the traditional view, women only leave home under duress: to find a job in a hurry, or escape some personal crisis.
Nowadays, the tendency is to settle away from home for a long time. This practice is merantau Cino, or migrating like the Chinese, whose vibrant roots stretch all over Asia and beyond. A short period is merantau pipit (sparrow-like travels) because the bird doesn’t linger long in one place.
Minangkabau restaurants serve Sumatran-style food across Indonesia, as well as in Southeast Asia, Europe and elsewhere. They are called Padang restaurants after the name of the West Sumatran provincial capital. They say you can find a Padang restaurant on the moon: just walk a little, turn left and there you have it! The most famous Padang dish is rendang, meat simmered in spices and coconut juice.
Some Minangkabau men leave home because they feel constrained by West Sumatra’s matriarchal system, which requires a husband to allow a brother of his wife (ninik mamak, in Minangkabau) to settle any family dispute.
Matrilineal customs require a man to give advice and money to his sister and her family. He helps her out, but has little influence over his own affairs. His role as husband is marginal. Sisters usually inherit their brothers’ rumah gadang (big house) and other family assets.
A century ago, West Sumatran men were only allowed to marry women from the same village. Some sought brides elsewhere so they could be free of the irksome ninik mamak.
West Sumatran men who leave home stay loyal to their families. Their success is judged by how much money they send home to build houses for relatives, or mosques or schools in hometowns.
Cewek
Girl.
Linguists say cewek came from ciwe, which means female genitals in the Hokkien dialect from China. Cewek took hold in the 1970s, and dictionaries define it as a young girl. Nowadays, it’s a colloquial term for a woman.
Then the term cowok, the male equivalent of cewek, came along. Male Javanese names usually contain the vowel o. Hartono is a male name, while Hartini is female. Joko, Padmo, Handoyo and Suranto are all male names.
Anak bawang
Onion kid = The runt of the litter. A nobody.
A shallot usually has a bulb that is smaller than the rest. It just seems to fill the gap.
In a school playground, kids slot into two teams for a game of tag. The youngest jumps up and down, eager to join. Her older sister smiles and tells the others: “C’mon let her into my team. But she can’t be ‘it.’ She’s only an onion kid.”
Ayolah, dia ikut timku. Tapi dia gak bisa jadi. Dia cuma anak bawang.
Bawang merah (red onion) is the fragrant Asian red shallot. Bawang putih (white onion) is garlic. Bawang bombay is a big white or yellow onion that takes its name from the Indian city known today as Mumbai. Onions were noted as a digestive and treatment for the heart in India more than 2,500 years ago, though the vegetable is believed to have come from central Asia.
Perek (acronym)
PERempuan EKsperimental
Experimental woman = Prostitute. Bimbo.
The word perek appeared in the mid-1980s when teenage girls turned up at Jalan Melawai, a street in Blok M, a jumble of bars, malls and hotels in Jakarta. The street became known as Lintas Melawai (lintas means cross or pass quickly) because crowds streamed back and forth. Women strolled, loitered outside shops, dined on bakso (meat balls) and teh botol (cold, bottled tea), and waited for men. Some wanted money; others settled for sexual experience. They looked for a type known as Oom-oom (Oom means uncle in Dutch), a sugar daddy who drove a flashy car and spent with abandon.
Perek is a common term for prostitute among the young, though many elderly people don’t know it. It used to refer only to a promiscuous woman, not a woman who required payment for sex.
Other terms for prostitute:
• WTS. A term for Wanita Tuna Susila (woman without morals). It appears in newspapers, radio and television talk shows, government edicts and speeches. The male version is PTS (Pria Tuna Susila, or man without morals). PTS can also be the client of a male prostitute.
• Pekerja seks komersial (commercial sex worker). A neutral term commonly used by feminists and social workers.
• Kupu-kupu malam (night butterfly). An insect with beautiful wings lures its prey.
• Perempuan jalang (wild, untamed woman). A rude expression.
• Ayam (chicken). This rude term is similar to chick, the old English slang for a young woman. Some sociologists say the term became popular in Indonesia in the early 1990s because of the alleged tendency of prostitutes to chatter, or cluck like hens. Indonesians often use the term for the benefit of foreign men who are on the prowl.
• Cabo. This term for prostitute comes from Ca-bau-kan, which means woman in Hokkien.
Players in the sex industry address each other with familiar nicknames. The regular term for pimp is mucikari or muncikari, but he’s also papi (daddy) to his charges. A madam is germo, but also mami or tante (aunt, in Dutch). They oversee anak asuh (children in their care), young prostitutes who often come from poor villages and have no other source of income.
Young prostitutes who become financially indebted to their pimps and cut off from their families are anak potong (cut child). Hefty cuts of their wages end up in the pockets of managers.
Kelas kambing (goat class) and kelas embun (dew class) refer to prostitutes who don’t charge much.
That’s because kelas kambing once referred to the cheapest seats in a movie theater. The meat of kambing (goat) is cheaper than that of a cow or buffalo.
Kelas embun also offers the cheapest seats at an outdoor cinema: spectators have to sit on grass covered in dewdrops.
Prostitution is illegal in Indonesia, but many Indonesians have a sweep-it-under-the-mat approach to the profession. The sex industry flourishes. Giant prostitution complexes operate in major cities. In some places, clients look through one-way windows at rows of seated prostitutes before making their selection.
In the 1970s, Jakarta governor Ali Sadikin advocated regulation of the sex industry, rather than an outright ban. He pushed for lokalisasi, a policy that let brothel complexes pay taxes and operate under state supervision. He made some headway, but the project died. One regulated brothel in North Jakarta has become a plush Muslim center with carpeted, brightly lit prayer rooms. Muslim groups voice their opinions more forcefully than they did under authoritarian rule, and lokalisasi is unlikely to make a comeback soon.
In 2004, hundreds of prostitutes in the East Javan city of Surabaya held a mass prayer for the success of the presidential election. They wore Muslim headscarves called jilbab, and some shed tears as they read verses from the Quran.
Tante girang
Happy auntie.
A middle-aged woman who seeks a gigolo. Armed with cash and gifts, she lures young men into romantic liaisons.
Some well-off Indonesian wives indulge in pleasures of the flesh because their husbands ignore them. Their spouses are busy, the wives figure, so why not keep busy themselves?
Om
