Dealing with Political Correctness (or the Lack Thereof)

I always thought that the “politically correct” phenomenon in America was just plain annoying, and (dare I say it?) just a little bit offensive in its own right. However six months in Indonesia will just about make anybody feel all warm and fuzzy about the whole P.C. trend. (And this is coming from a mac user!) You see, political correctness as a concept doesn't really exist in Indonesia. I remember learning this lesson pretty early on in the game, when back in 2003, my first language teacher thought it would be a great idea to teach us colors by referring to the skin hues of various people around the world. Chinese were “yellow”; American Indians were “red”; etc. The state of shock that this induced in the all-American class was completely inconceivable to our Balinese teacher, who was only annoyed that all of a sudden, his students were rendered mute, unwilling to participate in the “let’s name people’s skin colors” game. To put it even more in perspective, these classes were held at the University of Gadjah Mada (UGM), Yogyakarta, which is always ranked as one of the top three universities in Indonesia.

The thing about it that's most disturbing to me, is that a lack of political correctness means you can get away with saying really racist things and no one will even bat an eye. Personally, I’d rather be annoyed at people being overly careful with their speech, than having to be horrified by overt racism. In Indonesia, most of the racist comments are reserved for the ethnic Chinese. In my mind, I liken the ethnic Chinese situation to what the Jews probably faced in pre-World War II Europe. Ethnic Chinese are the embodiment of all the worst personal qualities: uncharitable, exclusivist, opulent. At the same time the ethnic Chinese, as successful businesspersons, are thought to own a disproportionate distribution of the countries wealth. Moreover, they are subject to all sorts of discriminatory legislation on the basis of their ethnic origins.

The other most hated groups of people are communists, mostly because Indonesians have been indoctrinated to hate communists from the former regime’s anti-Communist stance. I think it also has something to do with the Marxian understanding of Communists as atheists, something that is not only inconceivable (How can someone not believe in God?), but unpatriotic. The Indonesian constitution requires the belief in one supreme God. Your religion (which can either be: Islam, Christian, Catholic, Hindu, or Buddhist) is even noted on your driver’s license. Hey, I'm just highly entertained to find out that in Indonesia, Catholics aren't really Christian. :)

Curiously enough, one man did rant to me about hating the Jews, something that I still find puzzling, since he himself to this day, has never met a Jewish person. Judaism is not even one of the five permissible monotheistic religions according to Indonesian law. It legally doesn't exist. Actually, what he told me was: “Indonesians don’t hate Americans. When they say they hate Americans, they’re really saying that they hate the Jews. If you’re not a Jew, then there’s no problem.” Now, I understand this kind of comment to be attributable to Indonesia’s support for Palestine as a display of Islamic solidarity, and therefore a criticism of the U.S.’s foreign policy and apparently unwavering support for Israel. I’m quite sure that if this guy ever met an American Jew, he would probably backpedal and say, “Oh, its not the Jews that we don’t like, but the American government.” However, it is more disturbing in light of Indonesia’s search for a charismatic leader, which commonly leads to the idolizing of Hitler as a powerful leader. You would not believe how many times I've seen pictures of Hitler as coffeehouse art, the sides of buildings, etc. But, Hitler-idolatry, my friends, is a whole other story, for another day.

Tango in Singapore, the Review

(Warning: this is a topic of considerable interest to me, and therefore is pretty darn long!)

I must say that for a thriving metropolis, I was pretty disappointed with the tango scene in Singapore. Not to say that I didn’t enjoy myself or meet cool people. Although I certainly didn’t have that special dance with anyone, the one that fills you with perfect contentment and sends you home warm and fuzzy no matter what else had happened that evening. Trust me: tango dancers reading this will understand.

I tango-danced a total of three nights: Saturday, Tuesday, and Friday. Each time, I was the only “newbie” to the scene, and not a single person came up and introduced him or herself to me or asked me to dance. Note: this would not normally be a crime in another type of dance venue, but to me, this is one of the main indications of how friendly a tango community is. Argentine tango outside of Buenos Aires is often freakishly small, and can sometimes be described of as “cultish”. However, this means that when a new person arrives on the scene, they immediately stand out as someone “different.” Not a bad kind of different, but just someone of interest. When the seasoned tango dancer sees one of these new people, the first thought in their minds might be, “however did this new person hear about us; we must find out everything we can about this kindred spirit in our midst.” However, such was not my experience in Singapore. My presence did not so much as garner a hello from anybody.

