Part Sixteen

“And Now We Enter... End Game.”


The end is near.

My original plan was to stick around for about a week after Second Semester ended. This would have put me back in Portland around the end of June. The hefty payday from Merah Putih made balancing the benefits of my studies and the annoyances of day-to-day life much easier, and my mood had drastically improved.

However, something unexpected [and awesome] happened: I got offered A JOB at home. A super-flexible job with awesome guys I used to work with that seems tailor-made for working around projects, finishing school, etc. I enthusiastically accepted and began the arrangements for a mid-May return.

Even though a premature evacuation crossed my mind a few times before, I always put the thought aside because –as hard as living here has been at times- leaving this thing unfinished would just be LAME. The decision to come back for an ideal job situation was an easy one, but misgivings about the LAMENESS of ditching out early persisted for a few days. Until –as so often happens with me- I talked myself out of any problems.

Q: "HAVE I ACCOMPLISHED WHAT I SET OUT TO ACCOMPLISH BY COMING HERE?"

A: Well… I wanted to learn about a totally different type of performance, different way of telling a story, designing characters, a different way of playing music, and how those elements interact. Admittedly, I didn’t learn much about the history/philosophical details about wayang tradition(s) because a) my Indonesian is still insufficient for following a University lecture, and b) that stuff doesn’t really interest me. My goal was a more intuitive understanding of the art form, and I believe I achieved that. In a way, this was a fact-finding mission; I viewed most things here through the lens of my art, noting the relevant/inspiring parts and politely ignoring (or just tolerating) the rest.

And, of course, outside of school I’ve amassed enough ideas for art and music projects to keep me busy for years. So… in the end, my time here has been fruitful in all the ways I’d hoped. And more."


Once I realized I had satisfied my main goals for coming here, my apprehension about cutting out before the end of the semester faded away. Everything, it seems, is looking up. I fly out of Jakarta around 10 PM on May 14th and (through the magic of time zones and long-distance travel) I arrive 18-20 hours later at 8 AM on May 15th. That's it!



Coming next: final thoughts, the Darmasiswa closing ceremony in Jakarta, and a detailed account of my solo voyage to Komodo National Park, the only Indonesian locale I feel a strong, inexplicable need to see.

Part Fifteen

"War Were Declared"

MARCH: For a few weeks my studies here take a backseat to more pressing matters, namely getting paid [with a capital PAID] as an extra in another Indonesian movie.

I neglected to mention my first gig as an extra here… Back in December the makers of Ketika Cinta Bertasbih needed some white faces to add “international” flavor to a crowd during a wedding scene. For Rp. 300,000 a day we (some Darmasiswa friends and I) were happy to oblige:

Sadly, no photo can truly capture the feeling of listening to the same Indonesian ballad on repeat for the entire ELEVEN HOURS we were there.

We were told that the film would come out in March, but there’s been no sign of it yet. Alex and I may have to wait a little longer to see our December beards plastered across a big screen.


Filming for Merah Putih* is… a different experience. This one’s a war epic chronicling Indonesia’s bloody struggle for independence in 1947 and they need bule to play Dutch soldiers. They need us to run around in uniform being white and perpetrating atrocities until Indonesian rebels slaughter us all. This turns out to be precisely as awesome as it sounds.

*Red and White, AKA The Colors Of The Indonesian Flag, AKA The Colors Of Our Necks And Torsos After 5+ Days Filming In The Sun

The filmmakers are throwing jaw-dropping amounts of money [in Indonesian terms, anyway] at this thing, putting the 200+ person crew up at decent hotels, providing all of our meals and transportation, and the lowly extras get Rp. 1,000,000 for each day of “work”. [If that number sounds familiar, that’s because it’s my monthly Darmasiswa living stipend.]

The first weekend of shooting is in Semarang (2 hours north of Jogja). While Semarang leaves something be desired as a town [the rats are bolder than in Jogja and the city air carries a piquant odor I’d describe as ‘boiled piss’], the shooting location is an awesome old colonial building with cavernous hallways and some nice stained-glass windows:

I’m don’t arrive in Semarang until the end of the week, so I miss out on the rapes and the village bullying. :( From what I can tell, the weekend’s filming centers on three Indonesian dudes (one a 12 years old boy) sneaking into the Dutch outpost and killing everyone. My own onscreen activity during this time breaks down as follows:

1) Lay facedown in a hallway as the corpse of someone killed the previous day. The “blood” on my back is pungent strawberry syrup.

2) Stroll down a hallway and pretend to idly chat with one Indonesian dude who maintains a vicious sourpuss for the entire production.

3) Patrol a village with one of the actual Dutch guys playing a Dutch soldier.

4) Stand guard outside an outpost, scan the horizon, size up one of the rebels as he approaches the entrance.

Over the course of three days I see <>30hours reading, writing, sleeping, eating, and just sitting around waiting. It’s painfully boring, but we all hold onto the same thought:

Q: “What did you do today?”

A: “Nothing. Oh… wait, no. I did make a million Rupiah. But other than that, nothing.”

Here we see Vlado and Esteban mistreating one of the locals. I believe Vlado’s expression is inappropriately tender:

The days in Semarang are fun [and lucrative!], but on the following weekend we get the call about more shooting, this time for a seven-day engagement in Bandungan. [“Chuh-chinnnggggg!!!!!”] Once again, I miss out on the real mayhem: the day before we arrive, the rest of Holland's surliest, hardest-raping recruits get to burn down a village and brutalize more of the villagers. :( :( :(!!!

Bandungan is the site of one of the film’s biggest action sequences:

The Dutch convoy rolls down a hill, crosses a small bridge, and finds the road blocked by a herd of goats. A few soldiers hop out to clear a path when the alarm goes up: “Ambush!” One rebel appears and plants a bomb on the side of a tanker truck. He leaps heroically off the bridge as the truck explodes.

