by David Nesbit
Everything just felt a bit different, you see. Things seemed to be cleaner and more well-organised than I remembered when living there; people appeared to be more professional in their jobs but not as happy or friendly; as I just said, the weather was colder than I remembered. Another thing was the TV and entertainment world had moved on so I no longer recognised or knew most of the presenters on TV or many of the programmes or pop stars or other people in the public eye.
Yep, it was a bit of a strange feeling. Rather a case of feeling like a fish out of water, I fear.
Still, all in all it was fun and my family certainly enjoyed meeting Yoss and Tess.
‘So? That’s good, isn’t it?’ I hear you, dear reader, say. ‘Seems you finally had your life sorted out.’
‘Nope,’ reply I. ‘That was just the calm before the storm.’
By the end of the year it had all gone wrong again. Well, I say it had ‘gone’ wrong. It hadn’t, really. In fact, nothing had actually happened as such, things had just drifted into mutual antipathy. Time waits for no man and the year was once more coming to a close. Tess was now a couple of months past her fourth birthday and had become a lovely, well-behaved, well-adjusted little kid. All the more surprising seeing that her parents barely bothered communicating any more.
Oh, I don’t know. I just seemed to give up on Yossy. Yeah, yeah, I know this sounds like ‘poor little me’ again, but I’d just had enough of trying to reason with her, of trying to find out why she was permanently unhappy or angry, of being blamed for the aforementioned anger or unhappiness or anything remotely resulting in the slightest problem or deviation from the day’s norm.
God, I was sick of it.
Yossy seemed to be happy for a while with the onset of motherhood and the opening of our businesses, but I can see now it was just a case of the cracks being papered over and she was still in fact deeply rooted in misery. She was back to her snidey, surly ‘woe-is-me’ worst, and I had no inkling of why or how to fix things so I didn’t bother and simply gave up.
Initially, as she started withdrawing back into her shell, I would try and bring her out of her flux by asking her what was wrong, why she never smiled, why she never seemed to take any happiness from life or from people and the things around her but I would be met by a wall of silence. All I could ever get from her was the bland acknowledgement that she was ‘not happy’.
She would, at best, sit in silence if I happened to be in the same room as her, or at worst try and pick an argument so she would at least have an outlet for her frustrations. On occasion I could actually see her brain whirring as I walked into the room. It would be as if she was pondering: ‘How can I have a go at him now? What thing can I pick up on and turn round and make his fault so I can fly at him and then feel a bit better about myself?’
A typical conversation as I walk into the house following a full day at work might go as follows:
Me: ‘Hi dear.’
Silence and pouting.
Me: ‘Had a good day?’
More silence and pouting – her brain whirs into action.
Me: ‘What’s for dinner?’
Her: ‘Humphh.’
Me (getting exasperated): ‘What’s wrong?’
Her: ‘Nothing.’
Me: ‘So, what’s up?’
Her: ‘Why didn’t you cut the grass this morning?’
Me: ‘Eh?’
Her: ‘Why didn’t you cut the grass before going to work this morning?’
Me: ‘You what? I never cut the grass. We don’t have any grass. We don’t have a lawn.’
Her: ‘Well, we should do. We should have a lawn. Why didn’t you buy a house with a lawn?’
Me: ‘Eh?’
Her: ‘Oh, I hate you. You’re useless!’
I went past the hurting stage, hurtled beyond the trying to fix it stage, and bypassed the even pretending to show concern stage altogether.
I just couldn’t be bothered with it all anymore, and I finally did what Yossy had been accusing me of doing since really rather quite early in our marriage: I changed.
I decided then that I was just going to live for me and for what I wanted to do in life. That sounds very selfish, but it’s not quite as bad as all that. I didn’t mean I was just going to do whatever I wanted to do without any care or thought of anyone else. No, I know that such a lifestyle could only lead to more misery and unhappiness. What I mean is, I was going to try and lead a life whereby I didn’t allow her, or anyone else, to upset or worry me anymore.
I simply didn’t want to know anymore. All I cared about was spending time with Tess and trying to live out my days in relative peace and anonymity.
That was the reasoning behind things anyway, and I realise that the ripe old age of 33 could be said to be a tad premature to be settling for such an existence, but I was exhausted. I felt twice my age and I truly believed the only way to be around to see old age and thus Tess grow up was to switch off totally.
So I made a decision that Yossy could do whatever she wanted to as long as she did it quietly without involving me.
So she did. In both her private and her business life she started to get up to all sorts. She developed a multitude of ‘business partners’, and almost immediately three new schools popped up. I wasn’t privy to any of the details of these business arrangements and I couldn’t see how they all expected to see any return on their investments, and, to be frank, I couldn’t have cared less.
I simply told her not to involve me and if it all came crashing down around her ears, which I was sure it would, then she was on her own.
As for her private life; well, I don’t know … where to start? She had all manner of men around her for one reason or another, and someone who actually cared a bit would, I suppose, would have wanted to know who they all were and what their relationships to her were.
