I have completed about six weeks of my first semester as a teacher. I am taking extra strides to get to know my students so that they feel comfortable around me. Many students refrain from participating in classroom activities because they are still too shy. In order to get more face time with them, I sit at a desk outside of the teacher’s office so that I can engage the students when they walk by. When I see a group of students sitting in their classroom, which is often, I step into the room to ask questions and joke around with them. Still, there seems to be a fairly tall barrier of discomfort between us. Fortunately, the month of August brought several holidays that provided me with ample opportunities to bond with my students. Those opportunities proved to be drastically different than what I would have ever imagined. I certainly have experienced a boatload of “wow” moments during these last two weeks. Coincidentally, making the effort to bond with my students also required me to draw additional attention to myself. That’s not something I was excited to do, but if it drew the students closer to me then I think it was necessary to do. Indonesia’s Independence Day was August 17th, which fell on a Thursday this year. I had the day off from school, but there weren’t too many celebrations going around in my village. I love celebrating America’s Independence Day so I was rather disappointed with the lackluster events that took place that Thursday. Fortunately, everyone was saving their time and energy for Karnaval, which is the parade that took place the following Tuesday, August 22nd. The parade is made up entirely of the schools in the area. Each school spends an enormous amount of money on extravagant costumes, floats, and other decorations for the kids. Mas Wendi told me that, essentially, this parade is an opportunity for each school to show off to the community; it is more promotional than patriotic. That is why I wasn’t surprised when the administration asked me to participate in the parade. They wanted to show off their native English speaker to the local community. I was originally planning on joining in on the fun so I happily obliged. Students were often pulled out of classes during different times of the day for almost two weeks before the day of the parade. Teachers wanted students to practice their various marches, dances, or skits. Many students spent school time building their floats. I found it extremely frustrating when half of my class had to get up and leave only forty-five minutes into my lesson. It reminds me of a time in high school when students had to get their pictures taken for prom court. It took us close to two school periods to complete. Some of the teachers weren’t happy because we could have completed the task within twenty minutes. It’s funny to be in the teacher’s shoes now. As a student, I didn’t mind missing two periods of class time. As a teacher, it drove me crazy that my students were missing class to practice a dance (not even to take pictures)! I arrived at school that Tuesday morning to find hundreds of students chaotically roaming around the courtyard, walking in and out of classrooms, offices, and bathrooms. Many of them wore elaborate costumes and very detailed makeup. There were students dressed in traditional clothes from every single one of Indonesia’s provinces (there are 34). There were floats and performances for every school club: dance, music, band, art, etc. I was impressed with the pageantry. Then I remembered the previous two weeks—students in and out of class—and stubbornly reminded myself that all of those absences better have been for something impressive. Teachers used their cars to shuttle students from school to the beginning of the parade route, which was a couple miles away. The cars made several return trips to pick up more students. Then finally, when there were no more students to collect, teachers attached the floats, trailers, and generators, to the back of their cars. I got a ride in the last carpool, and headed to the parade’s starting point to join my students and fellow teachers. The car parked in a field full of students dressed as Javanese royalty, Apache Indians (I still have not figured out how that relates to Indonesia’s Independence day), pop-stars, mechanics, accountants, and soccer players. At this point, all of the decorations and floats had reached the field. It wasn’t just our school at the field, but all the other area schools too. I walked around the field with some of my students to check out the other schools’ decorations. I agreed with my students that some of the other schools’ decorations and floats were cool, but nobody came close to ours. I admired the floats from different schools with an unparalleled level of bias towards my own school. We were the best, no doubt! Why did I insist on labeling my school as the “best”? I thought about how I usually view many matters in my life with a high level of subjectivity: Logan