by Derek Hansen
There were no laser shafts of light to herald the dawn, just a growing grey sullenness. The surrounding hills buried their heads in cloud. The air was as thick as soup. I knew that, as the day progressed, the sun would burn off the low clouds, but who knew what sat above them? More clouds or a misty tropical blue? I opened shutters to let in some air and light. The effort raised a sweat. But the way the day was developing, blinking would raise a sweat. Tropical heat and high humidity could bring a water buffalo to its knees.
When I heard Charlie get up and leave, probably to wander down to the river to do his ablutions, I woke Abby with a cup of tea and told her we were going to Bukittinggi.
Time to call the cops.
Charlie disagreed.
‘This not police business, John,’ he said.
‘Then whose business is it?’
‘Wali negari.’
‘Wally who?’
‘Headman.’
‘Oh, that wally. And what exactly is he going to do that he didn’t do before?’
‘Before he shutted up house so man not get in.’
‘And now?’
‘Now he got to open house so demon get out.’
If this worked I could see I’d have to revise my opinions regarding the existence of ghosts. I wasn’t sure I wanted the exorcism to work. I thought I’d rather believe ghosts didn’t exist than have the headman prove that they did. In my heart I still believed the presence of a couple of gun-toting cops would be a whole lot more effective.
‘Can’t we just go to Bukittinggi?’ asked Abby once Charlie had left to find the headman.
‘We no longer have a driver.’
Instead we went to visit our friend with the refrigerator and downed a couple of Cokes. Amazing, isn’t it? There we were in the wilds of Sumatra, tormented by demons left over from the Majapahit empire, one of whom was into self-portraits, sipping the Coca-Cola Corporation’s fine product. If the Coke Corp were missionaries the whole world would be Christian.
We ordered another Coke each while we waited for the ghost-busters to arrive. The shopkeeper was all smiles. We were very good for business. He’d once tried to buy Abby’s Polaroid. He could see there was more money in ‘potos’ than cold drinks. When he learned how much the film cost he changed his mind.
Soon people began to leave their fields, looms and anvils. Obviously there was nothing like a good exorcism to liven up a boring day. Working the fields was backbreaking. Likewise working metal in the forges. But the people I most felt sorry for were the women weaving the intricate songket cloths with silk and fine threads of gold and silver. I was told it took years to produce a single cloth no more than a metre long. The women worked indoors where it was cool and the light was atrocious. They traded their eyesight for their exquisite creations.
‘Hello, Handlebars.’
Abby rose to meet her friend. The monkey looked up at her expectantly. JP had come back from gathering coconuts for the exorcism. He called to some kids playing nearby and instructed them to look after Handlebars. Abby waited until JP had run off to join the swelling throng before letting the kids get on with their game. She had Handlebars’ whole and undivided attention. She didn’t need any help to look after him. She had toffees.
It took about four hours for everybody to wash and get into the appropriate costumes. Somebody had started practising with drums.
‘They’re going to drum our demon out of town,’ I said, but Abby wasn’t listening. Facetiousness, she says, is one of my less endearing traits.
Chickens squawked and something about the pitch suggested that one or more of them had come to the end of its career. I couldn’t help wondering how all this fitted in with Islam. Clearly it didn’t. I half-expected to see the mullah raging at the gathering with a raised stick. I made a mental note to ask Charlie about it, though I felt sure he’d see no contradiction. Animism still had its place.
By the time they’d all assembled and begun the ceremony, Abby and I were well into the chilli voddies. Somewhere up above, the sun was over the yardarm and someone once told me that alcohol thinned the blood. It needed thinning. There was no escaping the heat and humidity. The shopkeeper had let us make our own ice cubes with mineral water and sold them back to us. They didn’t last five minutes in the glass.
Abby kept giving hers to Handlebars, who alternated between wiping them over his arms, his chest and his bottom before returning them to his mouth. Abby was laughing. I wanted to throw up. Handlebars was so tame and placid it was hard to believe he was from the same species of monkey we saw playing in the forests. Look but don’t touch is the rule with them. One bite and it’s straight on the plane to hospital in Singapore, followed by more jabs than a junkie ever dreamed of.
