a whole new level over the past six months. I'm sending one-touch passes to people making runs behind me that I would have never been able to do a year a ago.
Amidst all the confusion on the roads here, there is one thing you can always count on though, which adds an undeniable element of safety that does not exist on American streets. You can always take for granted that no other drivers are taking anything for granted. People drive more slowly; they are constantly scanning their surroundings (because they absolutely have to), and road-rage just isn't a factor because, guess what, shit happens, and it happens a lot on Indonesian streets; people just don't get angry about it. The phenomenon of over-correcting because you made a mistake and became panicked doesn't really exist here either. Indonesian drivers cannot afford to drift into a state of complacency and controlled cruise, where being startled is even an option. You can't do anything resembling “cruising” in Indonesia. Truth be told, you're sort of always panicking on the roads here, and while that may seem super dangerous on the surface, I think it actually falls into the category of, “if you emphasize everything, then you emphasize nothing.” What I mean to say by that is if you're always in a state of panic, then after a while, panicking ends up not being so bad.
So even in Indonesia, I still love driving, and again, that served me incredibly well last night when I found my way home against all odds. Chris, who I knew was going to be a fast driver from his personality, ended up totally ditching me only an hour into our drive home from Lake Toba. It was dark and rainy, and I simply wasn't going to step out of my comfort zone to try to keep up with him. There are certain things I am just not willing to do. One of those things happens to be driving entirely too fast in adverse conditions, risking the remaining years of my life, in order to save an hour. So, not paying enough attention, Chris kept the pedal to the medal, and he lost me. When I talked to him later, I found that he had made multiple stops to wait and watch for me, but since it was at night (cloudy and rainy), the only thing that was clear was that I did not see him. It would have been so convenient if we could have just called each other and figured out our respective locations. However, last night happened to be the year's biggest night of celebration in the whole country, the last night of Ramadan. And as to cater to nostalgic families, Telkomsel deemed it appropriate to make all calls free. Consequently, the air-space was completely clogged, and you couldn't make a call if your life depended on it. And so, Telkomsel entered my life in yet another area to inconvenience me again.
The magnitude of this particular holiday in Indonesia is far beyond Christmas Day in the U.S.; it's like comparing President's Day to Easter. The Christmas season as a whole in the U.S., however, is much more of an affair than the Ramadan season in Indonesia. We have decorations that we keep up for over a month; there are tons of Christmas songs and movies, and we even have a season change that adds the image of “a white Christmas.” There's virtually nothing like that in Indonesia. However (and this is a big however), the last night of fasting is the most impressive collective societal event I've ever conceived of, and no other culture on earth has a comparable holiday, even in other Muslim countries. Last year, locked away in the confines of an Islamic boarding school in a small village, I couldn't really appreciate it. This year however, I found myself driving alone, through villages and cities, at prime time (6 pm – 12 am), through some the most intense insanity I'd ever experienced.
Indonesians are very proud of their unique holiday, Lebaran, which marks the end of Ramadan and the beginning of Idul Fitri. It's a nation-wide migration, where nearly every person in the country leaves their home. Traditionally, you go back to your childhood town or village, where your parents are from, but families generally take turns visiting a different prominent family member each year. It transcends religion, so even Christians join in on the madness. I've been told that nearly 80% of the residents of Jakarta's metropolitan area (that's over 16 million people, but don't quote me on that because I just talked about how people exaggerate) leave the city to head home. It's the only time of year when you can drive freely on Jakarta's infamously crammed streets, and every plane and train ticket in the country is booked weeks in advance, and of course, travel agencies jack prices 3-fold. Frankly, it's extremely difficult to find a single person who's not going at least somewhere for Lebaran, even 15 minutes away. Indonesians love to get together to hang out, and no other country can boast a nation-wide migration even remotely close to the world's 4th most populated country.
On any saturday night, at any given city center in Indonesia, you'll find something comparable to the proportions of an annual county fair in America. Tents are set up; people sell produce and food from carts; stands are available where you can buy music and DVDs, and kids have every kind of entertainment they could ask for. So, to put this terms we can all hopefully understand, my journey home last night, during the biggest holiday of the year, was like driving through miles and miles on end of Thunder over Louisville, the Kentucky Derby, or within a half-mile radius of the racetrack parking lot directly after the checkered flag of the Indianapolis 500. Fireworks started as soon as the sun went down yesterday and hadn't stopped by the time I got back to Medan at midnight. Every mosque in the area was sounding it's call to prayer. Trucks everywhere were decorated like floats in a parade with people playing music in their beds. Countless gangs of motorcycles road together, revving their engines in synchronized rhythms. Policemen and other security were directing traffic at every stoplight. Makeshift stands, selling fried goodies lined the streets. Kid's carnival games were at every big intersection, and probably 90% of the population was outside. I've always heard people talk about Lebaran and how many people go out at night to celebrate it, but last year, circumstances prevented me from seeing what really goes on. This year, circumstances allowed me to see Lebaran from farm to village to the 3rd largest city in the country.
All this was admittedly quite nerve-wracking for me, considering that I had no clue where I was (except that the road signs kept saying “to Medan”) and that it was pouring rain the whole time. It is currently the most intense part of the wet season in North Sumatra, and at one point around 10 pm I was riding through six inches of water with a legion of other motorcycles. Despite the chaos though, from the moment I lost sight of Chris, I had already decided that I wasn't going to be angry with him. I know Indonesian people well, and I was positive that the extent to which he was going to be worrying about me, once he realized that he had lost me at night, in a monsoon, hours before arriving in Medan, on the last night of Ramadan, was going to far and away surpass whatever combination of emotions I could possibly be feeling about the situation. I also knew that if he had started to make calls to people at my school about his losing me, then they were going to be so angry with him, that there was no need for me to add any more negative feelings to the equation. In fact, I was hoping in my heart of hearts that he had not already begun to make calls (that is if he could have gotten through to anyone in the first place).
The fact of the matter is that I would have never agreed to go on an epic motorcycle journey if I wasn't already 100% confident that I could have done it by myself. I know how to handle myself here, and I know how to talk to strangers. After more than a year of constantly traveling in this country, I'm also much better equipped to deal with unpredictable circumstances in unfamiliar environments. If something to the degree of losing my only guide in the middle of nowhere had not happened on this trip, truthfully I would have pretty surprised. I may not willingly put myself in positions of needless risk, such as driving like the MotoGP champion on pothole-laden roads; on the other hand, I have come to the point where I seek adventure at virtually every opportunity.
Once I arrived in Medan, I went straight to Chris's house, and despite his having stopped to looked for me (as well as having asked locals if they'd seen a white guy wearing a silver poncho) at every intersection in each subsequent city before Medan, he still managed to get back before me. Truth be told, not too long after I lost sight of him, I decided that since I wasn't going to be mad at him, I would make up for those feelings in another way and just relish in the fact that he should have been more responsible and that he was certainly going to be feeling intense sensations of guilt. Accordingly, I slowed down, pulled over, got my iPod out of my bag, safely secured it under my rain jacket, and fed the headphones into my helmet. I reduced my pace to a speed that would ensure my utmost safety, and I drove happily in the rain for hours, listening to my favorite music, through the craziest bedlam Indonesia has to offer. I then cruelly enjoyed the desperate expression on his face when he burst through his front door to meet the motorcycle pulling into his driveway at 12 am.
Did I mention that Lake Toba happens to be one of the most beautiful places on Earth? Well, it is.
It's times like yesterday when individual qualities such as this, which have been engrained and nurtured for years, come in markedly handy. My motorcycle trip to Lake Toba, which started only on Monday and ended promptly on Tuesday consisted of over 12 hours of driving. It was supposedly a 4 hour trip in either direction, but as I've discussed before, estimates of time, distance, and speed are seldom accurate here. Indonesian people will consistently underestimate distance and time, but they will always exaggerate speed. This undoubtedly means that the more questions you ask about any particular destination (concerning the three variables mentioned above), the more your travel plans will differ from the reality of your actual trip.