High School was always miles better than Central; my Spanish camp was superior to any of the other language camps; no football team has ever, and will ever, come close to the Packers; no school can measure up to the awesomeness that is the University of Wisconsin-Madison; Wisconsin’s supremacy can’t be matched by any other state; and I’m positive that Peace Corps Indonesia is the organization’s best country program. I remember reflecting in an earlier blog post—after I visited my permanent site for the first time—that I was placed in the perfect site. I implied that nobody received a site as great as mine; that my site was, in fact, the “best”. What causes me to constantly uphold these predetermined notions of superiority? I’m sure that many of my closest friends and family ask themselves the same question about me. Is it an innate sense of competitiveness? An intrinsic arrogance? Maybe unyielding ignorance? Perhaps too much pride? There’s nothing at stake in this parade. Even if there was a competition for “the best” school, does it matter if my school wins? I laughed at myself and continued walking around the field. The long walk would provide ample time for me to internalize those questions. But in all honestly, our school’s floats were the best! Despite all of the impressive displays, students still gravitated towards me for pictures. I was impressed with my students’ discipline, refraining to take many pictures with me. It was the students from other schools that had never seen me before, and thus insisted on taking pictures with me. I appreciated my students’ restraint; but if I was going to take a million pictures with anyone, then it would be with my students (the “best” students)! The parade began, and the students all joined their groups so that everyone could leave the field and enter the parade route in order. I chose to begin my walk alongside a group of students who were reenacting the Indonesian people’s fight for Independence. The cast included peasants, soldiers, generals, and Dutch colonists (Indonesia gained Independence from the Netherlands in 1945). Every twenty minutes or so, the group of students stopped and reenacted key battles for Independence. Their acting was questionable, but it proved to me thoroughly entertaining. Halfway through the march I made my way to join the music club. Mas Wendi, my English teacher Counterpart (CP), also teaches music at our school. I danced with his students for the remainder of the parade. We walked behind a truck that carried a tower of speakers that blasted Dangdut, which is a popular type of Indonesian music. My dance moves attracted lots of cameras, but I didn’t care. I wouldn’t have agreed to walk in a parade if I was trying to avoid strangers taking photos. I was surprised to hear the Dangdut version of Despacito. It seems that no corner of the earth is exempt from the Despacito craze! I had fun joking with students and teachers along the parade route. I saw many teachers viewing the parade from the roadside. Just like other members of the community, those teachers asked me to stop and take pictures. They also insisted that I eat lunch, but I reminded them that I was walking in a parade and didn’t have time to sit and eat with them. The holiday Idul Adha fell on a Friday, September 1st, which meant Thursday was my last day of classes for the week. Judging by my previous meetings, I expected the last class that day to really make me work for the holiday. The boys in my Motorcycle Mechanics class were surprisingly attentive. I don’t know if the lesson topic “Giving Congratulations” was particularly interesting to them, or if they are beginning to enjoy my presence in the classroom. Regardless, I was happy with their performance that day. Even though they don’t remain seated at their own desk (breaking class rule #4), I let it slide because I was so impressed that they all continued working on their greeting cards. I left school that Thursday much happier than previous weeks. The morning of Idul Adha began just like Idul Fitri: I woke up to a 4am alarm clock, dressed in traditional Indonesian garb, and was ready to leave the house by five (as requested by my family). Another aspect eerily similar to the morning of Idul Fitri was that my family did not even wake up until a little after five, and weren’t ready to leave the house until 6am. I killed time reading a book while they all got ready for our walk to the nearby mosque. Once we were dressed to impress and had our baskets of rice to contribute to the potluck, we embarked on our short journey through the neighbors’ yards until we arrived at our final destination. I followed Pak Djito into the front chamber of the mosque and sat down next to him in the back row of men. This made me easily visible to the women’s chamber behind us. The murmuring subsided once Sholat began. I sat cross-legged on the floor and watched the men in front of me proceed with their service. Some of the young kids hung