Jacque in Jakarta: My fifteen minutes of fame...sort of

View of Krakatoa

This past week Alexander and I traveled to a quaint little place called Carita beach. It was quite refreshing to escape the madness of the city for a few days, though a bit disheartening that it rained everyday we were there. All in all though, it was lovely to go for a dip in the sea and exciting to see the infamous Krakatoa volcano on the horizon.

Living in Jakarta, I've grown accustomed to people staring and calling out 'mister', 'miss', or 'bule', but while in Carita, we experience something a bit more intense.  Of course there were plenty of people selling unnecessary baubles who assumed we had lots of money to blow, so they swarmed us. However, we got very good at saying 'tidak' firmly enough to scare them away. But, the sellers weren't the most surprising reaction. Since Carita is such a small town, the local people rarely see Westerners in person, so they were quite excited to witness two of them on their beach.

As the saying goes, "take a picture, it will last longer". Well, that's exactly what the locals did. They didn't just stare at us, they took pictures. Lots of pictures. There were pictures of us at dinner taken by people who worked at the hotel. There were pictures of us walking on a trail taken by a group of children staying at the hotel. There were pictures of us kissing in the pool taken by other guests in the hotel. I had a bit of an idea for what celebrities must feel, and I can honestly say I did not enjoy it. At first, I took no real issue and didn't mind if they asked for a picture with us, but after four days of the same it grew quite exhausting and a bit invasive. Not only did they ask for pictures, they invaded pictures that we were trying to take. And when we tried to have a private moment and ignore the camera, they called for us to have a kiss for the camera.

In the end, it was nice to breathe some fresh air for a change. Though next time I'd go for an abandoned island....or at least one with people thoroughly adjusted to the sight of Westerners.

Jacque in Jakarta: "Hei bule, bule, bule! How are you?"

After living in Jakarta for over a month, I've been able to notice some quirks of the locals. I've mentioned the cramming culture before, which is one quirk that I'm slowly getting used to. However, the thing that really drives me crazy is being called "bule" by a complete stranger.

Walking down the street, random people will quite often call out to me or Alexander and say, "Hei Mister/Hei Missus!", which is something I'm quite used to ignoring. The world over I've had to ignore unwanted advances of strangers. But more often then Mister/Missus we'll hear "bule". Generally, it is said more than just once. It kind of reminds me of a pig call, except they say, "bule, bule, bule".

"Bule" is not meant to be a derogatory term, it simply means Westerner/White person. It is not meant to be an insult, attack, or even rude. The most hilarious part is that they usually try to speak English to us after having called out "bule". The only problem is that we see it as rude, whether it is meant to be or not.

In Spain, I would joke about being a guiri, or gringa, and even here we say we're bules among friends. But if someone screamed guiri at me in the middle of Sevilla, I would understandably be irritated. It's kind of like telling someone who's disabled that he/she can't walk. Stating the obvious is never very polite. So even if they're just trying to be friendly, that's not the way to make a good impression with a stranger.

Alexander has taken to responding with, "Indonesian, Indonesian, Indonesian" everytime we're called bule. At first I was embarrassed that he did this, but then I realized a taste of their own medicine might be just what the doctor ordered. We may even achieve a cultural awarenes that bules don't like to be yelled at in public. Then again, Alexander might just give bules a reputation for being crazy.