harrassment, Indonesian style

He leaned in too close to me as I was stumbling over the keypad on my new cell. His body pressed against my side, as he feigned a casual interest in my affairs.

“I can’t do this,” I told him, and moved noticeably to my left. “I don’t know how to adjust the keypad from its numerical setting.” Beneath my words, I was telling him to back off. But he didn’t read the undercurrent of my speech. And why was he so eager to go through the motions of this useless exercise? I had no inclination to call this man, ten years or more my senior, and should he need assistance with proofreading his English grants, as I had offered, it would be him calling me to request help, not the reverse.

I hunched over my laptop that afternoon, on loan from the organization, and my frustration mounted as I replayed that casual exchange. Adding insult to injury, the man charged with keeping the building orderly kept trying to make flirtatious conversation. “Kamu cantik,” he said. “You’re pretty.” He kept playing with the dog who barked in alarm at each of my patrols from my workspace to the central office.

I asked him if he had his own dog at home. “Tidak,” he said. No, he couldn’t own one – it was against the Muslim religion to touch them. I wasn’t sure I understood his Indonesian, as I watched the dog lick him on the side of his face and even on his lips. “Kiss?” he asked me, pointing to the dog, as if I should follow its example. “Kiss,” he repeated, in his limited English. When that failed to rouse my interest, he tried a more direct approach. “Kamu indah,” he said – “you’re beautiful.”

I stared at him, soundlessly, for a few deliberate moments, before launching into an overly simplified lecture. “In America, men don’t tell women that they are beautiful. Understand?” I returned to my grant-writing and ignored him for the rest of the day.

On the way home that day, I walked to the corner to wait for the bus. A becek - bicycle taxi - driver initiated a conversation, which, within two minutes, had turned to the same compliment: “kamu cantik!” I explained the same thing to him, this time with the benefit of being able to use my mother tongue. “Tidak apa-apa?” he questioned. No worries?

I guess so, I said. “Tidak apa-apa.”

A shame that even volunteering for a Catholic-rooted non-profit in Indonesia leaves me exposed to the casual sexual harassment I unwillingly greet every day on the streets.