Businessman turned hermit

Businessman turned hermit

On March 2, 1999, I received a visit from a distant relative
who spent almost one year in a remote village near Pelabuhan
Ratu, West Java, a renowned seaside resort where local and
foreign tourists come to admire the beautiful scenery and the
nearby pristine forests. However, some swimmers are said to have
lost their lives in the treacherous undercurrents and whirlpools
in the coastal waters. I remember my company's guest from Japan,
who was a champion swimmer during his school years, dared to swim
in the sea and almost lost his life when the treacherous currents
nearly prevented him from reaching the shore. Only his
exceptional strength and his excellent swimming technique saved
his life.

My relative, fed up with the eternal bickering with his spouse
over his alleged extramarital affairs, resolved to leave Jakarta
for good and live in a remote village far from the hustle and
bustle of the metropolitan city. In fact, he was quite a
successful businessman. He worked in a travel bureau and owned a
chicken farm. He renounced all his belongings in order to lead a
hermit's life. But he made himself useful to the village
cooperative as a lecturer and an English teacher for the
secondary school, for which he asked only three meals and a cot
to sleep on in the cooperative building. He said that only those
people living far from our so-called civilization are good and
honest and it never enters their mind to cheat their fellow men
in business. They lead a frugal life and live mostly from what
Mother Earth provides them.

This businessman turned hermit also asked the village
cooperative to provide him with a 24-inch TV and parabola so the
people in the village could get in touch with the outside world
by watching CNN and CNBC. But life in a remote village can be
quite inconvenient. There is no tap water and only the village
well fills the demand for drinking water. This back to nature
sort of life indeed has its positive and negative sides, joys and
sorrows, as does any other human endeavor.

A. DJUANA

Jakarta