The Subtle Cringe

I would say that I'm an expert on reading body language and subtle communication cues.

I wouldn't say its because I'm a communications major (I dropped out). I also wouldn't say its because I like looking at bodies (which I do... I majored in it, unofficially).

I would be hard pressed to say where this skill/curse came from but I will say that I'm constantly aware of it and my body language radar is always working, well serviced, and beeping like a smoke alarm on crack.

All that being said, I've become so aware of the subtle cringe that Indonesians experience when they end up in conversation with me.

A flash. A hint of shoulders being raised as a quicksilver reaction passes over their face. Like someone made them sniff smelling salts, garbage truck on a hot day flavor but the penalty for reacting was DEATH, so they switch back to their normal smiling selves.

They are reacting to Malaysia.

They are reacting to the bastardized version of their language that I'm trying to adapt and bastardize so I can make myself be understood more efficiently, basically cutting out the middle man who translates spoken English that lives in their head.

They are reacting to my accent. They are reacting to my LAH. They are reacting to how familiar I am to so many things about their culture yet completely unfamiliar to things that should just MAKE SENSE seeing that I understand so many other things WHY DON'T YOU JUST FUCKING GET THIS PART HUH?

They are reacting to stories of maid abuse. They are reacting to other Malaysian production folk who swing through Jakarta, swinging their cocks and pocketing as much money as they can, as cockily as they can. The swagger. The arrogance.

But mostly they react, process, and then put that past them, because hopefully I'm different. Hopefully I'm polite (I'm a walking school of mafakin' etiquette), and hopefully if they don't laugh or react too hard then by the time this asshole leaves he'll have some kind of working knowledge of how to converse in Bahasa Indonesia. They certainly try very hard to please, not offend, and just generally be thought of as being nice people. It works. I definitely think they are nice.

Honestly I think Bahasa Malaysia makes their ears bleed. They can't handle it. Everyone cringes. From taxi drivers to chicks I'm trying to pick up at Karaoke joints to PAs that I'm sending off on wild goose chases to look for the specific type of cable I'm missing. So I spent the whole morning being really self-conscious about trying not to sound like an idiot or make people sniff rubbish and it was really frustrating. I felt like some kind of stupid school kid who hadn't done his homework, or someone who shits themselves in class and just kinda sits there and hopes that the smell doesn't make anyone turn around because clearly moving will alert them to the brown stain and you know that any disturbance of the shit will make people smell it and turn around and THAT would be a problem.

The solution was, at lunch, to have a beer... and then call my producer and her PA on it.

Me: You guys cringe when i talk, do you realise?

Her: Noooo, why do you say that?

Me: You just did it :)

Her: hahahahahahahha. No comment

then we got to talking and the solution to this problem is to firstly work on my accent and my Bahasa Indonesia as quickly as I can but also to stop worrying about the cringing. It is inevitable, and has to do with historical and cultural differences, problems, and arguments that have nothing to do with me. Maybe they have everything to do with me, but someone's gotta point that out to me so I can realise it. WHAT DO I LOOK LIKE, SOME KIND OF MIND READER?

I've always wanted to say that line, while shouting at a woman... I'm yet to come across the perfect opportunity to let it rip. I hope I get to do so at some point in this life.

A completely unrelated thing about Jakarta though is that they build all the way up to the street. It is decidedly a very unfriendly place to be a pedestrian, and you can't really see what's going on in the shops or the houses because the walls are so high up and actually you are very close to them.

Then you get behind the wall, or you walk through the door, and the most amazing spaces lay behind them. Had lunch at a place called Payon in Kemang earlier and it was absolutely stunning. I'm lazy to describe why it was stunning without sounding like some kind of Indonesian travelogue but the architecture was very Javanese and there was an amphitheater in the garden where a drum circle were rehearsing and just groovin' and the rhythm was just RIGHT. First the soundtrack to the meal was the percussion, then the skies darkened and it began to rain heavily. The doomDOOmChakdoomChak was replaced with the sound of fat raindrops crashing down on the clay tiled roof as well as hitting the pond that snaked around the restaurant. Everyone ate in silence for a while and we just watched the rain and ate some crazyDelicious Javanese food.

I'm meeting an old friend tonight to tokkok singsong. I'm going to get homey to break it down for me and learn some key phrases so I can get my shwerve on without making people cringe. They are definitely going to cringe, but maybe it'll be so subtle that it'll escape my radar.

That's all I'm asking for, really :)

Some bad pics of Payon that doesn't do it any justice.