“[…] a refuge for the old days, till my eyes are closed.”

Duly translated from the final verse of the Indonesian song "Indonesia Pusaka", I shake every time this song echoes through my mind. Not only does it resonate pride, it has also molded my subconscious Indonesian ‘soul’ so that no matter where I am, I will always belong to it. There is this constant missing of literally anything about Indonesia whenever I am not there.

Merantau can be straightforwardly defined as leaving one’s place of origin to a faraway place, a rantau, for certain purposes and a relatively long period of time, be it for studying, working, or simply to find a better life that can be anything other than the latter two. 

I am currently 26, and have spent almost a decade away from my village in Southeast Sulawesi with, as far as I can recall, less than twenty times visiting home, or roughly twice a year, which also means I have mini chances of holding my mother’s hands, helping my brother’s work in our cocoa farm, chatting with my eldest sister, and visiting my father’s grave. My experience is, of course, nothing to compare to those whose life stories in a rantau have taken years. However, not that I promise you that this will be an exemplary reflective story, I have lived an entirely different life, changed my perspective about something I used to believe impossible and witnessed a wonderfully incomparable journey by actually leaving my very home -- my village and my country.

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At the age of seventeen, I took a brave decision to leave my village and moved to a different province. Prior to that, I was certain that my mother, my only parent, wouldn’t approve of my decision. But after a short convincing discussion, which was also a tear-shedding drama, she agreed. Since that day, I took a vow that I would survive and wouldn’t let her down. The decision to continue my education outside my place of origin was simply because I wanted to see what was like to be out “there”. 

The reason my mother shed a tear prior to my departure to Makassar could be more than letting me pursue my study somewhere in the neighboring province, rather she was hesitant about whether I would be able to survive in a new environment – a situation she would have never put me in. It is plausible to say that some parents do not want to let their children go too far from home. Those with overprotective parents may see merantau like climbing aboard the Titanic. Why? Well, some examples could provide some plausible reasons: from a neighbor who recently became pregnant while still in her sophomore year, to some cousins who it turned out didn’t attend any classes for an entire semester. This kind of misbehavior, delinquency and misfortune is probably what my and some other people’s parents imagine merantau offers. 

This reasonable disquietude, however, limits their children’s world and could form a dependency among their children toward them, which can result in children lacking self-insufficiency and trust. But, to be fair, instead of seeing it as a journey of inevitable doom, many parents consider merantau a must for their sons and daughters to strengthen their self-reliance or simply because they once embarked on a merantu and want to pass on the experience to their children.

So, what exactly has merantau offered me? Smoking real cigarettes for the first time – which turned out to be my final ones -- taking my wallet back from drunk men living in a slum at almost midnight, eating only warm rice and salt with crackers for a day after a delayed money transfer from home, almost ruining my face due to a severe skin allergy after mountain climbing, and seeing a morning newspaper announcing that one of my students had died after committing suicide. Horrifying? Another not-so-horrendous summary; receiving a four-year studentship financial support, getting my first job, having the chance to call someone ‘dad’ during a voluntary program in Malaysia, nervously speaking about food and agriculture in Milan, Saman dancing in Bangkok, waking up in a small hotel room in Hollywood, and now, studying applied linguistics in Sydney. 

Though this is not a comprehensive retelling of my merantau, the key question is, would this have really happened if my 17-year-old self decided not to leave the village? Would my life be exactly or, somewhat, the same? I don’t think it would.

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It took years to fathom this, but if I had not made that decision, I would have still been a person who did know what potential he might have, which side of this world he believed he could go to or what a person like him could achieve. I knew that I would survive because I did what people do to survive in a rantau; to have faith in what I was doing, to respect the culture of that place, and to have patience in my endeavors. This way, I was taught, and I tried hard, to walk without anyone telling me which path I should take -- letting my inner sense of leadership show me the way. The right way was there, I only needed to take careful steps, and this took time, patience, perseverance, courage and sacrifice. 

I am fully aware that a merantau will always be a bittersweet symphony. Countless misfortunes along the way did not stop me from continuing the journey, because I know that it will not always be like that. Rainbow comes after a rainy storm, people say. On our way, we will meet some strangers who will soon call “friends”, and they usually the best ones that could have been sent to us. Perhaps, we far better know what it means to miss and to be missed by separating ourselves. 

More importantly, merantau has granted me experiences my teenage self couldn’t ever thought possible and because of it I am missing Indonesia even more.

 

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Sujardin Syarifuddin, 26, is an Indonesian currently in his second year of graduate study in Applied Linguistics at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He has traveled to 11 countries and is looking forward to visiting other parts of the world. You can reach him through his Instagram account @adin6190.

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