JAMU
July 5th, 2007 by goesonJAMU
The rose blossomed since the sky cried.
That night she found it was hard to sleep as days had passed. She moved, leaving a shrieking in her bed, stepping to the window, taking a smooth touch at the curtain wishing to come with a positive mind of her life. The wind blow and she could smell the sea. It was dark and cold outside as her mind was full of nothing. Never did she feel comfort, nor peaceful. Her entire life seemed so exhausted for the rainy July has left a restless fear and sobs. She grasped in pain, biting her lips and trying to throw the sense away over the gloomy sky. Why didn’t the moving cloud take her anxiety with and drop it in an isolated part of the earth? Why didn’t the raging wave rolled it up and bring it to an unknown space of the coast like it did to her life? She didn’t know why and she was too fatigue to find it out. There she stood straightly until she heard the cock crowing.
The morning passed too quickly for Marni. She fixed herself with a plate of fried rice and salty fish. She sipped a cup of tea in hurry. It was seven o’clock, time to peddle her jamu. She tidied her clothes up; took her jamu basket and tied it up to an old bicycle. She smiled. She is a beautiful figure of a Javanese girl. She often coils her long black hair. With her gentle gestures, she represents what people thought about her tribes; but she accustoms to do everything efficiently. Timidly, she never walks before the elders without permission and smiles. Timidly, she never responses the people’s comments in opposing high tension of tone; she rather likes to keep silent and puts the words in her heart.
The sound of bicycle ringing signed her coming. A woman of thirty’s would stop her. There, two times a week, in front of the faded yellow colored house, she served the woman who worked as a tailor.
Her monotonous motion in pouring jamu regularly accompanied the grumbles of her faithful customer, she wouldn’t about to argue but listen to her emphatically.
“I urge my daughter to work” she said, “She studied…mm…what’s that? Economy, I thought she would build a big company like those strangers. Don’t you see Marni? They have nothing, but they come and live here. I don’t know what they did to our land but I see them buy many things at the big market often, Do you know Marni? It’s our money”, she whispered.
“Marni, won’t you go abroad to make your fortune?” she asked seriously.
I suppose I can.
Marni shook her head slightly.
“I could see the point when you refused Ratmi’s offer to work in Malaysia; you had your own fate with Kartono”.
“but now you should do something else Marni. I’ve known you since you were a baby, I know your mother is in a line with me. Mark my words”, said the woman.
She gazed, naturally, then, the woman knew and would give her some Rupiahs. Marni put it in her wallet, smiled and went away. She knew many people were waiting for her, she hoped.
It was almost sun set when she arrived home. Not once, but often, the women told her to move and find a better life. Still, It never occurred to her to think of leaving the town. She made her decision, to go through a suffering episode of her tangled life. To be like her mother saying, “Nduk, a woman should be strong”, it resounded in her head repeatedly.
A creaking sound regained her consciousness, She was right, if only Kartono made a job at those big companies, he wouldn’t break his promise. They snatched my life away.
These next months should be the time to forget but Marni choose to memorize. She didn’t want to voluntarily loose the modest moments of her mother and her lover.
Yet, time itself would take them away.
The month of grief
She smiled. The weather was fine enough to take a walk along the shore. She waved her hand and called her friends chillingly. Two girls at the same age ran toward her. “Hi, remember friends! We will spend this day altogether before Marni’s wedding next week for tomorrow we cannot play outside”
“Why?” I asked.
“She has to stay home welcoming her wedding.”
“Is it a must Marni?” gently I added “ for what?”
Marni flushed, “Whatever it is, I’m glad to do it”
The day we sat on the rocks besides the beach line. We were in amiable silence for some minutes until Marni spoke out. She talked about her feeling and dream of having a happy family with Kartono, a man who proposed her to be his wife last month. They were neighbors. Kartono was her childhood friend although he was four years older than her. Marni was 15 when she realized that she fall in love with the man. She used to follow her mother to sell jamu, and Kartono was her mother’s customer. Witing tresno jalaran soko kulino.
Marni said she wants to live in a small house near the shore so that she knows when her husband coming. I stared at her. I saw a glimpse of hope in those shiny eyes. So pure and innocent. To live with Kartono, to pass a life as a fisherman’s housewife, was a real life for her.
On a dark afternoon, in a very brief time everything has changed. It needed not more than ten minutes to destroy her dreams. The rain came down hard and the thunder dazzling, painted a frightened flash in the sky. The water came from the sea. People ran in all directions to escape from the raging wave. It was in chaos that the asking-help yells be out of hearing taken along by the rush of tragedy. The five meters water height inevitably crushed the housing completely. None knew what happened, but all knew that one third of the town was wholly devastated.
Marni knelt and whispered trembly “Gusti Allah”.
The night she got insomnia. Again. I wouldn’t let myself cry for the funeral.
There she stood straightly until she heard the cock crowing.
For the victims of Tsunami in Cilacap,
Time would heal
