Are we a selfish people in decline?

Are we a selfish people in decline?

JAKARTA (JP): One afternoon, my friend Joko arrived with a
troubled look on his face.

"Do you know Lifebuoy soap is Rp 950 now? It was only Rp 450
before," he said. "My God, I think one day I will have to bathe
by rubbing my body with a stone!"

I laughed and then teased him.

"Come on, you should be ashamed because I can smell you from
miles away. Admit it -- you haven't had a bath today?"

"Ya!" he laughed, also joking. "What can I do? I have to be
thrifty, right? Bathing is a luxury compared to eating."

We were joking, but the monetary crisis has hit university
students like us, especially those who live far from home. We
have to spend our money carefully to make ends meet and we are
squeezed to purchase even basic necessities.

Along with my roommate, Evi, I am shocked by the increasing
amount of our monthly shopping bill, a trend which actually began
in October. We formerly spent around Rp 30,000 monthly to buy
things like powder, lotion, shampoo, sugar, coffee, and tea.

Now it costs us at least Rp 40,000, and sometimes more, even
though we make sure to buy only what we really need. For us, the
difference of Rp 10,000 is enough to affect what we eat for
several days.

Thank God Evi and I are not heavy users of cosmetics!

Our new pastime is spending a long, long time -- sometimes
hours -- in the store, checking every shelf to compare prices and
mulling whether we really need the item.

Quality is not so important anymore; we are thankful if we can
just meet our needs. Sometimes, we have to make a sad trip back
to an aisle to return something deemed "unnecessary", which I did
last month with my favorite conditioner.

But these shopping trips have given us something to laugh
about. We dissolve into uncontrollable giggles when we remember
the peeved look of the shop assistant after we visited the dairy
section three times, and still didn't buy anything.

We laugh even harder when we recollect the strange glances of
other shoppers when we parked our trolley in a corner and tried
to calculate the cost of our purchases. Or, rather, whether we
had enough money to pay for them.

This is why we feel sadness and jealousy when we read reports
about people rushing to shops to buy up goods. We have the same
fears as these hoarders, and it might be said that our concerns
are even greater.

But what can we do?

If anything, the monetary crisis has illustrated how we, the
Indonesian people, have declined. Where has our social concern
gone? Instead, our selfish interest is only to save ourselves.

This lack of concern for others may also be the cause of our
willingness to listen to gossip. This is strange from us, who
consider ourselves among the most sympathetic and kindest
citizens in the world, or at least that is what I have heard
since I was a little kid.

What are we? Where are we going? We can blame our problems on
the free trade era, or globalization, or the rapid development of
technology.

But I think we had better look at ourselves.

Maybe we are wrong. Have we really taught humanitarian lessons
to our children? Do we teach them to care about other people,
instead of needlessly prying into their private affairs?

We as a people are headed for the bottom of the sea because of
our own selfishness. Look how we buy dollars in the hope of
saving ourselves. It may well keep our personal bank accounts
healthy, but it could plague the future we owe to our children.

Do we realize that every dollar we buy undermines all the
rupiah we gained? It reduces the wages we earned over decades,
denies the sweat of our hard work, has millions wondering about
their future, and leaves many more wondering where or when their
next meal will come from.

Several of us are scheduled to graduate this April, but we are
so frightened about what the future holds. I believe thousands,
even millions of other students feel the same way.

We, the younger generation, do not deserve to have the burden
of our country put on our shoulders. Rightfully, we should help
our elders and eventually take over their positions to make this
a better country. Instead, it seems this right is already denied
us.

-- Chadijah Mastura