Empire of the East (5 page)

It was in Banda Aceh that the food problem came to a head. Delicious as Indonesian food can be in the restaurants of London or Jakarta, in Indonesian provincial towns it is deplorable. As we had already discovered, meat, after marinating in an assortment of chillies and spices, would go into the oven for several hours, to prepare it for a potential wait of days before it finally reached the table, and, strange as it might seem, many Indonesians appeared to have developed a taste for the result. The Chinese, here as in all parts of the world, produced food that was uniformly edible and often exquisitely cooked, not only in restaurants but in roadside stalls. We tried to persuade Andy to join us in these often sumptuous meals, but he firmly resisted on the grounds that the Chinese ate pork. When we promised him that we would support him in abstaining from pork, he reasonably objected that in a Chinese restaurant everything goes into the same wok. Nor was he completely happy to be taken to an Indonesian restaurant, where, feeling continually under a menace, he would have to eat by himself. This being the case there were days when all four of us fell back on biscuits and stale cake, supplemented on occasion by a plateful of rice.

In Banda the problem was half solved. By all accounts it possessed the best Chinese restaurant — the Tropicana — in this part of Sumatra, and by incredibly good fortune, the usual unpromising Indonesian eating house with a trayful of withered scraps on display in a showcase was just across the road. Andy was comfortably settled in this, close to the window where he could be kept under supervision, while we made for the Tropicana. This place of gastronomic adventure occupied two floors, and in it the Chinese had gathered in their families and their clans by their hundreds round enormous tables. Having run the gauntlet of the roaring television on the ground floor we escaped to an upper room where a karaoke singer struggled for an audience in the pounding surf of chatter and the competition of music turned up beyond the limits of amplification from numerous hidden sources.

Despite their reputation for exclusiveness as a race, the Chinese here were friendly and genial and a family instantly squeezed closer together to make room for us at a table. The waiter could do nothing with our English, but another was found who had spent most of his life in the States, and he began a fearful listing of dishes, beginning with pig’s stomach stewed in blood.

‘What else have you got?’

‘You want something fancy — shark’s fin, birds’ nests, pork in snakes’ gall — you go for alligator? Shit, we got everything.’

‘How about barbecued ribs?’

‘Sure, if that’s what you want. We gotta total of three hundred and sixty-five dishes on the menu here. One for every day of the year.’

‘Barbecued ribs would be great.’

Among the many things that fascinated — and in this case mystified — us about our environment were collections of stickers, stuck apparently at random at the table’s edge. These, printed simply with the word ALLAH, were in sight everywhere. There had been some re-arrangement of the seating of our Chinese neighbours, apparently to allow a family member to show off his American English. ‘Hello, there. You guys from out of town? I’m Lok Lee. In the trucking business here. Anything you want to know?’

For a start we wanted to know about all the advertisements for Allah in this stronghold of a race regarded by the Indonesians as unbelievers. ‘We get a lotta Muslim guys come in here,’ Lok Lee explained. ‘On their feast days it’s something you have to see. Hell, there’s so many of them sonofabitches you can’t get served. They order items they’re not supposed to eat. Maybe pork under a different name. You understand me? They buy these stickers at the mosque. That’s so Allah will look the other way.’

Two birthday parties were being held in this enormous room, and Lok Lee was off to join one of them. The Chinese have a crow-like avidity for the collection of foreign ceremonies for incorporation in the mixed bag of their own social pleasures, and birthday parties lead in popularity, adding in this case their separate lively contributions to the general uproar.

‘Happy birthday,’ they began, and within seconds all those present in the large room happily joined in, chanting resoundingly in what they believed to be English.

‘Ep-pi bir-deh to you,

Ep-pi bir-deh to you.

Ep-pi bir-deh Ho Fok Long.

Ep-pi bir-deh to you.’

The Chinese family shifted what may have been another candidate into position next to us.

‘Where you go tomorrow?’ he asked.

This man had certainly never been to America, but he was doing his best.

‘We haven’t made up our minds yet,’ I told him.

‘Why — ah you no go Weh?’ he asked. He bared large yellow teeth in a persuasive smile. ‘Why — ah you no stay here today and tomorrow go Weh?’

At first I had been afraid he was trying to get rid of us, but the rather fawning smile convinced me that this was not so.

‘Where’s Weh? I’ve never heard of it.’