Everything now supposedly cantered on her school and her business. She brought in some sort of local dukun, or witchdoctor, to ensure the business had the necessary good vibes and was protected from evil spirits. Before undertaking any decision, big or small, she had to ask this dukun for guidance and if he agreed with whatever she was proposing then she went with it, if not, well, she just left it. I am not sure Steve Jobs ever worked on such business principles, but still.
Part of this spiritual guidance, it seemed, was to provide, ahem, ‘therapeutic’ massages. I arrived home unexpectedly early one day and rolled into the house from the garage as usual, and as I came in I thought I saw the servant, the pembantu, give me a strange look; almost as if she was surprised and a wee bit frightened to see me.
Now, perhaps I should elaborate a little on the topic of domestic help in Indonesia before I go any further with this particular yarn. Whilst in the west it is uncommon to have hired-help, so to speak, it is the norm in Indonesia. The very vast majority of households from the lower-middle classes upwards will employ at least one full-time helper. These people are invariably, but not exclusively, female and are known as pembantus, which literally translates as ‘helpers’. Now, the vast majority are employed on a live-in basis and so will find themselves being on call to do household chores for anything up to eighteen hours a day for the equivalent of around fifty quid a month.
Wow, I hear you say, talk about exploitation, and I must admit that seeing that description written down before me I can see how people might think that way. However, when taken in context the situation is a little different. Wealth distribution amongst the population in Indonesia is amongst the most uneven in the world with something like the richest 2% of the country owning up to 90% of the country’s wealth. Rural areas are particularly poor and educational opportunities, when they exist at all, are basic with a very high percentage of children not finishing elementary school. This is especially so in the case of girls, who are still seen as inferior to boys.
This means every year there is an influx of young women moving from the country to the cities and towns in an effort to find work. With only the most
rudimentary educational backgrounds, their employment opportunities are somewhat limited and so they tend to become domestic workers or else gravitate to industrial work in factories – sweat shops – where they will usually be expected to work the same hours as domestic workers for about the same pay.
As pembantus they will usually live with a family and be expected to cook, clean and do the laundry. They will be on call all day, it’s true, but will rarely actually work much more than a few hours a day. They will be treated as a member of the family, have their own room, eat the same food as the family, watch TV together and generally be cared for and looked after. The salary they receive will be low by western standards but will normally remain almost untouched in an average month as all the pembantu’s living needs and expenses will be provided by the family she is employed by.
Anyway, I always had a reasonably good relationship with our pembantu and we got along fairly well with my pidgin Indonesian and her non-existent English, but, as I say, on this day in question she looked rather concerned to see me.
I proceeded on my merry way into the bedroom and upon opening the door saw the reason for the pembantu’s apprehension. Yossy, bless her little cotton socks, was lying on her stomach on the bed covered by the quilt, while Johnny, the dukun, was straddling her. He, at least, appeared to be fully clothed while I couldn’t see whether or not she was.
She didn’t miss a beat and smiled up at me as if a guy coming home to find his wife in bed with another man was the most common and normal thing in the world.
‘Hi, honey,’ she droned: ‘I feel so tired. Mr. Johnny has agreed to give me a massage. Good, ya?’
Mr. Johnny for his part at least had the grace to look if not guilty, then certainly a tad embarrassed and worried, as I guess is probably par for the course in such circumstances.
‘Ok, deh’ said I, and went back out into the living room to watch telly.
I think a slight diversion with regards to the general topic of dukuns in general is also called for. They are supposedly magical entities, who have the power to ensure all types of desired events or happenings occur (or don’t, as the case may be) and they are also alleged to have healing qualities applicable for the most intricate and diverse of ailments. Now, needless to say I was always somewhat sceptical of these gentlemen (they are always men) and tended to give them a wide berth at the best of times.
Having had a western upbringing, I found the whole concept of dukuns and black magic far fetched, but although I would sometimes share my doubts regarding the whole concept, in the main I kept my own counsel regarding such matters. However, one event that occurred shortly after Tess was born did cause me to slightly revisit my way of thinking.
When we took baby Tess home from the hospital after she was born, we were naturally delighted. She was everything we’d been hoping and praying for but there was one slight problem. No matter what we did or tried we couldn’t get Tess to settle down in the room we’d allocated her.
Every time Tess was led into the room she would scream and scream as loud as her little lungs would allow and just would not stop. Nothing Yossy or I did seemed to calm her down and no amount of soothing or cuddling seemed to make any difference whatsoever. Yet as soon as either of us wandered into another room with Tess in our arms, the wailing would cease instantly.
‘Neil. We have to face it. There is something in the room that is disturbing her. Even a noodle-brain like you can see that, surely?’ Yossy started for the umpteenth time. ‘We have to get a dukun in to see what the problem is.’
I was aghast. ‘No way! I’m not having some quack coming here and poking around my house. No, there has to be some logical explanation as to why Tess can’t settle in this room.’
Yossy eyed me scornfully. ‘Like what, Mr Logic? Come on, I’m all ears. Let’s hear it.’
Sometimes I really did regret teaching Yossy English to the level I had. However, that was the nature of the beast.
