Creating altercations with Westerners can be a win-win situation for Indonesians and I have personally been confronted by Indonesians on a number of occasions—in some of these cases I was at fault, in others I was not—but the result of most these exchanges has been to show me the real agenda behind aggressive Indonesian confrontation.
Disagreements between Indonesians and Westerners happen all the time. The simple rule is that no matter what the circumstances, never retaliate or you will come off second best. My first confrontation with an Indonesian was with a lifeguard on Kuta beach.
I had been involved in a running race and as I rounded the flag I reached out and used the pole to turn myself. Although I barely touched it, the lifeguard claimed I had bent his flag and demanded I replace it for a fee of one hundred Australian dollars. I refused and the lifeguard did his best to provoke me into fighting him. I sat and smiled while the lifeguard stood in front of me and called me every name under the sun.
This took place in front of a group of friends and other tourists and it carried on for an hour.
The non-retaliation rule wasn’t hard to comply with in this circumstance—no matter what this guy called me and no matter how many times he challenged me, there was no way I was going to fight him. In the end another Indonesian became involved on my behalf and the lifeguard relented, but all in all it was embarrassing and an unnecessary attack and its sole purpose was to extract money.
Another confrontation occurred after I allegedly scratched an Indonesian’s car. I was barely moving in gridlocked traffic yet somehow I was supposed to have scratched the car beside me—a pink Suzuki Karimun. I bet that the occupants of the other car were bored and when they saw a Westerner they saw an opportunity to make some money.
Anyway, an Indonesian man got out of the passenger side of the bright pink car next to me and came to my window and accused me of scratching his car. I told the man that I hadn’t scratched his car but he didn’t accept this and he called me few names before challenging me to a fight.
I did the only thing I could do: I wound up my window and ignored him.
The Indonesian screamed for five minutes then he gave up and returned to his silly pink car. The company car I drove at the time didn’t look much better; it was a Daihatsu Terios that was such a bright shade of blue it could be seen from space.
I thought the incident was over when the irate Indonesian gentleman returned to his car. I sat back to wait out the traffic jam, only to see the man send in his wife.
The lady walked over to the front of Gay Blue—one of many names my hideous car went by—and spat on my windscreen. This wasn’t pleasant but I decided to accept it. I thought once she had vented her anger she would go away and I turned on my widescreen wipers to wash away her spit. Unfortunately this seemed to anger the woman further and she went ballistic. She raised her fists and slammed them down on the bonnet of the car. Gay Blue had a shell as thin as paper and the irate woman left two fist-sized dents.
I was horrified so I bravely did the only thing I could think of to help my situation: I pulled my sunglasses down, turned up my stereo and I smiled.
This only incensed the crazy Indonesian woman further and she walked around to my window, screamed and then did her best to punch me through the glass. This didn’t work but I thought she may have hurt her hand so I mouthed the word “ouch” then shook my hand sympathetically.
Crazy Indonesian Woman didn’t see the funny side of this either and decided to kick her way through my car door. Gay Blue was insured so I did the polite thing and I gave her a round of applause for her effort.
She then decided that dents to only half of Gay Blue would look out of place, so she proceeded to kick every panel on the car. She even put a few dents in Gay Blue’s roof.
I had no choice but to sit and let Gay Blue get beaten up by a crazy woman and when the lights changed and the traffic cleared I inched the car forward. I was worried she would fall off the roof but I couldn’t sit there all day—I also felt sorry for Gay Blue.
Eventually I reached the traffic lights and with the nutter gone from the roof I zoomed off. I thought this would be the end of the confrontation but of course it wasn’t.
The Indonesian lady ran back to her pink car and she and her companion pursued me around Kuta.
The two brightly coloured cars must have resembled two giant M&Ms as they raced around town. This was my first car chase and I knew Kuta well. I drove past all my favourite haunts hoping someone would see me race by with the pink car in hot pursuit.
The couple eventually gave up but sadly Gay Blue was severely dented because a couple of Indonesians saw an opportunity to make some money.
These stories are funny to me and I didn’t take what happened too seriously, but sometimes you can find yourself in real danger if you retaliate. It is better to remember that you are being confronted for money and to smile, wave and leave.
The Prostitute Girlfriend
Sanur is the brothel capital of Bali and everyone who lives here knows it. At one stage the company I worked for had an office there and if I was ever asked by an Indonesian where I had spent the day and I replied Sanur, I was met with sly looks and giggles.
The brothels in Sanur litter the back streets like Circle Ks litter Kuta. Turn a corner and you will find one, but while Circle Ks display the “K” logo, Sanur brothels are marked with an “X”. Anyone driving through Sanur need only look for the crudely painted symbol on the front walls of the compounds.
Most Sanur brothels are little more than carparks dotted with small rooms where the girls sleep by day and work from at night. As many as half a dozen seedy gangster-type Indonesians can be found hanging around each carpark. During the day one of these guys will wake up a girl for a customer but at night when a car or taxi pulls up the girls will swarm out of their rooms like mosquitoes.