For example, I'd like to share an excerpt from the pre-travel-coordination conversation I had with my friend Chris the night before we left for Lake Toba. Distances have already been converted to miles for your convenience.
“So, how far would you say we're going to be riding tomorrow?”
“It's right around 60 miles”
“Great, how long do you think that will take?”
“It's usually around five hours, but if we tried to average 60 miles per hour, we could easily do it in four.”
“I'm sorry, could you repeat that?”
“Yeah, if we average 60 miles per hour, then we could make the trip in four hours.”
“...and how far did you say it was again?”
“60 miles”
“So... it's going to take four hours to get there?”
“Sure, but only if we average 60 miles per hour”
“Alrighty then.”
You can see the logic just completely break down right in front of you if you ask too many questions, and I honestly don't know why I still bother. First of all, I'd like to note that we likely traveled over 100 miles in each direction. And secondly, there's no possible way anyone could average 60 miles per hour riding on mo-peds in Indonesian traffic. I've never even gotten my mo-ped up to 50 miles per hour going down hill, and if I could, I wouldn't have any desire to do so. To make a lazy comparison, driving in Indonesian is like a constant game of Frogger – a game of Frogger in which the roles are reversed, and instead of a frog trying to avoid many cars, it's a motorcycle trying to avoid an amalgam of other motorcycles and a plethora of other randomly shifting objects. There are four chief differences, though, that add four new dimensions to the game. The first is that driving here is, in fact, not a game at all, which tends to amplify the gravity of the situation. The second is that actual gravity does, indeed, play a role. Helmets are flying off people's heads, shoes are coming off people's feet, and unsecured furniture is falling off people's trucks. Next is that, contrary to frogger where individual lines of traffic move at constant speeds, people in Indonesia are always accelerating, decelerating, and switching lanes altogether, at totally unpredictable times. And hey, what am I saying? There never really were lanes here to begin with. And lastly, in Frogger, you only have to worry about cars moving perpendicular to your path. In Indonesian traffic, you must avoid drivers who commonly head the wrong way down one-way streets, pedestrians crossing at inopportune times, carrying gigantic, vision-obstructing boxes of tofu, and let's not forget stray farm animals of all sizes, running in all directions.
I can't imagine how naturally adept at games like Need for Speed Indonesian children must be. When driving here, my awareness peaks, and I feel like I've inherited some sort of Spiderman-like super power, where I know exactly what's happening behind me as I follow multiple other simultaneous events in front and on either side of my motorcycle. I've always been one to analyze my soccer game, and even at age 23 and not playing on a team, I still can't help but do it. The last few times I've played pick-up games in Medan, in some aspects, I've been playing better than ever before. This made no sense to me until I started writing this entry, but I'm now pretty sure that even though I hardly played in Pati after Christmas, and though I didn't play when I went home this past summer, I have had numerous grueling practice sessions on Indonesian streets. It's not that I'm running faster or doing any impressive ticks, but my concentration on the ball and on my teammates has jumped to a whole new level over the past six months. I'm sending one-touch passes to people making runs behind me that I would have never been able to do a year a ago.
Amidst all the confusion on the roads here, there is one thing you can always count on though, which adds an undeniable element of safety that does not exist on American streets. You can always take for granted that no other drivers are taking anything for granted. People drive more slowly; they are constantly scanning their surroundings (because they absolutely have to), and road-rage just isn't a factor because, guess what, shit happens, and it happens a lot on Indonesian streets; people just don't get angry about it. The phenomenon of over-correcting because you made a mistake and became panicked doesn't really exist here either. Indonesian drivers cannot afford to drift into a state of complacency and controlled cruise, where being startled is even an option. You can't do anything resembling “cruising” in Indonesia. Truth be told, you're sort of always panicking on the roads here, and while that may seem super dangerous on the surface, I think it actually falls into the category of, “if you emphasize everything, then you emphasize nothing.” What I mean to say by that is if you're always in a state of panic, then after a while, panicking ends up not being so bad.
So even in Indonesia, I still love driving, and again, that served me incredibly well last night when I found my way home against all odds. Chris, who I knew was going to be a fast driver from his personality, ended up totally ditching me only an hour into our drive home from Lake Toba. It was dark and rainy, and I simply wasn't going to step out of my comfort zone to try to keep up with him. There are certain things I am just not willing to do. One of those things happens to be driving entirely too fast in adverse conditions, risking the remaining years of my life, in order to save an hour. So, not paying enough attention, Chris kept the pedal to the medal, and he lost me. When I talked to him later, I found that he had made multiple stops to wait and watch for me, but since it was at night (cloudy and rainy), the only thing that was clear was that I did not see him. It would have been so convenient if we could have just called each other and figured out our respective locations. However, last night happened to be the year's biggest night of celebration in the whole country, the last night of Ramadan. And as to cater to nostalgic families, Telkomsel deemed it appropriate to make all calls free. Consequently, the air-space was completely clogged, and you couldn't make a call if your life depended on it. And so, Telkomsel entered my life in yet another area to inconvenience me again.
The magnitude of this particular holiday in Indonesia is far beyond Christmas Day in the U.S.; it's like comparing President's Day to Easter. The Christmas season as a whole in the U.S., however, is much more of an affair than the Ramadan season in Indonesia. We have decorations that we keep up for over a month; there are tons of Christmas songs and movies, and we even have a season change that adds the image of “a white Christmas.” There's virtually nothing like that in Indonesia. However (and this is a big however), the last night of fasting is the most impressive collective societal event I've ever conceived of, and no other culture on earth has a comparable holiday, even in other Muslim countries. Last year, locked away in the confines of an Islamic boarding school in a small village, I couldn't really appreciate it. This year however, I found myself driving alone, through villages and cities, at prime time (6 pm – 12 am), through some the most intense insanity I'd ever experienced.
Indonesians are very proud of their unique holiday, Lebaran, which marks the end of Ramadan and the beginning of Idul Fitri. It's a nation-wide migration, where nearly every person in the country leaves their home. Traditionally, you go back to your childhood town or village, where your parents are from, but families generally take turns visiting a different prominent family member each year. It transcends religion, so even Christians join in on the madness. I've been told that nearly 80% of the residents of Jakarta's metropolitan area (that's over 16 million people, but don't quote me on that because I just talked about how people exaggerate) leave the city to head home. It's the only time of year when you can drive freely on Jakarta's infamously crammed streets, and every plane and train ticket in the country is booked weeks in advance, and of course, travel agencies jack prices 3-fold. Frankly, it's extremely difficult to find a single person who's not going at least somewhere for Lebaran, even 15 minutes away. Indonesians love to get together to hang out, and no other country can boast a nation-wide migration even remotely close to the world's 4th most populated country.
On any saturday night, at any given city center in Indonesia, you'll find something comparable to the proportions of an annual county fair in America. Tents are set up; people sell produce and food from carts; stands are available where you can buy music and DVDs, and kids have every kind of entertainment they could ask for. So, to put this terms we can all hopefully understand, my journey home last night, during the biggest holiday of the year, was like driving through miles and miles on end of Thunder over Louisville, the Kentucky Derby, or within a half-mile radius of the racetrack parking lot directly after the checkered flag of the Indianapolis 500. Fireworks started as soon as the sun went down yesterday and hadn't stopped by the time I got back to Medan at midnight. Every mosque in the area was sounding it's call to prayer. Trucks everywhere were decorated like floats in a parade with people playing music in their beds. Countless gangs of motorcycles road together, revving their engines in synchronized rhythms. Policemen and other security were directing traffic at every stoplight. Makeshift stands, selling fried goodies lined the streets. Kid's carnival games were at every big intersection, and probably 90% of the population was outside. I've always heard people talk about Lebaran and how many people go out at night to celebrate it, but last year, circumstances prevented me from seeing what really goes on. This year, circumstances allowed me to see Lebaran from farm to village to the 3rd largest city in the country.
