Frightened for Nothing

by Diah Lutfiani (Indonesia)

I didn't expect to find Indonesia

I liked to travel, my motto when travelling is “much effort, much experience, and less spending”. One of the farthest and memorable travelling that I did when I went to Nuse Island, Rote, East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. At that time, I was lucky to be chosen in an expedition program which its objective is to community dedication. Nuse Island is the southern end of Indonesia. It is one of the parts of the Rote Island which is famous for their beautiful surfing beach called Nemberala. I was so excited and trying to search for every information about Nuse Island on internet, everything about their profile, culture, demographic, and issues. But it was difficult to find any information about Nuse on internet, it lead me to Rote instead. Due to that problem, I tried asking to people who had been there. “In Nuse island the ladies like to gossip about newcomers with Nuse language” said one informant. “They feed their six-month babies with coffee.” I was so shocked, their culture could not be that different? I mean we’re still in the same country. I came from Java whom people always associated with the words calm, polite and humble. Many Javanese view on east part of Indonesian are rude and shortsighted. It could be because the lack of education and access to better facilities. “I gave them counseling to Nuse people once but they ignored me and leave” the informant continued. I became to hesitate whether the expedition could run smoothly. In july 31st we started our expedition in Tanjung Perak Harbor, Surabaya. It takes five days from Surabaya to Kupang. There was no signal on the ship, therefore I tried to talk with the passengers during the trip. “You’re going to Rote? You need to be careful with their food and drink.” said one of the passengers. An old man also said, “Be careful with their witchcraft!” I became more frightened as I listened to their answer, my opinion on Nuse Island were getting worse?. More thoughts appeared such as; is it safe there? ; will I be okay? ; how can I socialized with them after listening to horrible answer? by the time we arrived in Kupang we were not allowed to continue our trip to Rote. The weather was bad. I was tired cause my mind keep wondering everywhere, bad weather, the delay and also our fourteen boxes to bring. Even when we arrived in Rote we had to wait for eight hours before we got to across. At 11pm we get to cross the sea to Nuse Island. I felt cold, tired and my outfit got wet. It was a stressful day for me and maybe for all of us. When we arrived in Nuse the locals greet us excitedly, but they looked like shouting at us. Is it because they’re eastern? They helped us bring our boxes while chatting with us along the way. They spoke with high tones which made them kinda look angry to me. They would smile at us but somehow it looked like perverted smile. It was dark when we walked to the village, even with flashlight. I was positive that nobody knows which way we walked to. Shortly after we reached Mr. Thomas’s house, we were told to put our belongings on his terrace. He then escorted us to village chief’s house which is the brightest among another houses. He served us a tray full of drinks and snacks. But I could see nobody wanted that. I’m sure they’re still afraid of what they heard on the ship earlier but I know that it’s not polite to decline the host kindness. Maybe I should be the first one then they would follow me, so reluctantly I tried the tea and food. The village chief noticed our hesitation over the drinks and food, he then said to us “don’t worry the drinks and food are halal”. Afterwards, we tried not to think about the conversation we had before and tried to think positively about Nuse people. As long as we treat like what we would like them to treat us, which is polite and friendly, I’m sure they will treat us like that too.