A day with herbal medicine vendor 'Ibu' Slamet

A day with herbal medicine vendor 'Ibu' Slamet

Ibu Slamet, 55, was born in the ancient Central Java city of
Surakarta (Solo). A jamu (traditional herbal medicine) seller all
her life, she moved to Jakarta when she was 16. She currently
lives in Kampung Tambak, Central Jakarta, with her husband,
Jadit. They have four grown-up girls. In conversation with The
Jakarta Post's William Furney.

JAKARTA (JP): We live in a small two-roomed house, which is
rented. Every day, I get up at 4 a.m. to prepare jamu. I'll wash
the ingredients, such as ginger and so on, grind them together
and pour the mixture into bottles. That takes about an hour, and
after I say the morning prayer I'll go out and sell the jamu on
the street. There's no competition in my area; I'm the only Ibu
jamu in the kampong. If there were others, it'd be difficult to
sell.

I buy packets of jamu from an agent at the local market, and
mix it with eggs, ginger, honey and so on. I learned to make it
from my grandmother in Surakarta. She's dead now, but she taught
me a lot. After she passed away, when I was 16, I moved to
Jakarta and began selling. Surakarta is the heart of jamu; it's
where the knowledge is.

At 7 a.m., I'll have some rice and tempeh from a warung; it
costs only Rp 1,000. And then I'll continue walking the streets
looking for customers. But it's not hard to sell; many of the
people that buy my jamu are regular customers; they drink it
every morning. And they're nice people, mostly Javanese. Men,
women and children drink my jamu, and they're usually bajaj and
taxi drivers and housewives. Jamu is excellent for your health.
It helps all conditions, including colds and flu's. It also
cleanses the blood, clears acne, helps with antianxiety, skin
diseases and slimming, and lots of other ailments. Everyone in my
family, including my old parents in Surakarta, drinks jamu every
day.

Indonesians like to drink jamu because they know it's good for
them. Everyone drinks it, because for every ailment there's a
jamu remedy. But it takes some getting used to because the taste
can be quite bitter. People here like sweet things, so many of
them ask me to add a lot of honey to the jamu.

I'll sell until 10 a.m., when all my jamu is gone. Then I go
back to the house to rest. Sometimes I sleep for a while before
going to the market to buy more supplies. I sell jamu for between
Rp 1,000 for children to Rp 5,000, which is the complete one, and
I make about Rp 30,000 to Rp 50,000 per day, but only about Rp
30,000 of that is profit. I try to get to the market by 1 p.m. to
buy the things I need.

Every Idul Fitri (celebration at the end of the Muslim fasting
month), we return home to Surakarta by train. It's an overnight
trip and costs about Rp 30,000 per person. It used to be cheaper.
We stay with my parents. They're very old -- my father is 80 and
my mother 75. Every three months, I send them some money, not
much, just Rp 30,000, which a friend takes from Jakarta to their
house. It's just as well, as sending things by post is expensive.

Jadit drives a bajaj. He has been doing it for years, but
doesn't own the bajaj; he rents it from a local man. He works
half a day and makes about Rp 30,000, but has to hand over Rp
20,000 of that to the owner, leaving just Rp 10,000 for himself.

I've never been anywhere, because I'm always tired. But I
guess I like my work, it's all I know how to do. And if I didn't
work, there'd be no food on the table.

Like other Ibu jamu, I wear the traditional clothes of
Surakarta, which includes a batik sarong. And I carry my basket
of jamu in the gendong style (carried on the back). Even though I
am from Surakarta, I prefer to live in Jakarta. Life in Surakarta
is very difficult; there are many sellers of jamu there and it's
extremely difficult to make money. It's much better in Jakarta,
and there are no bad people in my area, just central Javanese,
who are good.

I'm tired of living in our rented house. I like the area, but
the house is too small. We pay Rp 1.5 million each year for it.
But what I really want is a house of our own. In Surkarta, houses
are very expensive, especially those near the city. A small house
costs about Rp 10 million there nowadays, but if you want a
bigger one, it'll cost about Rp 25 million. We have nothing in
our house, except for a well. We don't have a television, radio
or even beds; we sleep on the floor. I'd like to have some of
those things but we don't have any money. The most important
thing now is to save for a house.

I like to go shopping in the traditional markets. But I don't
like going to the big malls. Once, I went to Pasar Raya in
Manggarai, but I was frightened. I just bought some cakes for the
children and left. I don't want to go back there again; I don't
feel comfortable. I'm much happier in the traditional places.

As a child in Surakarta, I never went to school. My parents
didn't send me as things were difficult. But I'm proud my
children have all been to school in Jakarta, even though I can't
read or write myself, which is not a problem anyway as I don't
need to be able to do those things.

I've never had a bank account, purely because my money doesn't
last that long. After I pay for food and clothes, there's nothing
much left.

In the evenings, I just sit around in the house with the
others and we talk until we get tired. We usually chat about
families and children. Then I'll just lie down on the floor and
fall asleep. Although my life is difficult, I don't think about
things too much, there's no point; I'd just get a headache.