, and haven't gotten around to actually trying to edit it until today... real smart choice, me. real smart choice. if anyone has quick feedback on this, that would be awesome! i really need tips on how the story flows and if there's enough discovery in it. thank you so much xxxx
note: i change from first person to second person a looooot. comes from my own stream of consciousness and how my thoughts are presented in my mind. it's really weird and i don't know if it works
creative - not edited at all
If anything, I didn’t learn a thing in Year 10 Geography. Except for this one concept that keeps coming back to me. Urban decline.
Google says it’s ‘the deterioration of the inner city, most of the time, seen in buildings.’
I say it’s something I’ll never need to know again. But for some weird and wonderful reason, it’s always there.
You know when someone brings up memories of the *before*? When everything was simpler? For me, it’s that god-awful geography excursion to the local area to examine places of urban decline.
-----
[a little unsure if this bit fits in with the story flow-wise]
“Oh my goodness gracious WILL YOU JUST SHUT UP?”
Something like that is a common occurrence in a huge household. I swear, there’s no privacy here. People are constantly walking around, checking what you’re doing when all you want to do is sit in the corner and do your work. Or watch a TV show. Or read a book. Really, you just want to be alone.
Then comes the idea of going back to The Motherland. Indonesia.
Deep down, I was pretty excited. I get to see the cousins and the family I haven’t seen in three years. I get to go to a new country. Awesome!
-----
My giddiness about taking a break extended until I got off the plane at Jakarta. (Awkward phrasing here?)
Crisp, dry air from home was replaced with dense air, constantly thickening, forming another layer on my skin. Not even the numerous air conditioners in the airport could remove the sticky feeling.
Outside, pollution blanketed the almost non-existent blue sky. Weirdly enough, the dreariness didn’t seem to bother anyone. Yells were coming left, right and centre, from people wishing to help with placing luggage in cars.
Smarttraveller.com.au told me to ‘travel with caution’ in this country, and to appeal to surroundings at all times.
Was there reason to let these people help?
Nah, my subconscious said, who knows they’d want to steal your stuff?
-----
Driving through Jakarta streets was strangely nostalgic, because out of nowhere, ‘urban decline’ came back to haunt me. And that boring excursion.
I really didn't know what I was expecting to see on that excursion – ruins? The Parthenon, or Colosseum? It was just the local area, anyway, why would there be anything different to what I'd seen before? I went to school in that same area everyday. I went to netball training just up the road.
The teacher tour guide turned into a path that I hadn't noticed before. As we kept walking, it gradually began to heat up, with more people checking their phones for the weather. Then, the grand announcement came.
"This, girls, is urban decline."
Apparently, urban decline was buildings that were still standing, where across the back of these buildings was black, slowly creeping around the edges of said buildings; evidently some sort of decay. Brick buildings weren’t exactly red, but washed out.
Urban decay?
Nothing but a concept. Just buildings that had seen better days.
----
Metal squares, arranged into something far from stable, was considered a house. Fragile wooden structures, covered by flimsy plastic, which could easily fly away? That could be a restaurant. Everything contradicted Australia, and I didn’t like it.
And finally, the home stretch. Bendungan Jago was a walk through a mismatched puzzle. Small houses, big houses. Shops. Balconies without a barrier or a ledge. Cars were scarce, and instead, the street was filled with motorcycles, wedging between small gaps.
We were slowly approaching what was going to be my home for a fortnight. Although I had been to the house before, it was still a sight to see. It towered over me, looming over the street, balconies opening far and wide. As the only building with a stable structure, it stood out against the rest of the street. If the exterior was grand, the interior could be called urban decline. Paint was chipping off the walls, and taking a closer look, everything could use a good scrub.
A flurry of noise came tumbling down the stairs.
"Helloooooo! You're so tall now!"
"How are you?"
"Have you been studying well?"
Voices blended in together, asking about the flight, general life since leaving Indonesia last, and if we were hungry.
This family home was so full of life, with voices bouncing off the walls, late into the night. When would peace come?
----
Showers don't usually turn cold in Australia. If it turns cold, you get out of the shower, and you wait until the gas turns on again.
When you're in someone's house in Indonesia, people don't have what one would call a 'regular shower.' Assuming there's (clean) running water, which goes into a huge container thing. Then the water goes into a smaller bucket, which you then pour over yourself. At best, this method of 'showering' was inconvenient, but there was an issue with this - you had to have the water keep running so the bucket didn't get too empty, because waiting for the bucket to refill took time and effort.
Then one day, the water stopped running.
Everyone had to use a substitute tap, and the water took even longer to get out. What I didn't know that was here, water was sourced from the ground, and the passing of a couple of decades could mean that there would be a total shortage of water. There was the possibility of the ground shrinking as the water was drawn out, but the specifics were lost on me by that point.
The idea of no water pushed itself into my thoughts for days.
-----
"What is that?" someone asked, pointing to the absurdly thin stream of water that followed the footpath.
A quick google later, and we found out that was Wolli Creek. Framing of this tiny creek seemed like a shrine for water. Didn't everyone have running water in their home though?
We kept walking, and a graffitied tunnel was the next attraction. Not going to lie, it seemed dodgy. Why exactly would someone want a mural like this? But even though it was graffiti, it was carefully organised, to show some coherence. There were no obvious efforts to hide it.
-----
Tourist spots were carefully groomed to show the best version of Indonesia. Two places that stood out to me were Lembang and Monas.
Lembang was a small town about 2-3 hours from Jakarta. I had never been outside Jakarta, except for a couple of places on another island within my many trips to Indonesia. This was the first time in a while I was going on a road trip, which was exciting. Any bright, positive thoughts went out the window upon arrival at the accommodation.
It looked, felt, and smelt like absolute crap. Nothing was clean, there was barely any electricity. Leaking taps... the list went on.
For the huge family that has come, it was a downer, with most of us having to sleep in the living room to avoid the scattered mould in one bedroom. Despite the disappointing situation, Unity in the family was clear – they were all happily walking around, making the best of what was there. The complaints were being held back but at that time being together was more important.
Monas, on the other hand, was a small tower, with a couple of hectares with the garden surrounding this tower. The inside had several levels one of which was a dioramic timeline, showing the history of Indonesia. Another levelled showed the various stages of achieving independence.
The next thing I can remember is how the lift took so damn long to pick us up for the lookout on level two.
"Ce (big sister), look outside!" my sister exclaimed.
I ran out to the barrier, quickly snapping a photo.
-----
It wasn't until post-Indonesia depression, I realised. Urban decline had crept up on me again, in the form of my laptop wallpaper.
Independence was a huge deal in Indonesia. But it was right in front of me from level two of Monas. Two clearly different sections of the city. The foreground showed nearly build high-rise buildings neatly arranged, with fresh trees between gaps, separating each building. There was a fine line between the set of buildings in the background, we are very stages of half collapse buildings blended into each other shaded by the dreary clouds disappearing into the horizon.
The equator, the invisible line, clearly divided the city into two sections and a gasp of "wow, look at the view" was not in admiration, but bitterness, where there would be nothing less enjoyable than looking out, only to see gradual dilapidation of the city.
i'll probably upload a few discovery essay paragraphs later to make sure i'm on the right track.
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Topic: fantasticbeasts tries to write stuff [currently: business] (Read 2047 times)