‘Weh one island in sea. Weh very good place.’

‘What’s it got to offer?’

‘Weh is OK for do what you like. Banda very much hassle. Too much policemen, too much say prayers. Weh no hassle. Anything you want, right off ferry.’ He hissed invitingly, the sound thickened with mucus. ‘Anything you want. You know what I mean. Just ask for Harry Feng, and say Vic send you. Harry take care of you for sure. When — ah you come back?’

‘I’ve no idea. No idea even if we’re going yet.’

‘Try come back on Saturday. This day they show snuff-movie on ferry, but hard for you see show. If Saturday you tell Harry Feng. He fix it for you.’

The hotel had a leaflet advertising Weh’s attractions, suggesting that in our present circumstances a short side-trip to the island might not be a bad thing. It spoke in eccentric English of Weh’s weird beauty, and of the ‘wild pigs running at you with firing eyes out of the darkness’. It claimed the snorkelling was the best off the coast of North Sumatra, and reading this it occurred to us that, as an enthusiast for water-sports, even if he had never tried snorkelling, this experience might help to steady Andy’s nerves in preparation for the more strenuous part of the trip, yet to come.

By good fortune a ferry to the island was leaving the next day, and at midday we drove down to the port, squeezed the car into the last empty space and set out on the one and a half hour crossing to the small island port of Sabang. The passengers were quite clearly returning islanders, laden with enormous bundles and fighting cocks crammed into wicker cages, all of them in a state of emotional turmoil induced by the adventure of travel against the torpid background of island life. The moment the gangplank was let down a desperate, almost frantic rush ensued and a struggle up and down companion-ways and through narrow passages to reach and secure a seat in the first- or second-class saloons — both of them identical in the stark amenities offered. From the moment the anchor was raised until the ship tied up on the quay of Sabang, video programmes would be shown on the television in both saloons, and the struggle — irrespective of the ticket purchased — was to wedge oneself firmly in position out of reach of ticket collectors in the first class, where the most lurid videos were shown.

We found ourselves, quite unintentionally, among the first-class travellers encumbered by vast bundles of rabbits and poultry. All the more popular videos were based upon kung fu themes, and the one we were condemned to watch was the attack of outer-space invaders upon what at first glance might have seemed defenceless women. The leader of the invaders, although hampered by robes of the kind worn by a mandarin of the distant past, was an amazing acrobat who could leap into the air and somersault before delivering terrible kicks, sometimes on the vulnerable parts of pretty women. These were also into kung fu and picked up less effective space invaders and tossed them about in all directions. Fairly simple and repetitive action seemed to go on for a very long time, but those engaged in it came unscathed through their prolonged punishment. The motives of the invaders were sexual rather than predatory. Unable to carry out a rape by physical means the leading invader had recourse to chloroform, but his victim, recovering her senses at the last moment, was still able to knock him out. What surprised in these scenes of depravity and lust, these disordered garments and limbs, these lascivious gropings and frustrated thrustings of the buttocks, was that they should have been represented despite severe Islamic prohibitions. Could it be that anything went on a ship?

As was to be expected, Andy was revolted by the entertainment. Much to our surprise, having listened to his criticisms based on technical objections, he informed us that he had been granted certificates of proficiency in peucali silat, and ilmo kebasinan, both versions of the martial arts practised in Indonesia. Did he ever put them to use, we asked him. ‘Never,’ he replied. ‘I am saying no to violence. Martial arts only for improve inner serenity and spirituality of conduct. If space invaders to be shown coming to this earth, better is understanding discussion with earth people.’ We all agreed. ‘This thing is not funny for me,’ he said. ‘When we come back, I am sitting on deck.’

There was nothing — certainly at first sight — of the stereotype of the island paradise about Weh. Sabang was a small port, busy in its unmechanized fashion with carpenters making doors, mechanics degutting ancient cars, and work going on in the harbour itself to scrape away the ulcers of rust and repaint a dry-docked ship. Middle-aged people here remembered a time when Sabang had been a free port with a casino, said earlier still to have been busier than Singapore, but in recent years the Muslim fundamentalists had tightened their grip and the population was in steady decline. It would take another ten years, the owner of the losmen where we stayed thought, before Sabang went out of business as a working town. In a way, he thought that might be a good thing, because the tourists would come.

