Poorly Controlled

So this is my update from the last few days before we shunted into the workshop proper. Workshop reflections will be mostly posted at chriswenn.net. The weekend was mainly spent exploring the local markets – we’re in the heart of the textile (rendered endearingly as ‘tecksteel’, in the fluid Jakarta accent) district here in Tana Abang, so most of my gifts for friends and family are in the form of scarves, sarongs and t-shirts! As I’ve mentioned before, Jakarta is a mercantile city – everything that can be sold is being sold here, and the locals take pride in their bargaining abilities. Our guide for most of our shopping trips has been the streetwise Jack (whose name is either spelt Zack and pronounced Jack OR spelt Jack and pronounced Zhack), who seems to greatly enjoy the ‘press’, as he calls it, forcing the stallholder’s prices lower and lower until it reaches the point he deems acceptable. In the last few days, we’ve left a string of local traders shaking their heads in bewilderment, as if they’re not quite sure what just happened. We’ve reached an accommodation with a scarf trader in the Thamrin City market – Ika – who has had a garrulous group of Westerners descend on her stall every day for the last few days. We have been variously introduced as Jack’s brothers, cousins and sisters (in the face of overwhelming evidence, naturally) and have watched with delight and amusement as the drama plays out. Even speaking in Bahasa, the process of bargaining is carried out in pantomime, mock-scowls and grimaces, handwaving and backs being turned. At a tshirt/streetwear stall in Thamrin, the bargaining seemed to be entirely in disbelieving laughter. Jack pushed harder and harder on the poor fella: holding out fistfuls of rupiah, then snatching them away; holding out a handshake as the trader shook his head. All this conducted with good humor, of course.

Jack is an amazing character – completely untrained, he moves with a grace that is as intense as it is beautiful. He is a veteran of the Tana Abang slum – born and living there until by some remarkable osmosis he became a fixture of Indonesia’s most beloved theatre company. Slamet has given him a home, a job, and an education – receiving in return a powerful, magnetic stage presence that embodies traditional virtues of courage, strength, honour and generosity. It was Jack that was our guide through the slums, and has been our main communicator with the street people in this area. In our improvisations he has provided vocal work – deep, demonic laughter; raw howls; the aching calls of the azan (the call to prayer); and gorgeous, wordless lyrics in the traditional Javanese style.

It’s somehow inspiring to see this remarkable young man walk the streets of Jakarta with the confidence of a young lion. He steps into the feral traffic with a hand raised, guiding us across the four nominal lanes (in practice, more like six or ten) to whatever our next destination is. The traders and their hangers-on call out “Ay, Jackie!”, “Pagi, Jackie!” as we pass, as though he’s a local fixture.

I mentioned earlier that I had spent a few days with ‘belly’ as Mary and Draf have termed it. As it’s that experience common to travellers in Asia, I feel that I should say something more detailed about it. Maybe make a few jokes. If you’re reading (or feeding) this nonsense, you know what I mean. ‘Belly’ is that debilitating stomach condition that you end up with for no easily discernable reason while travelling in this region. Some random encounter with an inexplicably contaminated object – a secretly terrifying biscuit, perhaps, or a malicious passing toad – leaves you squirting the remaining contents of your digestive tract through the orifice you would least like to do so at the time. I’m pretty sure ears could be involved. In my case, I spent much of our trip to the hill country of Cibogo in close proximity to the nearest (and least horrifyingly alien) toilet. Rather puts a dampener on your glorious commune-with-nature time to noisily dispense of unprocessed waste every thirty-seven-and-a-half minutes (Do not ask. We geeks have ways of establishing these things). There is nothing more terrifying, in a culture which you are peripherally aware has some taboos regarding the handling of bodily functions, than to be in the cavernous echo-chamber of an otherwise magnificently tiled bathroom while producing noises with more than a passing relation to the last dregs of milkshake being dragged from the cup by a particularly enthusiastic toddler.

In case I have confused you with my verbosity, I’m talking about ARSE NOISES.

At this point I would like to take a moment to praise the wonders of the medical options available to the middle class here. I’m almost certain that the poor will not be whisked directly into the doctor’s office, probed discreetly by an exquisitely professional doctor in crisp whites, and then loaded full of magnificent chemicals. Nor will they (in this poor-folks’ clinic of my imagination) be permitted to take a moment to adjust to the nuclear-option drugs belting around their system. Nothing I’ve seen about Jakarta disabuses me of this notion. If you’ve got money, you get the good stuff. They’re pretty clear about that here.

