How to not be a ‘problematic’ Expat?: On reading The Year of Living Dangerously as a Westerner living in 2015 Indonesia

As Peace Corps volunteers, we often wrestle with our status in Indonesia, with its history of European colonization, cold war neo-imperialism, ethnic and religious conflict, and the history of Peace Corps as an organization and all international development programs that have been criticized (rightly so) for being imperialistic tools themselves (explained in more detail here) and the history and status United States as an interventionist world super power. Even if we come to Indonesia with the best of intentions and the purest of hearts we, at some point, need to deal with the baggage and history that we bring with us. Many of us find ask ourselves similar questions everyday: Am I really doing more good than harm here, and if I’m doing more harm, then how do I fix it? How do I get better and not repeat the mistakes of colonial history? How do I do what I promised to do and actually help make the lives of the Indonesians I work with better? Is there a way to be a westerner working in a formally colonized country, especially a “developing country” and not be an (sorry for lack of a better word) asshole?

                I was recently lent The Year of Living Dangerously by a fellow Peace Corps volunteer. The 1978 novel is set in 1965 Jakarta and tells the story of an affair between an Australian reporter and British Embassy worker who are both close friends with a dwarf Chinese-Australian camera man. The novel was later adapted into a film starring Mel Gibson, Sigourney Weaver, and Linda Hunt.

Mel...before the crazy? Picture from Wikipedia

 I have yet to see the film, but as a Westerner who currently lives a few hours outside of Jakarta it was thought provoking to able to compare the descriptions  of 1965 Jakarta to what I know of the city and West Java now. While the novel is set in Jakarta and ostensibly about Indonesian politics and society, it really can’t be read or understood in the same way that a novel starring an Indonesian character living in 1965 Indonesia should be read. In the tradition of Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, it is essentially about the expat interpretation of a society, a status which is both insider and outsider, helpful and harmful, occasionally dreamlike, but surprisingly mundane, and both pride inducing and tainted with self-loathing . Though there are expats in many countries and many different time periods there are some things that remain strikingly universal, lucky, and problematic. Separated by 50 years, having a totally different job from the main characters, and living as one Westerner in a rural community instead of in a large city with daily in-person access to other Westerners, I obviously have a very different expat experience than the characters of Christopher J. Koch’s novel. Nonetheless, reading this novel this past week has caused me to rethink many of those stress-inducing questions in perhaps more nuanced ways.

                Before going further, I want to discuss the term expat. I have technically been an “expat” for almost six years now (four years in South Korea and almost two years in Indonesia). Only a certain kind of person who lives and works in another country for more than a few months gets to be called an expat and the term is arguably racist. An expat is someone from a rich country and who has a privileged enough life that living in another country is very much a choice and not an economic necessity. He or she generally works in a middle-class, white collar profession. In theory, any Peace Corps volunteer could be in the United States right now and find a decent paying job, even if it isn’t exactly in the field we want or the salary is not as high as we might wish. (in theory..)  

This differs us (unfairly or fairly so) from people from poorer countries who work in wealthier countries out of economic necessity, like the woman I live with in my village who worked as a maid in Saudi Arabia for nine years. She gets called a “migrant worker.” I agree that these labels and terms are imperfect and somewhat discriminatory. I have met wealthy Indonesians (and other nationals from ‘developing’ countries) who live in foreign countries very much by choice and with a lifestyle much more “expat” than “migrant worker,” but generally it is a term used only for Westerners living temporarily in another country and who tend to form a tightly networked community. Go to any city around the world and there are certain bars famous for tourists, and there are other bars that are famously haunts of the expat community, a community that may live and work in a country for years but never become a citizen and gain voting rights. In the case of many developing countries, this community may participate in some aspects of the lives of locals but generally lives with a much higher salary, different housing, slightly different diets, and different social norms and rules (i.e. Indonesians would probably be shocked to see two white people kissing in public but they probably wouldn’t be reprimanded nearly as badly as two Indonesians doing the same). How involved an expat is with an expat community or the local community is going to vary by profession, the exact place in the country where the expat lives, and by the personality of the expat herself.

To live as an expat is to live in the same place as host country nationals but to move on different roads and in different circles. It is perhaps like a picture made in PhotoShop—expats might be in the same pictures as their host-country neighbors but they occupy a different layer than the average member of host-country society. To be fair, nationals within one country may be in different layers and circles themselves, divided by ethnicity, region, religion, family background, profession, and interests, so this isn’t unique to expats. But national loyalty and connection to the country and land on which one lives is still so important in one’s conception of self that the expat often struggles with how to deal with his own nationalistic feelings towards his host country; as someone living on the edges of society does he have the right to have those feelings? Does he or she even want them? What does he owe this country that he has only partially accepted and which has perhaps only partially accepted him? And what does that country owe him in return?

