Kos - A place of various rooms which are rented to students at a dirt cheap rate, usually owned by a family who also live in the complex...

This post is appropriately entitled Kos Hunting for the Lazy Bule because, put simply, when finding a place to live in a country that runs on word of mouth and informal chats about "potential" rooms, alot of pointless walking under the hot indonesian usually occurs and some dedication is needed. Kos hunting is not a formal notion and therefore there is no such thing as a "kos directory", that would be positively laughable here, which usually results in simply knocking on doors, asking them if the place is indeed a kos and more importantly, if there are any rooms. This can be a very long process.

At the start of semester, as Indonesians from across the archipeligo arrive for the new semester, there is obviously some jostling to find places to live and as i learned, if you turn up a little late it can become increasingly difficult to find a place at all. I spent the better part of two days wandering the streets, sweating madly as the white man does, to constantly here the same word, "penuh", or full. It is a draining experience, and in the two days i was looking, after speaking to countless people at the entrance to their homes, i was offered only two rooms.

The first was literally a squat (anyone who knows of my stingy tendencies and love for grot will imagine for themselves how filthy this place was if i wouldnt stay there) but the second looked pretty good. I wandered in and to my delight the room was not half bad, i almost couldnt believe my luck. But the golden rule of kos hunting (for the Bule kafir, white man who isnt going to heaven because he is unreligious) is to hang around long enough to make sure there isnt a mosque too close, because prayer is a 5 time daily ritual here and it isnt a private matter. The call to prayer is blasted on tinny loudspeakers to make sure everyone knows its time to pray. Sure enough, suddenly the sound of arabic broke the silence with deafening brilliance, i walked out the front of the kos to see what was happening only to find that the local mosque was across the road, not 15 metres away from where i would have to rest my head. Now it might seem culturally insensitive to reject a place on this basis, but i assure you that even the most tolerant will struggle with being woken at 5am every morning for the first prayer of the day, particluraly when you drink all night, dont pray and are therefore not going to heaven for your waking efforts. It was time to keep looking.

The other thing about kos hunting is that is that places are clearly divided most of the time, boys in kos putra, girls in kos putri. Although mixed kos do occur(kos bebas, or free kos), you are paying more for the privilege and it by no way means you are in some 1960's communal living space of free sex and wild times. Most of the time, these kos are still burdened by strict rules: The other sex is not allowed in you room with the door shut, and fooling around regardless is considered extremely poor taste as is living with someone to whom you are not married. This put a rather large dent in my plans and considering the difficulty i was having with finding any kos at all, a free kos, or one with the freedom i desire (as a seedy, sex-crazed western mug) is very pricey if not borderline impossible.

So i kept looking with my local friends Kiki and Vando, wandering around and drinking lots of ice tea (less that 20 cents a glass) but pretty much getting nowhere. I was feeling a little defeated. We gave up in the early afternoon and Kiki invited me back to his kos to chill out and meet the crew he lives with. I arrived through a serious of very narrow alleyways which wound this way and that before spitting out on to a small dirt soccer field. Just behind that, squashed in amongst trees and unplanned buildings was his kos, very very simple, and inhabited only by Indonesians. We sat around, smoked kreteks and they quizzed me on the deviant ways of the west and whether i liked indonesia, and how i felt about how dirty it is. It was a nice little spot, more basic than many of the other kos the bule's stay in but the atmosphere was good.

The next day i looked again through the streets but had no luck, something which was increasingly becoming a problem as the week of free accomodation at a hotel provided for orientation was over and it was time for me to move out. Kiki then suggested that i move into his room for the meantime, an offer which i gladly took up because he's really good value, with a keen interest in politics, socialism and the anti-globalisation movement, they're mad political over here. i moved my things into his room which is about the size of one of those segments of my room at home (everyone was right, you literally could fit an indonesian family in my room) and with the two of us in there it was pretty close.

It was only later that afternoon that the son of the kos owner told me that there was a room that a family member was living in but they were more than willing to boot them out (for the extra income i would provide). Without a second thought i took up the offer but it wasn't as simple as moving my bags. The kos owners wanted to do some improvements to the room for me, such as a window and a door, and it would be a few days (or maybe a week as it turned out) before i could move in, so i was bunking with Kiki. Before all this could be set in stone i had to go and meet the village head. i was a little nervous but i was assured he was a nice enough guy. I turned up to his house, he invited me in and we sat down to have a little pow-wow. He turned out to be one of those rocking older Indonesian men who are always smiling, always keen for a chat, or to sit and smoke some chop-chop style raw tobacco. I was in.

I didnt buy a mattress on the first night i moved in which turned out to be a big mistake. Kiki gave me his (for which i felt aweful) but it didnt make much of a different, it was like sleeping on a thin blanket on concrete floor. I asked him about how he slept and he told me that it was normal, that he had grown up boarding in islamic schools (pesantren) where they slept on the carpet and that it didnt bother him. I felt like such a weak bastard. I spent the night tossing and turning on the hard floor and woke up in the morning feeling 5 years older. The next day i bought the best mattress i could find.

The improving of my room was a group effort on behalf of everyone in the kos. I woke up at 5 in the morning, as i did before i bought earplugs, and one of my kos mates was standing in my room-to-be with a hammer and chisel smashing out the one foot thick concrete wall in the shape of a window, i couldnt believe it. i started to feel a little ashamed sitting around watching everyone else work, so much to their surprise i offered some assistance. To the sounds of laughs from the local children, smiles from the daughters of the man who owns the kos and some encouragement from my kos mates (who seem to think i must be weak and very incapable), i started mixing cement on the ground, adding water to the mix every now and then before shoveling it into buckets which were then applied. Also, i spent some time wheelbarrowing loads of bricks from the nearby soccer field in order to build a new wall for the room next door which they decided to build since they had enough cement and bricks. It was interesting, having done minimal hard labour in my life i did feel some sense of achievement at having put my hand to the room i would be living in. Also, It felt a necessary move to make which i rightly presumed would increase my standing in the kos. Having proved i could work and wasnt just a lazy bule, my friendships got better and smiles increased.

This increased standing in the kos became apparent the next day when i was invited by all the men in kos to attend friday prayer at the mosque. For most westerners and myself included, Islam is at times a scary religion and one which is greatly stigmatized yet i realised once i arrived that i really had no idea what the whole thing was about. I quizzed them thoroughly to make sure that doing such a thing wouldn't see me strung up naked being whipped and was told (in a tone which suggested that maybe they were a little offended) that they were moderate, and that of course i could come to mosque if i followed the rules. I had a shower, cleaned my feet, put on a sarong, collared shirt, little skull cap, was given a prayer mat and i was ready. Admittedly, i think it was a fairly far out thing to see the long haired blondie attending mosque but everyone smiled, shook my hand, and when it was time to pray, i simply followed the guy in front of me, moved my hands when it was neccesary, and touched my head to the ground when the others did. For all those reading this with a worry on their face, do not despair, my hedonistic principles are still very much intact (i went and got suitably pissed last night) and even if i wanted to, there is no way i could give up alchohol, drugs and sex. That kind of wholesomeness simply isnt in me.

So, to conclude, I moved into my room today, now considered the most luxurious of the rooms in the kos (see photos) and i am settled. All that is left now is to pay the rent, about 31 dollars a month, less than what i spend on coffee in a week in Melbourne.

From Yogya with Love,

Lindsay