Tales of a Female Nomad

by Rita Golden Gelman

  While they are working, Tu Nini’s body is laid out, naked, on the wooden platform, and a young cousin and neighbor, with a container of formalin and a hypodermic needle, injects the preserving agent into her still warm body, piercing the skin over and over again until suddenly he calls out in pain. Somehow he has squirted formalin into his own face and he is blinded (temporarily). Two men, their arms supporting him, lead him down the street to the doctor.

  A cremation is one of those times when the banjar takes over. If you are Balinese, you spend your life helping your neighbors as a member of the banjar, so that the banjar will be there for you when you need it. You cannot die in Bali without a banjar. Banjar men build the tower in which the body is transported to the cemetery, they decorate the family compound, deliver chairs for the guests to sit on, whittle the sate sticks, break open the coconuts, build the structures that are necessary for a proper cremation. And it is the men of the banjar who make the meat dishes that are served during the festivities.

  Banjar women make the offerings and cook the meals that all the workers will eat. Each of the approximately 250 families in our banjar will contribute three working days to the event. There are work charts, schedules, assignments, and meetings. The banjar is like a big public caterer. How many pots, how many chairs, how many gas burners will be needed to cook the food? How many pigs have to be killed? How many sate sticks have to be whittled?

  One night a procession of men marches into the puri, each man carrying two woven palm-leaf “shade tiles” that will be used to construct a roof. Under the roof, the men, chopping and cooking all day long, will be protected from the hot sun. Some of the “tiles” will be used to make a second shaded area so the guests who come to the cremation can eat their meals in the shade.

  All day for three days, there are women sitting in groups, weaving the offerings, peeling shallots and garlics, making coconut milk by grating hundreds of coconuts and soaking the bits in water and finally squeezing the “milk” out of the shredded “meat.”

  I peel shallots with the shallot peelers and stay far away from the women grating coconuts; every time I try to grate coconuts, I grate my fingers. The women around me peeling shallots are pleased that I am helping. They do not believe me when I tell them I have always done my own cooking. They assume that anyone with enough money to come to Bali must have a staff of servants back home.

  Each woman who spends the day helping is given rice and food to take home to her family. More than one hundred people are fed during each of the three preparation days, and more than five hundred, including guests, on the day of the cremation.

  On the second night I take my turn keeping Tu Nini’s body company; it can never be left alone. I am sitting there when Tu Man, Tu Aji’s architect son, comes over and says, “Rita, listen.”

  A dog is howling like a wolf. Aaaaaooooo. Aaaaaooooo.

  “When dogs howl like that, leyak are about. They are attracted by the blood of the newly dead.”

  A few minutes later, Tu Aji tells me that a special ceremony is about to begin. Each member of the immediate family will take a turn cutting a string that symbolically holds Tu Nini’s spirit to the earth. It is one way the family says to the spirit that they are ready to let her go. Tu Aji, Tu Biang, and their sons are all called to cut off a piece of the string (divided into six-inch segments by tied-on coins) and throw the snipped segment over their shoulders. I am observing from a distance, moved by the beauty of the ceremony, when I hear my name, and join the immediate family in releasing Tu Nini’s spirit.

  By the third night, my eyes can barely stay open. All night long there are neighborhood men sitting all over the compound, including outside my room, playing cards, eating the crackers and snacks, smoking the cigarettes, drinking the coffee and tea that the puri supplies, and talking loudly. Evil spirits would not dare to come to a place where there is so much activity.

  Exhausted by the sleepless nights, I head for my room, about a hundred feet from Tu Nini. No amount of noise will keep me up tonight.

  Tu Aji follows me to my patio. “Rita, there is a kekawin tonight at three in the morning. I would like you to come.”

  A kekawin is a wondrous thing. Four people sit on mats around a table, each with an open book containing the text of the Mahabharata, a sacred Hindu epic poem. They choose a portion of the text and one by one they chant in ancient Sanskrit. The first person sings a few lines in Sanskrit. Then he or she stops and someone sitting off to one side of the table chants the same passage in Balinese, so those who are gathered around will understand it. Occasionally, one of the listeners or singers will halt the process and discuss the meaning of the passage or the nuance of a particular word.

