Ass+u+me Continued!

An aisle full of Indian products welcomes the family of four as they walk into the store. Rows of basmati rice, instant mixes, instant gravy mixes, packaged spices, pastes, chutney and sauces, roti, and much more were on display -neatly stacked- as they walk past the aisle. Like always, the Mother stops at the huge commercial fridge and looks through the glassy door, admiring the treasure in it: from halal meat and chicken, parathas, young coconuts, feta cheese, to frozen Jamaican patties and so much more.

She smiles and continues on. As she’s turning left at the end of the aisle, she finds her children squatting in front of the Middle Eastern collection, pointing at some products.

“Hey Mom, look! We have this at home,” says the Son.
“Those olives? Sure do,” replies the Mom.
“We have this too! Dad uses it all the time,” says the Daughter.
“Well, not all the time, honey,” the Mom says as she returns the Sultan’s brand of EVOO huge container back to the shelf.

“Hey, over here guys,” the Father calls.

Standing at the Kitchen, all the way at the back of the store, he points at a table of four with plates and silverwares ready to serve. The children run to it, try to pick their favorite spots to sit. The usual ‘I want to sit by Mom!’ was heard in a short moment, soon diminished when the Father gave them ‘the look’.

A tall Middle Eastern man comes out from behind the partition, smiles to see the family of four, and his laughter was booming. The Father approaches and the two men shake each other hands.

“Ha, ha , ha, good… you are here.”
“Sorry we’re late.”
“Ah, nonsense… you’re just in time, my friend.”
“Thank you for this dinner invitation. Very kind of you.”
“My pleasure. And how are you?” he asks the rest of the three, with a slight nod as he says it.
“Fine, thank you,” the Mother replies, also nods; not sure if the Middle Eastern man still practices the tabooness of shaking hands between two opposite sex.
“We’re really excited to be here tonight. Right guys?” asks the Husband, followed by three excited nods from the rest of the family.
“Ha, ha, ha, yes… he’s a very good customer. Not only he comes a lot for lunch, but also ordered to cater for his meetings,” the Middle Eastern man pats the Husband’s shoulder.
“And I’m always grateful for the leftover he brought home from those meetings,” the Wife quickly adds.
“Ha, ha, ha… good. I’m glad you like it too.” Then his tone of voice turns serious, “And thank you for hiring my son for your department. He has good future now.”
“Oh you’re welcome. He is a very bright kid. All I did was offer him the job and introduce him to the Human Resources. They interviewed him, and must’ve liked him, because he’s now one of my best tech.”
“Ha, ha , ha… you’re a generous man. Come… sit down, I will bring the food out now.”

What reached the cafetaria table first was not the food. It was the aroma of grilled lamb and fried onions. Eager, the Son asked, “How much longer, Dad? I’m starving!” The Father asked him to be patient and suggested, “Why don’t we go get some drinks from the fridge?”

He goes for ‘Ting’, a Jamaican soda, while the Wife grabs a young coconut juice. The kids were settled for root beer.

Soon enough, the Middle Eastern man comes out with plates on his hand. Lettuce salad topped with goat cheese and black olives plus pita bread with homemade hummus, was the starter. As he puts the plates down, he lowers himself and says to the Daughter, “Salaam.” The Daughter looks puzzled. The Mother whispered to her, “Just say Salaam back. That means ‘hello’.” But before the Daughter was able to open her mouth, the Middle Eastern man straight his self up, and boasts, “What? You don’t teach religion to your children?”

“No. I’m atheist and my wife is agnostic,” says the Husband calmly.
“But I thought you said she’s from a Moslem family?” pursues the Middle Eastern man.
“Yes, my family is mostly Moslems,” the Wife answers. “But I also have an aunt who married a Christian, then she herself became a Christian, and actually is now a preacher.”
“Hah! And what does your parent say about you being an agnostic?” the Middle Eastern man crosses his hands over his chest.
“Nothing.”
“OK. I will bring the rest of the food out momentarily,” the Middle Eastern man announced.

After the man left, the Wife gave the WTF? look to her husband. He shrugged.

Shortly later, the Middle Eastern man comes back with two plates of gyros with french fries, and two plates of grilled lamb chop with pita bread (to be eaten with the homemade hummus). After he sat the plates down on the table, he approached the Husband.

“So, I was at the lake last weekend. Fishing. All by myself. Guess what happened.”
“You caught a fish?”
“Ha, ha, ha, no. As I was fishing, all of the sudden, there was this fog. I couldn’t see through it. But then, as it got clearer, I saw a huge ship. Like a pirate ship. Can you believe that?”
Is this man trippin’?  thought the Wife.
“I don’t think that’s possible,” says the Husband.
“Why not?” snapped the Middle eastern man. “You think the Universe just magically appeared, not by God’s creation. Why can’t you except my story about the ship?”

At that point, the Wife decided not to pursue the argument and ignored it. But the Middle Eastern man continues his assumption and at that point, the Wife decides not to go back there often.

So You Think You Can [Do Indonesian] Dance?

One of my guilty pleasure TV show is So You Think You Can Dance (SYTYCD). This summer was its fourth year, and I’ve been following it religiously from the get go. What I admire the most from this year’s season was its diversity. They added Bollywood, Argentine Tango, Pas de deux, Country two-step, and Russian Trepak into the routines. It’s a nice break to watch something else other than ballroom’s salsa, quickstep and jive.

