Let's Keep It Cold

My dream on Tuesday night takes the form of what dream intuition tells me is a new Tarantino film.

The story centers around a [mostly black] gang in the 60's. They dress colorfully, like 20-something versions of Fat Albert And The Cosby Kids. The gang is forced to take a break from dodging the cops and getting into light criminal mischief when they learn about a series of kidnappings (all infants) in their neighborhood. They suspect a rival gang is behind it and they set about solving the mystery!

The gang splits up to search for clues. We follow each group of kids as they walk around the city and engage in clever banter. The soundtrack is heavy on 60's summertime favorites. Along the way, we also get some tasteful allusions to the broader struggles going on with the civil rights movement, etc. The film's tone is playful, with moments of gritty darkness. It's great.

While investigating, the gang runs afoul of another [slightly preppy, mostly white] gang. The conflict between the two groups is fiercest between two heavyset girls: the Sassy, Relatable, Heavyset Black Girl and the Bitchy, Heavyset White Girl.

Toward the end of the film, SRHBG has a big epiphany and runs through the neighborhood (in one long tracking shot) until she finds the one remaining neighbor with a baby. She snatches the baby away and runs back out through the neighborhood with it (still one long shot) in what we assume is a ruse to flush out the real kidnapper. Of course, the other gang has taken it upon themselves to also guard the neighborhood and BHWG suddenly appears and gives chase.

Both girls exert themselves over the course of a lengthy foot chase, trading verbal barbs between heavy breaths all the way. They end up alone in an abandoned building of some kind. SRHBG puts the baby down somewhere and the two heavy girls square off for their Final Showdown.

The ensuing fight is brutal, but with lots of anime high-jumping. When she seems poised to win, BHWG leaps into the air to deliver a final punch and sneers: "Remember when you said you were going to kick my ass?" [She is referencing a previous scene, in which SRHBG muttered something that sounded a lot like that as she exited a room.]

"No", the , Relatable, Heavyset Black Girl corrects her, "I said I was going to KILL your ass."

SRHBG fast-draws a sawed-off baseball bat out of nowhere and cracks BHWG gruesomely across the skull before she can land another punch. After several more jarringly serious, not-at-all-cinematic blows to the head, BHWG falls back onto a small table, her arms out at her sides. A man's arms snake up and loop around her arms, pinning her into place.

What appeared to be a table is in fact a ritualistic wooden cage with a table top. A nondescript white dude who was hanging out in the background of the [mostly-black] gang scenes is hunched over inside it, facing straight ahead [this means he and BHWG are now back-to-back with their arms intertwined and the tabletop between them]. It becomes clear that a) he is a vampire, and b) he has been taking the babies to feed on them and SRHBG has been helping him. But he's very embarrassed and shows real remorse about having to do this.

He has huge, twisted fangs that curl out of his mouth [like Batman in Batman: Year 100*]. His jaw has opened to an impossible angle and the upper fangs are embedded in a wide piece of wood, like a second, lower level to the table. The camera focuses on his pained expression as he waits for blood to run down onto the lower level of the table, into his open mouth. As SRHBG bludgeons BHWG to death with the bat, it does.

That's the end of the movie.

*Like this:

Part Thirteen

No One Speaks English And Everything’s Broken

On a second trip to Kaliurang with Alex, we enjoy a brisk hike and see more monkeys. [Thankfully, the one with the Ball Trauma is nowhere to be found - one can only hope he got his problem stitched up OR that he found relief in Monkey Suicide.] Alex takes some time to feed the monkeys, tossing them small bits of fruit and –with a little patience- actually coaxes one to snatch a peanut out of his hand.

I originally meant to include a longer comment here about my aversion to feeding “wild” animals, how I feel like an intruder in nature, how mostly-paved “parks” like the one at Kaliurang fill me with guilt, how the idea of “connecting” more deeply with an animal in that context is preposterous, how we’ve ruined these monkeys and are ruining all animals, and so on. That took an ugly turn and concluded with something like “The idea that we can ‘save the planet’ is a joke. It’s too late.” and led into an even longer passage about how Indonesian culture is "crumbling", how "all cultures are crumbling", and so on. Sounds charming, I know! Probably best to keep it to that little synopsis.