                At one point in the novel, Wally, an obese Australian who has become the most famous Western journalist working in Indonesia says,

“I’m happy in this bloody mad country, you know. They might be on the wrong track at the moment, but the Javanese have everything, really: intelligence, subtlety, sense of humor, and sen-sensitivity [sic]… ‘I love them…This is my home, now. I may apply for citizenship…I have something to give them; they have something to give me. There are young men who are hungry for education and guidance that they can’t find in the present breakdown…I teach them English—supervise their reading—guide them in their political thinking. They’ll be leaders some day, and they’ll set this country on a civilized course. And I can be myself with them. Can you see that? I can’t be myself in Australia…I recalled his library outside…Outside the immense heat squatted like a malignant force, making these fragments of an alien civilization seem infinitely fragile; doomed…and very soon the military…would be knocking with their gun-butts at the door…If this was Wally’s imagined home, he had no home in this world.”  (94-95)

                While I was living in South Korea, many of the other English teachers and I had a mean spirited joke. Occasionally we would meet a Western man (usually a white male English teacher) who acted like he lived like a king in Korea. Suddenly he had a lot more attention from women, and he often talked about how he was saving local girls from dating local men who he claimed were more misogynist or abusive. He enjoyed Korea’s drinking culture without the pressure of a demanding boss, or the demands of having a family, and he spoke with “authority” on the ills of Korean society as though he were an expert and as though his solutions were totally insightful and revolutionary and never thought of by Koreans themselves. He spoke this way while barely being able to understand the language and rarely reading or understanding local media or literature. There was another thing striking about these men. They were usually, at least by Western standards, unattractive. Either they were physically odd looking or their behavior or dress was off putting. These men, my female friends and I used to joke, were known as “losers back home.” In their home countries they were unpopular or outcast, but here they lived in some odd fantasy that they could inhabit because of their unique situations.

Wally is revealed by the narrator to be a gay man who regularly sleeps with young male Indonesians. He is eventually exiled from Indonesia when this is brought to the attention of the government. Indonesia was not any more liberal on gay rights than Australia was during 1965; it was only his place as a wealthy foreigner outside of normal society that gave Wally the freedom to be himself. And his “love” for Indonesia might be pure, but it is also paternal and patronizing. His love of Indonesia does not stop him from paying for sex from much poorer men or for disregarding the voices or philosophies of local people in favor of Western words. Up until the last third of the novel he is immune from the power of the Indonesian military, unlike an average Indonesian person. He doesn’t quite love Indonesia, but really the position of being an expat in a poorer country.

The plot of the novel is fairly thin, and although the novel is billed as a romance, one looking for a great love story won’t find it here—while there certainly are romantic elements, the heart of the novel lives in its long, poetic descriptions of Jakarta, the West Java country-side and the various faces the narrator meets. In many ways, the narrator treats Jakarta, Java, Indonesia, and the political turmoil of 1965 as a surreal painting that he wants his audience to be able to recreate exactly as he sees it in his own mind. The narrator, a fictional version of the author, is a journalist, so it is no wonder that he wants you to see the situation, his stage, his story, exactly in the way that he was struck by it.

One review I read online, written by an Indonesian, claimed that the novel is “racist, sexist, and ableist.” I am not reading this novel as an Indonesian, but as an expat, so my opinion might not be the most authoritative. There are definitely odd choices made by the author that occasionally were cringe-worthy; his description of some Indonesians as looking more Indian or European and therefore more handsome, his obsession with distinguishing between Billy’s Chinese and European faces and expressions, the fact that the lead female character mentions having a career but does little else than get pregnant and beg for her lover’s love when he begins to withdraw from her, and that for the most part, Indonesians are described in strange detail, reminiscent of how one might describe animals you see in the forest. However, one has to keep in mind that just because a narrator says or feels something doesn’t mean that the author supports that opinion. The narrator is an expat trying to understand a society he lives on the outside of, so naturally his descriptions contain his own bias, his own distance. The fact that he doesn’t talk about Jill’s agency and career could be that he has also sexualized her as one of the few Western females he has come in contact with.  

The movie was also banned in Indonesia until about fifteen years ago presumably because of its description of revolutionary violence and critique of aspects of President, revolutionary figure, and national hero, Sukarno.

Mr. President and well-known ladies man. Photo from Wikipedia

 Despite his violence and corruption, he is still a national hero for many Indonesians. I have Indonesian friends that have decorated their Facebook profiles with pictures of him or keep posters of the president on their walls. This sounds odd, but how many American national heroes have hands clean of blood or angelic dispositions?