In any case, I was rapidly and extremely professionally bloodtested and pumped full of anti-diarrhea medicine, antibiotics, and vitamins, as well as some kind of calmative or tranquilliser. The doctor seemed to suggest that this was a way of enforcing bed rest, although as we only shared the rudiments of two languages I could be entirely wrong about this. After attempting to jump up from the doctor’s bench and suddenly discovering I had too many eyes and not enough brains, I slumped back onto the cool vinyl and precisely white pillow and allowed the whole business to settle. Then I jumped up and had a crack at walking through the door to wait for my prescriptions. On the third attempt I actually achieved hand-to-door contact, and shuffled through to the waiting room. I’m pretty sure I only fell asleep once while locating Yaya, Sutra, Ramon and Pamela (escorting crazy Westerners is serious business) Twice at the most, and I won’t admit to three times.

“Chris! Why didn’t you wait in the doctor’s office?”

“‘m fine. I fil quite OooOOOKay” *Chin slowly meanders to chest*

“You should have stayed there! We can get your medicine!”

“…” *Head snaps upright, begins slow descent of left ear to left shoulder. Left shoulder, meanwhile, is making plans to slide into the position currently occupied by left buttock. Left buttock remains resolute, leading to gradual folding of body sideways like a shattered accordion*

“Chris?”

“Mmfne” *Body has vague recollection that uprightness is generally considered more alert. Attempts this, fails. Movement is now rightwards, which is at least a change*

“Chris, why don’t we get you in the car? You can sleep there…”

*Silence*

I’m rather fuzzy on when or how we got back to Sanggar. On the other hand, I felt fucking fantastic.

All this is by way of praising our hosts yet again for their patience and forbearance in the face of these madmen who have appeared out of the cultural wastes of Australia, their willingness to assist at any time, and their steadfast refusal to let us pay for a damn thing. The favour will be returned a hundredfold.

I’ve mentioned before that one of our guides-slash-colleagues here, Ramon, is something of a celebrity. He’s got a Facebook fan page, and people stop him in the street for photos. What we continually fail to remember is that our garrulous host, Slamet Rahadjo, is much more than that. He’s a national icon. There’s a cluttered display case in the corridor here filled to bursting with award statues. I suppose there comes a point when you’ve got too many to arrange on a mantlepiece, and they have to go somewhere. I think Slamet’s got beyond the point when a display cabinet is enough. They’re just jammed into this thing, and lord knows how many there are. Craziness.

So we’re hanging out with the famous. Last night we were kindly invited to Slamet’s brother Erros’ birthday party. It was kind of loosely explained to us as a bit of a party where Erros was going to get his old band back together. What we discovered was a sight different.

In a roundabout sort of way I want to talk about my reaction to being in that environment. As we drove to the party, we passed through a region full of mansions and the homes of the very rich. Gates, razor wire, even bulletproof pillboxes for a security guard. The sense of outrage that bubbled up within me in the slums rose again, and all I could think about was how much I wanted to grab ‘these people’ by the throat and drag them down to the squatter’s camp, shouting “What the fuck are you thinking?” I expressed as much to the thoughtful indie kid, Khiva, who didn’t say much. In fact, he seemed a bit uncomfortable. After battling through the horrendous Jakarta traffic, we arrived at a magnificent outdoor bar, in a wealthy district of Jakarta. The kind of party that we would never get near in Australia, with flashing cameras and well-dressed videographers, and stars of stage and screen. I turned to Khiva and said “So, when I was having a rant before, you were looking uncomfortable, it was because the people who live in those houses are here tonight, right?” And in his careful, understated way, Khiva said “Yeah, that’s it.”

Your correspondent, international diplomat.

The party itself was great, though. Grand floral arrangements congratulating Erros on his 35 years in the entertainment industry, as well as his birthday. A fully-equipped stage and massive catering effort (about ten different caterers all competing for the best food), with open bar and a souvenir DVD. “Hey Chris!” says Ramon, “This guy is editor of Indonesian Rolling Stone.” Later, Yaya introduces Olive, who is starring with Ramon in a new movie (our resident smooth operator, Samir, immediately sets about making a move. All class, our boy.) Importantly, like all meals in Jakarta, there was a stupendous range of sweets. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, I guess.