All this was admittedly quite nerve-wracking for me, considering that I had no clue where I was (except that the road signs kept saying “to Medan”) and that it was pouring rain the whole time. It is currently the most intense part of the wet season in North Sumatra, and at one point around 10 pm I was riding through six inches of water with a legion of other motorcycles. Despite the chaos though, from the moment I lost sight of Chris, I had already decided that I wasn't going to be angry with him. I know Indonesian people well, and I was positive that the extent to which he was going to be worrying about me, once he realized that he had lost me at night, in a monsoon, hours before arriving in Medan, on the last night of Ramadan, was going to far and away surpass whatever combination of emotions I could possibly be feeling about the situation. I also knew that if he had started to make calls to people at my school about his losing me, then they were going to be so angry with him, that there was no need for me to add any more negative feelings to the equation. In fact, I was hoping in my heart of hearts that he had not already begun to make calls (that is if he could have gotten through to anyone in the first place).
The fact of the matter is that I would have never agreed to go on an epic motorcycle journey if I wasn't already 100% confident that I could have done it by myself. I know how to handle myself here, and I know how to talk to strangers. After more than a year of constantly traveling in this country, I'm also much better equipped to deal with unpredictable circumstances in unfamiliar environments. If something to the degree of losing my only guide in the middle of nowhere had not happened on this trip, truthfully I would have pretty surprised. I may not willingly put myself in positions of needless risk, such as driving like the MotoGP champion on pothole-laden roads; on the other hand, I have come to the point where I seek adventure at virtually every opportunity.
Once I arrived in Medan, I went straight to Chris's house, and despite his having stopped to looked for me (as well as having asked locals if they'd seen a white guy wearing a silver poncho) at every intersection in each subsequent city before Medan, he still managed to get back before me. Truth be told, not too long after I lost sight of him, I decided that since I wasn't going to be mad at him, I would make up for those feelings in another way and just relish in the fact that he should have been more responsible and that he was certainly going to be feeling intense sensations of guilt. Accordingly, I slowed down, pulled over, got my iPod out of my bag, safely secured it under my rain jacket, and fed the headphones into my helmet. I reduced my pace to a speed that would ensure my utmost safety, and I drove happily in the rain for hours, listening to my favorite music, through the craziest bedlam Indonesia has to offer. I then cruelly enjoyed the desperate expression on his face when he burst through his front door to meet the motorcycle pulling into his driveway at 12 am.
Did I mention that Lake Toba happens to be one of the most beautiful places on Earth? Well, it is.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Why this Language and Culture are so Darn Cute
Part 2: The Culture in General
The welcoming attitudes, the warm gazes, the incessant giggling, the sweet kids, the eager adults, and the effortless smiles are just some of the untouchable qualities that make Indonesian culture what it is. Granted, poor work ethic, rivers of garbage, roads plagued with oil-guzzling trucks, above-ground sewage, and preposterous standards for education also help to define this society. However, from day one, these blaringly obvious pitfalls have never seemed to stack up against the positive qualities I mentioned in my first list. I'm not sure if Indonesian people are so happy because they just ignore all the misfortune around them, if the are able to ignore all their misfortune because they have so much to be happy about, or if they encounter so much misfortune because they tend to happily ignore the root causes of all their problems. Regardless, these people struggle daily but remain unequivocally carefree. That sort of attitude is contagious. So when I talk about my experiences, it's not only difficult, but also culturally abnormal to mention drawbacks. Few people talk to me about Indonesian's problems in all seriousness, so what I end up noticing on a day-to-day basis (or maybe what I fight to stay focused on) is just how cute and enduring everything is.
The substitution of mind for heart in daily expressions, and in general thinking as well, is something I find, not necessarily comforting, but certainly, for lack of a better word, heart-warming. If a person wanted to express, “It's been on my mind for a while,” the common Indonesian equivalent phrase would translate directly as “It's been saved in my heart.” The word from Indonesian for heart is hati, and if you wanted to tell someone to “be careful,” you would say hati-hati. Suggesting that someone “pay attention” or “pay it mind” would be stated as memperhatikan, or “give it your heart.” And it's not common to simply call someone “sincere” or tulus in Indonesia; you would want to tell them that they are tulus hati.
Another reason why this brings a smile to my face, though, is because the Indonesian core of emotions is, in fact, not the heart; it is the liver. So actually, when telling someone to “give it their heart,” you are indeed suggesting to them to “give it their liver!” This may sound silly, but there might actually be more to this.
Let's look at the two vital organs side-by-side. The heart is without a doubt one heck of an important muscle, but let's face it; it's just a muscle. It's a strong muscle, creating enough pressure to circulate blood through the entire body, but it pales in comparison to the complexity of the liver. The liver has it's hands in such important enterprises as managing our metabolism, protein synthesis, decomposition of red blood cells, producing bile to aid in digestion, and as you heavy drinkers know, detoxification. Biologically speaking, the liver simply has a better track record and has proven itself time and time again that it is a more organized, responsible, and trustworthy candidate for taking on another important task, such as regulating our emotions. If a person in the U.S. gets “stabbed in the heart,” they will die instantly. An indonesian person, on the other hand, who takes the same blow to the liver has at worst 24 hours to collect themselves, make some phone calls, and chances are, they'll probably survive. Heart simply falls short.* If nothing else, this is as good an explanation as any for the causality conundrum on which I was commenting in the first paragraph.
If you happen to be quite close to someone's liver in this country, then you will be subject to all sorts of interrogation. In fact, it seems that the mundaneness of the questions someone asks you on a daily basis is a perfect indicator of the degree to which they care about you. The more uninteresting the questions; the more concerned they are.
“Sudah sembuh?” is the entry level question for a person who has entered your life and whom you see regularly. This means “Are you feeling better?” As you might have noticed, climbing “above the weather” and staying there is not the easiest task in this country. Getting sick in some respect (be it a cold, sore throat, or some stomach discomfort) is probably a biweekly occurrence for most Indonesians, and feeling ill is something simple that anyone with whom you have frequent contact would know about you. So basically, anyone who knows that you had, at one time, not been well will, with out fail, ask you if you are doing alright.
“Sudah tidur?” is a step up. Sleeping is something we people do once daily, and asking if you have “gotten enough sleep” shows that you are truly a fixture in that person's life. As it happens, lack of sleep can lead to illness, and we wouldn't want to have to take a step back in our relationship and ask something semi-irregular, like “Have you gotten better yet?” It's more promising to keep tabs incessantly on one's sleep patterns.
“Sudah Mandi?” is a question which shows that you have more or less entered the realm of family. Bathing is something Indonesians do at least twice a day, by culture. Plus, this is, by nature, a bit more personal. If someone has asked you if you've already taken a bath by late afternoon, they are in no way insinuating that you stink; they are simply making sure that you haven't neglected to consider your personal hygiene. Appearance and first impressions are even more important here than in the U.S., and we wouldn't want to find ourselves in a position where we would have to meet someone of a “higher status” without having taken a shower, now would we?
Let me put it this way; if a girl asks me, “Sudah makan?” I can be pretty sure that marrying her is not out of the question – or that she views me as a son (or both). And if this question comes from a male, we are basically siblings. We eat at least three times a day, and when people are checking up on your dining habits, you know that you could not be closer to them. In Indonesia, a question like “How have you been since your sister's death?” withers in the shadow of a question like, “Have you taken your lunch yet?” A true friend would not only already have a firm grasp on any case where your family member has died, but they would have already gone to great lengths to make sure you are coping positively. Conversing about death and serious injury in Indonesia is basically chewin' the fat and could come up as a side conversation in literally any setting. However, if it so happened that I forgot to bring a sandwich to the teacher's lounge, my closest friends would be eager to share half of their fried rice.