The show this year was pack full of respective choreographers. The usual ones (not less important) like Mia Michaels, Jean Marc Genereaux, Tyce Diorio, and Mandy Moore were mixed with new ones like husband and wife Tabitha and Napoleon D’Umo (hip hop), Nakul Dev Mahajan(Bollywood), Sonya Tayeh (jazz), Desmond Richardson and Dwight Rhoden (ballet). The result was a collection of outstanding and diverse dance choreographies; danced gracefully by the Season 4 dancers.

Closer to the finale, the routines were getting ‘crazy’. New dance styles were introduced, for instance: Bollywood, Country Two-Step, Pas De Deux, and Trepak. The dancers were at first struggling with these new stuff; because you can’t just dance something that belongs to other culture, you have to ‘get it right’. The dancers tried not to get a ‘Look at those Americans trying to dance our dance’ from a native Indian or Russian. They have to do the kick right, or the ‘Indian eye glance’ correctly. The dancers did not disappoint at all. At least not me.

On the last night of the show, where they announced the winner, all judges got a chance to pick their favorite dance number and watch it again. Among the others, Bollywood was chosen by Nigel Lythgoe (judge and producer). I was pleased to hear this, regardless if this is a ’scheme’ or not.

Then I pondered, if Bollywood could get exposed, why not [one of] Indonesian dances? Question is, how familiar is the audience and TV viewers with Indonesian dance? More specifically, which Indonesian dances is well exposed to the world? Balinese, Sumatran, or Javanese dance? I’d say the first one, probably Janger (performed sitting down, with highly coordinated hand, shoulder, and eye movements) or Kebyar (fans on one hand, they move dramatically while feet are strongly grounded, and hands and feet move abruptly).

I know for sure, that Indonesian dance is not that foreign here in the US, or even in Indonesia. When I was still back home, I heard a lot of foreigners were learning Indonesian dances at various institutions primarily in Bali and Java. While here in the US, a lot of our Indonesian student organizations (Permias) were able to host ‘Indonesian nights’ or some other form of Indonesian cultural events. Plus, our Indonesian embassies are also good in doing their job promoting our culture, dance is one of them. Indonesian dance and music could also be found through the education world, such as University of Wisconsin in Madison, the Center for World Music in Berkeley, Calif., and at the University of Hawaii. Other than the ‘formal’ institution, there are also dance centers such as this place.

So why is Indonesian dance not well known? How can we help Indonesian dance be more recognized?

The Circle of Bribery

Just heard about the Indonesian businesswoman who was sentenced for five years in jail after bribing a senior prosecutor to drop a major emblezzlement case. What the hell was she thinking? A prosecutor? Kudos for the current Indonesian president, SBY, who is keeping his word as promised in 2004 to fight corruption. More details here.

Speaking of bribery, have you ever done one? As long as I could remember, I have not intentionally bribed  an ‘official’ before. I did not have the stomach for it, nor know how to do so. Not a police officer, not a government employee, nor the like. Even when I was actually asked by the ‘official’ himself [to bribe], I was not quite following the down low and just gave him a dumb look, “Huh?”

An example. Long time ago, when I was visiting a police station to get some kind of paper work to apply for a job. In Bahasa Indonesia, it’s called Surat Tanda Kelakuan Baik (STKB), which basically stating that I don’t have any criminal records and I’m a good girl. The officer literally said that if I could come back with a pack of cigarette for him, he’d have it done in 2 hours instead of making me come back the next day or two. Since I was in desperate need for that paper work, I did go find his stinkin’ kretek (clove) cigarette. Sure enough, when I came back 90 minutes later after eating road side ketoprak for lunch, it was ready.

Another example was when I applied for my first ID card or Kartu Tanda Penduduk (KTP) at a local sub-division administrative office (kelurahan). The person behind the counter who happened to look like an official (with his brown government uniform and all those emblems) told me that with some extra money, I could have it done on the same day. When I asked ‘how come?’ , the guy got somewhat offended (which I don’t quite understand). So I thanked him for the offer and said I was fine with the waiting time. He got really upset, “Ya udah. Kalo Ibu nggak mau dibantu, dan mau nunggu lama, terserah aja.” Which would be roughly translated, “Well then, if you don’t want to be helped, and prefer to wait a long time, go ahead.”

Indonesian police officer on the road is mostly notorious, especially in Jakarta. There are certain busy intersections that have too many policemen standing by, waiting for us to make a wrong turn, then whistled us. The scary one is Bunderan HI or the roundabout in front of Hotel Indonesia. I was riding with a friend, and her car was the very front in line at the stoplight. She nervously asked me, “Is this lane OK to make a U-turn? Should I not be on this one? Shit, it’s green! What should I do? Should I go ahead or keep going straight? Aww *bleep* they whistled me. Oh *bleep* here he comes!”
My friend is a very confident woman. Unlike in the US, the driver in Jakarta was OK to get out of a car to talk to the officer. And that’s what she did, after grabbing some money from her purse. I was actually the one who’s sweating and got my heart racing pretty fast. I saw my girl friend was trying to smooth talking the stern-looking officer. Later, I saw her reached something out of her pocket and put something on the officer’s hand so smoothly, it looked like they were shaking hands. The officer looked around to see if anybody’s looking, before he took the ‘thing’ from my friend.

I don’t know how this mentality became a habit for us Indonesians. Is it because we like to do it to get out of a sticky situation? Thus created a suply-demand circle with the authorities? Because if we don’t initiate uang pelicin or money offer to get the proposal get done quickly, officials won’t expect or hope for bribery. Just do it properly, follow the rules, you’ll get there. Eventually.