We spent two-and-a-half days at Cibogo, about 2 hours outside of Jakarta, in the Sunda region. In the foothills of the Javanese mountain country, Cibogo was described to us as a village, but turned out to be more like the outskirts of a country town – I mean, what kind of village has an amusement park and 50 restaurants? The lush, green farming country of the hills turned out to be heavenly after the madness of Jakarta – cool breezes, the gentle rushing of mountain springs and the river, and all manner of animals. Mostly mosquitoes. Mosquitoes about the size of Sherman tanks. Seriously, you could hear these fuckers coming like the 1st Armoured. BBBBBLLLLARRRRRTTTTT. The Cibogo house which Teatre Populer has use of is a spacious split-level, with the kind of mountain view you only see in travel brochures. Fresh coconut from the trees, cassava from the vegetable patch (boiled and covered with shaved fresh coconut), and glorious fat yellow-striped fish from a fish farm at the bottom of the garden. Who needs fairies when you can fish for lunch?

Of course, I had a rotten case of Bellyus Baliensis by this point (which now seems to have been a side effect of my typhus vaccination – FUCK YOU, WESTERN MEDICINE) so it somewhat diminished my enjoyment of this magical place. I still managed to find time to boggle at the butterflies, the plump geckos snatching insects in the rafters, the tiny bats rocketing about the place. My personal favourite creature was a fat, grumpy-looking yellow frog who appeared on our last day to glower at us from the long grass as we left.

At Cibogo we ate (more!) and began preliminary work for next week’s workshop, with discussions of Western and Indonesian mythology, films of Indonesian traditional and ritual performance (including a Balinese cockfight) and an incredible cross-cultural dance improvisation by firelight on the concrete banks of the fishponds. We learned Bahasa, Javanese and Sundanese songs; ate at a suang restaurant (a suang is a traditional bamboo shelter) where a tiny street kitten just hopped over the side to say hello, and ended up trying to suckle Draf’s toes.

In that great roadtrip tradition, we snacked heartily in the car on the way to and from the ‘village’, talking about politics, music, religion. It may come as a surprise to some readers that my new Indonesian friends are utterly bemused by Islamic fundamentalism. It neither speaks to or for them. Admittedly, religion is a significant thing here – when our hosts meander their way around to the topic ‘Are you Christian?’ they seem slightly taken aback by the answer ‘I am an atheist’. A complex amalgam of cultures is at work here – ancient animist tradition absorbed ancient Hindu religion, which formed a strange but fertile ground for Islam to thrive and Catholicism to graft onto. The particular, everyday kind of Islam practiced here is not as conservative as you would think from Western TV images. There’s a thriving youth culture – tight jeans, sneaker freaks and all – and massive shopping malls all over Jakarta. Indonesia is officially a secular country. It’s true that many of the nation’s defining characteristics come from Islamic tradition, but there is a significant element of other Eastern influence as well, from the nations of the Asian region. We’d do well to remember that.

i don’t know if i can joke. i think i hit the point of massive culture shock. yesterday we were taken by our ever-generous hosts on a tour of the local area, one of the poorest in Jakarta. The four of us, with an escort, walked no more than a hundred metres to a tiny alleyway, crammed with little shops and dwellings.Dodging the ubiquitous scooters, we wound our way through the narrow streets to a road running by a stinking ditch of black water. almost immediately we were surrounded by kids, all crying ‘Mista! Mista! Hello mista!’ They giggled and shrieked with delight as we took photos, and smiled and laughed at them. They followed us for some time, dancing and singing and shouting. Through another narrow alley now, barely the width of two men abreast, out to the embankment of the train tracks.

All along the railway, there is a shanty town. Hundreds, even thousands of shacks and shanties and lean-tos. A horde of delighted children immediately vacated their soccer game, to cluster around us in an excited, chattering crowd. They weren’t interested in our money or exploiting us – just the excitement of something new, a pretty western girl and big western men. Their makeshift soccer pitch, just a concrete slab with lines painted on, was right next to the railway. As we stood there, showing the kids their pictures on our cameras, a massive train thundered through. We asked Ramon, our superstar guide, if it wasn’t dangerous for the kids to play here. He said, ‘Oh, yes. Very dangerous. They die.’ We crossed the train tracks, and as the rain started to pelt down, we took shelter in a bamboo-and-plastic hut above the river. Below, in the filthy water, men trawled through the shit and trash for plastic and cast-off rubbish to sell. The kids ran back and forth in front of the shelter, through the warm rain, shouting and laughing and calling to us. They were full of joy and playful energy, and it broke my heart to imagine them living and dying in this destitution.

