Week 11: The Power of Honest & Hard Work

 Indonesia is such an interesting place to live.  There is much that can be learned from a country who’s economy significantly lags that of many western countries.  We see evidence of the emergence of a larger middle class but the majority of people still cling to a delicate balance between subsistence and poverty.  We have seen a few neighborhoods made up mostly of families who we might call well-off but mostly the larger homes are surrounded by the homes of the poor.  Life is hard for most people and they work very, very hard.  Even for those fortunate enough to receive some post high school education it is very hard to get good paying jobs with a reasonable life style.  The daughter of someone we recently met graduated, at great sacrifice by the family, from a program in the hospitality industry.  Sadly, the only job she has been offered is that of making beds twelve hours a day with only one day off in a month for very very little pay,  

     The amazing thing to see however are all of the incredible things that people do to support themselves.  Most people live without most of the things that we might think are basic necessities.  Homes are very very small with little of no furniture.  Most people have a small mat that they put down on the hard floor for us to sit on while we are visiting.  One man we meet with regularly borrows chairs from his neighbors so we do not have to sit on the floor.  Beyond the receiving room there is usually limited lighting and even less furniture.  Most have what is called a “wet” bathroom which consists of a squat toilet with a large barrel of water next to it and a ladle to pour water into the toilet to wash it into the gutter outside the home.  The streets fortunately have mostly open gutters to collect and channel waste out an away from the homes.  In the wet season, which is all we know so far, this system works pretty well as it rains very hard most every day and the system is constantly cleared out.  Not sure what will happen in the summer. 

This man is a professional motorcycle parker

     People are willing to do almost anything to work and the entire system is set up to provide the maximum opportunity for people to do something.  Having very few traffic lights provides work for people to stand in the middle of intersections and try to make some order out of the chaos.  They get paid by people who appreciate not having to sit in a traffic jam by handing small amounts of money into their palms as they pass.  If you want to park somewhere you just turn on your signal light and someone emerges from the side of the road to guide you inch by inch into a small space then stand in the street to stop traffic while you back out.  This is done for a small fee of 2000 rupia (rp) or about 15 cents.  This system even applies in the McDonalds parking lot.  Many many people prepare food in their homes for sale to the warungs which are the small omnipresent and portable food stands.  A meal sold from these stands is very affordable for local residence, often as low as 25 cents, so many get their primary meal of the day from the street.  This may consist of a small bowl or rice, steamed or fried, with perhaps a small vegetable and/or a small portion chicken and a watered down drink.  

     Sister Miller and I often talk about the conflict between raising salaries and the value of keeping them low and providing the self respect that comes from having work.  Ultimately for the standard of living to be raised, incomes must increase faster than the cost of living.  We of course already knew this from our home in America but it somehow seems much more real when people are starting at such a different place than most of us enjoy at home.  This week we met in a neighborhood or gong, where every family lives by making shuttlecocks  or badminton birdies.  Badminton is a favorite sport in Indonesia.  This is done starting with a large bag of chicken feathers and is all done while sitting on the porch of their homes.  Another lady sits a home every day and folds plastic bags.  Many men collect used items and sell them on the streets, including second, third or even fourth hand motorcycle parts.  We are learning a great lesson about the power and dignity of honest hard work.  No matter how hard life can be, people are always lifted by knowing they are taking care of themselves.  In America we often kid about the burden of children living at home after getting married but in Indonesia almost every home is filled to the brim and overflowing with three and in some cases four generations.  With a very limited social safety net, parents naturally give everything they have to help their children then the children feel a huge responsibility for the care of their elderly parents when they are no longer able to care for themselves.  When this happens at both ends of the life cycle this creates many hard challenges, in other ways it keeps families close together and family values are easier to develop and maintain.

     One small but very interesting observation is that at home it is often  a struggle for many parents to get their children to go to piano lessons and to practice.  Sister Miller offered to help a few children learn to play the piano after school.  Two weeks into the process she now has 17 students in a group lesson with ages ranging from four to 40.  It a lot of work and even though none have a piano in their home, they want to learn, practice on a plastic printed keyboard and share a few keyboards in the church to share during the lesson.  We have made application to a foundation for a donation of keyboards for those that stick to it long enough to complete the required program.  They have a great deal of fun learning to keep time, understand rhythms, and to recognize half notes, quarter notes, full notes and dotted half notes, etc.  Sister Miller bought two sets of children’s tambourines, shakers and triangles to help them keep time.  I told her it was more like professor Harold Hill’s “think system” from the music man.