Out of Urban Smaug’s Black Claws and into the Grey Grip of Its Rural Cousins
On the Train from Jakarta to Bandung and out of Bandung Toward the Beach
The music is by:
Biz, a.k.a Bismark Idiong, a Nigerian-born musician and producer.
Gorillaz, a British virtual band.
Jakarta - Bandung (13. August 2018)
From the window of the Jakarta - Bandung early afternoon service, the view shifts between conical volcanoes and train stations, seemingly in equal number. Along the railway, clusters of women in matching attires dot the platforms. It’s a pretty sight. Their flowing garments cascade to the ground, as if mimicking the conical shapes of the fiery mountains around them. The figures vary in size, but always share the same colour—mothers and their daughters in perfect monochromatic harmony.
As the train makes it public with a hiss and puff that it wants to stop, these elegant female cones appear to hover inches above the platform in beautiful silent processions. It’s a shame, though, that this refinement doesn’t extend to their men, who, more often than not, shuffle by in mismatched clothes, walking along their own paths, as if reluctant to claim the grace of their beautifully draped females.
Somewhere past the Cikampek station, we’ve slipped free from the urban Smaug’s black claws, only to find ourselves ensnarled in the grey grip of its rural cousins. Can you, dear Indonesians, take a breather for once? Standing on my son’s balcony in Singapore and watching the Stormtrooper of the Galactic Empire evicting unwanted six- and eight-legged tenants with his F-11D white-smoke blaster rifle, little did I know that this peculiar term “fumigation” would crop up so repeatedly on the southern leg of the journey, forcing me to look at the devastating spectacle of an entire nation caught in the throes of this self-fumigation ritual.
I find myself slowly molding my private stereotypical souvenir fridge magnet that will cling to the frontal lobe of my brain until the end of my days: Garuda Pancasila* gasping for breath. I already carry other mental magnets like this:
- the Albanian two-headed eagle perched on the hood of an aging Mercedes, freshly rejuvenated in one of the country’s million car washing joints.
- the Georgian Dzala ertobashia**, meaning “Strength in Unity,” emblazoned over a map nibbled away by the Big Brother from the north at the Ossetian and Abkhazian edges, its integrity compromised, much like the striking number of front car bumpers, mysteriously absent from this country’s cars, leaving the fleet of snaggletoothed vehicles to roam the streets of this snaggletoothed land.
- the Cambodian Angkor Wat, infused with the aroma of two distinct pizzas: one a sweet snack with bits of sugar-coated meat, the other topped with psilocybin mushrooms, in place of the usual humble champignons.
- the Hungarian Pannonian Steppe, where salted sprat is served with beer like peanuts or crisps.
- the Russian hammer and sickle, adorned—or perhaps disgraced—by smiles framed with gleaming gold dental prostheses, and so on.
Oh, Indonesia, I beg you—don’t let my mental souvenir collection be finalised with the image of your beloved Garuda Pancasila gasping through a cloud of self-fumigation! I’d much prefer to see you biting your gold dentures into sweet pizza topped with hallucinogenic mushrooms, chased down with some salted sprat to add insult to injury, all while cruising in gleaming, freshly-washed old Mercedeses with their front bumpers mysteriously missing. Anything but this, please!
Bandung - Banjar (14. August 2018)
On the early morning Eksekutif service out of Bandung, Dikdik, the train commander has taken his sticker obsession to new heights in coach no. 3. One of many stickers boldly proclaims that I’m not allowed to write here!
Yet here I am, pen trembling as I scribble what must be my first—and hopefully last— illegal entry in this notebook. I can almost feel Dikdik's disapproving gaze from under his neatly angled patrol cap. He looks like he’s already drilled his crew—a battalion of sky-blue wanitas and navy-blue priaks—on the platform, and now he’s ready to deal with insolent smokers, wretched drug addicts, horizontal sleepyheads, unruly writers, and a rouge’s gallery of forewarned criminals. All in one sweep. The unwanted element onboard Dikdik’s train will be held responsible for their evil deeds.
Catch me if you can, sir! And then what? Will you snatch my pen, shouting: Dilarang merusak fasilitas kereta***?!… Oh, speak of the devil—Dikdik Permana has just stolled past, turning a blind eye to my rebellious scribbling? What? Has he, here at Cigalenka station, suddenly stopped giving a damn about eradicating onboard writers? And what was he afraid of in the first place? What? That the slender, oversized, saber-toothed elves—descendants of Dutch colonisers—so massively occupying coach no. 3, might start drafting exposés on how their ancestors’ extraction of blood and sweat from the local islanders has all gone to waste? That instead of happy, carefree souls cruising on their elegant Batavus and Gazelle bicycles, they’d find only grey smoke rising from arable fields, black smoke billowing from heavy transport, and the blackest smoke of all—curling up from men squatting by the tracks, fervently feeding plastic refuse to the fire?
Cattle class train tickets were long gone by the time Michał and me set foot on Java, leaving us in this Eksekutif coach no. 3 amidst a parade of orang besar**** from the Netherlands and a scattering of well-to-do Indonesians. Judging by the logos on their shopping bags, they are fresh from the glitzy pearl of West Java—a gleaming mall nestled in the otherwise gritty cityscape of Bandung. Its gaudy allure ensnared my wandering eyes last night and here is what unfolded:
Not at all aware of the pearl’s existence, I stumbled upon it by accident—somewhere between a modest but delicious meal perched on a roadside stool and a pint of Guinness in a dimly lit, semi-legal dive packed with hard-drinking degenerates. Sitting and eating, I caught a glimpse of an extra-large, flashy, shiny and ultramodern neon—Paskal 23.
Normally, the cold allure of glass, marble, and metal leaves me cold, but Paskal 23 was no ordinary temple of unchecked consumerism. It was a secular cathedral of rupiah-fueled metaphysical experience—bold, harmonious, and dripping with panache. Was it truly the most handsome shopping mall I’d seen or was it the stark contrast to the gritty cityscape outside that gave it such a grandeur? I couldn’t say. What I did notice, though, was the swarm of sales assistants vastly outnumbering the shoppers. Apparently, the three-million-strong army of roadside fumigators encircling this gleaming pearl of Bandung had little interest in entering its rhinestone eye.
* Garuda Pancasila is the national emblem of Indonesia. It features the mythical Garuda, a large, powerful bird holding a banner in its talons inscribed with the national motto: "Bhinneka Tunggal Ika", meaning "Unity in Diversity."
** Dzala ertobashia (Georgian: ძალა ერთობაშია) translates to "Strength is in Unity" and is the official motto of Georgia.
***The translation of "Dilarang merusak fasilitas kereta" is "It is prohibited to damage the train facilities." However, there was a crossed out hand with a pen on the sticker, so I misinterpreted the sign to mean: ”No writing onboard the carriage.”
**** “Orang besar” means “Big people”. This is my personal description of Dutch people, because they are known to be among the tallest people in the world. On average, Dutch men stand about 183 cm (6 feet) tall, while Dutch women average around 170 cm (5 feet 7 inches).
Photos from along the railway track between Jakarta and Bandung:
More stickers from the Eksekutif:
Sky-blue wanita and a platform drill:
I’ve no idea what will be next week. I have recently been filling in unpublished bits and pieces in order to finish reframing the whole book and prepare it for publication, so expect sometimes random posts. And remember my dear subscriber that whatever’s been published before, can be found in the archives. Also, if you can’t find my post on Monday next week, well… it will mean that I have gone to do the next thing that is making me tick at that moment I time….