As I mentioned above, status is quite important in this country, and it's an Asian phenomenon that just doesn't exists to the same extent in the western world. “Saving face” and “keeping your name” are of utmost importance and are always on people's minds. And what better way to show that you are an upstanding and contributing member of society than to have a boatload of abbreviated titles prefixing your name? These aren't just novelties either that you simply let go of after you switch jobs. In Indonesia, if you were ever manager of a Pizza Hut, then Mgr. is something you could always insert after Mr. and before your name. People often call me “Pak Guru Ken.,” which translates to “Mr. Teacher Ken.” Guru is just another heading I can now save, until the end of my days, within my ever accumulating list of titles. Should I obtain a doctorate and then acquire some sort of religious standing in the upcoming years, if I come back, then I will surely be referred to as Mr. Dr. Preacher Teacher Ken!
*The heart and liver commentary was in no way an endorsement for John McCain
The welcoming attitudes, the warm gazes, the incessant giggling, the sweet kids, the eager adults, and the effortless smiles are just some of the untouchable qualities that make Indonesian culture what it is. Granted, poor work ethic, rivers of garbage, roads plagued with oil-guzzling trucks, above-ground sewage, and preposterous standards for education also help to define this society. However, from day one, these blaringly obvious pitfalls have never seemed to stack up against the positive qualities I mentioned in my first list. I'm not sure if Indonesian people are so happy because they just ignore all the misfortune around them, if the are able to ignore all their misfortune because they have so much to be happy about, or if they encounter so much misfortune because they tend to happily ignore the root causes of all their problems. Regardless, these people struggle daily but remain unequivocally carefree. That sort of attitude is contagious. So when I talk about my experiences, it's not only difficult, but also culturally abnormal to mention drawbacks. Few people talk to me about Indonesian's problems in all seriousness, so what I end up noticing on a day-to-day basis (or maybe what I fight to stay focused on) is just how cute and enduring everything is.
The substitution of mind for heart in daily expressions, and in general thinking as well, is something I find, not necessarily comforting, but certainly, for lack of a better word, heart-warming. If a person wanted to express, “It's been on my mind for a while,” the common Indonesian equivalent phrase would translate directly as “It's been saved in my heart.” The word from Indonesian for heart is hati, and if you wanted to tell someone to “be careful,” you would say hati-hati. Suggesting that someone “pay attention” or “pay it mind” would be stated as memperhatikan, or “give it your heart.” And it's not common to simply call someone “sincere” or tulus in Indonesia; you would want to tell them that they are tulus hati.
Another reason why this brings a smile to my face, though, is because the Indonesian core of emotions is, in fact, not the heart; it is the liver. So actually, when telling someone to “give it their heart,” you are indeed suggesting to them to “give it their liver!” This may sound silly, but there might actually be more to this.
Let's look at the two vital organs side-by-side. The heart is without a doubt one heck of an important muscle, but let's face it; it's just a muscle. It's a strong muscle, creating enough pressure to circulate blood through the entire body, but it pales in comparison to the complexity of the liver. The liver has it's hands in such important enterprises as managing our metabolism, protein synthesis, decomposition of red blood cells, producing bile to aid in digestion, and as you heavy drinkers know, detoxification. Biologically speaking, the liver simply has a better track record and has proven itself time and time again that it is a more organized, responsible, and trustworthy candidate for taking on another important task, such as regulating our emotions. If a person in the U.S. gets “stabbed in the heart,” they will die instantly. An indonesian person, on the other hand, who takes the same blow to the liver has at worst 24 hours to collect themselves, make some phone calls, and chances are, they'll probably survive. Heart simply falls short.* If nothing else, this is as good an explanation as any for the causality conundrum on which I was commenting in the first paragraph.
If you happen to be quite close to someone's liver in this country, then you will be subject to all sorts of interrogation. In fact, it seems that the mundaneness of the questions someone asks you on a daily basis is a perfect indicator of the degree to which they care about you. The more uninteresting the questions; the more concerned they are.
“Sudah sembuh?” is the entry level question for a person who has entered your life and whom you see regularly. This means “Are you feeling better?” As you might have noticed, climbing “above the weather” and staying there is not the easiest task in this country. Getting sick in some respect (be it a cold, sore throat, or some stomach discomfort) is probably a biweekly occurrence for most Indonesians, and feeling ill is something simple that anyone with whom you have frequent contact would know about you. So basically, anyone who knows that you had, at one time, not been well will, with out fail, ask you if you are doing alright.
“Sudah tidur?” is a step up. Sleeping is something we people do once daily, and asking if you have “gotten enough sleep” shows that you are truly a fixture in that person's life. As it happens, lack of sleep can lead to illness, and we wouldn't want to have to take a step back in our relationship and ask something semi-irregular, like “Have you gotten better yet?” It's more promising to keep tabs incessantly on one's sleep patterns.
“Sudah Mandi?” is a question which shows that you have more or less entered the realm of family. Bathing is something Indonesians do at least twice a day, by culture. Plus, this is, by nature, a bit more personal. If someone has asked you if you've already taken a bath by late afternoon, they are in no way insinuating that you stink; they are simply making sure that you haven't neglected to consider your personal hygiene. Appearance and first impressions are even more important here than in the U.S., and we wouldn't want to find ourselves in a position where we would have to meet someone of a “higher status” without having taken a shower, now would we?
Let me put it this way; if a girl asks me, “Sudah makan?” I can be pretty sure that marrying her is not out of the question – or that she views me as a son (or both). And if this question comes from a male, we are basically siblings. We eat at least three times a day, and when people are checking up on your dining habits, you know that you could not be closer to them. In Indonesia, a question like “How have you been since your sister's death?” withers in the shadow of a question like, “Have you taken your lunch yet?” A true friend would not only already have a firm grasp on any case where your family member has died, but they would have already gone to great lengths to make sure you are coping positively. Conversing about death and serious injury in Indonesia is basically chewin' the fat and could come up as a side conversation in literally any setting. However, if it so happened that I forgot to bring a sandwich to the teacher's lounge, my closest friends would be eager to share half of their fried rice.
As I mentioned above, status is quite important in this country, and it's an Asian phenomenon that just doesn't exists to the same extent in the western world. “Saving face” and “keeping your name” are of utmost importance and are always on people's minds. And what better way to show that you are an upstanding and contributing member of society than to have a boatload of abbreviated titles prefixing your name? These aren't just novelties either that you simply let go of after you switch jobs. In Indonesia, if you were ever manager of a Pizza Hut, then Mgr. is something you could always insert after Mr. and before your name. People often call me “Pak Guru Ken.,” which translates to “Mr. Teacher Ken.” Guru is just another heading I can now save, until the end of my days, within my ever accumulating list of titles. Should I obtain a doctorate and then acquire some sort of religious standing in the upcoming years, if I come back, then I will surely be referred to as Mr. Dr. Preacher Teacher Ken!
*The heart and liver commentary was in no way an endorsement for John McCain
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Goat's Eyes and Rat's Tails
You might refer to my blog entries from last January and February to refresh yourself on what it's like to be sick on Java. That experience, however, was quite different from the one I most recently had. Last year, many factors distorted the reality of what being sick in Indonesia really means. In fact, the entire institution of being sick in this country is all together different. By the time I fell ill in the pesantren, I had already established myself in the community; people already knew my personality and had already begun to understand the cultural differences between westerners and indonesians. That being said, while I was in the village, I dealt with being sick much as I would have any other time. Of course, at the hospitals, I was at the mercy of local culture and business, but while in Guyangan, I stayed in my house, and I rested. I watched a lot of TV, and I lied on my bed. People didn't really disturb me because they knew I was sick. Until now though, after having observed people in this culture for six or seven more months, and also after having just moved to a new location with new friends who don't really know me yet, I hadn't consciously recognized how abnormal it must have been for the people in Guyangan to have handled my sickness as they did – that is with relative indifference, as I would have expected from any neighbor in the U.S.
I realize that my being a foreigner and a guest at this school tends to amplify whatever reaction people might have to my being in a state of need; however, that's not actually the biggest factor when looking at all the reasons for the differences in how people here are treated when they are ill. Number one is, with out a doubt, the sense of community that people have here. I've made comments like this before, but it's worth mentioning again. It's just so far beyond “southern comfort” that looking out for your friends and family doesn't only function as an aspect of the culture here; it defines social norms and the way people treat each other everyday, in every situation.