Some Sanur brothels have a small dark café somewhere on the premises—these places are dangerous and should be avoided. There is also a Sanur brothel that employs a window system—in Bali, as in Bangkok, it’s called a goldfish bowl. Men enter and look at the girls from behind mirrored glass. A lot of guys like this but I find it dehumanising.
I have never been a big fan of Sanur. Kuta and Seminyak working girls meet their clients in clubs and they have a personal choice as to whether they want to leave with the customer. The working girls in Sanur brothels have little choice and due to the process of obtaining these girls, the brothel system smacks of sexual slavery.
Generally, a brothel owner visits a poor village in the back blocks of Java, they meet a group of girls and entice them to come to Bali with the promise of a job and accommodation. The brothel owner then flies the girls to Bali and they sign a three-month working contract to pay back the money. These girls tell their parents they have found work in a restaurant, or as household staff, and they send all their money home. They have little chance of paying out their contracts unless they work very hard and accept as many clients as possible.
I don’t like to be a party to this process and so I don’t frequent these places.
This is not the case with all girls working in Sanur, however, and there are girls who re-sign their contracts and refuse to leave even when given the opportunity.
A friend once told me how he met a Sanur working girl and he talked her into coming to live with him. Rob met Nenny and fell head over heels in love. She was about twenty-eight, quiet and comfortable to be around, and Rob said he couldn’t get enough of her.
Rob told me that rather than visit Nenny in a brothel night after night he had asked her to give up her life and live with him. He told her that he would supply all her needs, take care of her family and that he would help her find a proper job. Nenny agreed to Rob’s proposal and she left her workplace and her belongings and went to live with him.
On the first day of her new life Rob took Nenny shopping. He bought her a new wardrobe and Rob told me that Nenny put on a fashion show and proudly paraded around in her n
ew things. He said that she seemed incredibly happy and that she cooked a nice meal and the two of them settled in to watch a movie.
Nenny was sitting on the couch in her new pyjamas when there was a knock on the door. Rob answered it and was met by two Indonesian men.
The Indonesians demanded to speak to Nenny and Rob led them into his home. Nenny and the Indonesian men spoke for some time and although Rob speaks fluent Indonesian he couldn’t keep up with the conversation as the group spoke in a dialect he had trouble following.
Eventually the discussion stopped and Nenny informed Rob that she was going back to the brothel to continue working.
Rob tried to bargain with the Indonesians. He offered to pay out Nenny’s contract on the spot, but the Indonesian men refused. They motioned Nenny to follow and the three of them left.
Nenny didn’t take any of the things Rob had bought for her, she left wearing the pyjama’s she had on.
When Rob told me his story I inquired how the Indonesians knew his address and he explained that he had taken Nenny out of the brothel on a previous occasion and she had been picked up from his home.
Rob missed Nenny but he left it for a few days before he attempted to speak to her. He did not want to have a run-in with the brothel owner or his henchmen.
One night Rob called Nenny and asked if they could meet. She told him they could meet at the brothel where she worked.
Rob went to the brothel and paid for a room so that he could talk with Nenny in private. She informed Rob that she would be staying at the brothel and that he could wait for her if he chose and that she would come and live with him when she had finished her contract.
Nenny’s contract ran for another two months and Rob decided to wait it out, he also paid for her to visit him on occasion. However, when she finished her contract Rob asked her to come home with him, Nenny refused and took another contract. To my knowledge she still works at the brothel.
Rob told me he was incredibly disappointed but he continued to visit Nenny and do his best to convince her to leave the prostitute life—he paid for this privilege.
When Rob told me his story, he invited me to meet Nenny. I was intrigued so I took him up on the offer.
Rob took me to the brothel where Nenny worked and he introduced me to her. My impression was that Nenny was neither pretty nor polite, and she looked as though she would have done well to get out of the business.
Rob had a legitimate love for Nenny and I believe he would have done his best by her, for her part Nenny chose life as a working girl over a life with Rob.
A Lesson from Billy
When I first arrived in Bali, Billy took me to a club where a punk band was playing. There were about twenty or thirty Indonesians sitting politely on the floor in front of the stage watching the band.
Billy said he wanted to show me something. Suddenly, without warning, he jumped onto the dance floor and began slam dancing. The crowd who had been sitting patiently immediately surged forward en masse and surrounded him. It happened so quickly and came as such a shock that I thought the crowd was attacking my brother. I shat myself and ran into the crowd with a beer bottle in my hand.
Billy found me in the crowd. He grabbed me by the arm, looked into my face and smiled to let me know things were OK. Then he dragged me off the dance floor and led me to a quiet area of the bar.
My adrenalin was pumping, I was bewildered and shaking. And I still gripped the large empty bottle of Bintang. I rounded on Billy: “What the fuck was that? I thought they were going to kill you.”
Billy smiled and told me to settle down. “That’s what I wanted to show you,” he said. “Indonesians don’t take the initiative. They may threaten, they may yell, but they tend not to make the first move. You can stare them down or you can walk away, but if you move on an Indonesian, they will move on you as a group.”
Billy had lived in Bali for three years and I was a newcomer. I have never forgotten the lesson.
