Catchphrases as life vests in a storm<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): The last few months have been the time to
\nbrandish those tired cliches your mother uttered when your little
\nworld seemed to be crumbling around you.<\/p>\n
Every cloud has a silver lining. No pain, no gain. What does
\nnot kill you, makes you stronger. We learn from our mistakes.<\/p>\n
Trouble is, this time it is not about flunking a geometry pop
\nquiz or being the last pick for the soccer team, but a horrible
\nhand dealt in that big, scary, uncertain crapshoot of life.<\/p>\n
For many of us, the dreams are unraveling in fast-forward.<\/p>\n
We know the sobering stories. Friends, or friends of friends,
\nwho suddenly find themselves with nothing to their name but a
\npink slip and a mound of debts. People robbed or assaulted by the
\ndesperate or, sometimes, those opportunists using the crisis as a
\nvicious excuse to victimize others.<\/p>\n
A foreign TV reporter, the one who undercuts her somber
\ndelivery with a uniform of plunging necklines, termed the
\nsituation \"surreal\", an adjective I usually associate with
\nblurred images of melted watches or animal carcasses framed
\nagainst parched desert backgrounds.<\/p>\n
For once, she was right on the nail. Who would have imagined
\njust seven months ago that all our confident assumptions would be
\ndashed as we quaked in our shoes, literally and figuratively
\nlosing our grip and seemingly powerless to put the brakes on the
\nslide?<\/p>\n
It is all the more staggering because it happened so fast.<\/p>\n
In December, I wrote in this column about the rupiah \"dallying
\ndangerously\" with the then unheard of 5,000 mark. A month later,
\nI spent a fitful night wondering if the end was nigh as the
\ncurrency slammed past 10,000.<\/p>\n
Now, barely six weeks later, the rupiah continues to dilly and
\ndally; sad stories of layoffs grow and prices are numbingly high.
\nThrough it all, most of us are soldiering on despite the daily
\nassault of almost universally gloomy news.<\/p>\n
Which is not to say we have a better handle on the conundrum
\nof this meltdown. I, for one, do not pretend to, because all the
\ntheories and finger-pointing often leave me searching for more
\nanswers.<\/p>\n
Now, however, we have a vicarious life vest to cling onto as
\nwe are tossed back and forth in this terrible storm. That
\nconvenient term 'krisis moneter' (monetary crisis) doubles as a
\nconvenient, blanket catchphrase to account for the dumbfounding
\nrealities which leave us scratching our heads.<\/p>\n
They are the magic words when the office boy, Mesran, dims the
\nlights at the end of the workday, or when the accommodating
\nwaiter sheepishly tries to justify a 30 percent increase in the
\nprice of a cup of coffee.<\/p>\n
And I mutter it under my breath as I reel, punch drunk from
\nthe shock, at the Rp 28,000 price of a can of imported beans, Rp
\n5,000 only five months ago.<\/p>\n
Hard-liners may sniff that this is a brazenly simplistic take
\non the problem, but this is precisely why applying the terms
\nworks in neatly encapsulating all that we are at a loss to
\nexplain rationally.<\/p>\n
There is a danger, too. Relying on snappy catchphrases shuts
\nus off from the realities of ugly situations as efficiently as
\npacking them away in the attic trunk. In the short term, in
\nbuffeting ourselves from seemingly unbearable truths, they help
\nus plug on with life.<\/p>\n
Once the storm has passed, as it inevitably will, they should
\nbe discarded, except as nostalgic reminders of the battle fought
\nand won. For this crisis, like any trauma, needs the closure
\nwhich comes from confronting the whys and wherefores of what
\ncaused it, however painful that soul-searching may be.<\/p>\n
The payoff is that we will be armed to weather any future
\nstorms that life may bring our way.<\/p>\n
-- Bruce Emond<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/catchphrases-as-life-vests-in-a-storm-1447893297", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }