The Rainbow Troops Read online

  Harun, who was well-behaved, quiet and had an easy smile, was completely unable to comprehend the lessons. Nowadays people call it Down Syndrome. When Bu Mus taught, Harun sat calmly with a constant smile on his face.

  In every class, no matter what we were studying, Harun would raise his hand once and ask the same question, all year round, year after year, "Ibunda Guru, when will we have our Lebaran school break?"

  "Soon, Harun, very soon," Bu Mus answered softly, over and over again, thousands of times, all year round, year after year. Then Harun clapped his hands.

  During afternoon recess, Sahara and Harun always sat together under the filicium. The two of them shared a unique emotional connection like the quirky friendship of the Mouse and the Elephant. Harun enthusiastically told a story about his three-striped cat giving birth to three kittens, which also had three stripes, on the third day of the month. Sahara patiently listened, even though Harun told this story every day, over and over again, thousands of times, all year round, year after year.

  The number three was indeed a sacred number for Harun. He related everything to the number three. He begged Bu Mus to teach him how to write that number, and after three years of hard work, he could finally do it. The covers of all his school books soon had a big, beautiful and colorful number three written on them. He was obsessed with the number three. He often ripped off the buttons on his shirt so there were only three left. He wore three layers of socks. He had three kinds of bags, and in each bag he always carried three bottles of soy sauce. He even had three hair combs. When we asked him why he was so fond of the number three, he pondered for a while, and then answered very wisely, like a village head giving religious advice. "My friends," he said knowingly, "God likes odd numbers."

  I often searched Harun's face to try to figure out what was going on in his head. He smiled whenever he saw me doing this. He was aware that he was the oldest among us, and he often treated us with care, as if we were his own little brothers and sister. There were times when his behavior was very touching. One time, unexpectedly, he brought a large package to school and gave each of us a boiled caladium tuber. Everyone got one. He himself took three. His demeanor was very adult-like, but he truly was a child trapped in an adult's body.

  The eighth boy, our honorable knight in shining armor, was Borek.

  In the beginning, he was just an ordinary student. His behavior wasn't peculiar. But a chance meeting with an old hair-growth product bottle from somewhere on the Arabian Peninsula forever changed the course of his life.

  On that bottle was a picture of a man; he was wearing red underwear, had a tall, strong body and was as hairy as a gorilla.

  From then on, Borek was no longer interested in anything other than making his muscles bigger. Because of hard work and exercise, he was successful and earned himself the nickname Samson—a noble title that he bore proudly.

  It was definitely strange, but at least Samson had found himself at a young age and knew exactly what he wanted to be later; he strove continuously to reach his goals. He somehow skipped the identity-searching phase that usually leaves people doubting themselves until they are older. There are those who never find their own identity and go through life as someone else. Samson was better off than them.

  He was completely obsessed with body building and crazy about the macho-man image. One day, he lured me in and curiosity got the best of me. I didn't understand how he knew the secret to building chest muscles.

  "Don't tell anyone!" he whispered while glancing around. He jerked my hand and we ran to the abandoned electric shed behind the school. He reached into his bag and pulled out a tennis ball that had been split in half.

  "If you want to have a bulging chest like mine, this is the secret!" He was whispering again, even though absolutely no one else was around. I looked at the two halves with surprise and thought to myself: Apparently the secret to an amazing body is in this tennis ball! It must be a great discovery.

  "Take off your shirt!" demanded Samson.

  What is he going to do to me?

  "Let me make you a real man!"

  The expression on his face indicated that he couldn't figure out why every man didn't use this method—a shortcut to the perfect appearance.

  I was hesitant, but I had no other choice. I unbuttoned my shirt.

  "Hurry up!"

  Suddenly, Samson forcefully shoved the tennis ball halves against my chest. I stumbled back and almost fell. He had caught me by surprise and I was powerless, my back against some planks of wood. To make matters worse, Samson was much bigger than me and was as strong as a coolie. I wriggled around trying to break free.

  And then I understood. The tennis ball halves were supposed to work like that strange thing with a wooden handle and a rubber cup that people use to unclog toilets. In Samson's crazy head, those tennis ball halves functioned as a tool to pump up chest muscles. Before I knew it, I was being tortured in Samson's strong grip by the powerful suctioning of the tennis ball halves.

  I felt the life being sucked out of my insides—my heart, liver, lungs, spleen, blood and the contents of my stomach—by the cursed tennis ball halves. My eyes felt like they were going to pop out of my head. I choked, unable to speak. I signaled to Samson to stop.

  "It's not time yet—you have to finish counting names and parents first, and then the results will show!" Count names and parents? Oh man! Darn it!

  Counting names and parents was our own foolish creation—doing something within the amount of time it took to say the full names of everyone in our class and their parents. For example: Trapani Ihsan Jamari Nursidik, son of Zainuddin Ilham Jamari Nursidik. Or Harun Ardhli Ramadhan Hasani Burhan, son of Syamsul Hazana Ramadhan Hasani Burhan. No way could I endure these things sucking the life out of me for the entire amount of time it would take me to count names and parents. Malay names were never short!