I once took the kick boxer to the same bar and showed him the same trick. I wanted him to understand the mob mentality of Indonesians and I thought I could teach him the same way Billy had taught me.
I timed it right and when we arrived a large crowd sat watching a band, patiently waiting for somebody to start the dancing. I did as Billy had shown me: I walked to the centre of the dance floor and did my best slam dance.
The Indonesians rushed me as they had rushed Billy on the previous occasion. As one, the large crowd stampeded towards the dance floor.
Unfortunately, this time a European tourist made the mistake of charging in with the Indonesians.
The kick boxer was pumped full of adrenalin from earlier events, he didn’t realise what was going on and he thought I was being attacked. He rushed into the crowd.
The kick boxer grabbed the European in a Muay Thai headlock, twisted him around so that he stood behind him, and forced him down onto his arse. When I arrived he was about to bring an elbow crashing down over the European’s forehead and onto the bridge of his nose.
I grabbed the kick boxer from behind and dragged him away from the bewildered Westerner, who fled from the club. I watched him leave and when I thought he was safe, I let the kick boxer go.
I asked him why he’d assaulted the European.
The kick boxer looked at me slightly dazed. “I thought you were being attacked,” he said. “I didn’t want to hit an Indonesian, there were too many so I took down the only white face I could see.” The kick boxer shook his head confused. “Did I do something wrong? I thought that’s what you said: don’t hit the locals.”
I smiled at the kick boxer, placed an arm about his shoulder and laughed. At least he knew better than to punch an Indonesian, I thought.
I have never showed that trick to anyone again.
Violence in the Street
Not only do the Indonesians fight each other but Westerners and expats do as well. For the tourists it is more alcohol fuelled, as they pour down arak-filled mixed drinks like lolly water; for the expats it is the frustration of living in a place like Indonesia.
The first fight I had in Bali was in the late afternoon and I was in a depressed state. I had been living in Bali for about two years and I missed my children immensely. My ex-partner was blocking my calls to them and I hadn’t been able to contact them for some time.
I had been through a very nasty break-up and, as far as I was concerned, I had no choice but to get as far away from my ex-wife as possible. This meant leaving my children and living in a foreign country … I struggled with this for a long time.
On this particular afternoon a mate and I went to have a few beers after work. I wasn’t in the best frame of mind and a couple of beers with a good friend seemed like the perfect remedy. We had a few beers in our usual haunts and then decided to find a new bar to drink in. I had noticed a new bar some days before and it being some distance from our normal hangouts, we decided to give it a try.
When we entered the tavern it was pretty much empty of patrons, just one person sat leaning on the bar talking to the barman.
Dave and I were a little disappointed but we had come a long way and didn’t want to turn around and head back. Besides, the bar had a pool table and we decided we should have a few beers and see if any people arrived. Dave went to order at the bar while I began to set up the pool table for a game.
I was just about to break when the guy seated at the bar called over to me: “Hey, mate, that’s my pool table.” Being Australian, I recognised the twang, and the rule.
I looked over and recognised the guy as an expat who had called an associate of mine out of a bar for a fight a few months earlier. The associate had refused to fight and the bloke at the bar had levelled all kinds of abuse at him. He had called him a weakling and a coward, amongst other things.
I had watched the argument but had not become involved. It wasn’t my quarrel, but the incident had irked me. I felt the expat at the bar had taken things too far.
It also bother
ed me that a person who was by himself had claimed the pool table—where I come from it takes two people to play pool. Who did you win it from, I thought, but did not voice.
I broke the pack and then called the guy over. “If you want to play, we’ll play,” I said, then handed him the pool cue. I wasn’t in mood to have the guy inflict himself into my company so I was abrupt.
The guy took the cue then introduced himself as Brett. He then said, “I only play for beer.”
In Australia, pub pool rules dictate that the person who owns the table has the right to name the stakes. I knew this but wasn’t really happy about it. I probably should have checked before I started to play, but I still felt as though I had been tricked. Brett was getting me offside very fast. “Yeah, whatever,” I said and went over to where Dave now sat with our beers.
Brett was a good pool player. He beat me hands down so I went to the bar and bought him a beer.
Brett accepted his beer then looked me up and down. “Next time you walk into a bar, check no one is using the table before you set up,” he said.
I shrugged and let the comment roll off me. I had no wish to get into an argument over pool etiquette. “Yeah, no worries mate,” I said.
As I returned to my table I heard Brett laugh behind me, “Easiest fucking beer I’ve ever won,” he boasted loudly.
I shook my head and smiled at Dave. “Your game,” I said.
Dave has lived in Bali a long time, and if you live in Bali long enough you learn to meet idiots on a regular basis.
Dave and Brett played the next game and Brett won another beer. I watched but did my best not to draw attention to myself. I didn’t like Brett’s attitude and I didn’t want to have anything to do with him.
Brett then looked over to where I sat and challenged me to another game. “Hey loser,” he said, “you want to play me again?”
I grimaced at the comment, raised a hand and dismissed Brett. “Yeah, not really into it mate,” I said, “it’s your table, you can do what you want with it.”
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