I entered St. Yoseph and my community here in a much different light than I did at the pesantren. I immediately started making friends who don't speak English; I instantly began making cultural jokes and quickly learned new ones; I could sing their songs, and I already had strategies for the classroom. By default, I was also less of a novelty. I'm in a big city with more cultured people who, aside from that, have grown up in a culture where everyone seems to be a little less willing to immediately take things at face value. What I mean to say by telling you all this is that I entered this community much more as a community member than as outsider, as compared to last year. And so, I'm being treated as one. I'm already used to how people act around one another (Medan just isn't that different from Java, from the perspective of a westerner, as far as interactions between friends and family); I expected this and instantly accepted it – rather than both parties starting from ground zero and learning everything from one another. Consequently, people look at me, and instead of trying to figure out what a westerner might want in a particular situation, they just assume that I would want to be treated as they treat each other. This is all you could expect from people who've never had intimate contact with an outsider, but because I was already familiar with so many aspects of their culture, I've made it much easier on them, and in some ways harder on me because now I don't even have the relative luxury of people trying to figure me out. You don't expect people in your own culture to have to figure you out, but at least subconsciously you know that people from other cultures are doing their best to try; however, when people here confidently treat me like an Indonesian, it can sometimes be even more frustrating than entering a completely new and unfamiliar place, without any prior connections.
Nevertheless, I've digressed. The second biggest reason why people feel the irrepressible urge to take care of me is due to a fact that I've already mentioned in a previous post; I'm 23, unmarried, and living by myself. At least last year, I was living on the campus of the school. This year I'm in a neighborhood ALONE, away from the people with whom I work, around people who no one knew before I moved there. This is a constant source of distress for my headmistress, who's sister once knew a German guy who died in Indonesia on vacation.
I'm currently half way through my round of antibiotics, and I'm almost well. I've been laying low in my house, trying to get over a throat infection, but to anyone from the outside, it probably looks like I've been having a week-long garage sale, judging by how many people have been coming in and out of my house all day. At this point, I really don't know how to tell people to stop bothering me. Once again, I have to come back to this western sense of privacy that these people just do not have. The two people sitting with me right now informed me that after they called my cell phone, and I didn't answer, they decided to come over (which is surely what they were going to do even if I had picked up). They've now been here for over two hours because it's apparent that they don't have to work (on a Monday), and one of them has fallen asleep watching, guess what, Indonesian day-time television with the volume at full blast. I feel like I've been running a circus all week, and it's no coincidence that it's because I've been feverishly ill.
I guess what has gotten on my nerves the most is having had to listen to the incessant suggestions as to how to get better and everyone's diagnosis, as well as probable cause for the illness. First of all, when I say diagnosis, what I mean to say is hearing people exclaim, “Ooooh, masuk angin!” Masuk angin seems to be the only illness afflicting anyone who's not perceived to be 110% healthy in this country. This is their expression for “catching a cold.” According to my co-workers and friends, my particular case of masuk angin could have potentially been caused by the following:
1)Eating too much spicy food
2)Playing soccer with the middle schoolers a week and a half ago
3)Riding my motorcycle in the rain
4)Riding my motorcycle without a jacket (even when it's sunny)
5)Watching TV with the fan pointed toward me
6)Taking a nap on the floor on my new mattress
7)Breathing chalk dust from the chalk board
These are all perfectly sound arguments for why I had a fever for 3 days in a row, a headache, dizziness, and swollen glands with a soar throat and redness. And interestingly enough, after my counterpart (who is just about the loopiest woman I've ever met) gave me her advice about not eating spicy food, she opened up the bag of arsyik she had brought me for my lunch, certainly the spiciest traditional Batak dish that I know of. I was positive that spicy food had not caused my throat infection, but honestly, stuffed chilies surrounding a goldfish swimming in chili sauce was not what I wanted at the time.
There are an ample amount of remedies for curing masuk angin, which range from a traditional massage to seemingly random concoctions of god knows what, and I've been subject to them all. The massage I was forced into left me with bruises on my shins, but the special drinks, at least, weren't physically painful. My favorite has been just taking huge double-shots of honey! I've also seen people taking shots of olive oil and strange fermented milk drinks. Honey, though, in this country is by far the most common drink that one might make a toast to. It is viewed as the preferable alternative to sugar in almost all cases because it makes you “strong instead of fat.” So like I said, people tend to just throw their head back and down a glass of it in fractions of a second. Another drink, however, that has only recently been brought to my attention was unfortunately forced down my throat twice in two days. When Mr. Jon walked in my house with two glowing blue eggs, I knew I was in for it. He casually walked into my kitchen, needing not to start any sort of conversation, and began draining the whites from the two eggs he had cracked on my counter.
“Are raw eggs healthy?” I asked in Indonesian, to which I got a delayed answer but instantly raised eyebrows followed by an intimidating glare. “This is medicine,” was Mr. Jon's only verbal reply.
He proceeded to mix the egg yokes with honey and some indonesian spices, which I don't think even have English names. After the brew was homogeneous, it was handed to me in a coffee cup. All I could think of was bird flu, and so I asked one more time if it was okay to drink. Mr. Jon assured me that there was no need to worry because these were not chicken eggs, but instead they were telur desa, or “village eggs.”
Oh great, “Village eggs!” I thought to myself. Well, why didn't you say so???
Reluctantly, I gulped down the entire glass, while Mr. Jon put a couple more eggs into my refrigerator. I didn't want another glass of that stuff, but I wasn't going to insist that he take the eggs home. The next day, he barged in while Mr. Sinaga had been making himself comfortable on my couch. Immediately he asked if I had eaten the other eggs. Pretending like I didn't know what he was talking about, I just looked at him with a confused expression, and hesitantly answered no. I guess I was hoping he would just let it go, but instead he simply opened my refrigerator and got them out himself. About that time Mr. Sinaga had awakened and walked into my kitchen to see what the commotion was about. He looked at me, then looked at Mr. Jon, and with a concerned but eagerly consenting tone, he exclaimed, “ahhhhh yes, village eggs!”
I realize that my being a foreigner and a guest at this school tends to amplify whatever reaction people might have to my being in a state of need; however, that's not actually the biggest factor when looking at all the reasons for the differences in how people here are treated when they are ill. Number one is, with out a doubt, the sense of community that people have here. I've made comments like this before, but it's worth mentioning again. It's just so far beyond “southern comfort” that looking out for your friends and family doesn't only function as an aspect of the culture here; it defines social norms and the way people treat each other everyday, in every situation.
I entered St. Yoseph and my community here in a much different light than I did at the pesantren. I immediately started making friends who don't speak English; I instantly began making cultural jokes and quickly learned new ones; I could sing their songs, and I already had strategies for the classroom. By default, I was also less of a novelty. I'm in a big city with more cultured people who, aside from that, have grown up in a culture where everyone seems to be a little less willing to immediately take things at face value. What I mean to say by telling you all this is that I entered this community much more as a community member than as outsider, as compared to last year. And so, I'm being treated as one. I'm already used to how people act around one another (Medan just isn't that different from Java, from the perspective of a westerner, as far as interactions between friends and family); I expected this and instantly accepted it – rather than both parties starting from ground zero and learning everything from one another. Consequently, people look at me, and instead of trying to figure out what a westerner might want in a particular situation, they just assume that I would want to be treated as they treat each other. This is all you could expect from people who've never had intimate contact with an outsider, but because I was already familiar with so many aspects of their culture, I've made it much easier on them, and in some ways harder on me because now I don't even have the relative luxury of people trying to figure me out. You don't expect people in your own culture to have to figure you out, but at least subconsciously you know that people from other cultures are doing their best to try; however, when people here confidently treat me like an Indonesian, it can sometimes be even more frustrating than entering a completely new and unfamiliar place, without any prior connections.
