Take it from the villagers<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Doing something pointless, as Joice Maynard put
\nit, can take you away from the pressure of daily routine. And
\nthat's exactly what I did after finishing an assignment in East
\nJava a while ago. I went to a small village called Panggul on a
\npublic bus.<\/p>\n
As the bus crawled along the hilly road, and more and more
\npassengers got in, I began to think that I had made a mistake.
\nBeing squeezed in the crowded bus was not only pointless, but
\nalso murder. The twenty-four-seat bus was occupied by more than
\nforty foul-smelling passengers. "Exactly what am I doing here?" I
\nkept asking myself angrily.<\/p>\n
Halfway to the destination, a middle-aged woman joined the
\ncrowd and put her merchandise, consisting of various snacks, on
\nthe lap of a man sitting next to me. "Nyuwun sewu," she apologized
\nsweetly. (I know, I should have given my seat to her, but
\nit wasn't the right time to play gentleman. I had a long and
\nrough ride to go).<\/p>\n
I didn't have to wait long until another woman got in and
\nauthoritatively put a basket full of chicks on my lap with the
\nstandard "nyuwun sewu". A basket-full of noisy and rotten
\nchickens, for Pete's sake! I could have blown my stack! But the
\nman next to me didn't show a trace of difficulty holding onto the
\nmerchandise. "Lha, wis ngene iki," he said, meaning that there
\nwas nothing we could do about it. "There is no way they could
\nstand the bus turbulence with the burden," he added
\nunderstandingly.<\/p>\n
I was amazed at how the passengers put up with inconvenience.
\nThe crowd, heat, noise and jolts didn't make them furious. No
\ncomplaint, no angry remark. Instead, they chatted gaily as if
\nthey were on a joy ride.<\/p>\n
At Dongko, the bus was stopped by the driver's wife carrying
\ntheir baby daughter. He spent five minutes talking to his wife. I
\nthought the passengers would get mad, but they didn't. In fact,
\nwhen the driver kissed his daughter, one of them shouted, "And
\none for Momma, please," and the others roared with laughter.<\/p>\n
In big cities, people complain about any inconvenience. You
\ncomplain when your coffee is too sweet or too black, when your
\nmaid or your driver makes a mistake, when there is a boring show
\non TV and when your children wake up late. But peasants face it
\nwith humor.<\/p>\n
Staggering to my hotel room that afternoon, smelling like a
\nchicken, I found that the room hadn't been cleaned and the maid
\nhad forgot to take my laundry. I was ready to raise hell, but
\nthen the faces of the passengers in the bus flashed into my mind.<\/p>\n
"Nyuwun sewu, Mas," I said, smiling to the manager, "If your
\npeople do not have anything better to do, could you please have
\nthem make my bed?"<\/p>\n
My trip I to the village wasn't totally pointless. It taught
\nme how to deal with inconvenience. I still keep a page from the
\npeasants' book.<\/p>\n
-- Carl Chairul<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/take-it-from-the-villagers-1447893297", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }