Tuesday, December 1, 2015

I was a bit tired and irritable yesterday. I keep saying that the noise here doesn’t bother me, but I don’t think I get much sleep. Last night, I switched out my earplugs for brand new ones, and that made a big difference. I slept much better. So perhaps my earplugs were not up to the task, and it might be better in the future. But the night before last, I hardly slept at all, and I was exhausted when I woke up. There is no chance of sleeping in considering the noise level from the streets and the rooms around me.

Then the day conspired to keep me a bit off-balance. I decided to go for a bike ride to a more distant area and bring my camera. And when I went downstairs to get my bike, I was annoyed to see that the cable lock was jammed badly between the spokes and the forks of my bicycle, and my bike computer magnet had been nearly broken off. The problem is that people move my bike, and they ignore or don’t see the cable lock threaded through either the rear or the front wheels. So they just roll the bike and when the wheels turn, it jams the cable lock. But instead of looking to see what caused the problem, they just push the bike harder and it causes all kinds of problems. This is a particular problem when the rear derailleur gets involved. My bike is often a mess when I go to retrieve it from storage or wherever I’ve parked it. A couple days ago, I decided to thread the cable lock through the front wheel instead. It isn’t as effective in terms of securing the bicycle, but it might cause less damage. But it was even worse because the cable got badly jammed. I had a difficult time getting it out. I was worried that it had bent the spokes. After that, I tried doubling up the cable so that it has less slack. Now, at least, the cable can’t get jammed. But perhaps it will cause even worse problems that I can’t foresee. The only real solution is to always store my bike inside my rooms. But this room is far too small for that. I should have insisted on bringing the bike upstairs and putting it on the balcony outside my room, but I’m always shy about stuff like that. The balcony is a public place for all guests, and I don’t want to inconvenience anyone. I often end up paying the price for trying to be considerate of others. People in these countries are rarely considerate of me in these ways. They are considerate in many other ways, but when it comes to personal space, noise, and possessions, the rules are different here. (In any event, the staircase here is far too narrow to easily accommodate a bicycle.)

The way the rules are different was apparent when I finally got my bike in order and set off. I’m talking about how people drive. It’s a tired old topic, of course. That people in countries like Indonesia are terrible drivers is hardly a surprise. People do debate me on this from time to time. They’ll argue that they aren’t bad drivers. They just drive differently than I’m used to. If they drove like this in Canada, they would be bad drivers. But here, the way they drive is normal. So, technically, I’m the bad driver. But I don’t buy that argument one little bit. Driving is driving. There is no debate in my mind that cutting me off, running me off the road, cutting too close and nearly hitting me, driving the wrong way, turning without looking, driving far too fast, screaming at me and honking at me, and a hundred other things are all examples of bad driving. I don’t care what country you’re in.

When I’m in a good mood, I take the bad driving in stride. It really is the way things are, and there is no point getting upset. It’s not like you can change anything. It would be like being angry that the sky is blue. You can be as angry as you want, but the sky is still going to be blue tomorrow. But yesterday, I was tired and irritable and the bad driving got on my nerves. I could sense that I would even welcome a fight. I was looking for excuses to get angry and yell at someone. This is a big part of the pscyhology of cultural misunderstandings for me. I’ve written about this many times in the past. What happens is that a thousand different people will do something that annoys me or bothers me. And I just let it go. But the irritation is building up inside me. And then when I finally can’t take it anymore and I respond, my response is way out of proportion. I’ll take all the anger that I felt for a thousand people and dump it all on one poor person at once. (I think this is behind road rage and air rage and things like that, too.) Also, I feel this intense frustration that there is no one to blame. Who do you blame for a pattern of behavior that is common throughout the entire society? And when I finally lose my temper, I’ll focus on that one person and I’ll blame them for the behavior of all 250 million Indonesians. It isn’t fair or logical, but that’s how it works.

A good example of that occurred after my bike ride. I returned to Tanjungbalai proper with the desire to get a delicious mango juice. My bike ride had been horrible. The traffic drove me crazy. The neighborhood I went to turned out to be industrial and commercial and wasn’t interesting at all. People had been quite aggressive and annoying the entire time – especially the children. So I just wanted to go back to my hotel and hide. But first, I was going to go to a juice stand that I had found recently. The man had been friendly. He had a nice set of plastic chairs and tables. And he made a good mango juice. But when I got to that street, he wasn’t there. I was so disappointed. I really wanted a nice drink, so I started riding around the streets looking for another place to have a mango juice. And THAT is never a good idea. It’s just asking for trouble. When I stumble across these things, I have a good experience. When I go looking for something in particular, it always leads to frustration and disappointment.