‘I don’t know, do I?’ was my rather weak response: ‘Maybe this room has recently been painted and the smell is still lingering to her sensitive nose. Or perhaps there is a draft in here that is making her uncomfortable, or maybe …’
Yoss cut me off. ‘Maybe … maybe … maybe,’ she mimicked: ‘Maybe I married a clown. I’m calling the dukun, and that’s that.’
That was indeed that, and an hour or so later said dukun was at our door. I didn’t need to be told to stay out of the gentleman’s way (Yossy’s evil eye in my direction did that trick) and I had no desire to get involved anyway. Instead, I busied myself with making a cup of coffee in the parlour kitchen at the back of the small dwelling.
From my vantage point, I could hear the guy making some kind of weird incantation and I could just make out a lantern of some kind being waved around. I thought I could also hear Yossy joining in on the chorus but wouldn’t have liked to bet money on that one. It would be a braver man than me to get that confirmed either way.
Finally the chanting stopped and, miraculously, so did Tess’s cries. That was strange, but still not enough to entice me from my place of sanctuary and my coffee.
When I finally did venture out of my hiding place, Yossy brazenly informed me she had taken two hundred thousand rupiah out of my wallet to pay the man. This less than shame-faced admission was met with another snort of derision from me and I was just about to remark that was nice work if you could get it, when Yossy cut me off by putting a finger to her lips in a shushing manner and nodding in the direction of
Tess’s room.
There was a sound coming from there: the sound of a little girl snoring.
In addition to coercing dukuns into compromising positions, Yossy seemed to be going through a stage of experiencing some kind of predilection for young men barely into their twenties. She appointed four or five of them to work as teachers in her school and she then took a shine to one guy in particular. His name was Arin and he was promptly installed as her ‘school manager’.
Goodness only knows what his actual job description or responsibilities were, but all I knew was he seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time in the presence of my wife. They were together all the time, morning, noon and night. When not in the schools there they were in our house having ‘meetings’ or forever setting off somewhere together, both within Surabaya
and outside.
One of their most favoured spots in those days was Malang. This is a resort a couple of hours drive to the south of Surabaya and is a kind of weekend retreat where you can go and rent a villa for the night or weekend. The weather there is a bit cooler and it is actually quite a pleasant place to stay. Although it was a basically a weekend-retreat sort of place, they didn’t ever stay there overnight, not in the early days of their, ah, partnership, anyway – instead they travelled up and back on the same day. In their rare communications with me I gathered they were ostensibly looking at properties in which to open a new school, but I had my doubts.
After they’d made a few journeys there and back, I found myself actually being invited to join them for the weekend. We all went there and stayed one gloriously sunny weekend. By ‘all’ I mean Yossy, Arin, Tess, and a load of other teachers from her school and it really was the weirdest thing.
As soon as we got there Yoss practically dragged me into the bedroom and insisted I give her a royal rodgering. Now, considering we hadn’t exactly ‘known each other’ in the Old Testament way on a regular basis for some time, I was somewhat taken aback by her rather uncharacteristic enthusiasm, Nevertheless, I made little headway when I brought the matter up and was practically called a wuss and told to put up and shut up.
Indeed.
Three weeks later. We went to the doctor’s. The test was negative.
Hmmmmm. What was all that about, I wondered.
Anyway, I was soon to find myself in a position of no longer being able to take the moral high ground, even if I could be bothered to do so. Yep, you see, muggings just had to go and do it again. Without sense
or sensibility, and when I least expected or indeed wanted to, I fell in love with someone else. You would think that with everything else that was happening in my life at that point in time, combined with my age and my experiences, I would know better, but there you are.
Her name was Jolie and I met her through my teaching a few months after Yossy started disappearing up to the mountains of Malang on a regular basis. I guess the normal thing to say in circumstances like this is that at first I didn’t plan on anything occurring between us, that she was purely my student and that things just started happening without either of us realising our planning it.
That would be wrong, though. Right from the outset I felt something click and I just had a weird and wonderful feeling about things. She was blessed with the appearance of an angel and the only truly fitting adjective for her was lovely.
Right from the word go I felt something for her, and not just lust or desire or any other yucky emotion. On the contrary, I felt something warm and right and nice and good stirring inside me.
I knew it was early days yet and there was no way of being able to tell how things would pan out but for the first time in many years I felt excited and nervous.
And alive.
And not the slightest bit guilty.
In fact, she would be the one often asking me if we were doing the right thing, if we should be feeling guiltier than we were, and if there was any future in it all. I did my best to reassure her, of course, but it was all somewhat unchartered territory for me too, and I’m afraid I wasn’t always able to assuage her fears, but I did my best to encourage and support her and let her know how serious I was about her and how much she had done, and was doing, for me.
Six months later, though, I was back living in England.
London, November 2002
I don’t want to go back to Indonesia. I am happy.
There was no one calling me ‘stupid’ (if they were talking to me at all, that was). There was no one calling me in the middle of the night demanding I be responsible for repayment of my wife’s debts. No problems with immigration coming to my door looking for a payoff all hours of the day (and night). No dukuns or young men with designs on my wife within eyesight.