Make the World a Sillier Place
Note: Please pardon all of the recent text. Internet connection has been slow, and my laptop was recently stolen. More info to follow shortly...
I spent today’s class in what is euphemistically called the language lab. While the room is equipped with all the trappings of a technologically advanced language retention center - gobs of electro gadgets, individual cubbies, headphones, pro-quality speakers, a computer, a big screen TV - it drove home, yet again, just how preposterously silly this country and the large majority of its inhabitants truly are. As Michael Jackosn’s “Heal the World” blared over the sound system, rattling the windows with what seems to be a nationwide pandemic case of uncalibrated bass, the students were asked to stand at their desks and tell their memorized life ambitions to the other forty members of the class. With their odd pronunciation and even more bizarre cadence, I usually have enough trouble understanding the students. But with MJ shrieking the background, I had trouble deciphering anything.
As I became more and more perturbed, fidgeting in my chair in an attempt to escape the aural trauma that was quickly driving me towards the depths of a Neverland-fuelled fantasy of driving myself into a wall on a panda-themed rollercoaster, I couldn’t help but notice that the other forty-some-odd functional humans in the room seemed to be oblivious to the cacophony surrounding them, if not reveling in the chaos. Indonesians have an incredible gift of being able to just shut-out the surrounding world. This comes with perks and drawbacks. For one, it allows massive groups of individuals to sit through never ending speeches, proclamations, and totalitarian blessings of progress and prosperity, the last of which had to be retooled for a contemporary lexicon of “freedom and democracy” with the fall of Suharto eight years ago. Unfortunately, the knack for blocking out reality also comes with drawbacks, such as an inability to follow rules of the road, a penchant for apparently enjoying epic government office lines, and an oblivious approach to all measure of taste in both volume and quantity of horrible, gut-wrenching, truly torturous developing world techno (DWT) music. I should really devote an entire blog to DWT, the phenomenon certainly warrants one.
To illustrate the point, some students were standing at their desks playing with large leaves, others were tooling with the electronics panels in front of them, while still others were locked on my person with a stare of death that I couldn’t shake even after I had matched their slack-jawed awe with what I reckoned to be my silliest grin. In the middle of all this, as one lanky, acne pocked boy was talking about how he wants to join the army to “front free from my country and must kiss parents,” the reigning teacher, Pak Suhartono, a man in his late-50s with large bifocals and an unkempt mustache, raised himself from his desk, went to the closet, and removed a very large, very obscene feather duster.
The device was made from what appeared to be, and after closer inspection definitely was, rooster plumes. As Pak pussyfooted around the class dusting the students’ desks, anarchy continued to develop in pockets of body-odor and hair-gel scented revolt. Well, perhaps “revolt” here is the wrong word since it implies that the group doing the revolting is raging against some sort of authority, whereas in this case, the authority was no more threatening than Mary Poppins. At random intervals, squeaky-voiced boys would anonymously shout “I love you!” into the ether at no one in particular, in an attempt to achieve I’m not sure exactly what.
Halfway through the class, Pak Poppins handed out sheets with partially completed Michael Jackson lyrics, and I was treated to another symphony of student-led Heal the Worlds. As I sat at my lectern perspiring like a well-fed Dutch colonialist, Pak rummaged through papers and the students bobbed their heads and sang along while waving their arms above their heads in the universal call sign of the burgeoning hippie. Outside the classroom, under a sweltering one hundred and four degree sun, the remainder of the nation pursued its path towards making this world a sillier place, one off-pitch and mispronounced step at a time.
I spent today’s class in what is euphemistically called the language lab. While the room is equipped with all the trappings of a technologically advanced language retention center - gobs of electro gadgets, individual cubbies, headphones, pro-quality speakers, a computer, a big screen TV - it drove home, yet again, just how preposterously silly this country and the large majority of its inhabitants truly are. As Michael Jackosn’s “Heal the World” blared over the sound system, rattling the windows with what seems to be a nationwide pandemic case of uncalibrated bass, the students were asked to stand at their desks and tell their memorized life ambitions to the other forty members of the class. With their odd pronunciation and even more bizarre cadence, I usually have enough trouble understanding the students. But with MJ shrieking the background, I had trouble deciphering anything.
As I became more and more perturbed, fidgeting in my chair in an attempt to escape the aural trauma that was quickly driving me towards the depths of a Neverland-fuelled fantasy of driving myself into a wall on a panda-themed rollercoaster, I couldn’t help but notice that the other forty-some-odd functional humans in the room seemed to be oblivious to the cacophony surrounding them, if not reveling in the chaos. Indonesians have an incredible gift of being able to just shut-out the surrounding world. This comes with perks and drawbacks. For one, it allows massive groups of individuals to sit through never ending speeches, proclamations, and totalitarian blessings of progress and prosperity, the last of which had to be retooled for a contemporary lexicon of “freedom and democracy” with the fall of Suharto eight years ago. Unfortunately, the knack for blocking out reality also comes with drawbacks, such as an inability to follow rules of the road, a penchant for apparently enjoying epic government office lines, and an oblivious approach to all measure of taste in both volume and quantity of horrible, gut-wrenching, truly torturous developing world techno (DWT) music. I should really devote an entire blog to DWT, the phenomenon certainly warrants one.
To illustrate the point, some students were standing at their desks playing with large leaves, others were tooling with the electronics panels in front of them, while still others were locked on my person with a stare of death that I couldn’t shake even after I had matched their slack-jawed awe with what I reckoned to be my silliest grin. In the middle of all this, as one lanky, acne pocked boy was talking about how he wants to join the army to “front free from my country and must kiss parents,” the reigning teacher, Pak Suhartono, a man in his late-50s with large bifocals and an unkempt mustache, raised himself from his desk, went to the closet, and removed a very large, very obscene feather duster.
The device was made from what appeared to be, and after closer inspection definitely was, rooster plumes. As Pak pussyfooted around the class dusting the students’ desks, anarchy continued to develop in pockets of body-odor and hair-gel scented revolt. Well, perhaps “revolt” here is the wrong word since it implies that the group doing the revolting is raging against some sort of authority, whereas in this case, the authority was no more threatening than Mary Poppins. At random intervals, squeaky-voiced boys would anonymously shout “I love you!” into the ether at no one in particular, in an attempt to achieve I’m not sure exactly what.
Halfway through the class, Pak Poppins handed out sheets with partially completed Michael Jackson lyrics, and I was treated to another symphony of student-led Heal the Worlds. As I sat at my lectern perspiring like a well-fed Dutch colonialist, Pak rummaged through papers and the students bobbed their heads and sang along while waving their arms above their heads in the universal call sign of the burgeoning hippie. Outside the classroom, under a sweltering one hundred and four degree sun, the remainder of the nation pursued its path towards making this world a sillier place, one off-pitch and mispronounced step at a time.
posted by Nick Taranto | 2:01 AM
1 Comments:
CONTOOOCOOOOK
Post a Comment
<< Home