Socializing between work assignments

Aceh Clam Chowdah

(continued)

By Freeman Anthony

During the last week in Banda Aceh, several days after my birthday celebrations, I caved in to the idea of another barber shop run with my assistant Maison. We had spent quite a bit of time together in recent days at Lambaro, keeping the project moving forward while he snapped digital photos with reckless abandon. This was likely his favourite aspect of the job. Less a favourite was attempting to translate site reports and learn to use a spreadsheet to monitor progress, but these needed doing, and he needed teaching. As a tribute to our time working together, Maison and I started with a trip under the straight razor for a night on the town. Not long into dinner, remembering that he was a Christian, I asked him if he liked beer. "Freeman!" he exclaimed, "I am a Christian, of course I like to drink beer!" and then quickly lowered his voice a notch. We chatted about his place in this land of Islam far removed from its roots. He would visit Medan, 14 hours away by bus, when he could to visit friends in the largely Christian population there. In this city of two million people, night clubs could be found with many beautiful woman, as he told it. Maison turned to me seriously and whispered, "Freeman, what do you do when you want to make love to the woman, but there is no woman?" I shrugged and lied: "Cold showers." I think he knew I was lying, and we both shared a laugh that few Muslims would understand.

The influence of Islam here was fully saturated, yet low in intensity when I compare it with shots from the Hajj and Mecca. Sharia law is touted, yet only occasionally enforced. In Sigli there were no hotel rooms, because the media was in town for a public caning of some gamblers, but apparently it was a rare event.

In every urban area with a stoplight, head-shawled girls with capris and colourful waist-conforming tops and armed with cell phones, could be seen mingling with cigarette smoking young men among the shops. There was a casual happiness seemed undaunted by the recent marine catastrophe that reminds us of the notion of fatalism in Islam. A contract worker from USAid had explained that Islam teaches that if something happens, no matter how great or small, devastating or enlightening, it is the will of Allah, and that's the end of the story. It's this outlook that had this town back at its cafes and barber shops and looking for forward momentum. This was something that you won't find on the Hindu side of the Indian Ocean. This sense of fatalism permeates the Christian culture as well, and I could see it in Maison as much as any other of our employees. Maison was careful not to call attention to his faith, but that didn't stop him from challenging a few IRD nationals to a serious round of dominoes after our dinner.

We rolled up to a hidden café on Maison's moped while our shadows from the halogen streetlight dashed across the thatched wall panels. Ishmeal was there at a wooden table with peeling red paint and jumped to greet us with his long fingernails. After a few introductions, coffees and Marlboros, we laid out the ivory tiles. The next two hours could have been any bar anywhere minus the booze plus the dominoes. These lads were dead serious about the game at hand and slammed those fake tusks down with the authority of polished suburban Los Angeles thugs. I'd like to get a Domino World Cup going, finals to feature Aceh versus Compton.

Around 1 a.m. we called it quits, with another big day at the plant waiting with the sunrise. I don't think I'd ever find that café again without Maison either, back in that maze of reeds and poorly mixed concrete.

With only four days to go, Christoph and I made plans for a night at the "Country Steak House", a recently opened restaurant that catered specifically to the aid workers due to the provision of wine and beer. The SDC has recently won a war of political words with a French engineering company to continue with the full rebuilding of Lambaro, and that was reason to celebrate. We slid in under the recently taped up banner with two aid workers from the WHO to a smoky parlor of khaki vests and well-tanned expats. The timid ideological Portuguese hygiene student, and his thundering Dutch supervisor from the WHO were two men with the same goals and entirely different personalities. After a relatively service-free meal and all the wine that we were allotted, we smoked cigarettes and listed to the update on the gun-shot wounding of a Hong Kong Red Cross worker in the eastern region. The update came from a reasonably sized security specialist from the UK. This character had kept Christiane Amanpour out of trouble in the Middle East while on CNN's payroll, but now was contracting out for high-level visiting officials in the Aceh. He ducked out momentarily to his car for another bottle of wine. Clearly, this wasn't as dangerous as other missions.

I earmarked my last day off for an overnight diving trip on Sabang Island. Marte and I left on a Friday afternoon and watched Banda Aceh fall behind the waves as we took the two hour ferry out to the island. We stayed at a simple breezy beach resort not far from a diving centre run by a long forgotten German couple. After a spicy fish dinner and a few Tiger beers, I smoked a cigarette and gazed at a few lanterns reflecting across the bay in the still night. I wondered if the Indian Ocean been this calm before the wave and considered that another just as easily appear tomorrow. The next day I spent hovering above multi-coloured coral with all manner of ocean life along side Marte and our dive guide who would take one breath to every three by me. I returned from Sabang that afternoon for an evening inspection of the ongoing refit to a sludge treatment plant I had designed only two weeks earlier. That evening I killed off my bottle of scotch with our eclectic tight-knit crew of IRD expats while our Muslim colleagues looked on in genuine friendly amusement.

To make my scheduled flight to Singapore, an overnight stopover in Jakarta had looked inevitable and at the same time, very unattractive. The worn red tiles were once again under my feet as I dashed to get on the next flight to Singapore. I'd have about 10 minutes to make the switch to the Air New Zealand flight when I got there. The desk attendant was apologetic when it became clear my luggage wouldn't be so lucky. I thanked her for the quick transfer and told her not to worry. Sixteen hours later I stepped down the stairway onto the tarmac in Queenstown in jandles, short sleeves with my laptop in hand. I was a meter away when my flat mate recognized me with my tanned expression of clinical culture shock amongst the fur coats and Goretex of the winter tourists.