Anyway, here’s us at the top of the hill:

It was bright. I’m told my expression here is “curmudgeonly”. To that I say SHUT THE HELL UP and of course GET OFF MY LAWN.

When I first arrived, people easily guessed I was American. With some preliminary beard growth, they began to guess I was from France. Later, it was Germany. Now, after a few months, someone tells me that when I spoke to his English class, everyone there was sure I must be Palestinian.

An annoying clerk at the bootleg DVD shop asks me: “Are you Muslim?”

Already annoyed, I curtly reply “No.”

He strokes an imaginary beard. “You look like… Hussein!”

I correct him: “Saddam Hussein had a mustache.”

Only later does it occur to me, “Oh yeah! When they finally pulled him out of that hole, Saddam Hussein did have a big beard!”

This is a hillside leading down to a stream in Bantul. These kinds of cascading mountains of garbage are everywhere. Most of the time they aren’t on fire. OK, maybe about half the time.

On that trip to Kaliurang, Alex and I stumble onto an unexpected show. After the hike but before the monkeys, we stumble onto a performance near the restaurants and shops at the foot of the hills. A band (a few gamelan players with a drumset and two gifted singers) is playing a frantic disco beat. Ogres dance around between opposing armies on “horseback”:

The ogres move off and warriors from either side spring forward to dance/battle in time with the music:

After the fourth duel, the dragon/horse thing charges wildly back into the performance area. Everyone “onstage” dances.


Suddenly everyone collapses. The men watching from the edges move in quickly and remove their costume armor and weapons. The ogres remove their masks and watch from the sidelines. The dragon/horse costume is removed, leaving the dudes inside sprawled on the ground like everyone else. They lay motionless, like corpses strewn across a battlefield:

The music picks up new intensity and the dancers slowly awaken and rise, stretching and testing out moves.

Soon they are all up and dancing wildly. All appear “out of it” but the guys who were inside the dragon/horse are clearly FUCKED UP. Someone puts neon green jackets on them - to make them easier to spot in the crowd? They flail about with their eyes closed or rolled back in their heads. One keeps falling down, rolling around, kicking and punching blindly. The sideline observers get him back on his feet, feed him a quick drink from one of the mysterious vials they're carrying, then shove him back into the fray. In time everyone is given a swig of the unknown substance.

The homoerotic dance party [or what would be a homoerotic dance party if Indonesians weren't so asexual] continues:

My camera’s battery dies just when things start to get weird. The sideline observers lay out a woven mat on the sand in font of the band. One of them makes intense eye contact with a dancer and assumes a sort of martial arts stance. He lures the dancer in by dancing a little with him, mirroring his movements. When the dancer is within a few paces of the mat, the observer yanks him forward using Powers. The dancer flips forward, lands on his back on the mat. Three men hold him down. Another man places his hand on the dancer’s stomach and brings it up to the dancer’s face, seemingly forcing the spirit from his body. The boy goes limp and must be carried offstage. This procedure is repeated on all the performers. When the last one has been cleansed [or emptied, or whatever] the shows ends and people disperse.

It's been over a month since the semester ended and I am still waiting to hear when Second Semester begins. I expect either a text message that says "Justin! Come to class tomorrow!" or one that says "Justin! Why didn't you come to class today?"

With dwindling funds and a lot of free time, a person in my position might strongly consider taking a job teaching Conversational English at a private school like Jogja English Dormitory. This would more than triple my income and would offer lots of fun stories. But since the terms of my Darmasiswa Scholarship preclude working while I'm here, it would be really silly to post such stories on the internet. So, you know, it's a good thing that I totally DON'T have a job now that has kept me really busy and will be interesting to juggle along with classes at ISI whenever those start. Yeah, that's the ticket...

