Saturday 7th October
You win some, you lose some
As I wander into Blok M Pasaraya early on Saturday evening to milk the ATM of my few remaining Rupiah to finance the revels ahead, I have a niggling feeling that tonight just won’t match up to last night’s beano on the Blok. Alas, it proves to be true. I turn into Falatehan to find a very thin turnout of parked cars, far fewer ojeks than normal - even the street urchins lack their usual cheeky liveliness and are listlessly lounging on car bonnets, motorbike seats and doorsteps.
The lack of ojeks is particularly ominous, as these are the Sweet Young Things’ main transportation. Like a thermometer, their number in the street indicates very precisely the number of girls in the bars that night. Going into stoic mode I trudge up the middle of the street and drop into Top Gun, and it’s just as I feared - not many guys, the lower quartile of Sweet Young Things, and no vivacity in the place.
Ah well, I decide to make the most of it and get stuck into the beer. A game of pool might raise my flagging sprits, so I sign up. But the only other guy playing is a very affable, but very drunk, American chap who’s so far gone that he has to be gently and frequently reminded that he’s playing pool, that it’s his shot, that he’s on the stripes, and to put his bottle down before he tries to shoot. The game is a washout, and to add insult to injury the dear fellow scoops up my bottle of beer and wanders off towards the bar, swigging it as he goes.
Luckily I’ve arranged to meet some friends for a chat, so at least we can sit and natter in the quiet surroundings. After we part, I decide to hop across the street and see what’s cooking in My Bar.
It’s already half past ten when I hit My Bar, so I don’t expect it to be in full swing yet. I settle at the bar, order a sop buntut to while away the time and put a little solid ballast inside me, and survey the field. There are a dozen or so girls in the place, but not the regular Sweet Young Things. These are the Heavy Brigade - solid, stolid girls who are way past their shelf date. One of them walks straight up to me, plonks herself on an adjacent bar stool, and launches straight into her depressing routine of “Where you from? What your name?”. I smile nicely and answer her questions, but as I fail to display any commercial interest she ups and walks away without so much as a word.
There’s a band playing, but once again too loud for comfort when the place is half empty. And as soon as the musicians take their break, it’s back to the thumpa-kathumpa rhythm of the dreadful rubbish inflicted on the punters by a tone-deaf management. This is not, I reflect, a vintage night in My Bar.
As the bar slowly fills up it becomes clear that the Indramayu crowd is severely depleted - most of the livelier Sweet Young Things are AWOL. There aren’t so many guys in either, so the momemtum just doesn’t pick up and I decide to cut my losses shortly after eleven o’clock and hit the road home.
Postscript: I’ve just learnt that the reason so many of the Indramayu lasses were absent last night is that one of the girls’ mothers is terminally ill and they were all rallying round to help out.