Squander good luck, rake in misfortune

http://www.thejakartapost.com/detaileditorial.asp?fileid=20061108.F04&irec=3

November 08, 2006

Julia Suryakusuma, Jakarta

Disaster has struck: My servants Sari and Didi have disappeared and with them goes a mother lode of ideas for columns! My ever-forgetful cook and her husband, the "pious giggler", were meant to return after a one-week mudik (Idul Fitri homecoming), in time for major renovations starting in my house. However, I discovered a few days ago that they had deserted me. Their room was stripped bare of their belongings (and some of mine as well!) and I finally realized that this was their very Javanese way of saying so long, farewell, auf wiedersehen, goodbye.

Perhaps I should have been suspicious from the start -- servants taking mudik for only one week? Get real!
As I stood there in their dusty empty room, it hit me that perhaps I should not be unhappy to lose them. The one thing that I had banked on from them -- their honesty -- turned out to be unfounded. They had lied, stolen and let me down at a crucial time. So, perhaps their disappearing act was a blessing in disguise. Better sooner than later, no?

But I was totally at a loss to comprehend why they did it -- why give up the fantastic deal they had? They only had to do the normal work expected of any household servant -- cooking, cleaning, laundry. In return they got an above-average salary, tips, medical costs and guaranteed education for their three kids, as far as they could go. All the children did well at school, so university and perhaps a chance to escape the poverty cycle was possible too. I was even willing to support the fourth child, Sari or Didi Jr., due any time now in November.

Yes, I know, women sometimes get loopy when they're pregnant -- maybe all the blood being pumped away from the head into the baby-making machine leaves the brain dry as a bone, reducing thinking power to zero, zippo, zilch. But what was Didi's excuse?

I had actually been quite excited at the prospect of a new life -- the baby -- in the house, but this excitement now became astonished reflection as I tried to understand their self-destructive decision. And I couldn't help but wonder if Sari and Didi's short-term thinking, squandering good fortune and planting the seeds for your own -- and others -- bad luck, was somehow a particularly Indonesian thing?

Looking back on our history, it struck me that the answer was a resounding "yes"! From day one in August 1945, we've been consistently wasting our good fortune. Forget Marhaenism, integralism, patrimonialism. Scrap theories of class, economics and institutions! Throw out all the complicated political, anthropological, cultural, psychological theorizing ever cooked up by Indonesian and Western scholars to comprehend Indonesia and Indonesians! Now there's one, complete, explanation: Sari-Didiism. Brilliant, brilliant!
Just look back over the last six decades. We squandered the hard-won independence that promised freedom (at last!), prosperity, pluralism and the pursuit of happiness, for Guided Democracy, our very own homegrown brand of tyranny. Sure, Western-style liberal democracy was fun to fool around with for seven years (1950-1957), but then we said, nah, this ain't suited to our Indonesian circumstances. Let's really mess ourselves up!

So Sukarno called for a political system of "democracy with guidance" based on "indigenous" procedures: Musyawarah (prolonged deliberation) and mufakat (consensus), all, naturally, under the guidance of the Penyambung Lidah Rakyat (Extension of the Tongue of the People, my personal favorite among the many titles Sukarno gave himself).

This dictatorship of "talk, but then do what I say" laid the basis for Soeharto's 32-year authoritarian rule, where all the fruits independence had given us -- political freedom, freedom of expression, civil liberties, human rights -- were dumped in the out-tray.

But there was a lot in the in-tray in the New Order as well, don't you worry. Indonesia experienced unprecedented economic growth, thanks to an export-driven economy, so much so that it was hailed as a model "Asian Tiger" economy. And poverty was alleviated as well -- especially for members of the military, Golkar and Soeharto cronies. In fact, Transparency International even proclaimed Soeharto the world's most corrupt politician, claiming he pinched between US$15-35 million through bribery, racketeering and embezzlement. So there we go again, short-term gains resulting from short-term thinking, squandering our chances to be an economic power in the region.

And 60 years after independence, eight years into Reformasi, will we have another Sari-Didi moment and squander our big chance for post-Soeharto reform? Will we drop the ball and opt instead for ego-centered instant power that gives rise to fragmentation and endless conflicts? Will we blow the chance for moderate Islam to emerge from under repression as a moral and intellectual force for good, instead allowing the positive aspects of religion to be lost in a wasteful burst of extremist militancy? Take a guess.

Enough! The reflections on Sari-Didiism in Indonesia jostling in my head may win me a Nobel prize, but they weren't doing much to solve my domestic crisis. I began to sweep up the dust and debris the fugitives had left behind.

Luckily Hadi, my quiet and efficient new driver, came to the rescue the next day, miraculously delivering me Asih, one of his neighbors, to help salvage my home from the ruins. She is effective, efficient, diligent and reliable -- and the house has never been so clean, the clothes more neatly ironed! There is a downside though. Asih is just too good. I don't think she can ever be the rich mine of ideas for columns that Sari & Didi were. But, then again, maybe she could be an inspiration for stories about the other side of midnight, where we use all the good chances that come our way. Let's hope ...

The writer is the author of Sex, Power and Nation.
She can be reached at jsuryakusuma@mac.com or jskusuma@dnet.net.id.