Leila Chudori - Home

“The place is full. All tables are filled!” Bahrum announced when he returned from a survey of the two floors. They even had to get extra chairs out of the storeroom. “You should see how Pak Tjai is sweating!” he added with a wide grin.

“And the pourboire !” Yazir screamed. “Pak Tjai said there are several thousand francs in it.” We had decided that any and all tips would go into a common tip box to be divided equally among the crew at the end of each evening.

I smiled to hear the good news — a delightful and unexpected surprise — but then went back to my cooking and preparing desserts. The most popular was es cendol , made from coconut milk, jelly noodles, shaved ice, and palm sugar, to which I added jack fruit (though, unfortunately, jackfruit from the can). Almost half of all the visitors that evening ordered an extra serving.

There had to be something right about all the work we had put into establishing the cooperative. There had to be something good in what we were doing as human beings. I didn’t know whether the opening night’s success was a matter of hard work or good luck; Paris, after all, has thousands of bistros, cafés, restaurants, and bars. But as I was slowly pouring the next order of es cendol into a glass, suddenly something, I don’t know what, began to tug at my chest and made my eyes begin to water.

“Zir, could you help me here?” I said to Yazir as I put down the glass.

Yazir took the glass from me with a look of surprise. I quickly retreated to the corner of the kitchen, my back to my two assistant as I faced the wall. I lifted my apron to wipe my face, which was suddenly moist with perspiration. I didn’t want my helpers to know that I was suddenly crying, for no explicable reason. But the more I rubbed my eyes, the faster my tears began to fall.

The door to the kitchen opened. Shit.

“Dimas …”

It was Mas Nug’s voice. Please leave me alone.

But I heard his footsteps as he walked towards me. Then suddenly felt his hands on the back of my shoulders. This time he was not whistling or singing off key. From the trembling of his hands, I could tell that he, too, was silently crying.

Life as a political exile would not have been complete without a steady stream of trials: having our passports revoked; being forced to move from one country and from one city to another; having to change professions; even having to change families — all with no obvious design or definite plan. All these things were happening while we were in the midst of a search for our identity, shapeless souls searching for a body to inhabit. The annoyances we faced — or the “challenges” as Mas Nug preferred to call them — were never-ending. For that reason, and despite the successful opening of the restaurant and the popularity of Tanah Air in the days and nights to come, we knew that our celebration would propel an opposing force.

This afternoon, for instance… I had just finished preparing spices and was enjoying a cool beer in the ground floor dining area next to the cash register where Tjai was working. The telephone rang and he answered it. I looked at him to see who was calling, but his face was flat and cold-looking. He frowned.

“Who was that, Tjai?”

“I don’t know. Some crazy guy,” he answered with a tone of unconcern as he went back to his calculator and notes. “Do you really have to use Bango soy sauce? Can’t you use another brand?”

“No,” I insisted. “Bango has a different sweetness.”

“Well, OK,” he said, but then turned to Mas Nug who was seated beside me. “If you’re going to Amsterdam, pick up a bulk order there. It’s much cheaper there.”

“And while you’re at it,” I added, “you might pick up a bulk order of Jempol shrimp paste. And tempeh, too. And kretek cigarettes. Oh, and don’t forget the turmeric, both powdered and fresh…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah… You and your fresh turmeric. That’s what’s so expensive!” Mas Nug grumbled even as he wrote down all my orders.

“Up to you, but if you don’t want the pindang serani tasting strange…”

The telephone suddenly rang again, clipping my commentary. Tjai picked up the receiver but then immediately put it down again. Mas Nug looked at Tjai in surprise.

“Who was that, Tjai? Your mistress calling?” he asked with a laugh.

“That’s your department, not mine,” Tjai said straightaway, not raising his face from the figures on the sheet in front of him.

“Yeah, yeah, but who was it? What if it’s someone wanting to order catering?”

Tjai raised his head and motioned towards the clock. It was eleven o’clock. He then went back to work again, leaving Mas Nug’s question hanging in the air.

Again the telephone rang and this time Mas Nug rushed to pick up the receiver. Tjai took a breath and crossed his arms, waiting to see how Mas Nug would respond to this mystery caller.

A startled look suddenly appeared on Mas Nug’s face and he lowered the receiver slowly.

“How many times has that person called, Tjai?”

Tjai raised his shoulder. “I’ve lost count. Every day at eleven. He’s crazy.”

“Who is it?” I asked.

“Some thug, looking to shake us down,” Tjai spat. “What, do you think Indonesia is the only country with shakedown artists?”

Mas Nug shook his head.

“How much is he asking?”

Tjai opened his eyes wide and quoted a figure that made me gulp. The swig of beer I’d just taken rushed into my nasal chamber. Damn!

There was no counting the number of rendang meals or skewers of satay that we would have to serve in order to come up with the baksheesh the man was asking for. For some reason, after Risjaf called Amnesty International to ask for their advice on what to do, the harassing phone calls stopped for a while. Maybe the people there had put in a call to the police or something — we didn’t know — but we were sure that one day they would start again.

Then there was another kind of caller: the deep breather. Whenever that kind of call came in, Tjai, whose work area was right next to the telephone, would balance the receiver on his shoulder while going on with his calculations of income and expenditures. After a few minutes Tjai would put the receiver to his ear to see if the deep breather had already hung up. If he had, Tjai hung up our phone too.

One time a group of prominent Indonesian academics came to Paris to attend a conference at the Sorbonne. Among them was the sociologist Armantono Bayuaji, who was a strong critic of the Soeharto regime. He suggested a group dinner at Tanah Air. When they came to the restaurant and saw how busy it was, plus the slate of book discussions and photographic exhibitions that Risjaf had planned, he left the place truly impressed. A few weeks later, Armantono published an article about his trip in Indonesia’s leading news magazine — almost two entire pages of praise for the work that we were doing and a not-so-veiled criticism of Indonesian government policies. Basically, the point of Armantono’s article was that if the tens of thousands of political prisoners who had been incarcerated on Buru Island had already been released and allowed to return home — even though branded with a stigma — why was the government not doing something to encourage those political exiles who were still abroad to come back home? Armantono said that Tanah Air Restaurant was Indonesia’s true cultural ambassador in Paris.

I don’t know what happened in Jakarta after that, but I’m sure that Armantono’s article must have caused quite a stir. Whatever the case, we continued to enjoy a steady stream of customers that surged daily at lunch time and early evening.