About a hundred people filed into our house, shouting and chanting. Perhaps they’d forgotten it was built on stilts, overlooked the fact that it was three hundred years old. I got my camera ready, expecting it to fall in a heap. Obviously the exorcism worked by filling the house with people until there was simply no room left for the demon. Throw in the drumming and what spirit wouldn’t get the hell out of there? They opened all the doors and shutters and held what I assumed was the Minang version of a disco without the spinning lights. Then they all filed out again as pleased as punch.
‘Poor devil didn’t have a ghost of a chance,’ I said, but Abby wasn’t listening. Bad puns don’t endear me to her either.
Charlie came trotting up the road, a bandanna around his head but otherwise bare to the waist. He was wearing a borrowed sarong.
‘All fixeded,’ he said.
‘Great.’
‘Now will you drive us to Bukittinggi?’Abby had less faith in exorcisms than I had.
‘No Bukittinggi,’ said Charlie. He made the final syllable last four bars, a sure sign of disapproval. ‘All fixeded. No Bukittinggeeeeee. No policemensssssss. Bad mens. You see. Now we feast.’
There’s a wonderful system that operates throughout Indonesia. When the people want favours from the gods they make sacrifices and offerings to them. Animals, fruit, vegetables. The gods have first crack at the goodies, then the faithful get to eat the leftovers. Surprise, surprise, there’s always a lot left over.
‘Charlie,’ I said, ‘if our visitor comes again tonight I’m going to feed your balls to Handlebars.’
Charlie smiled unconvincingly.
‘On satay sticks, Charlie.’
He definitely winced.
‘Are you sure you don’t want to take us to Bukittinggi?’
‘No Bukitinggi. All fixeded.’
JP came back for Handlebars. He looked very important and pleased with himself. JP had led the procession into our house. He must have been top dog in the ranks of animists.
‘Thank you, JP,’ I said. ‘Charlie, how much do we owe him?’
‘Not owe JP anything. Pay wali negari. You give me twenty tousand.’
‘I give you nothing. I pay headman. Ten tousand.’ ‘Okay, ten tousand.’
‘Five tousand now. Five tousand in the morning if our visitor stays away.’
‘No, John. You oppend headman.’ The Minang have a lot of trouble with ‘f’s.‘Send demon back.’
I gave Charlie ten thousand so the headman wouldn’t be offended, but did it in full view of JP. ‘Wali negari,’ I said and pointed to the cash.
‘Wali negari,’ said JP and never took his eyes off Charlie. Charlie left miffed.
Late afternoon Abby convinced Charlie to take us up to the top of the hill overlooking our valley where she hoped to find some kind of cooling breeze. We let the village kids come with us for a ride. Fourteen managed to squeeze into the back of the van. I had another on my knee. Abby had Shirley Temple. We promised to be back in time for the main feast.
Abby was right. There was a breeze and it rippled through the rice in the terraces. A boy was bringing home a string of ducks along a paddy wall. We counted twenty-two, all in single file, marching with purpose and funnier than anything Disney ever di
d. I wondered if Tombstone ploughed these narrow steep rice terraces. If so, how did he get his lumbering mate in and out? Another of life’s mysteries.
We detoured on the way home to buy ice-creams and win for ever the hearts and minds of our entourage. But our homecoming was not how it should have been. We weren’t glad to be back in picturesque Datar Guguk. Somewhere along the way paradise had lost its gloss.
We weren’t looking forward to another night in that house.
‘Cup of tea?’
Abby hovered over me. She was wearing a T-shirt and knickers. The hairs on her arms were like threads of finest silk. Silver on gold. She was smiling. I closed my eyes to give them more time to adjust. The bedroom was flooded with sunlight.
‘What time is it?’
‘Just after eight.’
