Ibu Wati

I just came across these photos of the lady who inspired this story. It prompted me to spotlight it, since I like it even though it only got 1 lone comment when it was published so long ago.

"Ibu Wati" may or may not be her name. But she lives on my street with her chickens in a lean-to made of scraps of wood. She could be 50 or she could be 70 and this may or may not be her story.

     Ibu Wati sweeps the street in front of her home at the end of Caringen Timur, where it turns a right angle and becomes Caringen Barat. It is a pleasant street, with tall trees on each side holding hands over the middle, casting a cool shade for its entire length. Shafts of strong tropical sunlight drill through the leafy canopy in places, with beams so strong that when Ibu Wati moves through them, it feels as if she is brushing against curtains. 

     Four chickens cluck around her as they peck for insects and any scraps of food she has dropped from her plate that day. She reflects that the white one is due to lay and reminds herself to check the nest, although she hasn't heard it cackle.

     "I hope it's not too old to lay," she says to herself, "like me." She laughs at the naughty thought.

     Her broom is a bundle of thin spines from palm fronds, gathered together and tied with a bit of string. It is short and Ibu Wati has to bend at the waist to sweep, making piles of leaves and scraps of paper near the curb. The bending makes her back ache, and she stops frequently to straighten and to press her thumbs into the muscle at the base of her spine.

     Ibu Wati lives in a lean-to made of scraps of wood on the narrow space between the street curb and the brick fence around Pak Hartono's yard. Two posts hold up the front of a thatched roof while the fence holds up the back of the roof and makes a wall.

     She hears the chatter and laughter of children as they leave school at the other end of Caringen Timur and start home.

     "Children sound like birds when there are so many together like that," she thinks.

     A group of younger ones always pass by Ibu Wati's home, and they usually stop to chat. She likes the younger ones, even when they tease her. Sharing a joke with them makes her feel happy. They are nice children, and sometimes share a bit of their lunch.

     She hurries to finish gathering the little pile of leaves and rubbish before the kids arrive, separating out the paper to use as tender for her cooking fire.

     "Ibu Wati, Ibu Wati, apa kabar, Ibu Wati?" chant two little girls as they approach, skipping hand in hand. "How are you, Ibu Wati?" Their long black hair bobs and flashes as they pass through sun beams like spot lights.

     "Salamat siang, perumpuan," "Good afternoon, ladies," Ibu Wati replies with a wide smile which shows only a few gaps.

     The girls giggle at the exaggerated politeness and stop to chat. They wear the uniform of grammar school - burgundy skirt and white blouse with burgundy necktie. One is missing her front teeth.

     "You look so pretty, ladies. What did you learn in school today?"

     "We learned to sing Pancasila."

     "And we read about Pak Iwan, who farms his padi."

     "Oh, that's nice. I used to work in a padi right here."

     "Oh, Ibu Wati! Rice padi in the street?" The girls look at each other and snicker behind their hands at the thought.

     "At that time there were no streets for a kilometer in any direction, only rice paddies and vegetable farms and I could walk on mother earth all day. It was two hours' walk to the nearest paved road; it led into Kebayoran where there were markets and shops and sometimes we could see a motor car."

     These days big fancy cars whisk by Ibu Wati's lean-to every evening, scattering her chickens, splashing muddy water onto her sleeping bench when it rains.

     "Where Pak Hartono's house now sits was padi belonging to my family. My husband and I grew much rice here until Pak Hartono bought it. Then others came to buy the surrounding padi and houses grew where rice once did. Like rising water in a flood, the paths became roads, and the roads became streets and the land disappeared around us."

     The girls skip along, joining the crowd of children on their way home and Ibu Wati watches until they round the corner.

     There is a crackle of static in the air as the mullah at the mosque starts the tape player. Ibu Wati stops working and straightens, her hands in the small of her back.

     "Allahu akbar, alla...ah...ah...hu akbar," the call comes over the loudspeaker. A second later, she hears the same chant begin from four other mosques. She listens for a while and watches the men go to pray, walking down Caringen in small groups, gossiping. They look very dignified and pious in their brightly colored sarongs, wrapped around their wastes, over white shirt tails, wearing their black pill box caps. There is Pak Ishak looking handsome with a new sarong. He is a man of skill, a driver for a rich family. Everyday he travels to distant parts of the city.

     Ibu Wati remembers going with her mother to mosque when she was a child. She loved standing beside her mother, admired the white chador that covered her hair and her caftan as big as a tent. She wishes she could go pray at the mosque to Allah for a pen to keep her chickens. They are in danger from the traffic.

     Ibu Wati walks across the road to the mosque, watches the prayers, men in front, women behind, separated by a screen. They stand in ranks, heads bowed, hands held in supplication to Allah the Almighty. Then they kneel and place their foreheads on the floor, their behinds in the air. Ibu Wati suppresses her mirth at the sight. She wants to join the prayers, but she can't afford a cloth to cover her head. She knows she wouldn't feel comfortable with all those well-to-do women. Women who have jobs as maids, whose employers give them a room and a real bed to sleep on.

     A candle glows in the dark as Ibu Wati prepares for the night. She groans as she stretches to untie the blue plastic tarp rolled up along the edge of the roof. Captured drops from last night's rain splash her face as it unrolls and falls to form the front wall of her shelter. She is thankful there is no sidewalk here where she makes her home. Although it is muddy when it rains, the chickens are able to scratch up a bug or a worm in the grass on each side of her shelter, and it seems more natural to her than the paving which surrounds her now.

     Ibu Wati's back ache is worse lately, and stretching to untie the tarp aggravates it. She moves the candle to the pile of cardboard at the end of the bench so that her shadow won't fall on the tarp as she removes her dress and puts on her shift.

     Ibu Wati is short and stout, and her old skin sags from her upper arms as she reaches for the shift. She longs for a bath, but she has tipped over the rain bucket earlier as she spread her sleeping cloth on the bench.

     "How silly of me to leave it in the way," she thinks. "Oh well, it looks as though Allah will refill it tonight."

     As if in confirmation, lightening illuminates the street, followed immediately by a boom of thunder. The chickens roosting on the roof mutter and shift above Ibu Wati's head. Her head touches the thatching and the rustle brings a cackle from the laying hen.

     "Shush, ayam putih, shush. Rest so that you can give me an egg tomorrow." The white chicken clucks in reply.

     She sits on the bench and positions the bucket under the back corner where the water runs through the roof when it rains, then blows out the candle. She lies on her side with her knees drawn up because the bench is too narrow and short for her to stretch out on her back. Mosquitoes whine and Ibu Wati dozes, dreaming of going to the mosque on Caringen Street in a batik sarong.

Excerpted from "Oil Patch" available from Borders, Amazon & www.authorhouse.com/bookstorewhere you can see Ibu's Wati's photo on the cover.