Until rooms in our mansion do us part
JAKARTA (JP): When Haryono met Salyah (this is not the title of a movie, mind you) they fell in love instantly. They vowed to live happily ever after. "I'm not a fortune hunter," said Salyah (later known as Sally). "All I need is a piece of floor ..."
"And a little roof," interrupted Haryono, nicknamed Harry.
"As long as we are together, I don't mind living in a small hut."
That romantic piece of conversation took place more than two decades ago. Now the couple are very well off. Harry is a successful businessman, and Sally is a popular dress designer at the same level with Poppy and Ghea. And that "piece of floor and a little roof" have become a mansion with 15 bedrooms, each with a private bath, not to mention two huge living rooms, a library, a movie room and a Texas-style bar. Their friends joke that, without carrying a map, you could go astray in the house and instead of going to the guest room you're supposed to stay in, you could end up entering one of the four maids' rooms.
In the beginning, Sally and Harry kept changing their residence as often as Michael Jackson has changed his appearance. Their reason for moving was that the previous houses did not meet their requirements. Their first house in Bintaro was too small for a family with three kids. The second, in Pondok Indah, was not constructed in line with Feng Shui (Chinese philosophy about building houses). The third was disliked by their kids who found it too far from Jl. Thamrin, the center of excitement. The fourth was not socially acceptable because its immediate environment was not "elite" enough. And so on. Not until a few months ago did they find this perfect mansion. "This is what I call a house," said Harry.
People in Jakarta, especially those with money, are obsessed with having a "proper house" to live in. And there are so many criteria for defining a "proper house". And the offers advertised by the real estate developers are fanning the flames of voracity. The more choices you have, the more complicated it is to find a house that meets your taste. The closer a house comes to meeting your requirements, the more expensive it turns out to be. And in most cases, one ends up buying a house which is far beyond his means -- with a monstrous mortgage of course.
And it seems that one of the criteria for a proper place to live is privacy. Since sharing has become an ancient, almost forgotten word in this day and age, one has to work hard so that he or she can provide privacy for the family.
Indonesians in big cities used to be so friendly that relatives and friends could stay with them for as long as they wanted. This required a spacious house with as many rooms as possible. But nowadays, the number of rooms in a house doesn't reflect the friendliness of the owner, nor his willingness to accommodate guests. The quantity of rooms reflects nothing more than the owner's prosperity. If you don't mind my saying so, the size of one's home has become another status symbol!
Beyond that, however, just what is it that you get from having a large number of rooms in your house? The answer to this question could be very intriguing.
Harry and Sally offer an example. When they lived in Bintaro, theirs was a very close-knit family. They ate at the same table, shared the same television set and chatted warmly in their only living room. But now, that warmth is gone. Everybody has their own room, with a private TV set, a private refrigerator, and a private phone. For business purposes, Harry even equipped his bedroom with various business machines such as a computer, a facsimile machine and a printer.
"I can't stand the noise," complained Sally, justifying her choice to sleep in her private bedroom full of equipment for fitness and beauty care, including a sauna.
With everything so private, the family members rarely even encounter each other in the house. In addition, the activities of each of them are so intense that they have to make appointments to see each other.
In her solitude, one night, Sally began wondering where prosperity had taken her. She longed for the time when one of her kids grabbed the drink she was holding, or wolfed the bread she was about to eat. She longed to see how her children competed to get to the ringing phone. Now they seemed to be at such a distance that she felt she was all alone in that big house she once craved.
Wishing to say "good night" to her husband as she had always done in their earlier days together, she went to his room upstairs. But her steps halted at the close door. On the door there was a sign that read PLEASE DO NOT DISTURB.
-- Carl Chairul