Can we escape from our past experiences?

By Mochtar Buchori

JAKARTA (JP): The Nov. 30th edition of The Economist carried a very interesting story about Andre Malraux (1901-1976). According to Jean-Francois Lyotard, throughout his life, Malraux devoted as much energy to his life as he did to his writings. In particular, he devoted a great deal of energy to shaping his personal image.

One of his accomplishments in this respect was his ability to talk and behave like a graduate of the famous Ecole du Louvre, even though he was never registered at this school and had no diploma to his name. Another feat was his success in convincing his first wife Clara, a wealthy woman, that his mother belonged to the high bourgeoisie whereas in reality, she was just an owner of a grocery shop.

This story made me think of people like myself, Indonesians who were born before World War II, and through the revolution and years of independence had succeeded in moving upward socially. People who came from the upper lower and lower middle class, from families which were neither poor nor rich, but which were very strict in observing traditional values. There are many Indonesians of this category who, through hard work and luck, managed to crawl to a higher social and economic standing. Indonesians of this sort have usually worked very hard to create personal images.

If I am not mistaken, there are at least two popular routes that have been followed thus far to create a desired image. One is what I call the "material route", and the other is the "cultural route". There are a few people, of course, who tried to use both routes: employing the material route first in creating a desired image, to be followed later by steps along the cultural route. This can be called the "double approach" in creating an image.

Those who follow the material route -- and this is the majority -- usually employ trappings which symbolize wealth of nobility. The decoration of their homes is designed to create the impression that they have come from a class of nobility where material wealth was taken for granted. In Javanese families of this type, the presence of a set of traditional umbrella's signifying nobility in the front room of the house is an imperative. It will be more impressive still if in addition, a set of traditional spears (tombak) is also part of the decoration. These nobility ornaments are usually accompanied by stories on how these things were passed from generation to generation.

Such a display of wealth and nobility is usually considered more dignified than the display of wealth through mere modern gadgets: expensive cars, television sets, a set of handphones and the like. This is cheap. The trick is that you create the impression that you were born in a rich and noble family. Van huis uit rijk (rich from the very beginning of one's life), and not simply being rich, is an image that many people covet. Many people are willing to lie to create such an image.

Those who follow the cultural route usually start with improving their language, followed by improvements in mannerism, including table manners. Once you manage to improve your language -- Javanese, Indonesian, Arabic, Mandarin, or any Western language -- you start paying attention to your clothes and etiquette. You take courses in educational programs for "personality building". There you will also learn how to behave properly at a dining table, including how to converse during a dinner course. This is the most difficult part, and only those with a solid educational background can make significant progress in this part of the course. If your language is too poor to make a meaningful conversation during dinner, then you just learn how to smile charmingly.

I once met a person who really made an impression on me with his language skill. He spoke Dutch in an unbelievably Dutch way. He was an Ambonese. I thought that he was reared in Dutch from his childhood. Later on, I met one of his old teachers, and this teacher told me that his very Dutch way of speaking was acquired while he was studying in Holland. It is still a great accomplishment in my opinion, but many people would be satisfied only if they could create the impression that their home upbringing was the source of their cultural finesse, and not only the education they received at the university.

Those who follow the double approach in creating a new personal image usually use encyclopedias and other standard books to decorate their living room. These symbols of cultural accomplishment are usually encased in a beautiful glass-paned bookcase. This betrays the true character of the owner. A person who reads his or her books never puts the books in a closed bookcase. They are always placed in an open bookcase.

The important question in this regard is whether a person is at peace with the image he or she has created for others. Image creation is always done for others, not for ourselves. Living in the shadow of a created image is like living in a world of illusions. It is like an actor who wants to extend the image of the characters he has played into his personal life. He has to lie. "Acting is lying, and good acting is lying convincingly," Sir Lawrence Olivier once said. How long can one act in his or her life? How long can one speak, for instance, in a voice which is not his or her own?

When I was young I tried several times to live up to an image I created for others. I tried to live in a world of illusions. I did this in my attempt to show that in spite of my humble origin, I was no less than those around me who came from better family backgrounds and had better upbringings. But this "role playing" never lasted long. I became tired of having to be alert all the time. To live in pretexts is never comfortable.

For people who have moved up socially in a significant way, there are certain parts of their past that sometimes hurt their ego. If you are an internationally recognized expert in one academic discipline, or a general with more than one star, or a cabinet minister, it may hurt your ego if other people have come to know that your father was an illiterate peasant or a bus driver. It is for this reason that some people do their best to camouflage their past. But can we really wipe out and recreate certain parts of our past? I think it will be very difficult, unless you are willing to be called a phony person.

For certain people to accept the entire past gracefully and gratefully seems to be difficult. But there is really no escape from our past. Not everybody is as gifted as Andre Malraux who, in spite of the different images he had created in his life, managed to bring together the image of a man who outlived "his miserable heap of petty secrets".

The writer is an observer of social and cultural affairs.