Once again, my habit of lengthy edits and procrastination keeps me from giving real-time updates of new developments, specifically Dad's recent visit. The Indonesian leg of The Old Man's world tour [his delightful account is here, with regular updates] brings him to Jogja on Monday and he ends up staying with us the whole week before jetting off to Bali on Friday night.

I am extremely busy [you know, with stuff that's TOTALLY NOT a new job that I'm not really qualified for], but we manage to share some meals and take in a little of the "local flavor" (fried foods, exhaust fumes). And he cooks for us throughout the week, which is always welcome. I will attempt a more timely update when he passes back through in a few weeks.

Finally, as I noted elsewhere, I will be posting mixes of recent musical favorites here from time to time. This is the first one. Listen to it! It will roughly approximate an hour-long car ride with yours truly. More coming soon.

1

Fucked Up “No Epiphany” (Daytrotter)

John Zorn “Almadel”

Crime & The City Solution “All Must Be Love”

Miss Murgatroid & Petra Haden “Fade Away”

Björk “Naturra”

Kristin Hersh “Juno” (Daytrotter)

Caribou “Desiree”

The Microphones “The Pull + Ice” (April 27, 2003)

Tripping Daisy “Mechanical Breakdown”

Einstürzende Neubauten “Weil Weil Weil (Kurt Sweil Remix by Jochen Arbeit)”

The Qemists & Mike Patton “Lost Weekend”

Dälek “2012 (The Pillage)”

School Of Seven Bells “Conjjur”

Dragging An Ox Through Water “Not Harping On Powers”

Part Twelve

See The World, Subjugate The Ocean

“Kids Learning English” Story #1

A friend of a friend is looking for a Native Speaker to judge an English Speech competition at UNY (Universitas Negeri Yogyakarta) in the first week in January and I enthusiastically volunteer. For the first round, the 12 competitors have prepared speeches about:

a) Whether the Indonesian government lowering the price of fuel was a good idea (All agree: YES!)

b) How Obama’s victory will affect Indonesia in the coming years (All agree: President Obama will be good for Indonesia! Because he used to live here!)

c) The Young Leader Phenomenon (Each one mentions Obama’s victory over McCain and makes a vague reference to how younger leaders know more about things like The Internet.)

Most of the speeches are mediocre and repetitive, with few coherent arguments coming across. Five finalists move on to the second -and final- round, in which they’re given 10 minutes to prepare a brief speech on “Israel’s Recent Aggression Toward Palestine”.

The frontrunner from the first round once again gives the best-pronounced, best-thought-out speech. However, her speech is barely 5 minutes long and before addressing the topic she takes a moment to define the word “Holocaust” and brings up discrepancies between different groups’ claims about how many people were killed in the Holocaust, plainly explaining that: “The Jew uses the Holocaust to get sympathy from the rest of the world…” [That’s right. ‘The Jews’ would have been special enough, but no. The Jew (singular). Like how Borat says it.]

However, her arguments and her English are by far the best of the group and she wins easily. To her credit, she goes on to acknowledge that the issue is a complicated one and that blame cannot be laid solely at the feet of… The Jew.

This is the nightmare tree with long human-sized fingers

for roots next to where we park our bikes.

“Kids Learning English” Story #2

The same acquaintance needs help a few days later, so I join Dora (Darmasiswa from Hungary) in administering a conversational English test at a school where Indonesian kids are trained to work on American and Dutch cruise ships.

The test covers basic introductions and personal information, then describing a few simple photographs. They’ve only been studying English for a few months, but some show remarkable progress. When asked why he wants to work on a cruise ship, one young man happily replies: “I wish to work on cruise ship so I can see many places and subjugate the ocean.”

“Ha ha ha," I say, "Uhh, are you sure that’s the word you want to use?”

He nods earnestly. “Yes, yes! Subjugate!”

“Kids Learning English” Story #3

When Jeannie goes on a school field trip, one of her [normally conservative] female tutors arrives wearing a t-shirt with this on it:


If there were any questions about how much English this tutor knows, this would answer them. Jeannie opts not to explain the meaning of the shirt to the tutor, to avoid an immensely awkward conversation and –I expect- hysterical outburst of shame from the girl.