The novel is not perfect in regards to racism, but it has to be understood in its context. One has to understand that this is written from the perspective of a Western expat in 1965, and I think that the author is aware of many of his narrator’s shortcomings. We aren’t meant to agree with everything the narrator thinks, but we are meant to see that living as an expat can cause the expat to develop a unique form of ‘racism’ (for lack of a better word)—she is overwhelmed and the environment around her gains a weird mysticism for all the things she doesn’t understand while also being comfortably familiar—it becomes like a street cat only partially tamed; you may love it, but you never know when it might bite you. That develops into a dream-like paranoia. You gain a feeling like you are swimming in a society, a reality, instead of just walking through it. The world around you becomes heavy, and her guilt of having more privilege than the people around her, combined with her resentment of being othered and objectified twists the world around her into some kind of amorphous blob that must be categorized, labeled, and dismissed as a defensive mechanism. She must think of herself as different and disconnected to make up for her only partial understanding of the local reality and history. She must battle against this urge to dehumanize those around her and to turn them into caricatures every day.

If I am honest, I remember moments when I was living in Korea where I came up from out of the subway in Seoul, and I saw a sea of Korean faces moving towards me and felt so completely overwhelmed, as though this world around me would eat me up and spit me out in some neon-lit, kimchi-smelling mess. As an expat you often only interact with the surface level of society; your language skills or the way people interact with you (ignoring you, deferring to you, attempting to make you see their country in a certain way, etc), your limited time and your own insecurities prevent you from digging too deeply and you are inundated with the national symbols and mythology of a country and never able to relax totally. It is hard sometimes to fight against our impressions and imaginations enough to acknowledge the diversity of lives and realities that exist in every nation.The fact that Peace Corps makes us live in rural communities, most of which are far from other Westerners, and we are given local style housing and salaries, perhaps gives us a bit more insight than other expats. On the other hand its also more stressful and can lead to bitterness that pushes out new information and tolerance.

I get overwhelmed in Java; at bus terminals, when my language skills fail at what should be a simple task, when I realize my thoughts on something are totally different than everyone else's around me. Sometimes being overwhelmed is exhilarating; when the call to prayer rings out at dusk, and I’m riding my bike through birds and bats whipping around me—society becomes an animal, and I am a prey. Is it a logical way of thinking? No, but living as a foreigner in another country leads to strange psychological tics.

Another reviewer asks why this book couldn’t be written by an Indonesian. It certainly would be a lot different. Should this book exist as is? Is it right that foreigners are writing of the national history of Indonesia and are the ones characterizing it for the rest of the world? Every time I share a blog or a picture of people I meet in Indonesia, am I taking away their right to depict themselves as they want to? To give themselves a voice? But isn’t there also merit in having an outside perspective, even with the shadow of colonialism? I would love to read a book about American society written by an Indonesian living and working there. I would love to know what shocks him and overwhelms him and disturbs him. I would love to see how he mystifies my country or caricatures us. But Americans are powerful enough on the world stage to move out of caricatures. 

Well...maybe not exactly...

Have Indonesians been properly given that chance?

At one point in the novel the Australian reporter is sitting with his Indonesian assistant by the pool. They are both young men in their twenties. The Indonesian compares their skin colors and tells him that his brown is ugly compared to his white. He tries to goad the Australian into agreeing with him, and the Australian tries to unsuccessfully deny this assertion. How many times have I had Indonesians talk to me about my skin? And I never know how to respond. Do I deny it? Do I tell them I think they are beautiful, and that women in my country are obsessed with tans? But doesn’t that erase the racism in my own country? Haven’t whiter Asians been treated better than darker Asians in the US for the most part? Should I ignore it? Is it simply empty words? Am I putting too much weight on this? In America some people are obsessed with having blonde hair or cuter noses or bigger eyes or thigh gaps. Am I imposing my own understanding of racism on people who might not see it that way? When I see a casting call asking for only girls with “white” skin, and I tell an Indonesian that that is wrong, do I have that right? And is it hypocritical from someone who has been privileged for her skin color in her own country? Am I like Wally, deciding how Indonesians should be based on my own “enlightened” philosophies that aren’t relevant here? I don’t know. I never know.

                History will judge me and Peace Corps. There are already so many books about the effectiveness (or ineffectiveness) of Peace Corps and people will continue to write. Maybe years from now, one of my students may write about me and how I helped him or say that I was a good teacher, friend, example—I hope so. Most of my students will probably remember me. I might be the only American they will ever meet. Perhaps to a degree all expats are “losers back home.” We are a little in love with this feeling of only having one foot in society and one foot out of it, and even if we learned that all we were doing was exaggerating imperialism and stereotypes, maybe some of us would still selfishly want to stay and never admit it to ourselves. Maybe. I like to think most of us are better than that. I hope.

