What price for those 15 minutes of fame?

JAKARTA (JP): Each of us must carry a finite lifetime quotient of close encounters with the high and mighty.

These are the fleeting moments when we get to bask in the heady glow -- or cringe in numbed embarrassment -- at the experience of rubbing shoulders with the famous.

But those of us who spend our days living in suspended hope of catching a glimpse of so-and-so sifting through the produce section at the local Hero may find it easier going these days.

Great leveler that it is in cutting all of us down to size, the crisis seems to have prodded a bevy of Indonesian actors and singers to try their hand opening one of the upmarket sidewalk cafes sprouting up around the city.

Now you can spot sex siren Inneke Koesherawaty sans sequins but attired in a matronly apron, or maybe get quiz show host and Trio Libel singer Ronny Sianturi to serenade you as he serves up your dinner.

On second thoughts, maybe not.

I myself chalked up another entry in the file of celebrity- spotting anecdotes a couple of months ago. In the plush surroundings of a Jakarta hotel fitness center (think fountains and security guards in dapper designer jackets), Indonesia's Man of the Moment scampered before me into the plunge pool.

No, no, not the old soldier who simply refuses to fade away. Here instead was the economic messiah whose pinched features and Rin Tin Tin buzz cut have become part and parcel of the nation's collective consciousness.

Financial markets and penny-pinching housewives alike may cling to his every word, but Hubert Neiss, sweating buckets from the sauna and just as nature intended, was showing all and sundry his very human side on this particular Sunday afternoon.

Even so, I could not muster the courage to strike up a conversation. For one, subject matter seemed a tad restricted ("That IMF is really putting the screws on the country, huh?").

And, for another, this man, alternately feted and reviled at every turn, looked like he needed a breather from the trappings of a celebrity thrust upon him by the fate of circumstances.

Today, in Indonesia at least, he lives in that claustrophobic nightmare of an unforgiving public fishbowl, even though his only claim to fame is he happened to be in the wrong job at the wrong time when Indonesia started falling apart at the seams.

Come now, I hear you say. We all laugh in derision at Demi's diatribes against invasions of privacy, at having her and Bruce's marital spats plastered over the tabloids for public consumption. But her plea for a respite from the paparazzi blitz rings a tad hollow when we recollect her willingness to jiggle her silicone- enhanced wares for all the world to see in exchange for a fat US$12 million paycheck.

But Hubert's dueling with the double-edged sword of fame is a deserving case for sympathy.

After all, I doubt he has an ounce of Madonna's blond ambition, and he certainly did not stoop to conquer, like Imelda, in making a name for himself.

Which is patently irrelevant because, like it or not, he is saddled with dealing with how the rest of us react to his presence in our midst.

We demand the famous show superhuman understanding and grace, even if we are shoving a pen and pad in their faces or moseying up to snap a photograph as coffee dribbles down their chin.

I found this out for myself when I crossed paths with the renown Gloria Steinem, then editor of Ms magazine, when I was a high school intern at a museum in New York.

It was 6 a.m. in the morning, Gloria was filming a documentary and she was most definitely not a happy camper. If looks could kill, half the camera crew and museum staff in attendance would have been headed for cold slabs of marble in the city morgue.

Cold fish, I thought at the time. I did not take into consideration that perhaps Gloria was not a morning person, that she disliked the process of filming or that maybe she got out of the wrong side of bed.

While the price of fame may be costly, I can assure Hubert of how fickle its glare can be.

We only have to flick back a few months in our memory banks to find the ultimate fly-by-night celebrity.

Does the name Steve Hanke ring a bell?

-- Bruce Emond