New cultural experiences

….BEEP,… BeEp,…. beep,….. with one hand I turn of the alarm clock and open one eye to see what time it is: 5.20AM too late to snooze for a while. It was a short night after I came back yesterday evening around 0.30Am. It took a while falling asleep since the drums of the mosque where going all night long. Today is Idul Fitri which means the end of the month fasting for Muslims here in Indonesia, a feast with a lot of food. I’m getting up early to go with my friends to watch the Solat Eid.

 Before the feasting starts women had been busy all night cooking, children and men were hanging in and around the mosque praying and playing the drums. And now around 6ish they all gather together outside on different places in the city to pray together as a closure of the period of fasting and to become clean before Allah.

All men, women, children and babies gathering together. And me and my friend went out to see this to happen.

People gathered together at the road, waiting till its time for Solat Eid

Womens pray at the same field but have their own section

Everybody from Granny till baby

Shot from the back

Praying women covered up from head till toes.

Solat Eid

Man praying in the back

After Solat Eid, they go home and say this phrase to one another:

Minta maaf lahir dan batir.

which means such as asking forgiveness for all their sins, their wrongs they did. It’s about coming clean not only with Allah but also with your family.

I got invited to the house of my housekeeper, which is an honor, I felt a bit shy going there and stepping into this house loaded with Indonesians, all family gathered together. You know it feels a bit like your a baby, all these new cultural stuff, first times and trying to learn and understand. The fun thing is that last year I was here aswell during Ramadan, but as a newbie I wasn't gone that deep yet into relationships and culture. So it's fun to see the difference in myself from a year ago. I grown so much. I learned so much, understand still so less. But my language is fluent and I enjoy talking to people in Indonesian. I made Indonesian friends and I love them! I like to learn from them and to figure out why they do what they do or believe what they believe. And this weeks with so much new cultural things to happen I really felt that I had grown up you know.

I know how to get around here, I know how to find my way and where in the first year it was more about surviving I actually feel that I start to live!

Me visting during Idul Fitri/Hari Lebaran

Left my current housekeeper at the right my current housekeeper

Anyways after greeting everybody in the house on the Indonesian way. They told me to sit down at the bench and to eat all this food. O my it was so much haha they explained all the different dishes, cookies and sweets. Can’t remember it all anymore, but ate some pretty interesting things where my stomach not always agreed with, but I ate it anyways, cause that’s the polite thing to do.. So after I my belly was stuffed and statisfied and they were sure that I wasn’t hungry anymore, I had to asure them 3 times nothing more could fit in haha and they even gave me  me food to bring home to survive for another week haha.

I chitchatted with some people and after that headed home to crash into my bed for a long afternoon nap. And I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one today =)

We call it superstitious, they call it believe..

While I write this blog Ramadan has almost come to an end and things start to be crazy here in the city, prizes on the market has gone up again. For 1 kilo beef you pay 100.000Rp (€ 8,70/US $ 9,90). On Monday I still paid 11.250Rp for a 19 liter gallon of drinking water, today it made 13.000Rp and some even ask 14.000Rp…

The spiritual atmosphere is more intense. People spent a lot of time in the mosque, especially 10 days before the end of Ramadan, so my friend told me.

All people (pulang kampung) return home, so from all over Indonesia people gather together. Places like Jakarta are quiet these days and newspapers are writing about this event. The last tickets for airplane, bus or train are sold for prices that are shocked me.

Since today my helper is not coming in, because she has 1,5 week off. Now she will be home backing cakes, sweets and other delicious local dishes for Idul Fitri, the feast to end the Ramadan.  So I have to take care for the house myself. Poeh…I can’t tell you I feel so blessed to have her doing my laundry, swiping and mopping the floor, and cleaning outside where it’s extremely dusty..

In the meanwhile I started in unit 7 at school. I’m enjoying it very much! Every day I learn new things. This 3th level of language learning isn’t that much about gaining vocabulary or pronunciation, but about learning to understand the way the people think, trying to understand their believes. Can tell you I learned some pretty interesting and useful things.

So I learned about pregnant women about the cultural do and don’ts. I learned about that when a women is pregnant there’s a lot that she’s not allowed to do. Such as standing in the opening of the door, cause that will induce trouble during giving birth, she’s not allowed to eat too much Icecream, not because of she will gain ;) but because of they believe her baby will be very big. Her husband cannot go out fishing otherwise their baby will be born without arms or legs. They like to squeeze cheeks of other babies or touch white people (like me) when they desire their baby to look the same. Some even believe a pregnant women is not allowed to cut meat or cook.. well it’s clear that these times can be troublesome.. 

We call it superstitious, they call it believe..

But the most interesting cultural stuff  for me to learn was about ngidam (cravings of a pregnant women) In Holland (and in the western world) we believe that these desires for food come from hormone change and come from the mom. But here they believe that these desires or cravings come from the baby. They believe when they don’t fulfill these longings from the baby it will be a drooling baby when it’s born. So they will do anything to not have a drooling baby.

So these desires go from understandable to weird and crazy. When I was talking with my friend about it I asked her what ngidam she had. She told me when she was pregnant with her first child she longed to eat pork. Now that’s not so interesting in itself, but this friend of mine is Muslim, so eating pork is not halal, not allowed. But since they didn’t want to have a drooling baby, she, her husband + family decided that it was ok for her to do so. But in the end she only licked the pork to make the baby think that she eat the pork and no drooling baby would be born.

Well these stories and new cultural information got me thinking. I really try to understand how did people start to believe these things and why is it so difficult for them to let go. And till today still people believe this even people who are educated, like some of my friends who I never thought of that they would believe this things.

This week I learned so much and what I shared is only the tip of the mountain ( as we say in Dutch). In these moments when culture is so overwhelming and sometimes goes together with culture shock, hitting me in waves, I try to find my way in this maze of information, believes, values and culture. Where is the line between accepting and adapting or to disagree.  In those times of confusion I like to send this prayer up into the sky:

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference..

To crave cheese and love soto ayam

As I’m writing this blog I'm sitting on the floor inside my house, it’s almost empty. The big chair I used to sit in while writing this blog is already in my new home. I hear the people praying in the mosque asking to their god to show them the right way. Words gently blow along with the soft breeze that comes from the mountains through the valley.

It’s feels strange to leave this place. My house, my cozy place that turned into home, where I spent my first year in Indonesia. And to pack my live (again) together into some suitcases and to realize that everything just fits into 2 cars.

My first year with joy and laughter, a lot of tears and missing. Times of being amazed and annoyed by the culture. Times of reaching new milestones, making new friends and having precious moments. Times where my faith got stretched a lot till the point I thought I couldn’t handle it anymore. Times where I counted my blessings and felt so rich. Times of dying to my flesh and feeling spiritualy so dry. Times where I felt so close to God and felt so much joy and so blessed. Times where some words got another meaning or I discovered the true meaning. Times of evaluation, making conclusions, new changes and true love, to cry, to forgive and forget, to hate and to love, to grow and to fail, to be homesick and to never leave Indonesia again, to miss hugging and to not wanna be touched, to crave cheese and love soto ayam, to miss the snow and to embrace the hot weather, to be cold when it’s 22 degrees and to get masuk angin when it’s raining, to not gourmet with Chrismas but bbq sate all year long.

But for now it’s time to move into my new house and make it feel like home, for as long as it lasts…till it’s time to move on, cause the next season waits to bear the fruits fertilized with tears, joy and laughter.