  A kekawin is a beautiful ceremony, but for me, it is tedious because I don’t understand Sanskrit or Balinese, and it can go on and on and on.

  I have never said no to Tu Aji. Out of respect, out of curiosity, and because he has a keen sense of what will intrigue and interest me. But I have seen a kekawin before; tonight, all I want to do is sleep.

  “Tu Aji, I am so tired. I don’t know if I can stay awake.”

  “Don’t stay awake,” he says. “I will call you when we are ready to begin.”

  In the middle of the night one of the servants wakes me up. At the bale, Tu Aji motions for me to sit next to him on the mat. We are surrounded by protective spears that surround the bale and keep the evil spirits away from Tu Nini. The draped white cloth covering the ceiling adds a touch of purity to a solemn event. From where I am sitting I can see the mat-wrapped bundle that is Tu Nini. Tomorrow she will be cremated. Tonight she will be entertained.

  The people who will be chanting are seated on mats around a low wooden table. They have finished their coffee and the books are opened. The chanting begins. It sounds like the chant of Torah scholars. Or the call to prayer from the top of a Muslim mosque. Or a Catholic priest intoning Latin to his congregation. The sound is otherwordly and deeply spiritual.

  Then the first singer stops and the same passage is sung in Balinese by a man sitting on the other side of Tu Aji. And then the people at the table turn to Tu Aji. There is a pause as Tu Aji turns to me with a smile . . . and chants in English.

  Several months after Tu Nini’s death, I am making offerings with Dayu Biang, trying to figure out which bit of leaf to weave in next, when my friend Ida Bagus walks in the gate. He and his family live more than an hour away. As soon as I see his face, I know something is wrong.

  There are no phones in Kerambitan. My family in the States has instructions to call Ida Bagus or his wife if there is ever a family emergency. They have a phone in their house. They speak English. And they have a car.

  The phone call came in the middle of the night. First thing in the morning Ida Bagus has driven over with the news that my father has had a heart attack.

  My hands are shaking as I toss some underwear and a change of clothes in a bag. Three hours later I am on a plane. And twenty-eight hours after that I am standing over my father in the hospital. He is pasty white and weak, but he smiles when he sees me.

  “Where’d you come from?” he asks.

  “Around the corner,” I say. “I heard you were sick.”

  Later that day he slips into a coma, and a few days after that, it is clear that he is not going to make it through the night.

  “Dad,” I tell him aloud, holding his hand. “You’ve been a wonderful father and you’ve lived a good and caring life. If you are ready to leave us, I give you permission. I am certain that your spirit will live on and someday we will meet again. Go in peace. I love you.”

  I hear myself speaking the words and I realize that I believe them. Tu Aji, Tu Biang, and Tu Nini have helped me accept my father’s leaving. I hope my words will help him through his transition.

  That night, he dies. When the call comes from the hospital, I find myself wishing there were concrete rituals to help me say good-bye to his spirit and wish it well on its journey, the way there are in Bali. But her
e there is no body washing, no cutting the spirit loose by symbolically snip-ping a string. After comforting my mother and calling my brother, I sit up in bed and meditate, creating my own private ritual.

  The funeral home is overflowing into the parking lot; there are hundreds of people. My father was a pharmacist on the same corner on the east side of Bridgeport, Connecticut, for fifty-two years. He was “Doc” to all the people whose splinters he removed and the thousands of customers who came in for medical advice. He and my mother were born and lived in one city all of their lives. They are both known and loved for their years of civic leadership.

  My mother takes comfort in the outpouring of sympathy, and so do the rest of us. It is a celebration of a life well lived, a person well loved. After the funeral, for a full week, hundreds of people come to the house to comfort my family. There is no neighborhood organization like the Balinese banjar, but there is food and the supportive company of friends, family, and community.

