The anatomy of a turf war, Indonesian style

By Ode Barta Ananda

Jibun limped aimlessly. The white gauze on his wounds had blackened, upon which dozens of flies feasted. The wound, full of oozing pus, smelled so awful it stank two meters away. Stinking, yes. What does not stink in this whole world?

Anything that exists will eventually rot. Man is born through a tract next to the urethra. Trees develop from seeds and they are fertilized by peats originated from decaying leaves. Then people will also die and decompose, and so will trees, the sea, stones, the wind and the storm.

Jibun once had time to think about such matters but now, no more. Even for a meal, he had to receive more scorn than rice. He held out his hands, begging. Even if he had some money, some owners of food stalls would wrap food for him until they poured on him words of abuse. Some even chased him away.

"That's what you are if you always give in to your dream!"

"A a district chief, he even wants to become a king!"

"Yes!" Badih said, pointing his index finger to Jibun. "His greed has made his wound worse, that's why."

Upon hearing these comments, Jibun ran fast, though still limping. He walked through the small paved roads in the district. He concentrated upon his panting breath racing with his heartbeat. Unaware of where he was he suddenly arrived at the neighboring district. He kept running, yes, but continued limping. Mounting fear of hearing fresh condemnation mixed with heaps of regret.

Regret? Yes, regret always comes later and, conspiring with uncertainty. It will lead to confusion.

Now Jibun was on a road. He didn't care about cars and continued rigorously running after something unclear. Hurriedness in disguise of busy activities. Busy? It was a reason that Jibun often presented when persons who were unimportant according to criteria he set wanted to see him when he was still a district chief.

"Sir, there is a young woman who lost her bracelet in the market. she wants to lodge a complaint!"

"Tell her I'm busy!"

"Sir, there are three people from an Islamic boarding school, asking for some donations."

"Give them five thousand rupiah and tell them I'm busy!"

"Sir, there is a group of farmers that want to meet you, to talk about the compensation for their land you have designated for a dike."

"The dike is built also for them, isn't it?"

"But..."

"Tell them I'm busy! Such a matter should be discussed with a subdistrict chief!"

At that time, Jibun, with his myopic eyes, was savoring a porno on VCD. Busy? Of course, he was busy watching an indecent film. Or, at another time, he was busy answering a call from an entrepreneur who wanted to clear a forest in his district.

"No matter how many forests you'd like to manage as long as you can take my eldest child into your business, it will be okay with me. Please teach him to run the lumber business. He's just graduated from so-and-so university, Sir...."

***

How busy I was at that time, Jibun said to himself as he ran and ran. He limped even more. His wound became more painful. Fresh blood started to ooze down his calves and his ankles, reddening the paved road now increasingly disturbed by all types of noisy automobiles.

Jibun was weary. His gray hair was tossed about in the blowing wind of a passing automobile. Jibun was stunned. His cap fell off. He saw stars when he tumbled down. Screeeeeeech! A sedan suddenly stopped. Jibun flew!

"Hey! Stop!"

"There's a hit-and-run"

"Chase it!" A group of taxi motorcycles moved all at once after the sedan. Without first checking what had really happened, they gave chase, their instinct for vengeful adventure against outsiders getting the better of them.

Over a hundred motorcycles roared on the road that afternoon. They yelled and tried to take over the four-wheeled vehicles before them. The sedan driver was frightened. He increased the speed. Turning to the right. Screech! Then to the left. Screech! It kept speeding.

The gang of taxi motorcycle drivers was becoming increasingly eager to catch up with the sedan. They took up their positions. Some followed the sedan by turning to the right while the rest took a short cut to the left.

The car driver had no time to wipe the cold sweat from his dripping forehead. There was only a single thing on his mind: how to arrive safely in his own neighborhood. "Oh jeez! Another half a kilometer away!" he complained to himself.

The roar of motorcycles was bearing down on him.

