Indonesia: Exkurs

Friday 17.04.2009

Collection of (disturbing) street experiences

- Creepy woman 1: I was walking from one intersection arm to the next one, feeling that a woman touched my elbow when passing her. Already feeling disturbed and annoyed I kept on walking a few steps then stood at the intersection thinking, which Angkot came from where, would go where and where I would have to hop on. She placed herself on my left side, shorter than me (obviously) maybe 60 years old or something, rambling and rambling in Indonesian. I was already NOT encouraging at all, looking straight ahead in order to concentrate on my thoughts (a bit difficult in that situation) when she simply touched my hair, which was open and therefore lying on my collarbone (had to look that one up too, so putting it in German as well: Schlüsselbein).
Seriously, the only thing you can think of is „Arggh – don’t just touch me!!!“ Such an invasion of privacy!

- Creepy woman 2: passing by me, 30 something years old, looking blatantly at me, saying “hello Miss” and touching my arm with really cold fingers while passing. As if touching me is not creepy enough, I look down on my arm and notice that she left two big ice cream stains on me. I added a picture – with the white spots on my arm. I have no idea what is going on with those people?! She was dressed normally.

- Poor EP: I was having a not so good mood for days, cause it just kept raining and raining, and this day I was especially grumpy, having a headache and a heavy laptop to carry through the rain. So I saw ahead on the “footpath” (as Gary would say) two guys, one Indonesian, one looking a little Japanese already seeming quite interested in me. I just held my umbrella very, very low so I could not even see their faces while passing, thinking only that I could and would not speak to the whole freaking population of Bandung just because they have that urge, when the Japanese-looking-one actually ducked in order to look under my umbrella. I just didn’t move a single muscle in my face, turned that unmoved expression towards him and then straight again, didn’t say a word and kept on marching. I reached the orphanage. 5 min later those two guys came in, telling me the Japanese one was an EP (AIESEC intern) and my future coworker. Gosh - was that embarrassing! I felt incredibly bad and apologized, I guess, 100 times... He doesn’t seem mad though, and I kept explaining it with my headache and the general horrible mood I was in...

- Hey sweetie: I am already accustomed to a lot of “hello”, ”hello, Miss”, ”how are you?”, ”where do you come from” etc. Yesterday though I got a „hey sweetie“! That in itself is already inacceptable but then it was topped by being said from a kind of boyish, thick, teddy-bear-looking-like guy. That kind of macho-sentence from a cliché Spanish guy with lots of hair and testosterone at least makes sense – but from a teddy bear??? The first 4 steps I took I was mad, but then I couldn’t help but grinning. Wonder if that teddy bear doesn’t know the attached connotations to ‘sweetie’ at all, or if he is maybe doing a therapy to find his manlyness and being all macho is like step 3 on a ladder of 10 steps *lol*.

- No, no, no, no, no, no: Completely annoyed in Yogya by all the people offering you bikecaps and never giving up after the first or second time you said „no, thanks“, I tried saying repeatedly “no,no,no,no,no“ in order to shut them up quicker. I thought that way they might get, that I don’t want anything. The person of course first didn’t stop rambling, so I kept saying ‘no’ in the same pace – then he said “no,no,no“ too and laughed, and then he actually said „sorry“! What a success!!

- Prambanan and Borubudur temple: Gary and I were the main attraction there. Who cares about temples from the 9th century when these weird creatures with white skin and blonde and red hair are around? People kept asking us for pictures, and while the ones who had officially asked took their pictures, other people passing by just used the chance and took some too. In the end I simply kept reading my guide, so there should be some pictures in this world of Gary smiling into the camera with them, and me simply reading. I guess I am just not friendly enough. But hey, I am there to have fun, too. In the end even Gary became completely annoyed. I suspect there are definitely 50 pictures of us, though not all taken by different people. When at Borobudur we were only asked twice – I am kind of offended by the lack of interest in our persons ;) Why on earth would they not want pictures with us??Another interesting observation: Gary said he believes all of them asked him (not me), if they could take pictures of us, but he suspects they would have been very disappointed if I had just left the scene (seeing that they hadn’t asked me). This might be a sign of guys still being more important in this country.
[That brings an idea to my mind: maybe next time Gary, just don’t allow them to take pictures of me. Then YOU don’t allow me, instead of me not wanting to. Which reasonable person would wanna share me anyway? You can offer yourself – that way you can make sure if they are disappointed or not about only getting the guy.]

- Checklist: I went out alone and coming back, Gary asked „so- did you get a lot of attention?“. The answer was obviously “Yeah“. The most outstanding experience that day was the sweetie-guy. After having talked about that, he asked “did they say ‘hey beautiful‘?“. The answer again was “yeah“. Isn’t that crazy – you go out for 15 minutes and afterwards you are being asked possible comments you might have received and you can just checkmark every single one of them. So either there is no getting away from necessary statements you have to hear on a Saturday night or Gary just has the right senses.

- Some ‘hello Misters’: sometimes I receive „hello Mister“s – probably out of the lack of knowledge of anything else than that.