Nevertheless, I've digressed. The second biggest reason why people feel the irrepressible urge to take care of me is due to a fact that I've already mentioned in a previous post; I'm 23, unmarried, and living by myself. At least last year, I was living on the campus of the school. This year I'm in a neighborhood ALONE, away from the people with whom I work, around people who no one knew before I moved there. This is a constant source of distress for my headmistress, who's sister once knew a German guy who died in Indonesia on vacation.
I'm currently half way through my round of antibiotics, and I'm almost well. I've been laying low in my house, trying to get over a throat infection, but to anyone from the outside, it probably looks like I've been having a week-long garage sale, judging by how many people have been coming in and out of my house all day. At this point, I really don't know how to tell people to stop bothering me. Once again, I have to come back to this western sense of privacy that these people just do not have. The two people sitting with me right now informed me that after they called my cell phone, and I didn't answer, they decided to come over (which is surely what they were going to do even if I had picked up). They've now been here for over two hours because it's apparent that they don't have to work (on a Monday), and one of them has fallen asleep watching, guess what, Indonesian day-time television with the volume at full blast. I feel like I've been running a circus all week, and it's no coincidence that it's because I've been feverishly ill.
I guess what has gotten on my nerves the most is having had to listen to the incessant suggestions as to how to get better and everyone's diagnosis, as well as probable cause for the illness. First of all, when I say diagnosis, what I mean to say is hearing people exclaim, “Ooooh, masuk angin!” Masuk angin seems to be the only illness afflicting anyone who's not perceived to be 110% healthy in this country. This is their expression for “catching a cold.” According to my co-workers and friends, my particular case of masuk angin could have potentially been caused by the following:
1)Eating too much spicy food
2)Playing soccer with the middle schoolers a week and a half ago
3)Riding my motorcycle in the rain
4)Riding my motorcycle without a jacket (even when it's sunny)
5)Watching TV with the fan pointed toward me
6)Taking a nap on the floor on my new mattress
7)Breathing chalk dust from the chalk board
These are all perfectly sound arguments for why I had a fever for 3 days in a row, a headache, dizziness, and swollen glands with a soar throat and redness. And interestingly enough, after my counterpart (who is just about the loopiest woman I've ever met) gave me her advice about not eating spicy food, she opened up the bag of arsyik she had brought me for my lunch, certainly the spiciest traditional Batak dish that I know of. I was positive that spicy food had not caused my throat infection, but honestly, stuffed chilies surrounding a goldfish swimming in chili sauce was not what I wanted at the time.
There are an ample amount of remedies for curing masuk angin, which range from a traditional massage to seemingly random concoctions of god knows what, and I've been subject to them all. The massage I was forced into left me with bruises on my shins, but the special drinks, at least, weren't physically painful. My favorite has been just taking huge double-shots of honey! I've also seen people taking shots of olive oil and strange fermented milk drinks. Honey, though, in this country is by far the most common drink that one might make a toast to. It is viewed as the preferable alternative to sugar in almost all cases because it makes you “strong instead of fat.” So like I said, people tend to just throw their head back and down a glass of it in fractions of a second. Another drink, however, that has only recently been brought to my attention was unfortunately forced down my throat twice in two days. When Mr. Jon walked in my house with two glowing blue eggs, I knew I was in for it. He casually walked into my kitchen, needing not to start any sort of conversation, and began draining the whites from the two eggs he had cracked on my counter.
“Are raw eggs healthy?” I asked in Indonesian, to which I got a delayed answer but instantly raised eyebrows followed by an intimidating glare. “This is medicine,” was Mr. Jon's only verbal reply.
He proceeded to mix the egg yokes with honey and some indonesian spices, which I don't think even have English names. After the brew was homogeneous, it was handed to me in a coffee cup. All I could think of was bird flu, and so I asked one more time if it was okay to drink. Mr. Jon assured me that there was no need to worry because these were not chicken eggs, but instead they were telur desa, or “village eggs.”
Oh great, “Village eggs!” I thought to myself. Well, why didn't you say so???
Reluctantly, I gulped down the entire glass, while Mr. Jon put a couple more eggs into my refrigerator. I didn't want another glass of that stuff, but I wasn't going to insist that he take the eggs home. The next day, he barged in while Mr. Sinaga had been making himself comfortable on my couch. Immediately he asked if I had eaten the other eggs. Pretending like I didn't know what he was talking about, I just looked at him with a confused expression, and hesitantly answered no. I guess I was hoping he would just let it go, but instead he simply opened my refrigerator and got them out himself. About that time Mr. Sinaga had awakened and walked into my kitchen to see what the commotion was about. He looked at me, then looked at Mr. Jon, and with a concerned but eagerly consenting tone, he exclaimed, “ahhhhh yes, village eggs!”
Thursday, September 11, 2008
How I Long for Seinfeld
My blog entries seem to be going about once-a-week strong. I'd like to write even more, but I think we can all agree that if this pace keeps up, then I will be doing much better than last year. This new rate of postings, however, is admittedly not the result of a new-found motivation for writing; it is just as much a product of the time I spent watching TV in Pati being displaced to other mediums. While I did not veg-out exorbitant amounts last year, I can certainly attribute my recent and genuine interest in politics/current events to having had access to both Al-Jazeera and The BBC on my satellite television. I watched them enough to have both of their musical themes memorized, and I know the names of my favorite shows on each station. This year, however, my only exposure to televised media is through the 12 or 13 channels on Indonesian basic cable. AN-TV, Trans-TV, and Trans-7 are the only stations that I have ever had the slightest interest in sitting in front of and watching straight through an entire program. I highly doubt I will be able to elucidate just how terrible television programming is in this country, but I will try.
Last night I had come home from breaking fast with a new Muslim friend, Era, whom I made ironically at the Liquid Chlorophyl presentation. She's really sharp, and she's the only person I even bothered to try and convince not to be sucked into this down-payment, 4% yield, pyramid scheme. We had a really pleasant time and hung out for close to 3 hours, if not more (which is border-line monumental for me for three main reasons: 1) she is female, 2) this did not happen on vacation, which means I will be able to continue to build a relationship with her, and 3) we actually broke cultural norms and chatted through an entire meal). The only snag is that she doesn't speak any English. So, after straining my brain for the better part of the evening, and only after getting turned around in the rain on my motorcycle and having had to ask three or four street vendors how to get to Setia Budi Street, veging-out in front of the television was really the only thing I wanted to do once I got home.
The only redeeming quality that Trans-TV possesses is the fact that every night there is a line-up of American movies. I've seen quality films such as “Batman Begins,” “In the Line of Fire,” and “Air-Force One” during my time in Indonesia. Despite this however, movies of that sort are somewhat of an anomaly when you consider the type of flicks that are regularly shown. For example, last night I watched the second half of “Boa vs. Python” for the forth time since I've been here.
I was more discouraged than ever and no less mentally exhausted, after having had to endure predictable one-liners and horrible quality CGI, so I decided to wait for the midnight movie. The movies shown at midnight are usually of a slightly higher quality, which unfortunately is pretty disappointing, since I rarely stay up that late. Last night's feature, though, was Oliver Stone's “U-Turn,” possibly the most frustrating movie I've watched since I saw David Lynch's Mulholland Dr. four years ago. I don't know how they get off on juxtaposing a low-budget horror flick with an experimental art-film that caters to the tastes of only a small minority of people in the country in which it was actually intended to be seen – but it's not the first time I've seen this happen on Trans-TV. Ultimately, I forced myself to watch the entire movie, despite the fact that by every commercial break I could only reflect on how badly I wished the main character would just die and the movie would end.
Wishing that programming in this country would just end is regrettably the sole reason why I've only turned my television on four or fives times in the three weeks I've been in Medan. The only actual news I've seen so far was last night at 2 a.m., when “U-Turn” finally ended. And even when watching real news, I can hardly bring myself to pay attention because it's so graphic. When you actually do catch news in this country, it's nothing like our own. Instead of airing a professional shot of the crumbled roof from outside, Indonesian news usually seems to include personally submitted “handycam” footage of someone walking into the destroyed house and video-taping lifeless, legless children.