The first place I stopped at annoyed me in another way that is unique to these cultures. From the outside, the juice place looked quite nice. It had a nice display of fruit. It looked clean. And there were tables inside where you could sit down. It was more like a restaurant than a juice stand. So I made the effort of finding a place to park my bike and get everything secure. Then I went to the juice stand, and, of course, there was no one there. In Canada, we’re used to a brightly smiling clerk always standing there right behind the counter. And they generally are wearing a uniform, so we know exactly who to talk to. But in places like Indonesia, nine times out of ten there won’t be anyone there at all. And that’s what happened here. The place was completely empty and there was no one standing behind the counter. I looked into the restaurant and I saw one man way at the back lounging on a chair and watching TV. I knew the score. If I wanted a fruit juice, I’d have to yell to the back and get this man’s attention. Then he would either come to the front and serve me or he would go to the back and find someone else. That’s normal here. They are usually family-run businesses, and everyone lives there as well as works there. So they just lounge around and dress normally. You can’t tell who works there and who doesn’t. And half the time, no one is working. You have to shout to get someone’s attention, and there can be a long discussion and lots of confusion as they argue about who should serve you. This gets more complicated when it is a foreigner like me and the girls are too shy or scared to come serve me.

I have two general responses to situations like this. If I am in a very good mood, I will join in with the Indonesian style, and I will shout to get someone’s attention. If I am in my normal mood, I will just go somewhere else. I generally look into a shop from the outside. If I don’t see anyone, I don’t go in. I can’t be bothered with all this shouting and effort. After all, I just want a fruit juice. It’s not a life and death situation. It would be like going to Tim Horton’s but having to shout and shout towards the back to get someone’s attention first and then endure five minutes of complications as they figured out who should get you your cup of coffee. In the end, as a customer you start to feel a bit foolish. It’s just a cup of coffee. It’s not worth all this effort. You feel weird to be fighting so hard just to get a cup of coffee, or, in this case, a mango juice.

Yesterday, I was not feeling Indonesian. And I was not in my normal mood. I was angry and irritable. So I left the shop, and I did so while making lots of noise and banging my bike and bike lock and pannier bag around. I was spoiling for a fight. I wanted people to see that I was annoyed. It’s the over reaction I was talking about. At that point, if someone on a motorcycle had suddenly cut me off or nearly hit me, I would have exploded at them and yelled at them. I would dump all the hours of frustration on them all at once. But nothing happened and no one noticed that I was annoyed. Again, there was no one to blame.

I was going to go back to my hotel and give up on my dream of a consoling mango juice, but at the last minute, I spotted another juice stand. I knew it was probably a mistake, but I decided to take a chance. The place looked nice enough. There were seats. So I parked my bike and made one last attempt to get my mango juice. It was never quite a pleasant experience. There seemed to be some confusion about what I was ordering and the price. The woman said something about “six” and she showed me six fingers. I said that was fine, though the normal price for a fruit juice is five thousand rupiah, not six thousand. I took a seat, but then she seemed to be counting out six mangoes, as if I had wanted six mangoes instead of a mango juice. So I interrupted her and indicated that I wanted a mango juice. She nodded and indicated that she understood.

There were lots of mosquitoes where I was sitting, and I kept getting bitten. It just wasn’t a comfortable place. The woman spent a long time making my mango juice, but it was finally ready. When she brought it over to me, I gave her a 10,000 rupiah note. This woman pocketed the money and then went away and sat down. She didn’t produce any change. This annoyed me right away. I hate uncertainty, and now I had no idea what was going on with my money. It was on my mind. Had this woman forgotten to give me my change? Should I say something? Should I wait until I leave? So instead of relaxing with my mango juice, I was sitting there being devoured by mosquitoes and worrying about the money. I couldn’t relax. The whole mango juice thing had been a disaster from the beginning. To make matters worse, the mango juice wasn’t very good. It was far too sweet. The woman had loaded in tons of sugar plus chocolate sauce plus fake honey plus candy sprinkles. It was disgusting.