[Australian] Carla and I have been practicing for weeks, putting together a set under the name Kilat Khusus (from an Indonesian postal service slogan alluding to their lightning speed, a reference I find particularly laughable since the package I’ve been expecting has taken more than a month to arrive). Some moments sound a little like Glass Candy or Suicide or The Deckers. Audio/video evidence of a possible show in late January will follow.

We’ll have to work quickly though since they just got word that Darmasiswa canceled the Short Course for Second Semester, so Carla, my friend Alexandros, his sister, and all the rest who were applying to extend their studies for the rest of the year are out of luck and will have to vacate the country soon. This is especially lame since the administrators here were telling them all along that extending their programs would be no problem. (Apparently it was 100% possible right up until the day it suddenly wasn’t.)

I recognize Pooh and Mickey, but which Copyrighted character

is that blue …thing on the right supposed to be?

“Kids Learning English” Story #4

Helping kids learn English is fun, so I agree to take Maya (Darmasiswa from Wisconsin)’s place speaking English at a local high school. This assignment turns out to mean accompanying a group of a couple hundred kids to a local herb plantation, then to a park at Kaliurang (near the foot of Mt. Merapi). It also means free lunch.

Seen from outside, Kaliurang is super cool; tall hills covered with jungle trees arouse the imagination. Unfortunately, upon entering one finds paved paths and state park-style structures everywhere. The group of students -which includes several contestants from the Speech Competition from the previous week- crowds around me to practice conversation and endure long, ranting answers to their questions about American culture.

My excitement at seeing “wild” monkeys for the first time fades quickly. The park monkeys are less wretched than the cats and dogs I’ve seen in town, though they are afflicted with the same hideously drooping Malnourishment Teats.

As one monkey scampers along about 20 feet away from me, my eyes catch a quick flash of red. I follow him to get better look and that’s when I see the Worst Thing I Will See In This Country. This poor monkey has sustained a terrible injury to the balls. His sac has been slashed or torn on the right side and movement pulls the wound apart, revealing a wedge of the bright red stuff inside.

After attempting to draw this horror at home with unsatisfactory results, I manage to recreate it using a pink t-shirt inside a plastic bag. From behind, this poor monkey’s pouch looked like this:

And yet, there in the park, somehow no one else seems to share my dismay. They can't NOT notice. How could ...THAT... be unremarkable? FOR GOD'S SAKE, SOMEBODY RENDER SOME ASSISTANCE!

But they don't. The injured monkey disappears, the field trip concludes without further incident, and they give me some nice batik for my trouble. The End.

Part Eleven

Crappy Holidays! (ZIIIINGGGG!!!)

Christmas Eve 2008! Unprecedented snow? Familial warmth? Delicious prime rib, pies, and whatnot? Sadly, no. In Jogja it was last-minute gamelan rehearsal that forced me to postpone beach travel plans until Christmas Day.

The rehearsal is held in a dusty shack full of gamelan instruments somewhere in backwoods Bantul. My classmates and I practice a new song for about an hour as members of our teacher’s gamelan group trickle in. Once the whole group arrives, Amateur Hour comes to an end and they get down to the real business of the night - running all the music for the next show. Here’s a taste (Note: the video's a little dark):

Things conclude at around midnight and we [Yuri –from Japan, the other non-Indonesian in class- and I] are told to report to campus in the morning to get new text for the show on the 29^th, when we will be “opening” for Pak Udrek.

I get up and go to school at 10 o’clock on Christmas morning without protest [since, really, what else do I have to do?] and find the wayang building locked. I wait around until 11:00 when Yuri shows up to tell me that Mas Udreko is still typing up the text, he’ll be here at noon and can I wait there til then? Uhhh, NO. I have to catch a bus to Pacitan. I’ll get it in a couple of days. Bye!

