Editor’s Note:
This humorous observation by Aida Greenbury reflects Jakarta’s nightlife during the period in which it was written. While many venues today have stricter smoking policies and Jakarta’s nightlife has evolved, anyone who has tried to hold a conversation in a crowded bar with loud music will probably recognize the situations described below. In an international city like Jakarta, conversations can also be complicated by the fact that many people are communicating in English as a second language or speaking with a wide range of international accents.
It was Friday evening – 8 o’clock – in an up-market bar on Jl. Thamrin. Latino music blasted through heavy-duty speakers strategically positioned in each corner of the room. The air was hardly breathable. Layers of thick white smoke floated above the crowd. An excellent place for people who had already quit smoking, but still craved nicotine. All they had to do was sit down and inhale.
Waiters dressed in penguin uniforms were run off their feet back and forth to the half-moon-shaped bar. The bar was covered by a gleaming sticky liquid – a blend of various drinks from Singapore Slings to Slippery Nipples.
The room was only about 25 square meters. It was a bit too stuffy for the bar and the dozen high round drinking tables crammed inside. You could simply reach out and touch the next table, if you could get through the throngs of overweight, beer-gutted males sitting and standing around their drinks – acting much like what an Australian football commentator once described as “a mob of seagulls on a sandwich at the beach.”
Each table had four chairs around it. These were basically obsolete. There were always more than four people at each table, all showing a healthy distrust of those skinny, unbalanced high chairs given their body weight and level of sobriety.
The place was packed with Jakarta’s white-collared professionals. The scene was so familiar that it could happen in almost any major city. People gathered after work, hoping to unwind, network or simply catch up with friends. Ironically, the very atmosphere designed to create excitement often made genuine conversation almost impossible.
Julia and her Englishman sat at table one. She was a sweet Indonesian woman in her mid-thirties, trying to reconnect with an old friend on whom she once had a crush. Julia played with her cutlery, trying to catch her reflection in the back of her spoon. She checked her magnified teeth, which reminded her to buy another packet of dental floss.
The Englishman shouted a few words.
Julia looked up, staring at him in confusion.
The music was deafening, made even worse by a group of Australian men behind them enthusiastically debating golf. It was impossible to have a decent conversation without stretching their neck muscles to the limit. She could hardly hear him, not to mention he also had a very thick English accent.
To make matters worse, English wasn’t Julia’s first language. Like many educated Indonesians, she spoke English perfectly well in everyday situations. But in a noisy bar, every unfamiliar accent became another obstacle. The booming music swallowed consonants, the Australians behind them were practically shouting over one another, and the Englishman’s rapid-fire sentences disappeared into the background. Even native English speakers often struggle to understand each other in that sort of environment. Add English as a second language to the mix, and a simple conversation can become an exhausting game of guesswork.
“So, how are you doing?” he asked.
“Great,” she replied.
She wasn’t entirely sure why he had asked how her wine was when she hadn’t even taken a sip.
The evening slowly became sheer torture for Julia. She did her best to read his lips and pretend she understood everything he said. With a broad smile, wide-open eyes, slightly raised eyebrows, serious nods here and there, and the occasional sip of wine, she successfully convinced everyone around her that she was a wonderful listener.
“Do you know that John, bless his soul, passed away last week?” he asked earnestly after a lengthy story.
“Yes, wow… that’s great!” Julia answered enthusiastically before bursting into laughter.
It’s interesting to observe how people slowly lose their sense of politeness in direct proportion to the amount of alcohol they consume.
Initially, Julia politely asked, “Pardon me?”
After the second glass she switched to, “What?”
By the third glass it had deteriorated into “Huh?” and eventually, “What on earth are you talking about?”
And that was it.
No more drinks for that woman.
A lonely local night butterfly occupied table number two. Her name was Siti.
She had been sitting there for the last hour, scanning the room for potential prey. Her left hand held a glass of Coke while the other kept stirring the melting ice cubes. She hoped the ice would melt quickly enough to refill the glass without having to buy another drink.
Siti could feel her back becoming damp from the sweat of the man standing behind her. He moved around constantly while enthusiastically demonstrating his famous golf swing to his friends. After his elbow struck her ribs for what she estimated was the thirteenth time, she responded with a well-timed jab of her own.
The incident caught the attention of a backpacker sitting quietly in the corner. Back when nearby Jl. Jaksa was Jakarta’s famous backpacker district, it wasn’t unusual to find travelers wandering into bars like this.
He smiled at her, stood up and shuffled over in dusty mountain sandals.
“May I join you?” he asked.
She nodded.
She glanced at his khaki shorts and faded Garfield T-shirt while her brain worked overtime estimating his net worth.
Her expectations immediately improved when her nearly empty Coke was replaced with a brightly coloured cocktail.
He had bought her a drink.
That was a promising start.
The limited hearing scenario also played havoc with this newly acquainted couple. Only this time, it worked in their favour.
“We can’t talk here. Let’s go to my place,” he said after a series of hopelessly misunderstood conversations.
He paid the bill and they strolled hand in hand toward the exit.
“Nice hair,” the backpacker complimented Siti’s long black wig as they walked away.
She never heard him.
She was suffering from temporary club deafness.
“Star light, star bright, I wish I may, I wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight…” she hummed to herself.
Looking around the room, it struck me that many people weren’t really talking to one another at all. They were smiling, nodding, laughing at the appropriate moments and hoping they hadn’t completely misunderstood what had just been said. Loud bars may create a lively atmosphere, but they are often the worst places for meaningful conversations. In an international city like Jakarta, where many people communicate in a language that isn’t their mother tongue, lowering the music by just a few decibels would probably create far more memorable evenings than turning it up ever could.
By Aida Greenbury
