Friday Night Diversion

While riding my motorcycle to one of the less obstreporous expat hangouts, Jl. Jaksa, I passed a Wayang Golek Performance.

I had never seen one "en vivo" and thought it would be a nice compensation for the "discultural" activities I had in mind for later that evening.

Surprise, surprise. Not only was I to be somewhat entertained by wayang golek (couldn't understand a word), but there were all sort of vendors in the parking lot selling everything from pick-ups to amplify acoustic guitars, t-shirts with wayang kulit patterns (75.000rp ? lain kali aja) , to native remedies for enlarging the penis involving a trilobyte looking critter called a MIMI (still looking for english name).

The seller was showing off his laminated credentials (licensed snake oil salesman :)) and book of newspaper articles and headlines. He quickly flashed a page of a bule with a gigantic "red tree trunk" between his legs. In a country where sex is generally a taboo topic, there sure are a lot of natural potions to make it happen more often and last longer. Perhaps after I've procured a girlfriend/willing victim, I'll be able to sample some of these native treatments and give them a "clinical trial."

The "huh?" moment of the evening was seeing one witch doctor, complete with a necklace of animal teeth, treat one patient with "cupping" using what looked like bull horns. In this picture the patient is sitting on the right with about a dozen bullhorns (?) stuck on his back.