Actually boarding a bus to Pacitan turns out to be more difficult than expected. Jeannie and I barely make it to the bus station by our scheduled departure time and everyone there is aggressively unhelpful. We’re pointed in all different directions, usually by dudes hoping to hustle us onto their own buses. All insist there is no direct bus from Jogjakarta to Pacitan, despite the fact that our friends Alex and Paula took that bus on the previous day. Suspicious but tired of waiting, we end up getting a bus to Solo [around 2 hours] then transferring to a bus to Pacitan [almost 3 hours].

In Solo we eat Christmas Dinner: sate ayam and water at the bus station, choked by the fumes of a dozen shabby buses. It is at this point that I realize that I will never have to worry about having a worse Christmas than this one. Maybe there’s some long-term satisfaction in that. In the short term, though, it just sucks.

Real hat, real chair, cardboard girl. From a distance = alarming!

Exhausted and smelly, we arrive in Pacitan after 9 PM. Having spent the entire day rushing around or crammed into bus seats designed for a people whose average height is 6-12 inches less than ours, we manage to chat with Alex and Paula for a bit [and ascertain what a nice, relaxing Christmas Day they had, those jerks], and we all retire to our small, hot, mosquito-friendly room.

We spend most of the next day (December 26^th) at the beach. As a town Pacitan is unremarkable, but the beach is nicer than Krakal. The sand is softer, the water is cleaner, and there is ample area for swimming. We play in the waves, eat tasty watermelon, and escape with manageable sunburns.

Alexandros goes in for the close-up.

Later we venture out for food and I finally get to try roti bakar. For the uninitiated:

-Roti Bakar begins with a loaf of bread.

-The loaf is sliced lengthwise three times, until it looks like a tall book with four thick pages.

-Each “page” is painted with butter.

-Chocolate sprinkles are poured over the butter.

-Condensed milk is drizzled onto the chocolate.

-Then they fold the thing up, smear butter all over the outside, and grill it.

The result is like a chocolate sandwich between wedges of French toast. I have heard it aptly described as “apocalyptic”. [Note: In Jogja, Roti Bakar is sold alongside local Fresh Milk stands. More on that when I experience it.]

After more confusion and misinformation at the bus station, I get the bus from Pacitan to Batu [2 hours] and the bus from Batu to Jogja [3 hours]. The Batu-Jogja bus is particularly crowded, as they seem to stop at every wide part of the road to take more villagers on.

Several times I think I detect the smell of shit. It passes so quickly, I assume it was my imagination. Not so! Apparently that’s an intended use for the plastic bags dispensed from the ceiling of the bus. The kid in front of me hands a bagged-up package to his mom (who is standing in the aisle, hovering over him) and she dutifully flings it out the window.

[photo coming soon]

December 29^th is my first wayang performance in front of an audience. While the shows I’ve attended so far have been remote village affairs, this one is in an open-air building on a [relatively] well-trafficked Bantul street. Before the show, they take me to the epic wardrobe at Pak Udrek’s house where all the group's traditional dress is kept. It takes two of them to assemble the dhalang outfit: a fancily wrapped batik sarong thing, tightly wrapped and pinned sashes and belt, flowery shirt, and kris (plus another 20 minutes of rooting through the many hats to find one that I can squeeze onto the huge melon on top of my neck).

[photo coming soon]

The performance goes well. The next few days are quiet, New Year's Eve is mellow, it isn't until the following week that they mention that the show on the 29th was NOT my exam, that in fact my exam performance will be on January 5th. We meet on the 4th to dismantle Pak Udrek's wayang screen, cut down some banana trees (puppets stick into banana logs just below the screen), load it all into a truck, and spend the rest of the day setting it all up in the place we practiced on Christmas Eve.

The second performance is better than the first. Even though I'm still in the dark on the exact meaning of most of the script I must still read phonetically, the jokes get laughs and my singing elicits fewer jeers than at least one of my fellow students'. Considering these circumstances, not being The Worst in some respect feels like a major victory.

Next: Judging English speeches, finding a job, and adding YouTube videos to old entries...