any foreigner who has dealt with a government ministry in Indonesia, with offices maintained an atmosphere of 1960s clatter of typewriters and swinging ceiling fans well into the next century, knows how frustrating red tape can be.
Extending a tourist visa on arrival, for example, can take three consecutive daily trudges to the immigration office closest to your hotel (often miles) - first to show your passport and the forms and pay the fee, and finally collect the passport. Your trip to Krakatau will have to wait. And this extra month is only available if you can concoct an Indonesian citizen to sponsor you and countersign the application form.
Therefew years, my Australian friend Matthew, a longtime expatriate married to an Indonesian, had a motive to reflect on the daunting operation of the Immigration Department then locked in a cell in the east Java.
His troubles began when he went to an immigration office to collect first Indonesian passport of his young daughter. After being handed the document Matthew fortunately or may not reflect the results-has given details of a recovery to go deep to ensure they were correct. Now Matthew has two chic name. We'll call Matthew Willis Constantine.
He spotted an error immediately. And it was not minor. Because some Indonesians, especially North Sumatra Batak, have plenty of long names that some Westerners also find it difficult to copy as the chemical compound names, we can assume that the passport issuers have managed to print 'Willis Constantine . "But properly the hyphen had thrown them on the passport data page of his daughter was printed the" FIRST NAME:. Willis NAME: Constantine chopped and changed,
disbelief. Matthew error on the clerk, who carefully read the name. the man considered the implications and said the mix-up to be harmless and passport remains valid.
Matthew pleaded with other officials in the room to do something about the error, even offering to pay for the passport re-issued correctly. But officials have remained indifferent to the bridge restored union.
" We can change spelling as passport expires in five years, "said one of them. Matthew envisions a future where her daughter is doomed to always check the 'Yes' to the question on incoming passenger card asking "Have you ever used a passport under a different name to enter Singapore? He explained this concern for officials. They tried to open the way to the door. He continued to apply for a new passport.
The wall of the intractable bureaucracy that Matthew was beating his head against finally proved too much.
He raised the passport over his head for all to see in the office and began to tear it to pieces.
What happened next was like a scene in a cartoon Hanna-Barbera, where a crowd of police jumps on a victim and surrounding, guns pointing down arm's length to the figure now prone. Judging by the way all the official valid in the room had dropped a flash everything they did and, in some cases, by jumping into an office, accelerated through the floor to apprehend Matthew, you would have thought that it produced a bomb in his bag. Metaphorically he had.
I once saw a stranger upset to be manhandled by an angry mob outside a money changer Jakarta. He had a torn Indonesian bank note, an action considered a colossal act of disrespect for national symbols shown on it.
But what Matthew had done was much worse. Right there, in the sanctuary of the Indonesian immigration in a room anointed by the presence of presidential and vice presidential portraits gilded frames, in a country where national pride is a sensitive issue - it was as good as light game the flag nation and trampled on it.
An Indonesian prison is a claustrophobic microcosm of all the worst in society and the establishment, and it starts at the door. Before entering the building, visitors must sign a document that states in bright red lettering (as you stand in the great anti-corruption posters on the wall.); THERE ARE NO FEES PAYABLE FOR VISIT THIS
In reality, the fees start as soon as you cross the threshold. You must pay the lackey of a privileged prisoner who performs work of the guards search the prisoner from his cell. You must also pay for each 15 minutes of visiting time in a crowded room. A supplement you will get a private room, maybe even the governor's office.
Regarding the prisoners themselves, who do not have a financial lifeline to the outside, are forced to live on what would barely keep a dog to show his chest. Need to visit a hospital? You will have to pay the bill for your transportation and armed escort.
Matthew was lucky. It was not placed in a regular prison, but in an immigration detention center, where he was to spend nine days. Here, the regime was less severe and less austere cells. There was a bed A window. A curtain. Chicken bones for lunch had meat on them. In fact, according to Matthew the place was more comfortable than its usual housing in Jalan Jaksa alley.
Eventually, he was taken before a senior immigration officer, who invited him to sit in front of his office. With this meeting having the feeling of a parole hearing, Matthew put on thick, explaining that contrite Western surnames, especially those who boasted of traits union battles-are sacred things of honor that kings and queens over the centuries had fought over. To break such a composite name as the passport had been tantamount to slamming the former half lancet family ceremony. And so on.
The officer nodded sympathetically throughout, despite the badge on his chest bearing the simple name 'Budi'. But when, at the end of the speech, he shrugged, Matthew guess he was taking too slight error that his subordinates had. However, the officer informed him that the correction of the name on the passport of his daughter, no doubt, was a simple matter. So why the great anger?