Luckily, I am not the kind of person who sits in the corner and mopes by myself, especially if I had to pay $20 just to get in the door—a ridiculously expensive sum to do anything in Southeast Asia. So, first I worked my way through the ladies table. I introduced myself, chatted a bit, and generally tried to get a feel for what tango was like in this part of the world. Now this night, there were more ladies than men. Apparently, the night before, there were more men than women…go figure. So I had a lot of time to check out the dancers. I think I saw every one of my pet peeves (beginning with the aforementioned lack of friendliness.)

For example, one man went up to each of the female dancers at my table with outstretched hand, just saying “Next!” with not-so much as idle chitchat, or a “how are you?” Now, for all you aspiring tango males out there, this is really annoying. Instead of being a social experience, the dance has been relegated to a charity case for female dancers. No thank you, I’m not that desperate. And the worst part was, that he never finished a tanda (the traditional set of 3-4 dances) with any of these women. Instead he displayed another example of poor tango etiquette, which is to walk away, leaving his partner stranded and feeling abandoned on the dance floor. Note#2 to aspiring male dancers: Walk off the floor with your partner. This is no buffet, where you can try one thing, decided you don’t like it, and leave it for someone else to clear away. Manners, people!

However, at least he was circulating dancers. The other male dancers stuck to their partners like glue, never moving one step beyond their comfort zone.

Now we get to the sixth pet peeve of the evening: women dancers who just sit there, waiting to be asked to dance. Not a single woman could lead, so, because it was a female-heavy evening, most of them sat dourly on the sidelines, looking bored. Note to women in this situation: Practice your leading…it’s not like there ain’t room! Especially in this particular dance space, which had a whole separate dance area just for practicing. Or get over there and just practice walking by yourself. At the very least, chitchat; be merry; eat the food; enjoy yourself! I practiced leading with some of the ladies, and it was probably the only moment of happy silliness the whole evening. Tango doesn’t have to be super-serious. It can be fun.

I finally scored a dance, when I forced one of the female dancers to introduce me to somebody, anybody… Now, while he quickly repeated pet peeves #2 and 3 (looking bored without so much as a hi, how are you?” and not finishing the tanda) he did walk me off the dance floor, where he proceeded directly to pet-peeve #7: “Criticizing your Dance Partner.” Granted, he only told me that I needed to relax my body but: a) I don’t recall criticizing him when he knocked me off my axis as he barreled through the steps) b) no offense mister, but you are not my teacher and I didn’t come to you for a lesson, so chill and enjoy what is meant to be a purely social dance, and c) if you don’t even finish the tanda, how do you ever get to the point of knowing another person’s dance style to the point where you can relax and enjoy the dance? Usually, my favorite dance is the second or third, after we’ve gotten acclimated to the way the other person moves and the bodies start working together.

Pet Peeve #8: A guy who repeats the same move three or more times, cuz the girl didn’t “do it right” the first time. Now listen guys, if this happens to you, chances are you led something wrong in the first place, or the lady has never done that before and she’s feeling a bit confused. Don’t make her feel stupid too, by repeating the step again and again until she “gets it right.” Bad, bad etiquette! Luckily this didn’t happen to me; I just witnessed it with some other poor misfortunates.

All those pet peeves aside, once I decided to brazenly talk to the “taken” boys, (those who obviously had set partners) we broke the dating barriers and had a merry time. We even went out for an early morning breakfast and I was offered a ride home.

So, moral of the story: if you are a tango dancer, avoid the top eight pet peeves of all time (or of me, in any case!), get to know the newbies, and help make the world a smaller place.

Overall score of the Singapore tango scene: C-
Tango dancers are very knowledgeable about the dance, but don’t adhere to standard etiquette practices, of which they claim to be aware. Music is ok, a varied mix of traditional, movie music, and Nuevo tango stuff. Dancers are friendly once you get to know them, but don’t expect anyone to go out of their way to make you feel welcome. Tips: Introduce yourself to a guy named Zee. He will put you in touch with tango dancers all over Southeast Asia, including...(gasp)...Indonesia!