Eventually, I had no choice but to deal with the situation. I could just get up and leave. After all, we’re only talking about 50 cents Canadian. It’s not like I was worried about the money itself. But if I left without asserting myself, I’d feel like a fool. I’d feel like this woman had treated me like an idiot. So I decided to say something, and with English and body language and showing the woman my wallet, I indicated that I was still waiting for my change. The woman refused to give me any change. She went to the cash drawer and showed me my 10,000 rupiah note and she indicated the empty juice cup and put them together. One juice costs 10,000 rupiah, she was saying. This really annoyed me because the price of juice is the one thing I really know. I don’t know much about Indonesia, but I know the price of mango juice. I’ve had mango juice every day, and it always costs 5,000 rupiah at every juice stand. The juice stands generally have the number 5,000 written on it in big black letters. I’ve even taken pictures of this. Had I been able to find it quickly on my phone, I could have called up that picture and showed it to the woman. As it was, I gave a big sigh and scoffed at the woman. I tried to convey the idea that all the juice stands in town charge 5,000 rupiah. The price is 5,000, not 10,000. But she refused to give me any change.

I don’t know that I was angry. I’m not sure that I was even upset. I think the overwhelming feeling I had was one of sadness. It’s almost like regret. This woman was turning what was supposed to be a pleasant experience enjoying a mango juice into an unpleasant one of her cheating me and treating me like a fool. And why? For fifty cents? Why do this? I hate all the fighting you have to do in places like Indonesia. It’s part of the culture and part of the reality here. But on some days, it just makes me tired. And I knew this experience was going to be on my mind and bother me for hours if not days. And there’s the feeling of helplessness to fold into it. Without any language ability, I couldn’t even argue with the woman. I couldn’t say anything. I had no power. I’d already given her the money. She had it in her cash drawer. So she had all the power and she could do anything she wanted. And I was mentally kicking myself for giving her the 10,000 rupiah note. I rarely assert myself, and I always end up paying the price for that.

Nothing happened in the end. I didn’t do anything beyond the rather pathetic statement in English that I would never return to her juice stand. She couldn’t understand that, so there was no point in saying it. The best I could manage was to look at her with my meanest and most disappointed look and shake my head at her, like saying “bad dog” and wagging your finger at a pooch. Later, I rode by her juice stand on my bike, and I gave her another mean look and shook my head. I just wanted her to know that I knew she had cheated me. I guess that’s the point more than anything. She was trying to tell me that a mango juice cost 10,000 rupiah. I knew she was lying, and I wanted her to know that I knew. It’s all very ridiculous and not worth the calories I burned on it.

The story goes on because, as I said, a frustrating thing about life in these countries is that there is never anyone to blame. I can’t lodge a complaint with the government agency responsible for all the noise and the bad driving. And often what happens is that you’ll take out your anger on the nice people that speak English that you’ve gotten to know. I really don’t like doing that, but it’s really frustrating to have all these experiences and thoughts and have no one to tell them to. That’s why I write such long emails. In this case, I told the story to Rea through my smartphone. She knew I was getting a mango juice, and she sent me a message later asking me how it was. I told her the truth: the mango juice itself was terrible, and the woman had cheated me by charging me double the price. I kept it lighthearted with lots of smiley faces to show I wasn’t angry or upset. I treated it like a cultural experience. But it doesn’t always work out that way. Rea felt personally responsible for this and she ended up sending me a message in which she apologized on behalf of all Indonesians. Now I felt awful. I was blaming her for what someone else did. So I tried to tell her that I was not angry at all. I was going to try to convey some of what I wrote above and tie the whole story into the nature of travel and cultural misunderstandings. But there was no way she could relate to any of that.

Now comes the fascinating end of the story. Much later in the evening, I went out for something to eat. Rea had pointed out a big corner complex of food stands, and she said that they made burgers. That sounded pretty good me. I just wasn’t in the mood for the whole Indonesian cultural experience thing. The idea of sitting down and ordering a burger in a well-lit establishment without mosquitoes seemed like a good one. I sat on a plastic chair at a plastic table, and a nice young woman brought me a whole stack of menus. I ordered a chicken burger and something called a Blue Vanilla Milkshake. My bill came to 19,000 rupiah. I handed the owner a 20,000-rupiah note, and he gave me 10,000 rupiah in change. I pointed out that it was too much, but he insisted. He said that he was so happy that I was eating at his restaurant, he wanted to give me a discount. He even took a picture with me in front of his restaurant’s sign. I assume it will show up on his Facebook page for marketing purposes. So in one short span of time, a woman cheated me of 5,000 rupiah, and a restaurant owner gave me a discount of 9,000 rupiah. So I came out ahead on the day to the tune of 4,000 rupiah. And, ironically enough, while I was eating, a blind beggar had come to my table, and I had given him exactly 4,000 rupiah. So it all evened out.

Tags: Sumatra Part 01