on their dads’ backs while they sat on the floor, and then reached for their legs when their fathers had to stand up. I don’t know if they usually hold on so tightly during Sholat, or if they did that morning because I was there. Despite the little ones’ lingering shyness towards me, the rest of the service went rather smoothly. Pak Lani (the mosque’s Imam) did not call me to the front afterwards. I detected an unfamiliar, yet very welcomed, sense of normalcy throughout Sholat and during the meal that was served afterwards. I appreciated that. Idul Adha is the Muslim holiday that celebrates the willingness of Ibrahim to sacrifice his son Ishmael for God, and praises God's mercy of sparing Ishmael. There is a similar Judeo-Christian tradition, but Ibrahim is pronounced Abraham and the son he is willing to sacrifice is Isaac, not Ishmael. The story in Islam, however, ends the same way. God saves Ishmael (the son), asking Ibrhahim (the father) to sacrifice a nearby goat instead. This is why Muslims celebrate Idul Adha by sacrificing goats and cows in Indonesia. The meat of the sacrifice is evenly distributed to members of the community, ensuring that the less fortunate get their share too. The mosque intended to sacrifice eight goats that morning. Pak Lani planned on killing four of them outside behind the mosque. I knew that I would participate in another sacrifice ceremony on Sunday with students at my school so I did not take pictures that morning. I took mental photos and soaked in the experience. I will go into more detail about the sacrificial procedures later on in this post. Sholat concluded, our bellies were full from the potluck, and the goats were sacrificed. After a particularly eventful morning, the remainder of the day was low-key. I took a nap in my hammock, continued reading my book, and called a friend or two. Sunday was the day of Idul Adha celebrations at my school. OSIS students at my school invited me to participate in their special Idul Adha ceremonies. While my family’s mosque sacrificed goats for the holiday, my school planned on sacrificing a full-grown cow! I was also flattered that the students wanted to include me in the festivities. I arrived at school right at 7am. While I suspected that arriving on time meant I was arriving fairly early, that turned out not to be the case. I parked my bike and walked over to the crowd of students. I knew what the commotion was; it was the reason we were all at school that Sunday morning. Everyone was admiring the day’s sacrifice—a big, brown cow. NOTE: I have a video and several photos to accompany the following story. The video only shows twenty seconds of the prayer that preceded the sacrifice. The video does NOT show any gory, stomach-wrenching details. I watched a group of four men strategically rope the cow’s legs together. The cow resisted, kicking its hind legs and bucking its head. After a great deal of struggle, the men pulled the cow close to three trees that stood right next to a drainage gutter. They used ropes to tie the cow’s head to the tree on the furthest end of the row, and the cow’s hind legs to the tree on the other end. The middle tree stood right at the cow’s belly. Two of the men craftily used another rope to swipe the cow’s feet out from underneath itself. The cow flung onto its side and landed with a loud thud. The men tied the rope around the cow’s head very tight to the tree. They also tied the front hooves to its tail; that prevented it from kicking. The rope that pulled the front hooves to the tail did so that the cow was almost hugging the middle tree. It also forced the cow’s neck to extend. The cow was gasping heavily, and I could smell its breath. The cow was finally in place. A long, bamboo pole was placed in the cow’s head harness. An additional person stepped on the pole, forcing the cow’s head to turn to the left and exposing the throat. A religion teacher at the school lead a traditional Muslim prayer before another man slit the cow’s throat with a knife. Two men held down the cow’s legs, another remained standing on the bamboo pole, and the fourth man held the knife. It takes quite a team effort to conduct a proper sacrifice! The man with the knife started to saw away at the cow’s throat and blood started to pour. Now I understand why they conduct the sacrifice next to the gutter! It makes cleaning up much easier. The viewing party watched for a few minutes until the twitches subsided and the cow was completely dead. Now it was time for the real work to begin. One man tied the front top leg of the cow to a new rope. Another person did the same with the top hind leg. Together, they pulled the legs and tied the rope to the tires of a truck parked parallel to the cow’s body. This caused the cow’s body to rotate onto its back with all four legs spread apart. With each individual leg attached to its own rope and anchor, the cow was ready to be skinned. The four men took to a different leg and started cutting