Ramon told us that the government had bulldozed the shanty town only a month or so before, and that this collection of shacks had been rebuilt in only a short time. The residents of this are have nowhere to go.

Continuing on, we walked past the huts where the men sell the paper and plastic and bottles they collect, past tiny shacks selling beer or snacks. The people in the shanty towns are so far beyond desperate that I don’t even have a word for it. But the commercial imperative of Jakarta still holds – that libertarian, economic rationalist message that the poor are poor because the are unwilling or unable to work is proved false by the residents of the Tana Abang slums, wading through mud and shit and filth to earn enough to live? Raising children to play soccer in a railway siding, to die under a train, for their home to be razed to the ground. A poor work ethic doesn’t keep these kids in poverty – institutionalised indifference, corruption, injustice and prejudice does. This is the failure of late capitalism. A kid struck by a train, while his father wades through the detritus of the middle class to put food in that child’s mouth.

I’m nowhere near coherent enough for the professional site yet, so this is where it’s at for now…

We landed in Jakarta about 6 or 7 hours ago now. Only just got on the tubes here in Sanggar so don’t judge me. As I said last time, I’ve never been overseas before so this is an entirely new realm of experience for me, and… well, about all I can say is fookin’ ‘ell! Jakarta is big, and hot, and smelly, and insane. I think I’m in love. Thanks to Garuda Indonesia, I not only had awesome food (snack spicy broad beans FTW!) and a really nice flight BUT also there were a) haaaaawwwt flight crew; and b) The Transporter on the in-flight back-of-seat tellybox.

Jakarta airport (which has an absurdly long name that I can’t remember) is kind of like a combination steam bath and imminent threat of ultraviolence. Anyone with a uniform seems to be armed. And not like Victoria Police ‘oooh, oooh I’ve got a taser’ but like “holy shit motherfucker’s got a machine gun”. And that doesn’t even compare to the traffic. Because Jakarta traffic is a full-body contact sport. I was initially concerned because lanes didn’t seem to matter. Then I realised that carriageways were just as immaterial. Merging is a matter of who’s got bigger balls, and its usually the scooters – two adults, two kids and a FUCKING FRIDGE pinging between our van and a truck approximately the size of the aeroplane we arrived in.

It’s an entrepreneurial city – if you can pick it up and put it in a bag or carry it on your head, there’s a dude in ragged cutoffs selling it by wandering aimlessly through the hurtling traffic. Markets spring up wherever there’s not enough cars through in ten minutes – or in traffic jams. In all, it’s fucking amazing.

More tomorrow. Night, kids.

I’m 31 now. 32 in a bit less than a month. Tomorrow I’m going overseas for the first time in my life (I’ve asked The cbomb if going to Tasmania counts, but she poured a bucket of water on my head and clipped me ’round the earhole, so I guess that’s “No”). I suppose that’s what’s got me thinking about what I wanted my life to be like. The fibs and half-truths and outright lies we tell ourselves about ourselves – the “I’m gonna” and “I wanna” and “I shoulda”.

At the time, and even now, I wanted my teenage years to be a dreamy haze of music, dopesmoke and the kind of safe-but-illicit adventure idolised in teen movies. We were coming of age with Nirvana; The Wu-Tang Clan; raves; Nine Inch Nails; Nick Cave’s tortured, sexual roar paired with the husky piping of Kylie. We were convinced that we were the most important kids ever to debate politics, history, music, art and philosophy in the cafes of Melbourne. That only we understood what it’s like to be alive. The dying years of the 20th Century were ours, man.

They weren’t, though. And we weren’t that important. My teenage years – and I’m thinking about from that strange moment a teenage boy turns 16 onwards – were ordinary, middle-class, and relatively untroubled. I met girls, fell desperately in love, and just as torridly fell out. I went to a few parties, of the roaring random teenage kind, took my pants off, passed out, or played my three records on two old turntables and a mixer dug out of somebody’s shed. I smoked a bit of weed, had an accident with bourbon, entertained a week or two of sexual ambiguity until one of the rugby jocks noticed and shoved my head in a locker.

Just enough to round you out as a person, never enough to seriously trouble my parents. And certainly not enough to trouble the law. In fact, the only time I was ever spoken to in a serious manner by a policeman was for jaywalking across Elizabeth Street to the tram terminus, when I was 27. I might have got a little teary at being told off, but I admit nothing.

What’s my point? I suppose its that its easy to judge yourself, and to expect more. But that maybe what you’ve got is enough to be going on with.