The driver increased the speed again. He had passed two neighborhoods. Just a couple more minutes.....

When he was just twenty meters from the gates of his house, dozens of motorcycles managed to block the sedan. The driver had no other options. He got out and screamed, "Help! People from the another neighborhood are after me!"

His neighbors, surprised by the rare whir of motorcycles stopped what they were doing and ran to the scene. Spontaneously, they surrounded the sedan, safeguarding it.

"Why did you chase him?!" Colak snapped.

The people on the motorcycles looked at one another slightly confused. Defenders and attackers were nearly equal in number.

Candung also grumbled, "What did he do wrong?!"

Soni got off his motorcycle and finally said, "He ran over a man on our turf!"

Colak was surprised. He then grabbed the sedan driver by his shirt and asked, "Is it true that you have just hit somebody?!"

"Nnnno. He fell. I still had time to brake and swerved to avoid him," the car driver said with a very serious expression. "I swear! It was not my fault!"

Colak loosened his grip. "Did you hear him?" he said trying to soften his voice. "He didn't do it."

"We don't believe him!" some people shouted, as they started getting off their motorcycles.

"If you don't trust him, what do you want!?" Candung challenged them.

The taxi motorcycle gang felt offended. One of them spontaneously threw his helmet. Then ....

"Attack!"

The brawl ensued. It became chaotic. Helmets flew all around. Stones were hurled everywhere.

"Samsul was stabbed!"

"Let's get revenge!"

"Manyuk was stabbed!"

"Go on"

"Spear!"

Screwdrivers were blood covered. Monkey wrenches were sharper than crowbars.

"Get some machetes!" All sorts of weaponry came out of the woodwook. The brawl turned into a full-scale battle.

"Kill!"

"Burn!"

Houses were set ablaze. Motorcycles were burned. Bodies lay sprawled everywhere. The communal brawl turned into an inter- neighborhood war. They continued fighting, with no concern that the sun had almost sunk in the west.

Some three kilometers away from the chaotic site, Jibun was still writhing on the road. A horse-drawn cart stopped. The coachman tried to help Jibun to stand. Yet, Jibun continued to writhe. He was foaming at the mouth. His groans sounded more like pained snores.

The coachman was at a loss for what to do. He mused for a while and then stopped a gray car. The car pulled up. With annoyance, the driver left the car, asking, "What's up?!"

The coachman, trying to smile, said, "Would you please take this man to a hospital, Sir?"

"What's wrong with him?

The coachman shook his head and then nodded it. "Perhaps, he had a relapse of his epilepsy."

"Not hit by car, then?

"Apparently not. He isn't injured," the coachman said, approaching Jibun, who was still groaning with foam forming in his mouth.

The car driver shook his head. He returned to his car, pressing some buttons on his cellular phone and talking for a while. He then approached the coachman. "I've already called an ambulance. You'll have to excuse me now!" he retorted, in a sharp, unfriendly tone, as walked briskly back to his car without even turning back for another glance.

The coachman was startled, his mouth agape. Screeeech! The coachman was again startled. Spontaneously he began to direct the heavy traffic on the road so that no vehicles would run over Jibun, who was then still groaning.

It was not until the coachman had kept his patience under control for nearly half an hour that the siren of an ambulance was heard.

Screeeech! The ambulance came to halt. Nurses moved fast. They carried Jibun, who was no longer writhing. The man, nearing 70 years old, was laid on the cot inside the ambulance. A doctor examined him. "He is suffering from a bout of epilepsy," the doctor murmured, fixing the intravenous bag for a blood-covered man lying on the next bed.

The bleeding man, groaning in pain, asked, "Waaaaasn't he hit by a sedan?". The question was heard at the same time that a clinking sound was made, a sound strikingly similar to that of motorcycle taxi keys falling to the floor of an ambulance.

Padang, March-April-December 2001 For Ambon that flares up again.

Translated by Ismiarti