Something extremely perceptible in the atmosphere separated Weh from the Sumatra mainland, where outside the towns practically everyone grew rice or had some connection with its production. Ingrained, inherited occupations produce their own psychology, their own kind of man. No rice-farmer would ever voluntarily switch to other forms of agriculture, or adapt himself with any enthusiasm, say to forestry or a sea-going life. In Weh, for numerous generations people had depended upon cloves, and we still saw cloves everywhere, laid out to dry. Provided the market holds, growing crops of this kind is devoid of strain. Long periods of the producer’s existence can be devoted to contemplative satisfactions. The clove grower can sit back feeling little but pleasant expectation throughout the long months in which the cloves grow and then dry. He has little conception of urgency, and what he lacks by way of ambition he recovers in confidence and calm.

This may be the secret of the pleasant people of Weh. No tourists came here to startle them by unfamiliar behaviour, and there was therefore no trace of what might be described as mainland xenophobia. No sooner had Andy set foot ashore than his worries were at an end. It was impossible to imagine enemies in these narrow lanes where men spent so much of their time in chairs at their doors waiting for friends to pass, or to hail strangers like ourselves and ask them where they had come from, and where they were going, and why.

An example of islander tolerance and generosity arose immediately in our contact with the owner of a losmen to which we were directed in search of rooms. These were quite acceptable but the access to the building was so narrow that we would have had difficulty in parking the car. The place which we finally settled on was run by a most genial Chinese from Hong Kong. He welcomed us with vanilla tea, gave us a fan apiece and said, ‘You are English, so tomorrow there will be cakes and jam for breakfast.’ This man had a marked sense of humour. The washroom contained an enormous tank instead of a bath. ‘Careful with this,’ he said. ‘If in danger of drowning ring bell.’

An embarrassing matter now arose. Since it was agreed that Andy was to snorkel we asked where masks and flippers were to be hired only to be directed to the previously investigated losmen-owner whose rooms we had felt obliged to turn down. Tails between legs we had to return to him. No one could have been more charming. The equipment was too small for us so he went all over Sabang in his determination to fit us up. This he was able to do.

Well Beach Number Three, as it is called in Indonesian, was accepted to be the best place to snorkel and it was also a place of social consequence, particularly among the young. We went there on Sunday afternoon when ritual visits were paid to it from all parts of the island. When we arrived boys and girls were on the beach parading stiffly in their holiday clothes. One boy promptly detached himself from a group and walked towards us, lingered for a moment when he was quite close, then returned to the others, to whom he clearly reported what he had been able to discover. This was the signal for one after another of the young paraders to leave the others to approach us, stop, and mumble a few words of polite, broken English. In one case a whole group arrived for the inspection. They seated themselves in a row, heads slightly turned away to avoid the discourtesy of staring into our eyes, then got up and departed. By this time we had schooled ourselves in several phrases suitable for use on such occasions, but for Andy the words were too few. ‘In this country place you must say more. They go because you do not speak to them. These things are easy to say. They will be happy.’

The leaflet had described Weh as weirdly beautiful, and on our way to Well Beach Number Three it had seemed a little unearthly in parts. At some time in pre-history it had started as an upthrust of small volcanoes from the bed of the sea. What remained of them were no more than tumuli of ancient lava, a surrealistic addition to a setting of scrub forest, maniacally distorted trees and the black girdle of the coastline, visible at all its points from a high place.

The beach offers inducements of a more comprehensive kind: rocks to be climbed, a glowing multi-coloured sea, and the well itself at the back of the beach, dribbling the purest of water eternally down immaculate sand. The memory of old animistic enchantments and the presence of a benign water spirit still attracted respectful attention from weekend visitors. People came here to drink the water or to wash their clothes in it in the hope of gathering a little of its magic influence. While we were there someone was occupied in this way in the tented enclosure, and the scented soapsuds in the water trickling from beneath the canvas had attracted a number of black butterflies with extraordinary pleated wings. As we watched these a young woman wrapped in a wet sarong came out and stood looking from side to side, but quite clearly keeping us under inspection. Since we were still in the early stages of our studies of Indonesian protocol it was hard to decide whether or not she resented our presence, but as we were about to make a cautious retreat she suddenly faced us directly. Very slowly and carefully she enunciated the words I suspected she had been working on. ‘Now will you go for a swim?’ She smiled. It was her contribution to the demonstration of island good manners.