Raves, Rants and Whines from Jakarta

Kicking off with a Short Joke

Jakarta, Indonesia, is a city famous for the overuse of car horns by its drivers. While sitting in a car one day with a friend, we heard copious amounts of car honking all around. My friend immediately started tooting away as well, for no apparent reason. When I asked what he was honking at, he replied; “Nothing really, but if everyone else was honking and I wasn’t, then everyone would think that they were all honking at ME!”

Massages in Jakarta

By Maurice Templo

September 2007

This month's whine is a direct result of pain, a topic I feel quite strongly about, since the source of this pain is emanating from my lower back. Having tried several remedies, from herbal drinks to Salonpas, I could find no relief, and thus, I had no choice but to commit myself to a session of irony.

It is ironic that in order to cure my pain I have to withstand an hour of even more excruciating pain, most of which is not directed at the problematic area but all over my tortured body. Yes, you got it, I am about to get a massage.

Near where I live, there is a blind masseur who offers a full hour of absolute suffering for only Rp.20,000, and on the appointed morning, my driver escorted him to my house, where my thoughtful wife had already laid out a mattress and a well placed chair from where she can observe the proceedings.

Not that she would not trust me with a blind masseur, her reasons for wanting a front row seat might be valid if the service was provided by a young attractive masseuse, but in this case, she only wanted to provide whatever comfort and moral support she can muster in my hour of desperation.

She would stroke my head, wipe my sweat and whisper things like; "Real men don't cry", or "you have your son's sympathy, because he can hear you from his room upstairs", or "remember when I wanted that new pair of shoes and you said no?" She can only inflict severe mental anguish. But for bodily harm, without infringing on existing laws of domestic violence, she ravishes the experience as a spectator sport. My only comfort was in the saying; "You feel much better afterwards." Well of course it will be better, once the pain subsides!

The whole business of Professional Therapeutic Massage is bovine excrement! What use is this therapy if its only purpose is to create a diversion. While the source of the pain may no longer be as debilitating, you now have to contend with a dozen other sore spots, a result of crushing pressure exerted by wrought iron fingers strategically placed over areas to generate a maximum amount of agony!

After 10 minutes of this, I was ready to confess to being the second gun on the grassy knoll, being present at Area 51 during the crash, and causing all those disappearances from the Triangle! Yes, I realize that there are other forms of massage which are definitely more pleasurable, the term "Thai Body" springs to mind, but that only shifts the focus of the problem from a simple back ache to a more severe pain resulting from a forced separation of penile muscular tissue from the host body, caused by the insertion of said object into a domestic blender by the spouse! Wait a minute, I'd just discovered the root cause of my problem, it’s this rotten chair I am sitting in as I work on the computer! Well, I guess I've found the cure afterall, either get a better chair, or stop putting out this trash!

NB: After my recent divorce, I am ecstatic to report that once again, I am beginning to rediscover the pleasures of a masseuse!

Roving Insight at Ramako Radio Station.