Rebels open fire on the convoy from the surrounding hills. Half the soldiers in the main troop transport are killed immediately. The others assume defensive positions and are also gunned down.

At the same time, a band of rebels storms the back of the convoy. Their leader 1) throws a knife into a Crying Dutchman’s chest, 2) throws a grenade that blows up another truck, 3) delivers three flashy slashes across a second soldier’s chest, wielding his machete samurai-style, 3) leaps onto the hood of the jeep to better hack at a third soldier (possibly decapitating him?), and 4) triumphantly raises his fist and bellows –flames billowing behind him- “MERDEKAAAAAAAA!”

Then the rebels blow up the rest of the Dutch trucks all in a row BOOM!! BOOM!! BOOM!! BOOM!! BOOM!! BOOM!!!!

We arrive on Saturday night. Sunday morning is spent warming up and learning some basic falls and bullet reactions from the team of Australian stuntmen:

The second day, we mill around at the village location as they film one soldier getting stabbed. Deciding which of us to stab, setting up the shot, and filming three takes somehow takes the entire day.

That night, the phone in our hotel room rings: our call is at 5 AM. We groan a bit, but prepare to wake up early.

A few minutes later, the phone rings again: call has been pushed forward to 4 AM.

A few minutes after that the phone rings again and the others beg me not to answer it.

Of course I do. 3:30 AM!

Of course, in the morning when we’re all ready to go at 3:30 we’re told we won’t be leaving until 4:00 (and once there, shooting starts well after 9:00). We’re all unclear if this is normal movie-person double-speak or if it’s a uniquely Indonesian thing.

The bulk of our day is spent in the back of a truck. The convoy trundles down the hill, someone yells “CUT”, the convoy reverses all the way back up the hill, and we wait about an hour until they’re ready for the next take.

This is the lead jeep, the truck with the soldiers in it, and the tanker truck, as seen from the top of the hill (where we spend most of our time hanging out, waiting):

I’m mildly alarmed when I learn that we’ll be sitting in the truck when they blow up the tanker and that my position at the back of the truck gives me a front-row seat for the explosion. The scene goes off without incident, though. No limbs lost, no lasting trauma.



Except for the explosions –which are always fun- the rest of filming is pretty mundane. All the action at the back of the convoy occupies much of the crew’s attention, so it takes them two days more than expected to complete the post-explosion shootout where we are (though I do have to spend hours laying ‘dead’ in the spot where I will have died, as background for some scenes that take place after the ambush).

My ‘big scene’ has me crouching behind the truck firing a 30.06 at the hills. One of my buddies gets shot, I shoot back a few times, and am shot in the back. This requires two squibs (exploding blood packs) for entry and exit wounds. When they rig you up with these they use lots of tape:

The shot apparently goes well, since they only do it once. With a little luck my expression of panic over having never shot a rifle before will translate into believable panic about getting shot at.

A nice moment - on Sunday afternoon a thick mist rolls down from the hills, blotting out everything for a few hours. I know this is a thing that happens in this part of the world, but it’s an exciting thing to actually experience:

It’s unclear exactly when Merah Putih will be released, and in what format. We heard it would be a six-part television miniseries here, we heard there would be a feature-length version released to theaters… Either of these [or neither] Rumor has it Partai Demokrat is rallying to get it released in time for the presidential elections in July. (Propogan-tastic!)


Adventures In Indonesian Television #1

While filming Merah Putih I get the chance to watch a lot of Indonesian television in the hotel room. I posted some photos earlier from of a country music special featuring an all-Indonesian band, singers, line dancers, etc. I jokingly refer to this as Jakarta City Limits, but I have no idea what it is really called or why it exists.

At any hour of the day, chances are good that at least half your available channels are showing a different inane soap opera where hurt women look longingly/accusingly at unhappy men. These are unwatchable, except when the characters have bizarre physical traits, like wild facial hair or crazy eyes.

For example, we saw enough of this soap opera to ascertain that it was awful in spite of this girl’s huge scar:

Adventures In Indonesian Television #2

I was floored by a commercial for feminine hygiene products in which the severity of each girl in the commercial’s "flow" is illustrated with a gaily-colored CGI icon floating over her shoulder.

The first teenage-looking girl has a wobbly watering can floating next to her, spilling a few tiny drops. The next has an overful bucket that sloshes more cartoon water out from side to side.

Cut to the beautiful spokeswoman explaining the product’s efficiency. As she stands, her secret shame materializes next to her: she is currently gushing like a high-pressure shower head turned on full blast; the imaginary torrent runs down the entire length of her body.

Is this any more bizarre than the tried-and-true American method of illustrating absorbency by dumping a vial of blue liquid onto the product in some sterile lab? Now that I think about it, I'm not quite sure.

Entire blogs and books could be –and no doubt have been- devoted entirely to the ways non-native speakers blithely abuse the English language. This is usually good for a cheap laugh. For example:

But, like in the Patton Oswalt bit about the poetry of p0rn emails, Indonesian writers’ errors often achieve a peculiar quality unavailable to those with even a basic understanding of grammar.

Case in point: The incredible slogan for a DJ event held at Jogja nightclub Papillon, a slogan emblazoned across a banner over the entrance and on the t-shirts of all the club’s employees that evening, a string of words you could almost call a sentence. The banner says:

THE LEGEND WILL ALWAYS A LEGEND

NEVER CHANGE AND NO ONE CAN EVER CHANGE

I can’t choose a favorite part of this. The mysterious reference to The Legend is rich, but the menacing last line “AND NO ONE CAN EVER CHANGE” tickles me to no end. I’m going to assemble a To The Neck comp and call it The Legend Will Always A Legend Never Change And No One Can Ever Change.