One Night in Jogja

Today I was chatting with an American friend who has been here for about one month. He asked me this question, “Do you ever get desensitized to the fact you are in Indonesia?”

I do. There are hundreds of little things I don't even notice anymore.

So tonight I am blogging about one night in Yogyakarta. Well, in truth only about two hours. I made mental notes about all of the little things, and some of the big things, that frequently occur here. Everything that occurred from the time I went to dinner to the time I returned home.

I would prefer to have pictures, but I didn't take my camera. Plus, I'm not sure that snapshots could capture the evening's events. So I will try to describe it as best I can with words.

It is Saturday night here (Malam Minggu), which means it is busy. Everyone goes out on Saturday nights. The streets are crowded with motorcycles and cars and buses, but mostly motorcycles.

I pulled up to my favorite Chinese restaurant, which is actually a storefront nestled in the middle of a bunch of other storefronts along a busy road. Since it was night, most of the stores are closed. In front of them have sprung up street-sellers (warung), as happens every evening. They have canvas and plastic banners, plastic or wooden benches and chairs, and mobile kitchens.

Motorcycles and cars are parked along the side of the road in uneven clusters around the restaurants. I pulled up and was directed to park on the sidewalk by the parking attendant (juru parkir). These guys are everywhere. They guard parked cars and bikes; they also help you navigate back onto the road when you are ready to go.

I sat down in the restaurant. The kitchen is in front. It is open air, and you can watch them prepare your food for you. I prefer this because I then know that my food has been recently cooked. Tonight there were three cooks, each manning a large wok over an open gas flame. I sat down and made my order (stir fried beef), and directed my attention to a tv on the wall near the kitchen. It was a soccer game.

As I sat, the cooks kept stealing glances at the game.

I sat and ate for a few minutes before the first beggar arrived. There are two words for beggar in Indonesian. Pengamis and pengamen. Pengamis literally means beggar, but pengamen means singing beggar. The former sit on the side of roads and hold out their hands. The later come to you. They then sing or play an instrument or find some other way to make themselves annoying until you pay them. I try to always carry coins in my pocket to get rid of them.

Anyways, the first beggar came in and played his guitar and sang. I stared at the soccer game on TV to pretend to ignore him. Eventually I just pulled out 300 rupiah to get rid of him.

He left. Then the next set of beggars arrived. These were waria or cross dressers. The ugliest cross dressers you can imagine. One stood outside the restaurant and banged some clackers together while singing. The other went from table to table singing and holding out an empty cup. I waved him/her off. All my coins went to the first beggar. I just wanted to finish my dinner in peace.

A short time later I went up to pay for dinner. The woman who partially runs the restaurant smiled and asked me for 22,000 rupiah. My meal should have cost 24,000, but she regularly gives me small discounts because I am a regular. Indonesians do that a lot. Prices always fluctuate.

I went out and got on my motorbike, paid the parking attendant (1,000 rupiah), and was on my way. I decided to pass the church, as sometimes people are there on Saturday evenings. No such luck.

So I prepared to make a right-hand turn at the traffic light. There I was behind two young men on a motorbike sitting much closer than would ever be acceptable in the US. Here it is normal. People are much more comfortable being close to each other than we are back home. Touching is normal. Americans have this bubble of personal space that keeps us from touching one another.

Anyways, the light turned green and I continued on my journey. A subsequent red light, though, left me fuming. First, we had to stop for a long time. Many red lights here have counters. This one is a 106 second wait. Finally, just as it was our turn for green, a cop walked out into the intersection. He stopped all traffic so a motorcade of government vehicles could pass the intersection unhindered. Just as they passed, our light turned red again and we got to wait another 106 seconds.

If government officials here had to sit and wait in traffic, I am pretty sure they would take fixing traffic problems more seriously. Instead they flaunt the police power for personal comfort.

Well, life goes on, and so does traffic. Eventually I stopped at another light. Waiting for cross traffic to finish, I witnessed two girls on an automatic scooter crash into another scooter. They were hurrying through the light after it had turned red and not paying attention.

Both motorcycles fell in the center of the intersection. Interestingly, the first people out into the street to help the unfortunate folks get up were the street beggars who regularly inhabit the intersection. Interesting.

After a moment or two the girls and their victim were all safely off to the side of the road. Personally, I take extra care around teen or college-age girls on motorbikes here. While it is often a bad to generalize, I do so for my own safety. Much like teen girls everywhere, these girls are addicted to texting, chatting, and generally not paying attention when driving (yes they text with one hand while driving a motorbike with the other). I regularly witness motorbike accidents here, and more times than not the culprit is a young woman not paying attention.

Perhaps I am being sexist, but in matters of possible injury or death to myself, I don't feel bad about it. Thus far it has worked well for me.

Then it was on toward home. Before I got there though, I ran into a traffic jam. On an island roughly the size of Louisiana, there are 135+ million people. And they all either want a motorcycle or a car. There just aren't enough roads. Shortly before the turn-off to get home, the road narrows into a single lane. Thus traffic jams.

Finally I got home.

And that is just an average night in Yogyakarta.