at the cow’s hide. I watched in awe with little kids as the butchers went to town. I was impressed with the kids’ nonchalance of the whole scene. Clearly, they have been there, done that. Once the cow was cut up, people transferred the meat over to an area of tarps that were laid across the ground. Many students and teachers took the pieces of the animal and cut them into smaller parts. Some of the students awaited the animal parts with cleavers and chopping blocks. I took a knife and worked on the hind leg with Mas Rusdyanta, a fellow English teacher. I had no clue what I was doing, and I was far too mesmerized by the production that was going on around me. Everyone had a specific task. There were so many moving parts, but the process went incredibly smooth. The warmth of the meat surprised me; it was almost too hot for me to hold and cut. The temperature reminded me that I had seen the cow standing up and breathing less than fifteen minutes prior. These students were pros. Within twenty minutes of beginning, the body was nothing but a carcass. I followed instructions from the students on where to cut the meat, and where to place it on the tarp once it was removed from the bone. They all laughed at me when they noticed I was using the dull end of the knife to cut the meat. One of the students held the cow’s eye in his hand and put it close to others’ faces to scare them. The teachers sitting next to me had the ribcage and used cleavers to cut the ribs apart. The splatter from the whacks landed on the side of my face. I made a note to not sit near the men with cleavers next year. One teacher was assigned the task of balancing the cuts of meat on a scale and placing the appropriate quantities into small plastic bags. Once the meat was all cut up in equal proportions and placed in small plastic bags, everyone returned home. Everyone involved in the sacrificial ceremony went home with an equal amount of meat. One of the teachers handed me a bag that had a note reading “Mr. Edison” stapled to the front (Another note: make sure everyone knows how to spell my name correctly). When I returned to my bike, I passed the spot where the cow originally laid. The cow was on the ground, right in front of me, less than one hour ago. Now, I carried the cow in my left hand in a plastic bag. Despite the cow’s misfortunes, I certainly had an exciting Sunday morning! I biked home from the Idul Adha sacrifice, carrying my bag of beef. I thought to myself, “That was the best moment I’ve had so far in Indonesia.” Once again, that superlative entered my mind. Similar to when I marched in the parade with the “best” school, I just also marked my “best” experience as a Peace Corps Volunteer. Why do I label everything as the “best”? I don’t feel that I am locked in this competition with my fellow Peace Corps Volunteers for “best sacrificial ceremony.” I never entered a contest with someone to decide the “best” state in the USA. I think that the reason I do label things as the “best” is because it gets me excited. My Spanish summer camp was pretty awesome; but I couldn’t stop thinking about it during the school year because I was convinced that it was the “best.” I think that the mindset ignites a lively passion, and gets me emotionally invested in whatever path I am heading down at that time. I don’t find it very appealing to be a little excited about something that is kind of cool; and I don’t find it worth my time to be slightly sad about something that is kind of a bummer. I’m all in, or all I’m all out. Maybe those superlatives that enter my mind—the “best” and the “worst”—are what trigger my emotions. I am so mentally and emotionally invested that I end up on far ends of the spectrum. Whether I am on the positive or negative end, I think that my passion persists. While I usually analyze events with a heightened sense of subjectivity, it’s equally important to have the ability to look upon situations with impartiality—free of emotional bias. But I think that objectivity is important for slightly more serious situations. When it comes to my favorite football team, home state, or Peace Corps program, I think I’ll continue continue to think in positive superlatives. That's the best idea I can come up with! Shouts-Outs: SO to the PCV who sent me a letter from his site. It reminded me that mail doesn’t have to come all the way from the USA. ESO for your impeccable stationary! HSO to all of the students and teachers who walked in the Karnaval parade. It was hot that day! SO to my fellow PCV for wearing matching batik with me during our Safety and Security meetings in Jakarta. SO to the Wisconsin Badgers football team for winning their season opener. HSO to a certain PCV and fellow UW-Madison alum for following the college football season with me. On Wisconsin! HMFSO to my Pre-Service Training host family for wearing their Wisconsin shirts. They certainly know the way to my heart :)
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