  As I sit in my mother’s living room, surrounded by friends and relatives, I think about the fact that I have chosen to live my life without a community. I will not have hundreds of people at my funeral like my father and Tu Nini. I am overwhelmed by a rush of loneliness. I fear that I have given up something significant.

  But as I think about it, I realize that I do have communities; I create them wherever I live. They are not communities of people with whom I have shared experiences over time; but rather, they are communities where I have made new and intense connections. Community is important to me; and my kind of travel does not preclude being a part of a group. In Mexico, it was the backpacker community; in Nicaragua, it was Marco and Doña Juana and their family; in Israel, it was Servas. And in Bali, my community is the puri. There is more than one kind of community.

  I remain in the U.S. for several months. My mother has Parkinson’s; and though she is fully functioning, she cannot live alone. I put a two-by-two-inch ad in three suburban papers, and I post notices in local churches:

  I am looking for a gentle, intelligent woman to live in and be a companion to my mother, someone who will share her interests in art, classical music, current affairs, and good conversation. Mother is suffering from Parkinson’s and cannot drive or cook or take care of her house, but she is still interested in the world, in the community,and in people. If you are interested in meeting and being a friend to someone very special, please call me.

  There are lots of calls and interviews; most of the applicants are all wrong. Then Amparo walks in. She is from Colombia and has five sons and four grandchildren in the area. She is articulate, literary, cultured, and she and my mother click immediately. I stay around for a while, giving support to Amparo and working with my brother, Dick, on taxes, on the house, and on all the bureaucratic paperwork that death carries with it. When I leave, I tell Amparo to keep the place lively. Her children and grandchildren and friends are welcome. Houses need children and healthy people.

  I go back to Bali knowing that my brother and his family will be there if there are problems, either major or minor. With Dick, his wife Margaret, and their daughters, Michelle and Danielle, just a few towns over, I feel secure in leaving. And I also have a feeling that my mother is in for new, happy adventures with Amparo.

  I have been away for three months. During my absence, Tu Aji has bought a refrigerator. The women who cook have no interest in ruining perfectly good food by putting it in a refrigerator. They continue to shop for fresh ingredients just before they cook. And if there is leftover food, they continue to give it away or feed it to the dog. Everyone tells me that food doesn’t taste good if it is kept in a refrigerator overnight. I am the only one in the puri willing to eat last night’s dinner the next day. They are amused at my lack of taste.

  Tu Aji has not bought the refrigerator to preserve food. The refrigerator is for making ice. He has been seduced by the iced juices in the tourist restaurants around the island: fresh fruits, like pineapple, banana, and papaya, swirled in a blender with water, sugar, and ice. They are thick and fruity and healthy, and “enak sekali” (delicious).

  Tu Aji has also bought a blender. And he has instructed his architect-son, Tu Man, to learn how to make juices. An architect, Tu Aji tells me, unlike the women in the kitchen, has mechanical skills.

  “Would you like a juice?” he asks me while we are sitting and talking on my patio late one afternoon. And when I say yes, he calls across the courtyard, “Tu Man? Man? Tu Man?”

  And from wherever he was, Tu Man arrives and takes his father’s order. Then he disappears into the kitchen, where he plugs in the blender. The sound of a machine in the kitchen is new and strange. In this kitchen there have never been machines . . . no blender or processer, no coffee grinder, no toaster. Even rice makers are years away for this family.

  When the whirling stops, Tu Man delivers a tall, fruity, icy glass of papaya-banana juice; and then he goes back to the other side of the garden, where he was trimming hedges (with hand-clippers).

  Every day Tu Aji has a glass of juice, and each time, he calls for his son, loudly across the courtyard. “Tu Man? Man? Tu Man?” And Tu Man, who is over thirty, arrives to serve his father.

  I have been back for two weeks when one evening, Tu Aji, Tu Biang, and I are talking and Tu Aji’s craving hits. He wants a juice.

  “Ah,” he says, “but I remember now that Tu Man is not here. I cannot have it.”

  I smile, happy for the chance to serve him. “I will make your juice,” I offer.

  “Do you really know how?” he asks.

