How to be Indonesian

map of Indonesia

As promised in my previous post, here is an ultimate guide to be an Indonesian. Surely, it is a total generalisation (how can a country with 17,500 islands, 2,500 million inhabitants, 300 distinct ethnic groups and 740 different languages be just called a country?). Something that's entirely acceptable in my hometown may get someone roasted alive at a pig burning party in rural Papua. Also, if it ignores all the details and jumps directly into a judgemental conclusion, think of being a bunch of people living on remote islands in the pacific: it's merely a way of living. Despite being the 4th largest population in the world, we are on our own, separated by sea to other countries and to ourselves. Indonesians, like myself, live in a snug, comfortable and amazingly tiny bubble around our head called 'the universe’. And while everybody is a bit racist sometimes, we are too, only slightly more deliberately. 

So, to be Indonesian, one must:

• Switch off our brain from time to time. This is important not only to preserve our energy, youth and beauty, but also our sanity. In this big country with no rule or regulation whatsoever, this is the only way to keep afloat. And stop asking why. Only God and the spirit of our ancestors know (if you happen to find out how to contact them). We are happy and well alive because we have no idea how our country works (or if it does). Be seriously ignorant, we'll survive. 

PS. If you're extremely good at doing this, you'll have a promising future as an Indonesian politician.

An example of conversation with a normal Indonesian goes as follow: 

My curious foreign friend: in your country, at what age limit we can legally employ someone without being charged with child abuse?

Me: Is it not allowed?

• smile and nod when we don't understand. We don't mean to lie, it's just our nature of being super friendly: we say that we hear you, but what you imply is the mystery of life.
• walk slow but type fast. There's no point of walking fast, you'll end up waiting anyway. While waiting, we kill time by playing with our mobile phone. No wonder we can type in messengers at a speed of a bullet.
• eat at all times. Unlike France, our restaurants and street vendors open 24 hours per day. We eat not because we're starving (how come if you do it at all times?) but just to keep us busy. Indonesian sweats not when working but when eating (thanks to our spicy foods).
• not greet friends "how are you?" because that what tourists do. They learn to say "apa kabar?" which means 'how are you' in Indonesian according to Lonely planet phrase book. But the real Indonesians greet friends by saying, "kamu gemukan ya?" which means 'you're getting fat'. This is the beauty of our country, we can always tell people they're fat and still be very friendly (don't forget to smile and nod).
• put everyone in labelled boxes. We don't discriminate people, we are just well-organised about who belongs to which group. We believe that all people come from Sumatra are lawyers or 'Padang food' sellers. People from Madura are barbers or satay hawkers. All middle-aged potbellied men are government employees, e.g. politicians, tax officials, public university lecturers, etc. All skinny pretty girls are secretaries, soap-opera stars or second/third/fourth wives of potbellied men. Chinese people are annoying and filthy rich. Young, long-haired, shabby, lanky guys are unemployed. Scrawny men who go to work everyday on old bicycles are elementary school teachers in the villages, etc. It seems quite abrupt but it's more often true. It's because, admit it, we always try to meet the expectation.
• pick a religion. To say that Indonesians are religious is an understatement. It's completely understandable: amidst the chaos and shambles (which mean our normal daily life), we can only count on divine intervention. We also have to put a religion on our ID card. It doesn't matter if your name is just a number, but your religion must be one of 5 beliefs recognised by our government. Of course we are a free, democratic country, no question about that. Otherwise we wouldn't be able to use facebook, twitter, picasa, youtube, blogspot, google, google map, wikipedia, etc like in mainland China.
• be good at multitasking. A bus driver in Indonesia can simultaneously drive, smoke, take on and drop off passengers, type a text message, answer a call and talk on the phone while overtake a truck, without loosing a beat. A chief of one department can be a head of another office, a president of another organisation, a manager of another company as well as a chairperson of a politic party. And why not, his/her job is simply to sign letters (and to be photographed, occasionally). Whether they ever read these letters or not isn't an issue. After all, most of them are illiterate.
• know everything in our neighbourhood. We may not know that there's a new country named South Sudan (it's too far from us and 99.99% of us will never visit it anyway) but we know precisely who's the wife of our next-door, where she comes from, how old she is, what school she went, what she does for a living, what she wears and what she recently bought and how much it costs. We know which neighbour has financial problem and which has marriage problem. At the workplace, colleagues must know every one's backgrounds and their far-flung relatives' backgrounds. We are bigger than 'big brother' and although not well-equipped with CCTVs, we even manage surprisingly better than that.
• think of 'shopping mall' as our centre of culture and civilisation. It's where people spend their time when they're not working to eat, to shop and to be entertained, to meet friends and drink, to watch shows and exhibitions, to do sports, to visit beauty parlour or to go to movies. While in other countries people talk about number of inhabitants to decide the size of a city, in Indonesia it's the number of shopping malls. The bigger a city, the more shopping malls it has.
• take a motorbike to go anywhere. You may well just go two houses around the corner, but a really good Indonesian will take a motorbike ride. Walking isn't an option because the pavement is blocked by street-food sellers, barbers, other merchants and broken sewers. Not to mention a risk of being hit by a car or the hazard of unidentified falling objects. Indonesians also have an astounding ability to take their motorbike in the inaccessible hinterlands. Once I saw a motorbike parked in the depths of a forest up the hill. Only the driver and the parking guy (if he exists. Sometimes he suddenly pops up out of the blue) know how it got there.
• understand your priority when communicating by text. In Indonesia, it's important when you give a long answer and when you don't. Example:

• My mobile got stolen but I am alright. Please don't worry and ignore if there's a random text from me. Answer: ati2gbu.cu. (it looks like a confirmation code for online shopping but it means 'take care. God bless you. See you.' It was a real message from my parents for me, actually)
• Can you send me some money soon? I'm desperate and nearly dying of hunger. Answer: Y (means ya or yes in Indonesian)
• Will you marry me? Answer: N (means nggak or no in Indonesian)
• Look at this monkey! Answer: wkwkwkwkwkwkwkwkwk....(laughing, Indonesian style)
•  You're so funny. Answer: huahahahahahahahahahahahahaha. Hihihihihi. Xixixixixixixixi (also laughing, Indonesian style)
• It's too funny. Answer: Huahaha :-) huahaha :-) huahaha:-) huahaha :-) wakakakakakakakak :-D:-D:-D (also laughing, Indonesian style with emoticons)

• consider that time and other measures as relative and therefore they're neither precise nor countable. When we mention 'about 12 o'clock', it can mean midday today or midnight the day after tomorrow. Or if we tell you it's 1 km it means 'in a distance not so far away for a motorbike but honestly we never measure it since the era of European settlements in south east asia.' I always bear this in my mind since I consider being fat is definitely relative. When I see an old friend, I know that I'm still skinnier than a hippo.

There you go, my fellow Indonesians, feel free to add or to cut. I'm sure there're a lot more which I can't recall at the moment. Thing is, it doesn't feel weird until you see that not everyone are used to the same things. I still have to eat rice for breakfast once in a while and I love to wet my bottom with running water than just wipe it with toilet paper. And I strongly believe that my ancestors came from the sea (where else?) as great sailors who discovered delicious stuffs like sweet soya sauce.

How to be French

In order to make the most of my staying in France, I totally immersed myself in its culture; notably by spending lots of time drinking, partying and playing 'social games' (who can think of any other stuff that is more French than these anyway?). So this is probably a real guide to a French real-life experience (yeah, you bet), not just a passing tourist who merely skims its haute cuisine or Gallery Lafayette to buy some Yves St Laurent or Dior, as if they're not made in China and are not available in a local departement store across the road and do not cost like buying a little town in a third-world country.

So to be French, one must:

1. plan the next holiday right after a holiday, preferably on the first day of work. This is completely sensible, otherwise what is the point of working all the way until the next holiday?
2. go to the pharmacy more often than going to the restaurant or movies. Of course French people also go to the restaurant, don't get me wrong. But not too often because it may look like you're so lame at cooking. Also, showing off a bit of home-made meal is a French way to charm guests. They go to movies once in a while, especially on Tuesday when there's a "buy one get one" thing with one mobile phone provider. In France downloading movies from the internet is illegal, but if an officer finds you downloading one, he/she will just suggest another site that is more secure to download movies. While adding a downloaded movie on top of a delicious self-made speciality will be a perfect scenario for spending a nice evening, ones can not drug themselves unless they get an endless supply of drugs. Viola the pharmacy. 
3. talk with a lot of of puffing sounds. If you want to sound French, add a 'pfft', 'brrp' or 'beuf' occasionally, so even if our French level is the same as Spanish cow, we'll still sound so natural and so French indeed.
4. live through a strike. French people go on strike every now and then to make a point that some of them have a point and they are free to express it by making other people wait a long time, walk a long distance or other minor inconveniences. Still, it's good to see a country allowing its citizens to speak out and aloud, therefore the Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité.
5. kiss everyone (yes, don't miss anyone please) at the party, especially if you come late and leave early. Unfortunately this kiss will be meaningless pecks on the cheek, but we may get lucky sometimes and a hunky bloke will land wet smooches on both cheeks (amen). 
6. have a lunch or dinner only at a particular, scheduled time of the day. Restaurants in France only open for a couple of hours in the afternoon and about the same 'office hours' in the evening. The restaurants are quite strict about their schedule, even the bars serving hot food will refuse to make a sandwich if you come at the wrong time of the day. You can get some peanuts and alcohol instead, at the very best. For people whose home country has foodstalls that open 24/7, this may reminisce of those days of wars in military camp where food was rationed and people stood in line holding bowls and one must be careful not to queue too long to miss the feeding hours. PS. Pharmacy has longer office hours.
7. take one day off for filling out the tax form. Or maybe two, just in case there is a problem with it. We never know.
8. leave a shitty job for a dole. If you don't have a good job, just quit because the government unemployment support pays better.
9. take up an activity or interest outside the job. Or maybe two activities. Or three. Or four. French people are very good at using their spare time and they do practically all cool stuffs imaginable apart from their work. Boating, jumping, surfing, wind surfing, horse riding, flying, playing musical instruments, all types of dancing, kayaking, cycling, boxing, martial arts, mountaineering, climbing, hiking, skiing, scuba diving or car racing, to name but a few. Other people do it as well, but not as often, as common, as much nor as many kinds at once (I believe). 
10. do all the shopping on Saturday evening because stores are closed on Sunday. If you really need something on Sunday that you can't delay till the following day, go to the Arab stores (it's not being racist, it's just called this way). They're a bit more expensive than the grande surface like Carrefour or Super U, but they have more friendly office hours.
11. not eat frog legs or snails. What a stereotype, like Chinese always eats dogs. But no, they eat everything. Frog legs and snails are just for tourists who believe that these are the food French people normally eat every day. In fact, they eat mostly 'normal' food, apart from the duck liver pâté or foie gras, of course. Normal is just too relative but apparently when I was in France, frogs were just out of fashion. 

Despite all those lovely things, I like France for their innate ability to enjoy themselves and to complain a bit just not to make their good life sound too perfect. I will write more about "How to be Indonesian" just to have more fun and to be fair to myself.