Everything I've ever seen during the day is either celebrity gossip or an intolerable “Morning Cup of Coffee” kind of show, with more fake laughter in five minutes than I would care to endure in five hours. Prime time sit-coms here are actually what we would label as daytime soap-operas. And thankfully, we don't even have a word in English for Indonesian day-time television. These shows are so horrible that I guarantee I could star in any one of them. I'm not joking, I've considered it, and I may still try.
Cheap laughs are incredibly common as well. Game shows usually include some ridiculous obstacle course with conveyer belts and moving walls, where people are sure to fall and then be shown at least four times in a row in reverse-motion, slow-motion, and fast-motion replay. Commentators with silly voices, such as on “America's Funniest Home Videos” or “The Planet's Funniest Animals” are also overused to the farthest imaginable extent, on any show where a reply could possibly be shown.
If I must have the television switched on, nature shows are what I usually find myself staying tuned into. The apparent demand for 1970s American science programs is simply astonishing. I'm sure I could find at least one subtitled documentary narrated by Morgan Freeman each week. Just as with Trans-TV's choices of films, though, it's not even the out-of-date, science and nature programming that entertains me; it's the choice of programming that generally comes on directly afterwards. I've gone from watching cute panda cubs quarreling over a shoot of bamboo to seeing an interview with a crazy indonesian man, with a 5-inch mustache and a Metallica shirt, talking about his professional horse-fighting ring. I imagine you've probably never seen a dog fight or a chicken fight. Maybe you have. Nevertheless, I bet you can at least imagine how brutal it must be. Now, lets add about 4 feet in height to those dogs and about 600 or 700 pounds of muscle. I promise that unless you ever seen a horse that has been trained to fight other horses, you cannot imagine how horrible it is, especially considering how majestic these animals are and how our culture tends to hold them in such high esteem. Watching Sea Biscuit get the shit beat out of him is pretty traumatizing.
Last night I had come home from breaking fast with a new Muslim friend, Era, whom I made ironically at the Liquid Chlorophyl presentation. She's really sharp, and she's the only person I even bothered to try and convince not to be sucked into this down-payment, 4% yield, pyramid scheme. We had a really pleasant time and hung out for close to 3 hours, if not more (which is border-line monumental for me for three main reasons: 1) she is female, 2) this did not happen on vacation, which means I will be able to continue to build a relationship with her, and 3) we actually broke cultural norms and chatted through an entire meal). The only snag is that she doesn't speak any English. So, after straining my brain for the better part of the evening, and only after getting turned around in the rain on my motorcycle and having had to ask three or four street vendors how to get to Setia Budi Street, veging-out in front of the television was really the only thing I wanted to do once I got home.
The only redeeming quality that Trans-TV possesses is the fact that every night there is a line-up of American movies. I've seen quality films such as “Batman Begins,” “In the Line of Fire,” and “Air-Force One” during my time in Indonesia. Despite this however, movies of that sort are somewhat of an anomaly when you consider the type of flicks that are regularly shown. For example, last night I watched the second half of “Boa vs. Python” for the forth time since I've been here.
I was more discouraged than ever and no less mentally exhausted, after having had to endure predictable one-liners and horrible quality CGI, so I decided to wait for the midnight movie. The movies shown at midnight are usually of a slightly higher quality, which unfortunately is pretty disappointing, since I rarely stay up that late. Last night's feature, though, was Oliver Stone's “U-Turn,” possibly the most frustrating movie I've watched since I saw David Lynch's Mulholland Dr. four years ago. I don't know how they get off on juxtaposing a low-budget horror flick with an experimental art-film that caters to the tastes of only a small minority of people in the country in which it was actually intended to be seen – but it's not the first time I've seen this happen on Trans-TV. Ultimately, I forced myself to watch the entire movie, despite the fact that by every commercial break I could only reflect on how badly I wished the main character would just die and the movie would end.
Wishing that programming in this country would just end is regrettably the sole reason why I've only turned my television on four or fives times in the three weeks I've been in Medan. The only actual news I've seen so far was last night at 2 a.m., when “U-Turn” finally ended. And even when watching real news, I can hardly bring myself to pay attention because it's so graphic. When you actually do catch news in this country, it's nothing like our own. Instead of airing a professional shot of the crumbled roof from outside, Indonesian news usually seems to include personally submitted “handycam” footage of someone walking into the destroyed house and video-taping lifeless, legless children.
Everything I've ever seen during the day is either celebrity gossip or an intolerable “Morning Cup of Coffee” kind of show, with more fake laughter in five minutes than I would care to endure in five hours. Prime time sit-coms here are actually what we would label as daytime soap-operas. And thankfully, we don't even have a word in English for Indonesian day-time television. These shows are so horrible that I guarantee I could star in any one of them. I'm not joking, I've considered it, and I may still try.
Cheap laughs are incredibly common as well. Game shows usually include some ridiculous obstacle course with conveyer belts and moving walls, where people are sure to fall and then be shown at least four times in a row in reverse-motion, slow-motion, and fast-motion replay. Commentators with silly voices, such as on “America's Funniest Home Videos” or “The Planet's Funniest Animals” are also overused to the farthest imaginable extent, on any show where a reply could possibly be shown.
If I must have the television switched on, nature shows are what I usually find myself staying tuned into. The apparent demand for 1970s American science programs is simply astonishing. I'm sure I could find at least one subtitled documentary narrated by Morgan Freeman each week. Just as with Trans-TV's choices of films, though, it's not even the out-of-date, science and nature programming that entertains me; it's the choice of programming that generally comes on directly afterwards. I've gone from watching cute panda cubs quarreling over a shoot of bamboo to seeing an interview with a crazy indonesian man, with a 5-inch mustache and a Metallica shirt, talking about his professional horse-fighting ring. I imagine you've probably never seen a dog fight or a chicken fight. Maybe you have. Nevertheless, I bet you can at least imagine how brutal it must be. Now, lets add about 4 feet in height to those dogs and about 600 or 700 pounds of muscle. I promise that unless you ever seen a horse that has been trained to fight other horses, you cannot imagine how horrible it is, especially considering how majestic these animals are and how our culture tends to hold them in such high esteem. Watching Sea Biscuit get the shit beat out of him is pretty traumatizing.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
I Can't Understand Mr. Monang
I'm still not quite to the point where I can fully comprehend the actions or intentions of many Indonesians, but at least I have finally gotten to a place where expecting the unexpected is second nature. I feel like I've developed a unique ability to at least recognize situations where the result will be doubtlessly unpredictable. In Medan I've already been doing much more laughing to myself (as opposed to staring in confusion) about the strange occurrences that happen here, mainly because leastwise I'm prepared for the irony. This year, rather than hitting trip mines and getting blown away, I will be watching time-bombs from a safe distance.
My second night in Medan truly began about two hours after dark with a shout from outside my bedroom window, produced by the high-pitched voice of five-foot-nothing Mr. Monang, an employee at St. Yoseph. I had met him briefly at school that day, and he had already been to my house that afternoon to help fix a slight problem in my bathroom. Especially at the time, but even right up until yesterday afternoon, I'd had a problem communicating with this man. I did deduce, however, that he wanted to enter my house, totally unprompted, after I'd already eaten, prepared for bed, and locked my doors. I'd been home alone for hours and was fully expecting to sleep soon, so his abrupt and arguably discourteous arrival puzzled me slightly. Of the few people I'd already met in Medan, and with whom I'd formed only a 24-hour relationship, I inarguably knew Mr. Monang the least. Wielding an over-night bag, he walked past me at the front door, sat on my couch, and turned on my television.
