'hang on to yourself' or 'Ibu and The New Yorker'

Every once in a while I come to realize just how serious my swoon for the comforts of home-- the idea of western intellectualism, pork, stores that sell more than random shit with completely nonsensical signage systems (shout out: A. Riley), an overabundance of (working) electrical outlets--has become. If you have received emails from me where I say things like, ‘I had no idea how cosmopolitan I can be!,’ here is an example. (I also have realized how attached to carpet I am.)

Sitting at the breakfast table one day, I noticed that Ibu (Indonesian for mother, mrs, maam, and everything in between—in Ibu’s case she actually does not have a name other than this, something fairly common in Indonesia), the lady who does the cooking, washing, and general invocation of the third person at our house, was holding a tattered and greasy magazine that I believe had been used to line the bottom of a trash can. Inconsequentially peeled back where it had been torn halfway through, I knew the typeface in an instant. It was ‘The New Yorker’ and I actually demanded it brought to me, upon which I began greedily thumbing it through. Ibu, understandably, seemed stunned by what was taking place and kept telling me, 'no, this is trash, you must be confused, sudah trash, sudah mas,' all while I refused to release it. And indeed it was sudah trash in that about half of it had been penetrated by a massive grease spot and the entire thing kind of smelled. I realized this but needed to muster an intense detachment to finally give it up to Ibu's tugging, demanding all the while, 'Where did this come from? How did you get this? Who left this?.'

Having prevailed, she just stood there and stared (I usually avoid all talking, let alone competitions of physical strength and stick-to-it-ness, before my morning coffee) at me while I mumbled something about 'Oh, that is from America' before walking off. As I left the room I noticed her looking at me suspiciously through the narrow eyes of mistrust while she tore it both lengthwise and widthwise (I imagine both for good measure and her future safety) before again laying it to rest in the rubbish heap.