Abby had opened all the shutters and pulled back the mosquito net. Some people say there’s nothing like a good sleep to clear the head. I’d slept for eight hours solid and mine felt stuffed with the same material that filled our mattresses. The tea scalded. Abby was clanging away in the next room making breakfast. Probably a mee goreng seasoned with TNT and napalm. Abby had decided she preferred noodles to rice first thing. One theory suggests that if you have a lot of chillies for breakfast you’re less affected by the heat of the day. My wallet made a familiar lump under my pillow, the one welcome lump among the many. Abby’s bag was undisturbed. My Nikon slept on blissfully behind its lens cap. If our nocturnal visitor had called he’d left empty-handed. He probably hadn’t come at all. Perhaps he’d gone for ever. So where did that leave us? I finished my tea, pulled on shorts and a T-shirt.
I sat down at the table and waited until Abby joined me. The mee goreng could have lifted paint. Hell! It could’ve melted steel.
‘Very good,’ I said.
‘You’ll appreciate it later.’
It seemed we were both in good humour but how deep did the feelings run?
‘Well,’ I said, ‘I suppose now we should believe in ghouls, ghosts and demons.’
‘Don’t knock it if it works.’
‘So what are we going to do? Hang garlic off the doors and windows and crosses around our necks for the rest of our lives?’
‘Don’t be silly.’
‘It’s not me being silly.’
Abby has this infuriating ability to withdraw and regroup when argument and reason turn against her. Her lips retreat to a thin red line, at least as stubborn as Victorian soldiers confronting the heathen hordes. She becomes ice cold and as calm as a pond at dawn. Impenetrably calm. Swan-like. Ritual required that I break the silence or Little Miss Injured Innocence would ignore me all day.
‘Abby, we don’t believe in ghosts. We’re rational, well-educated human beings. We don’t believe that a ghost took my wallet or your camera, nor do we believe that one hundred or one thousand drum-beating Minangs can drive a ghost that doesn’t exist out of our house.’
‘Do you have a better explanation?’
‘Perhaps someone is using us to reinforce ancient beliefs and turn people away from Islam and back to their roots. Maybe there are Minangkabau traditionalists who want to preserve Minang culture and customs, some kind of nationalist group. The village people are easily swayed. Maybe they saw us as a chance to demonstrate the power of the old ways.’
‘So how did our Che Guevara get in?’
She had me there. I’d searched for secret entrances and found nothing.
‘And what about the photo?’
I had to concede the photo was still a major sticking point.
‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio . . .’
We’d both studied Shakespeare at school and quoted and misquoted him in equal measure. It was her gentle way of letting me know that there was a distinct possibility I didn’t know everything.
‘The mee goreng’s too oily,’ I said. I had to say something.
‘All fixeded,’ said Charlie. He wore a smile like a Cadillac grille.‘I tolded you.’
‘Yes, Charlie, you tolded us.’ Abby gestured towards me. ‘Some people just need more convincing than others.’
‘You don’t believe me, John?’
‘Jury’s still out.’
Charlie looked disappointed which made all our spectators also look disappointed. Abby frowned at me, the one dark cloud on a glorious tropical morning. Birds sang and the gourami growing in the pond rose to snap up insects, grateful to have survived the previous night’s festivities, not to have been netted, steamed and served beneath a dynamite padung sauce. Only Sad Sack clothed in his Billabong shorts, Mambo shirt and university education soured the day. Nobody could understand why I was less than overjoyed. I punched Charlie’s arm lightly and laughed. Everyone cracked up. Obviously I really was overjoyed and grateful. I’d just been teasing Charlie.
We gave Charlie the day off and set out on bicycles along the tracks between the paddies to visit the neighbouring villages. We passed JP and Handlebars. JP gave us the broadest of smiles. Perhaps more than anyone, he would have got the credit for exorcising our ghost. He’d led the procession. Was his smile one of triumph at his success or the satisfied grin of a con man who’d tricked an entire village? Was JP the local keeper of Minang culture? Was he entirely animist or had he adopted Islam? I returned his smile and made a mental note to check with Charlie.
