Jalan Nusantara, or Archipelago Road,
how aptly named! At Makassar, this road divides the two worlds of stories, the
land and the sea. On one side is Makassar port, one of the busiest in
Indonesia. On the other is a row of cafes, karaoke bars, hotels and restaurants;
shutters down during the day, and at night, barely lit, revealing themselves as
brothels. These two worlds meet every night after a long day of anxious waiting
when sailors and young ladies, both groups who have arrived from all over the Indonesian
archipelago, disappear in the arms of each other.
It is nine in
the evening and Jalan Nusantara feels ominous with the constant barrage of
monstrous trucks carrying the impenetrable realms of containers. The ladies,
with fresh make-up, have just begun to come out from the dark, sitting
themselves on a long row of plastic chairs that have now lined Jalan Nusantara.
In Indonesia, commercial sex workers are known as Pekerja Seks Komersial or PSKs, a name that seems straight out of
Carl Linnaeus’ book. They are now sitting themselves in rehearsed postures of
crossing their legs, baring one to catch the light from the streetlamps.
Makassar is one of the few cities in the world where, as was common in much of
the world before, ports still attract brothels.
I see sailors
attempting to make the dangerous crossing of Jalan Nusantara through the plying
trucks. From across the road, the women begin whistling and clapping at him. The
sailors, in small groups of two or three, are halting, sprinting, halting, dodging
and jumping as the women cheer them on. Once on the other side, they have a
smile that soon turns shy. The girls call out to them. The sailors walk on for
a while, avoiding making eye contact, till a bold female hand holds their hands
and pull them in. One woman gets up and grabs the hand of a sailor and pulls
him in. Isn’t she a teenager? Her co-workers push the other men in too who
don’t resist.
I wonder if
the sailors and the PSKs tell each other stories; stories from the sea, of
mysterious creatures, countless stars, near-miss accidents, and weeks and
months spent away from the comforts of home; and stories from the land, of youth
and families left behind, of the range of body odours they have encountered, of
the never-sleeping fear of the unknown, or of hopes still alive.
The PSKs and
their agents are calling after me too. But I am not a sailor and my heavily
insured life is too sterile, my stories bleached of much of the pains of life. One
man, probably the manager, screams and points at the girl sitting next to him,
“Stock Baru,” new stock. Where would
she be from? PSKs usually work in cities far away from home to hide their
identities. Red light areas all over Indonesia are known to run exchange
programs for PSKs so that local customers get acquainted with new people.
I keep walking. Suddenly one man opens a door to reveal a dazzling world
of lights and women scantily clad, seated in stacks. They look like lifeless
mannequins; staring vacantly towards me or are they longing for the door that
just opened out! Like a man possessed by a messianic duty, I run from Jalan
Nusantara, gasping, my heart as heavy as a container truck.
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