I've been in my new home for over two weeks now, and I've had countless interactions with Mr. Monang. He's taken me to the bank, motorcycle shopping, and has often given me rides home from school. Even now, I'd say I can understand maximally 20-30% of what he says to me. It's not because I have a hard time with his accent nor with his choice of words; it's mainly because I absolutely have no idea where this guy's mind is, and it doesn't help that he speaks in sharp, short bursts. I can literally speak in Indonesian with a group of people for 20 minutes straight and be totally within an Indonesian mindset, and Mr. Monang can enter the scene, and I can no longer communicate with anyone in the room. He destroys my groove like nothing else. One thing I never let slip by me, though, are his frequent queries about why I'm always laughing at him. I don't know how to explain that I pretty much never know what on earth he's talking about, so I've just resorted to laughing at the situation every time I'm around him. I feel like every once in a while we have the occasional and exciting breakthrough, but each time that happens, only 30 seconds later does he ask me a question that I simply don't have an answer to, nor can I think of anything to say that might be even slightly related. I usually just look at him with a huge smile on my face and get nothing back but a blank stare. He sees me speaking in Indonesian with countless people, so I'm sure he's also confused as to why we can't seem to get ideas across to one another. I love him, but I'm not sure that he likes me at all.
That night when he arrived at my house for an unannounced sleepover (or maybe it was; I guess I'll never know), I couldn't even understand him when he asked me simple questions like “what time is it?” His questions not only came up at seemingly random times during what I'd like to think was a conversation, but he'd use expressions that I'd never heard before (and of course using nothing but words that I actually did know, so it was all the more frustrating to not understand). He repeatedly kept saying “jam kita,” and with his unfamiliar Medanese intonation, I didn't even realize that there was an implied question mark until he reached for my cell phone to look at the clock. Jam can mean “time,” “hour,” or “clock,” and kita means “we.” I finally figured out that kita was modifying jam and, therefore, probably meant “our time.” But it was “our time” for what? I guess it's not so uncommon for someone to ask, “Yo, what's our time, bro?” But at least in English, we've got a question word floating around somewhere within the sentence.
Clearly, in his mind, there had to be no question as to why he was slipping into his pajamas and making himself comfortable on my couch. So, I was at least hoping that his thoughts were going farther than the fact that we had finally established that it was bedtime. Nevertheless, my knowing that he certainly must have some straightforward reason for being in my house, it made it extremely difficult for me to phrase the question that was turning over and over in my head; “what the hell are you doing here?!?” One thing I have gathered is that people in this country, especially if they work with you, are almost always obliged to assist you, and so rarely do they have negative intentions. I knew that I had nothing to worry about, but I certainly wasn't expecting to have a room-mate. I was admittedly in a tough spot because I really wanted to know what was going on, but if there's anything you shouldn't do in this country, it's insult or refuse someone's attempts at kindness, especially upon first meeting them (and especially in Medan, where I had heard that people are more vindictive and easily upset).
Ultimately, I willingly let this complete stranger take a shower and brush his teeth in my bathroom, and I gave him my extra pillow. The next morning, he left without a word, and I went to school alone, as I had expected to do all along. Once I got there, I decided it might be a good idea to give Sister Modesta, the school's headmistress, my account of last night. Simply ecstatic to hear that I had spent the night with Mr. Monang, she explained to me that she had “ordered” him to sleep at my house. I assumed it had to be something like this, and that's why I went to her first. Indonesian people are always genuinely concerned about whether or not others are lonely, and for them, this sort of thing is not only common, but it would be totally unacceptable to have a new guest in the ranks and not provide company for them. After all, I'm only 23 (a kid in the minds of many here), so how could I not be scared and lonely in a new house? It's a simple fact that there was no word in Indonesian for the western notion of privacy until they added pribadi, only recently, into their dictionary. Oh Indonesia.
My second night in Medan truly began about two hours after dark with a shout from outside my bedroom window, produced by the high-pitched voice of five-foot-nothing Mr. Monang, an employee at St. Yoseph. I had met him briefly at school that day, and he had already been to my house that afternoon to help fix a slight problem in my bathroom. Especially at the time, but even right up until yesterday afternoon, I'd had a problem communicating with this man. I did deduce, however, that he wanted to enter my house, totally unprompted, after I'd already eaten, prepared for bed, and locked my doors. I'd been home alone for hours and was fully expecting to sleep soon, so his abrupt and arguably discourteous arrival puzzled me slightly. Of the few people I'd already met in Medan, and with whom I'd formed only a 24-hour relationship, I inarguably knew Mr. Monang the least. Wielding an over-night bag, he walked past me at the front door, sat on my couch, and turned on my television.
I've been in my new home for over two weeks now, and I've had countless interactions with Mr. Monang. He's taken me to the bank, motorcycle shopping, and has often given me rides home from school. Even now, I'd say I can understand maximally 20-30% of what he says to me. It's not because I have a hard time with his accent nor with his choice of words; it's mainly because I absolutely have no idea where this guy's mind is, and it doesn't help that he speaks in sharp, short bursts. I can literally speak in Indonesian with a group of people for 20 minutes straight and be totally within an Indonesian mindset, and Mr. Monang can enter the scene, and I can no longer communicate with anyone in the room. He destroys my groove like nothing else. One thing I never let slip by me, though, are his frequent queries about why I'm always laughing at him. I don't know how to explain that I pretty much never know what on earth he's talking about, so I've just resorted to laughing at the situation every time I'm around him. I feel like every once in a while we have the occasional and exciting breakthrough, but each time that happens, only 30 seconds later does he ask me a question that I simply don't have an answer to, nor can I think of anything to say that might be even slightly related. I usually just look at him with a huge smile on my face and get nothing back but a blank stare. He sees me speaking in Indonesian with countless people, so I'm sure he's also confused as to why we can't seem to get ideas across to one another. I love him, but I'm not sure that he likes me at all.
That night when he arrived at my house for an unannounced sleepover (or maybe it was; I guess I'll never know), I couldn't even understand him when he asked me simple questions like “what time is it?” His questions not only came up at seemingly random times during what I'd like to think was a conversation, but he'd use expressions that I'd never heard before (and of course using nothing but words that I actually did know, so it was all the more frustrating to not understand). He repeatedly kept saying “jam kita,” and with his unfamiliar Medanese intonation, I didn't even realize that there was an implied question mark until he reached for my cell phone to look at the clock. Jam can mean “time,” “hour,” or “clock,” and kita means “we.” I finally figured out that kita was modifying jam and, therefore, probably meant “our time.” But it was “our time” for what? I guess it's not so uncommon for someone to ask, “Yo, what's our time, bro?” But at least in English, we've got a question word floating around somewhere within the sentence.
Clearly, in his mind, there had to be no question as to why he was slipping into his pajamas and making himself comfortable on my couch. So, I was at least hoping that his thoughts were going farther than the fact that we had finally established that it was bedtime. Nevertheless, my knowing that he certainly must have some straightforward reason for being in my house, it made it extremely difficult for me to phrase the question that was turning over and over in my head; “what the hell are you doing here?!?” One thing I have gathered is that people in this country, especially if they work with you, are almost always obliged to assist you, and so rarely do they have negative intentions. I knew that I had nothing to worry about, but I certainly wasn't expecting to have a room-mate. I was admittedly in a tough spot because I really wanted to know what was going on, but if there's anything you shouldn't do in this country, it's insult or refuse someone's attempts at kindness, especially upon first meeting them (and especially in Medan, where I had heard that people are more vindictive and easily upset).
Ultimately, I willingly let this complete stranger take a shower and brush his teeth in my bathroom, and I gave him my extra pillow. The next morning, he left without a word, and I went to school alone, as I had expected to do all along. Once I got there, I decided it might be a good idea to give Sister Modesta, the school's headmistress, my account of last night. Simply ecstatic to hear that I had spent the night with Mr. Monang, she explained to me that she had “ordered” him to sleep at my house. I assumed it had to be something like this, and that's why I went to her first. Indonesian people are always genuinely concerned about whether or not others are lonely, and for them, this sort of thing is not only common, but it would be totally unacceptable to have a new guest in the ranks and not provide company for them. After all, I'm only 23 (a kid in the minds of many here), so how could I not be scared and lonely in a new house? It's a simple fact that there was no word in Indonesian for the western notion of privacy until they added pribadi, only recently, into their dictionary. Oh Indonesia.
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