Prostitutes still have their own dreams

Moch. N. Kurniawan and Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Indramayu, West Java

Yani looked much happier when we saw her at the Lumba-lumba discotheque that second time.

The previous night we came in with two girls, long-haired Leni and fair-skinned Ai. Yani and her friend Ratih, who work at the disco, looked furious.

As Yani returned our smiles, Ratih sent mixed signals. But then she said she wanted us to take her to the Grage Mall in Cirebon to do some shopping.

No problem, we told her.

But she canceled the date just before we were to pick her up at her house in Karangampel district.

"No way. I won't go out with you on such short notice. You should have asked me the night before," she said on her cell phone.

But you were with someone else, we said.

"Yeah and you were with other girls. Why were you with them?" Ratih asked furiously before hanging up.

Both Ratih and Yani are hostesses at the disco, located along the Jatibarang-Karangampel highway in Sliyeg district.

We almost forgot that they are people with their own dreams, feelings and problems.

"I am the oldest of three children and now I am the breadwinner for my family because my mother does not have a job," said Yani as she lit a cigarette.

"Our family would have been better off if my mother had married an employee from the Balongan refinery. The children gave her our consent but the marriage was canceled because my mother thought it wouldn't work out," she said.

Yani said that at one time she worked in a shoe factory in Tangerang, Banten, in the packaging department.

"But it was not enough money for me. Besides, I had to wait until the end of the month to get my salary. Here, I can earn more money every night."

Ratih also said she did not like working in a factory.

"I used to work in a garment factory in Bekasi, but I decided to quit because I did not feel comfortable."

Both Yani and Ratih look smart and modest. Nobody who saw them on the street would guess what they do for a living.

At the disco, after a couple hours of chatting and dancing, Ratih put on her jacket, followed by Yani a couple of minutes later.

Our local friend, Yanto, said that meant they were ready to be taken anywhere else, as long as you took them back home.

When we decided not to take them out, they looked disappointed.

A similar disappointment was apparent when we decided not to take out Ai and Leni after hours of dancing.

We met the two women at Melati Putih, a type of nightspot known locally as a warung remang-remang because of its dim lighting.

If you cruise along the northern coastal highway, known by its acronym Pantura, you can tell these nightspots by the small red bulbs that hang out front.

Most of these places are houses that have been turned into entertainment venues. They sell beer, soft drinks, snacks and cigarettes.

Some of the places are owned by outwardly religious people. The owner of the Melati Putih, for example, was in East Java at the time to enroll his son in a pesantren, or traditional Islamic boarding school.

"The owner's wife is here taking care of the business. She is also our cashier," Ai said.

In the Melati Putih, the women offered us a drink. We preferred soft drinks, which cost Rp 15,000, although a can of soda could be had for only Rp 3,000 outside.

Both Ai and Leni told similar stories when they described how they had become prostitutes.

Ai, who hails from the neighboring Kertasemaya district, is a divorcee who worked at a billiard club in Tangerang until the 1998 riots.

"The billiard club was razed by fire, otherwise I would still be working there. My husband was a security guard at the billiard house," said Ai.

"I decided to divorce him not just because he often hit me. My decision was finalized when I caught him in bed with another woman. She was already pregnant with his child so I decided to let him marry her.

"I got my divorce papers just this January. I am glad to be free," she said.

Leni said she got into this work because she was unemployed and couldn't find any other jobs in Indramayu or the surrounding areas.

"It's better to do something like this rather than be broke," she said, adding that she moved to Indramayu last year to be closer to her older sister, who lives here.

"My sister found out about my profession but she didn't object, so I continued to do the job. Then I moved out of my sister's house because I wanted to be independent," Leni said, adding that she had not told her parents about what she does.

She said she had wanted to go to the Middle East or Korea to work but her parents wouldn't allow her, saying it was too far and too risky.

Leni said sometimes her visitors came from Jakarta, but mainly they were from Indramayu.

If Ratih and Yani put on their jackets to "announce" that they are ready to leave, Leni has her own approach.

Timidly, she asked us to dance and afterward she asked permission to go to the toilet while staring at us. Yanto said that meant she wanted one of us to follow her.

Lenny recognizes that her profession is unpleasant, and hopes to find another job and, like her sister, marry a man who can take care of her.

"I won't be in this place long. I am ready to get another job, and I dream of marrying a nice guy someday, having children and walking them to school," she said.

There might be hundreds or thousands girls in Indramayu like Ratih, Yani, Leni and Ai. Their ambitions are human ones.

"I just want to find a nice husband who can protect me and support me. That's all," said Leni.

But she said she was still traumatized by her divorce and no longer trusted men.

"They just want to hurt me. But someday I want to get married to someone who really loves me."