But what about Charlie? I didn’t see him ducking out four times a day to pray. He was as proud of his Minang heritage as anyone. He couldn’t wait to get back into traditional costume and join the conga line that discoed through our house. Was he one of them? And what about the headman? Apparently Sherlock Holmes used a seven per cent cocaine-tobacco mix to clarify his mind and help solve his cases. He would have needed pure cocaine to solve this one. How would he explain the photo?
The nearest village was famous for its spider web-like silverware. Abby haggled ruthlessly for silver brooches and rings, usually settling for a fair price plus ‘poto’. We weren’t the first Westerners to visit the Minangkabau nor would we be the last. Abby is normally extremely generous but didn’t want to upset the local economy or spoil things for those who followed. She matched the silversmiths’ patience and struck agreement while I did what we were being paid to do.
One of the biggest problems in developing rice-fish farming in remote areas was the cost and availability of fish fingerlings. Abby and I set up hatcheries and trained locals to operate them. While Abby haggled, I showed the locals how to milk eggs from the mouths of tilapia and transfer the eggs to the hatching tanks.
Sometimes our work can be very rewarding and this was one of those occasions. While tilapia was a new fish to the men of this village, there was little I could teach them about carp or gourami. As soon as they’d realised they would have a regular supply of fingerlings, they’d dug fish refuges in all the paddies and used the soil they removed to build up the paddy walls. They built ponds and introduced fish into their nightsoil disposal tanks. This was international aid at its best.
But despite everything, my mind was elsewhere. After a couple of hours I decided to join Abby and play tourist. I watched the silversmiths at work, in awe of their skill and patience, and marvelled at the beautiful songket cloths the village women were weaving. If I lived for ever I’d never acquire the artistry they displayed. I’d happily have settled for their patience.
At another village we watched a new house being built to the same pattern as the one we rented, to the same design laid down by an architect hundreds of years earlier. So what did that tell me? Minang craft and culture were still alive and thriving. Did they really need a contrived stunt to ensure their survival?
I cycled home depressed and blind to the beauty surrounding us. Abby made me stop while she took a picture of the sunset. The sun sat jammed between the hilltops and low clouds. Dust and smoke from village fires had created a haze which filtered and refracted the rays. Golden fingers reached over fiery ridges and touched lightly on palm tops and roofs. A man and his wat
er buffalo trudged home by a flooded crimson paddy. Gourami made circles in the water snapping up insects. God affirmed His glory. I know this because Abby captured it all on film. My thoughts were on other matters at the time.
‘Peels lie comb toomey.’
I wanted to go to bed. My strumming felt half a beat behind and my fingers couldn’t have picked fruit let alone notes. But our neighbours had requested Abby doing Linda Ronstadt. We’d sung the song so often they’d learned the words of the chorus.
‘Peels lie comb toomey,’ they sang. ‘Feels like I’m on my way back where I belong,’ sang Abby when she reached the bit they didn’t know. I usually joined in the chorus too, but I didn’t have it in me. I wanted bed. Maybe I’d had too much sleep. Maybe the straw or horsehair or kapok, whatever they stuffed our mattresses with, had permanently infiltrated my brain. I didn’t believe in ghosts. I didn’t believe in spirit gods. I didn’t believe in exorcisms. I didn’t believe there was a Minang cultural conspiracy either. I wanted bed. Dreamless sleep. Maybe the flash of insight that often strikes on the cusp of consciousness.
‘Mr Wallace! Mr Wallace!’
Our 6 am alarm. The voice was shrill and the thumping on the door manic. Urgent. Even desperate. I didn’t know why, but I felt oddly reassured.
‘Where was it, Charlie?’
‘Iceman founded it.’
Iceman was the shopkeeper who plundered Indonesia’s electricity grid to power his fridge. He’d heard about the one-thousand-rupiah bounty and patiently awaited his due.
‘Outside mos-kee.’
It didn’t make any sense. If Minang nationalists even existed and if they wanted to make a point, they would hardly be so blatant. Islam isn’t noted for its tolerance of thieves. I took Abby’s little backpack from Charlie and tried to remember what should be in it.