                When I lived in Seoul I used to occasionally volunteer with South Korean organizations that promoted human rights investigations, freedom of information, and North Korean refugees. I helped out at a fundraiser one night with another American woman, and a very drunk Spanish man started harassing and screaming at us. “You Americans are always interfering with other people’s business!” He said but with less nice words. “There are so many sick and poor kids in your own country, why are you bothering raising money for North Korean children?” The whole North Korean issue is complicated and for another blog post—I have a lot of thoughts on it—but I can’t say I wasn’t struck by some of what he said. What was I doing helping North Korean children? What am I doing now in Indonesia? Isn’t it true that there are plenty of American children that need my help? But isn’t the idea that you are somehow more responsible for children in your own country a lie of nationalism?

 No doubt there are political and selfish reasons for the things we care about. Part of the reason why I cared about North Korea was because of my fascination with the image of North Korea; the mystique of being privilege to information about one of the most mysterious societies in the world. And part of my interest in helping Indonesian children learn English is simply because I wanted to keep traveling in Asia.

Everyone who joins the Peace Corps or becomes an international journalist has, at some base level, a hero complex. No one can totally divorce their selfishness or imagination from their altruism. I eventually came to this conclusion: there are so many people in this world that never find any issue that moves them or makes them feel passionate. Therefore, if you find something that stirs your imagination and that you can champion with your whole heart, with the caveat that you are prepared to reflect on your actions and are prepared to change your behavior if you’re doing harm, don’t ever throw that passion away. If you have a skill that can help someone, and you are willing to give it, then just do so.

                Even now I am perhaps making a mistake. Does the Western world need to hear more expat voices writing about Indonesia or Asia? Am I overthinking everything, and is my overthinking actually patronizing? If Indonesians are happy to have me in their country and want to learn English because the reality of the world is that, whether or not it’s fair or efficient, English is the most useful language to know, and if they are excited to see me just because I have a different face, then all I can do is accept these facts. Just live, a part of me demands. But that isn’t right either because no human can divorce herself from the weight of history. Live with kindness and the ability to listen. Live with wisdom and conscience. Live knowing you will make a thousand mistakes.

                I want Indonesians to be telling their stories to world, and of course I want to tell my own story. That’s only human. I am only human. Indonesians are only human. And humans have the urge to make others see exactly how they see and understand themselves exactly how they are. But if all your mysteries were really opened up and analyzed, then who would you become? Something of everyone must be left to the realm of the imagination--we must let ourselves move in and out of reality and fairy tale, to be both real and character, to be American and Indonesian and something in between.

                So in the end, all mystifying , all myth-making, isn’t always bad. There is artistry to every country, a magic. And sometimes a pair of outside eyes can capture that beauty and describe with awe, a feeling that only someone new and half in understanding of a place can express. For all of the problematic elements of the novel, Koch’s descriptions and passion makes us see Java as a great, confusing, and powerful thing as he sees it. So I’ll leave you with a little piece of his awe:

“No kingdom on Earth can equal this one, which is the Gate of the World. Its countless islands from the Moluccas to northern Sumatra, balanced in an arc between Asia and Australia, shield it from the storms of the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea. Active volcanoes form its spine and Vishnu, its guardian god…protects it from all harm. Its children are more numerous, its women more beautiful, its soil more fertile; foreigners covet it. And most favored of all is Java. As you fly into Java from Sumatra, over the Sunda straights, the most crowded island on Earth appears mysteriously devoid of human settlement. Indigo cones of volcanoes rise into the clouds from jade territories which seem as empty as those of the world’s dawn. But these are the paddy fields and terraces the people cultivate to the very rims of the craters. President Sukarno, Vishnu’s incarnation, tells us in his speeches that Java’s spirit is the terrible volcano Merapi, which seems to sleep but is always ready to explode in violence.” [147]

“The Jade green of Java is like an hallucination…the slow breeze of the south-east monsoon moved in the coconut palms beside the road, and a sweet-sour mixture of smells reached him: scents of frangipani and jasmine; reek of copra and moist earth. The humid land was like a huge creature stirring to life. Beyond the wet rice paddies and the tea estates rose the deep green cones of terraced hills, and finally the silk-blue cones of the great volcano chain that is Java’s spine. All colors were more intense here, in this land of cones, all smells more insistent…Dignified West Javan peasant women pedaled gracefully, comical yet gravely charming, their Junoesque figures outlined in tight, multicolored kains and kebayas, their hair in gleaming antique buns; goddesses on wheels…

Out here, if you wanted to pretend so, there was no real poverty…” [150].

*This blog uses page numbers from Penguin's 1995 print of The Year of Living Dangerously by Christopher J. Koch