A Bus Full of Grace

On Thanksgiving before we tuck in to our turkey, pies and stuffings we take a few moments to say what we are thankful for, or in a more Anglo-religious sense, we say grace. Grace is not only something we talk about, it is also a skill we have to learn, like playing the piano or forgiveness. This month has been a lesson in honing my grace. It was a difficult lesson to learn, but I am thankful for it. So here is where I bow my head gratefully and say a little grace of my own:

When I was twenty-three years old I became a kind of daughter to an older Muslim couple who called me their baby. Now, I am twenty-four years old and I have spent eight months growing up in my adopted Indonesian home. I laugh, cry and celebrate with them. Under Ibu’s instruction I can make a mean pecel sauce. Bapak takes me out to the field and shows me how to spot a ripe dragonfruit. My students write me notes of love and admiration and will walk me home if it gets too dark. I’m happy, healthy and safe here.

Since I arrived at my permanent site in June, I have experienced nothing but love and warmth from my community. I suspect a lot of this is due to the respect my host parents garner here. Aside from the fact that people in my desa are ridiculously wonderful and kindhearted, nobody dares cross my Bapak. My host parents look after me with laser like concern. I can’t speak yet from experience, but I’d assume that as a parent (or host parent) you want to shield your children from the darker and harsher realities grown ups know are out there. But eventually the babies have to leave the nest where they will learn for themselves that sometimes life turns dark and you have to find your way out on your own.

Because my community has been such a bubble of all that is good and glowy, it is always jarring when I leave my village. People are pushier, motorbikes are more reckless, even the air feels hotter. Let me preface this by saying I am not a small town Pollyanna naive to the workings of the world. I’ve been blessed to have done a fair amount of traveling in which I’ve seen and experienced some things that still press down sharply on my memory. I read news articles that repeatedly demonstrate how badly people can treat other people. I wasn’t born yesterday. Yet on a deeper level I am of the belief that when we encounter others, we make a basic human promise to be decent, and to be respectful as we explore and circumnavigate each other.

That is what I expected when I boarded the bus back to my site earlier this month. A quick aside on public transportation here: it’s hard to put across the sensory effect of that many people breathing heated exhaust and dust while shifting around in a crowded tropical space: part bouncy school bus part train to internment camp. A tad militia, but cheerful. My Indonesian bus riding strategy is as follows:

Step 1: The bus will not come to a complete stop to pick you up at the side of the road. Reach your hands up to the “doorman” and allow yourself to be swung up and on quickly. Do not dawdle. The bus does not like this.
Step 2: Keep your balance as the bus rolls forward. Scan for seats that a) are near an open window away from any smoking passengers b) are near any itty bitty old women who will take pity on you and tell you what you should be paying for bus fare so you are not cheated later on.
Step 3: All eyes will be on you. Rattle off as many Javanese greetings as you can as you make your way to your seat. This is a surefire bus crowd people pleaser.
Step 4: Put on your sunglasses and watch the rice paddies zip by. Watch out for live poultry that can get underfoot and enjoy the ride.

These were the steps I was prepared to take on that bus home from Surabaya. I boarded the bus well enough (Step 1), but found that this bus was too crowded for any seat scouting. Bodies pressed on bodies, as I did my best to balance in the back.

I should have known that the man collecting fare was going to give me a hard time when he hauled me on board and did not call me the polite “Mbak” (Miss) but “bule” (white foreigner). I should have turned around and given him a piece of my mind when he edged up behind me and started whispering obscenities in my ear. I should have immediately gotten off the bus when he started rhythmically pushing his crotch into the small of my back. But I didn’t. I couldn’t. I was too surprised to act.

It’s a special kind of privilege to be born into the body you wanted, to embrace the essence of your gender even as you recognize what you are up against. Unfortunately, as a white, female volunteer this sometimes means that I am up against a lot. Being a woman in a conservative country has not quashed my feminist tendencies, but rather redefined them. I expect men here to treat me with respect, maybe not because I am a woman, but because here, women are considered with care and reverence from a distance. Men will not sit next to me, shake my hand or allow me to eat before they do. This gap between the genders, while frustrating at times has up until now acted as a safety buffer. How can a man hurt me if he will not touch me?

The end never comes when you think it will. It’s always ten steps past the worst moment and a weird turn to the left. I demanded to get off the bus a few moments after the fare collector began grinding into me to the beat of a Bollywood song.

A few mind numbing bus rides later, I arrived back at site. I wanted to tell my host family what had happened but I didn’t know how to begin. Instead, I walked into the orchard behind my house and had, for lack of a better term, a major going to pieces. I sat for a long time under a cacao tree thinking about what I should have said, and what I should have done. I reassured myself that I had done nothing to provoke that man into doing what he had. But that isn’t how it works is it? When someone shows you how little you mean to them, your own self doubts creep in. That is the real tragedy of harassment. People are not made up of compartments. What is done, or what is said to you gets said and done to all of you. Being treated like shit is not an amusing game or a transgressive intellectual experiment. It’s something you accept, condone, and unfortunately sometimes believe you deserve.

But I didn’t deserve that. You expect harm from some things but not others. As the sun started to sink I thought on all the things we need that can also hurt us: knives, motorcycles, men who collect money on buses. I thought on women and men alike who have experienced harassment and hurt on a far more serious plane than I did that day, than I ever have in my life. I spent a lot of time sitting under that cacao tree trying to make sense of all the shit things people do, and alternately go through. I couldn’t think of a good explanation. There are some things that are so sad and wrong and unanswerable that the question must simply stand alone like a stick in the sand.

Since that afternoon there is one clear answer I have found buried behind my sternum: within the chaos of my shame and rage and fear there is meaning, and within that meaning is the possibility of grace. My anger and sadness is tremendous, but the love I have in my life here in Indonesia is bigger. I remember reading somewhere that the word “obliterate” comes from the Latin “obliterare.” Ob means “against”; literare means “letter” or “script.” A literal translation is “being against the letters.” It was impossible for me to truly talk about what happened so I wrote a blog post instead. The darkness we harbor within ourselves is both equal parts destruction and creation. It is both black as night and bright with light. It is the rainy season and it is the drought. It is mud and it is manna. When dark things obliterate our lives like bullets blowing out bits of our hearts, it is impossible to go on as we did before. So we must carry on as we never have. It’s wrong that this is what needs to happen, but it is what has to be done. And I think it is in this place of healing and acceptance that we discover true grace.

In the past few weeks I have found that there is a certain beauty to having my heart sucker punched the way it was on that bus. I’d give it all back in a snap, but the fact is, that bus ride broke me open and taught me things. It showed me shades and hues I couldn’t have otherwise seen. It required me to suffer. It compelled me to reach for my grace and light it up as I would a torch in a tunnel. It has cast a light on my wonderful life here and all the people I am grateful for this Thanksgiving.

On a lighter note Happy Thanksgiving to all my fantastic friends and family! Eat an extra slice of pumpkin pie for me 🙂