- Normal tourist stress: Stressful is also, that even when you already passed, bikecap-people keep asking “8000, yes?”. I can understand that you try selling while a person comes towards you or is next to you, but a person that has already passed? As if it was probable that I, after not reacting, after not saying a word while still facing them, would turn around and gladly say “yes, NOW I want to”!

- Number-guy: the number guy was quite an experience. I was supposed to meet people in a restaurant but didn’t know where exactly it was, only that it was close to BTC, where I was dropped. From there I went alone but soon there were less restaurants and lights and people at the street sides. Then this Indonesian on his motorcycle comes up by my side and talks to me. Usually not up for a conversation with some stranger I did ask him where that restaurant was. He told me I was on the right track and kept talking to me in Indonesian. He offered to take me there on his motorbike three times, which I repeatedly, politely refused. Then he started asking for my number so I was like “why?” He rambled something in Indonesian. And he wanted my number. So I again: “WHY?? Kenapa, kenapa?? Kamu bahasa Indonesia, saya bahasa inggris, so WHY???” (meaning you speak Indonesian, I speak English, so what do you want with my number??). He said “no problem, no problem”. I said “yeah – masala, masala” (meaning: yeah – problem, problem). I repeated the facts and said masala. He kept asking though, until I gave him some fake number, after which he quite immediately drove away…

- Helpful nice guy: to finish though, I want to mention a nice story. I visited Ariane (who lives quite far from my house and I had never been in that area, at least not knowingly) at the other end of the town, and after she explained which Angkots I would have to take to go back, she said at the end of the street I would have to take my first Angkot to the left. I went to the end of the street and waited for an Angkot. Taksis came by and wanted to drive me, Ojek’s did the same – every time I said I waited for Angkot they started talking a lot in Indonesian. After a while I figured that at that time no Angkots drove anymore. Ariane wasn’t going to be able to help me either. But neither did I want to spend the money on the Taksi crossing the complete city. So I tried talking to the Ojek drivers, that they would take me to the next bigger intersection, where I hoped Angkots would still drive. I got out my huge map, tried to tell them that at a specific intersections surely Angkots would go, when two Indonesians (all of them men of course) came up to join the discussion. Somehow they seemed to believe that no Angkots drove anywhere (which is weird, cause I know they drive forever near my house) when one of them offered to take me home. I kept on asking, but soon accepted that offer (sorry for the heart attack I am giving you, Schatz). He was very nice, had a friendly face and smile, spoke English, was in his 40ies I guess, wore a big white T-shirt and was shorter than me. How am I supposed to be afraid of someone smaller than me? Well, he took me home, I am fine and that’s that.
Cause usually Indonesians are very nice about driving you home – I have been driven so many times in this country! And also some of my friends here were shocked about the stories of the creepy women. So they ARE unusual – even in Indonesia!

- Update: Fun street experience: I was running in the morning on the running track. I hadn’t gotten to my usual pace yet and was still running very, very slowly. I slowly caught up with a middle-aged Chinese-descent Indonesian who merely walked instead of running. Yet, when I was about to pass him on his left side, he seemed to decide to stick with me and got a little quicker, so I wouldn’t get rid of him. I was in a good mood, I was running, the sky was blue, I felt good about myself so I thought ‘this can be fun’. I let him run a while with me, then got a tiny little bit quicker. He noticed and had to go quicker too, in order to stay at my side. After a few steps I increased my speed again – he kept walking with me. I got consistently quicker and he determinedly kept up with me, looking down at his feet, very concentrated, moving his arms quickly by his side. Every now and then I couldn’t hide my smile anymore, so I looked left with the biggest grin on my face, and then looked all serious straight forward again. Finally, when it was almost impossible to ‘walk’ at the pace I ran by then, he laughed out loud and said one word in Indonesian, which, unfortunately, I didn’t understand. Then soon I reached up to Gary who was merely walking, and I stopped to walk with him. The Indonesian stopped immediately as well, and then walked freely at a different pace away. This just made it shamelessly obvious that he had been running by my side. When he was some few steps away I just cracked up laughing about the whole experience.
Later I thought about it, and I am quite proud of myself. I don’t think this would have been able between Westerners only, cause Westerners are never subtle. They would have spoken about the thing going on quite early. Or another Westerner with an Asian might not have noticed at all what was going on. Or might have been annoyed. But I kind of communicated with that guy, there was definitely some connection between us, for a very short period of time, and it was so subtle we didn’t need words to confirm it. I am glad I am able to connect this Asian way with Asians – at least in some circumstances (who knows how many of those instances I just missed, cause I would have needed obvious, Western signals).

Appendix: Since I wrote about these experiences, I have talked to quite a lot of Indonesians. I think I got a better understanding of what is going on. It definitely seems, as if for Indonesians taking pictures with foreigners is a positive thing, they like it and they would be glad if you asked them to take pictures with them. They even somehow view it as a compliment and it’s a way of relating. Actually they would be glad if they were in Germany and Germans would be saying ‘hello Miss’ to them and ask them to take pictures [even though highly improbable ;) ]. I will work on getting rid of this “I am not an animal in a zoo”-feeling that I usually have when complete strangers want to take pictures with me. That is just not how it is meant.