  “Of course,” I say. Then I turn to Tu Biang. “And I will be happy to show you how to do it.”

  I go to the kitchen and plug in the blender. I look around for Tu Biang but she has gone to her room. I peel and cut some papaya and banana and put it in the container. Then I add water and sugar and ice. Tu Aji is waiting at the table when I bring him his juice.

  Later that night Tu Biang joins me on the patio outside my room. “What happened to you?” I say. “I was going to show you how to make juice in the blender.”

  She giggles. “Rita, you don’t understand. If I learn how to make the juice, Tu Aji will stop calling, ‘Tu Man? Tu Man?’ And he will begin calling, ‘Tu Biang? Tu Biang?’ Thank you very much, but I don’t want to learn.”

  After a few weeks, I settle into my old routine. I bike to the beach and meditate early each day. I write every morning. And I study Indonesian and read in the afternoons. I usually have lunch and dinner with Tu Aji.

  Late one morning, as I am sitting in front of my computer, Dayu Biang hands me a banana-leaf package. There’s a sparkle in her eyes as she tells me she has brought me a present.

  Yesterday, when I asked her about the kids and the old people I had seen in the rice fields who were “fishing” for dragonflies, she told me how she wishes she were young enough, or old enough, to catch dragonflies again. Then she stopped her chores and we went “fishing” in the yard. Our pole was the spine of a palm leaf, tapered to toothpick-size at one end. The hook was the tarlike sap that came out when she scraped a frangipani tree trunk.

  We smeared the thin tip of the spine with the sap and went after dragonflies, who are apparently attracted to it. And when they didn’t come to us, we tapped them as they rested on a wire, and they stuck. Dayu removed the wings and skewered the bodies, piling up seven tiny dragonflies on a stick. Fortunately there weren’t enough for a meal.

  But today, Dayu Biang’s nephew spent the morning on assignment in the rice fields; he came home with fifty dragonflies. And while I was writing, Dayu Biang sautéed them in coconut oil with onion, shallots, garlic, hot pepper, and salt. Now she can’t wait to watch me eat them.

  My friend Dayu Biang, who wouldn’t even take a bite of the French toast I made the other day, and who told me a few weeks ago that she wasn’t brave enough (“tidak berani”) to get into my hammock, is awaiting my first crunch of dragonflies with a smirk on her face.

  Once, long ago, I ate chocolate-
covered ants, but they didn’t look any different from chocolate-covered peanuts. The dragonflies in my package look exactly like what they are: wingless dragonflies. I pop one into my mouth and bite into it. It tastes like a crispy vegetable sautéed in garlic and shallots and hot pepper. There’s nothing wrong with the taste. It’s the tiny legs tickling my tongue that I’m not too fond of. Dayu stands there while I eat the dragonflies like potato chips. I do get her to eat a few.

  After I have been back in Bali for four months, I decide to go to the U.S. My brother reports that Mom is doing fine, but I want to see for myself.

  United States

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  BACK IN THE UNITED STATES

  Mom has a new haircut, her nails are painted, and she looks well. She never did discuss feelings with me, nor has she, like most of her generation, shared her pain. This time is no different. She doesn’t say anything about how she is adjusting to being without my father, but both she and Amparo tell me about the meetings and lectures and concerts they’ve attended, the dinner parties they’ve given, the friends they’ve shared. Amparo is taping my mother’s stories about her life and family, and with my mother’s help, she is putting together an album of pictures, with captions.

  I don’t know if I am projecting or if there really is an excitement in my mother’s tone that suggests she is reveling in the companionship of someone, unlike my father, that she does not have to drag to concerts and lectures, sometimes kicking and screaming. She and Amparo are enjoying their time together. At seventy-seven, Mom is experiencing her own version of liberation.

  Amparo has hired Gera, an Italian woman from Argentina, to come every Wednesday to do my mother’s hair and nails. Sometimes Gera brings her six-year-old daughter, Romina; and while Amparo enjoys a few hours away from the house, Gera and my mom and Romina bake cakes and quiches and make pasta from scratch.