My “Story behind a picture” series contains posts, where I present one photo only, and a commentary to explain the context and what is happening there. All of these mini stories are either interesting, shocking, nice, extraordinary, or perhaps typical for a given community or place, but strange for visitors from elsewhere. Or they are simply interesting from some other point of view. Anyway, I will try to keep them short. (And sweet? – we will see.)
I was travelling from Medan, Indonesia, to a tiny village in the Sumatran jungle called Ketambe. I had pre-arranged a shared taxi, which would take me right from the airport in Medan to my guesthouse in Ketambe. The driver was arranged by my tour guide in Ketambe. You can see the driver and his car in this photo, when we stopped for lunch on the way (9 hours).
My driver was indeed waiting for me at the arrival hall in Medan, but he didn’t speak English at all. After we met, he was rushing out of the arrival hall, me following in his footsteps, when he suddenly stopped at the roadside just in front of the entrance. He then made a phone call and gave the phone over to me. It was my guide from Ketambe, who said to me that the driver is now going to collect his car, and will return soon, and that I should wait for him there.
But at this moment, when I looked around, I realized my driver was already gone. The phone he gave me was an old one, not a smartphone, on which you have to push actual buttons. I couldn’t even end the call, because without my glasses, I had no idea which button did what. I decided to drop the phone into my bag, hoping it would switch itself off after a time. So there I was, and when it dawned on me how quickly everything had happened, I got very frightened: I had realized that I hadn’t actually looked at this man carefully, and that I hadn’t the faintest idea what he looked like or what clothes he was wearing. All I knew was that it was an Indonesian man – rather than a Botswana woman, for example, or a Norwegian teenager. This is a problem. Because I’d already had considerable experience in airports in Southeast Asia, and I knew exactly what to expect: if a foreigner is just standing about in front of the exit door at arrivals, looking helpless, millions of taxi drivers and private car drivers will stop in front of you, and invite you “for a ride”, in both a literal and a figurative sense.
I decided the best solution would be if I played dumb: whoever stops in front of me, I will look away, pretend not to understand a word, and only react, if someone is really decisive and insists that I should get in his car. After a few successful playing-the-dumb games, a large black car stopped, opened his door wide, and pointed at me, and said come on. I looked at him puzzled. He then repeated his call even more assertively, so I said OK, this must be the one then – it was neither a Botswanian woman, nor a Norwegian teenager, after all.
I went ahead to board the car (a large one which you must climb up on, rather than sit in). I dropped my backpack on the backseat and was already trying to climb up on the seat myself. But at this moment, a local Indonesian woman appeared behind my back, and started to explain something excitedly, which I didn’t understand a word of. Then she turned to the driver, and to me again. After a few turns, the driver said to me – in English! – that this was the wrong car, I should get out. A few moments later, my real driver also arrived, grabbed my backpack from me, and lead me to his car (a much lees fancy one).
What is the lesson? You should always memorize the face – or in case your facial memory is as useless as mine, the clothes – of the person that you will depend on. And do that the very moment you meet that person, to avoid problems.
Check out some more of my Story Behind the Picture posts:
The grass is greener on the other side of the fence
How to avoid electoral fraud – with ink
Always remember the face of those you depend on
Waiter in Laos shares his food with me
The Kindness of Indonesian people