  Samson didn't care. I was a fish trapped in a net. My breaths became short. The suctioning of the tennis ball halves felt like stings from killer bees. My body seemed to be shrinking. My legs flailed around hopelessly. The suffering felt as though it would never end.

  Then, all of a sudden, one of the wooden planks behind me fell and gave me room to gather my strength. Without stopping to think twice, I mustered the last ounce of strength left in my body, and with one roundhouse style move, I kicked Samson as hard as I could right between his legs—just like when the Japanese boxer Antonio Inoki took a cheap shot at Muhammad Ali in their 1976 fight. Samson howled and groaned like a bumble bee trapped in a glass jar. I broke free from his grasp, jumped away and bolted off. That genius body-building invention flew up into the air before sluggishly tumbling down onto a stack of straw. I stole a peek back and saw the boy Hercules hurl over and clutch his legs before falling down with a thud.

  For days, my chest was encircled by two dark red circular marks, traces of unbelievable idiocy.

  My mother asked me about the marks. I wanted to lie, but I couldn't. Muhammadiyah Ethics class taught us every Friday morning that we were not allowed to lie to our parents, especially not to our mothers.

  I was forced to expose my own stupidity. My older brothers and my father laughed so hard they were shaking. And then, for the very first time, I heard my mother's sophisticated theory on mental illness.

  "There are 44 types of craziness," she said with the authority of a psychiatric expert as she gathered tobacco, betel leaves, and other ingredients from her pillbox containers for making tobacco chew, squashed them into a small ball and chewed the concoction.

  "The smaller the number, the more critical the illness," she said, shaking her head back and forth while staring at me as if I were a patient in a mental hospital.

  "When people lose their minds and wander the streets nude, that is mental illness number one. I think what you did with that tennis ball falls into the category of mental illness number five. Pretty serious, Ikal! You'd better be careful—if you don't use common sense, that number will soon get even smaller!" />
  On another morning, at ten o'clock, the jalak kerbau flock should have already arrived. But that morning it was quiet. I smiled to myself as I thought about the unique characteristics of my classmates. Most of us came to school berkaki ayam—chicken footed, literally, but in other words barefooted. Those who weren't chicken footed wore shoes that were much too big. Our underprivileged parents deliberately bought shoes that were two sizes too big so they could be worn for at least two school years. By the time the shoes fit, they were usually falling apart.

  Malay people believe that destiny is a creature, and we were ten baits of destiny. We were like small mollusks clinging together to defend ourselves from the pounding waves in the ocean of knowledge. Bu Mus was our mother hen. I looked at my friends' faces one by one: Harun with his easy smile, the handsome Trapani, little Syahdan, the pompous Kucai, feisty Sahara, the gullible A Kiong, and the eighth boy, Samson, sitting like a Ganesha statue. And who were the ninth and tenth boys? Lintang and Mahar. What were their stories? They were two young, truly special boys. It takes a special chapter to tell their tales.

  Chapter 9

  Crocodile Shaman

  LINTANG WAS uncharacteristically late this morning. We were dumbfounded when we heard his reason.

  "I couldn't pass. In the middle of the road, blocking my way, lay a crocodile as big as a coconut tree."

  "Crocodile?" echoed Kucai.

  "I rung the bell on my bike, clapped my hands and coughed loudly so he'd leave. He didn't budge. All I could do was stand there like a statue and talk to myself. His size and the barnacles growing on his back were clear signs that he was the ruler of this swamp."

  "Why didn't you just go home?" I asked.

  "I was already more than halfway here. I wasn't about to turn around just because of that stupid crocodile."

  I could only imagine what Lintang was thinking at that moment: The word absent isn't in my vocabulary, and today we study the history of Islam—one of the most interesting classes. I want to debate the holy verses that foretold Byzantium's victory seven years before it happened.

  "You didn't ask anybody for help?" asked Sahara apprehensively.

  "There wasn't anyone else around—just me, the giant crocodile, and certain death," Lintang said dramatically.

  We were fretful yet astounded thinking about Lintang's struggle to get to school.

  "I was almost hopeless. Then suddenly, from the currents of the river beside me, I heard the water rippling. I was surprised. I was frightened!"

  "What was it, Lintang?" asked a wide-eyed Trapani.

  "The shape of a man emerged from the moss, cutting across the murky, chest-high waters, and ascended from the swamp. The hair on the back of my neck stood up as he walked in bowlegged steps in my direction. Each step of his oddly shaped feet formed the letter 'O.'"

  "Who was he?" Mahar choked out.

  "Bodenga."

  "Oooh," we all gasped at once as we clasped our hands over our mouths, horrified. Not one of us could find the courage to comment. We waited tensely for the story to continue.

  "I was more scared of him than of any crocodile!"

  We knew. The man who emerged from the moss was a man who didn't want to know anyone, but who in coastal Belitong didn't know him?

  "Then what?" Borek asked nervously.

  "He passed by me as if I weren't there. Then he approached the ruthless animal blocking the road. He touched it! He petted it gently and whispered something to it—it was so bizarre! The crocodile submitted to him, wagging its tail like a dog after its master's heart.

  We were stupefied.

  "Seconds later," Lintang continued with a low voice, "that Cretaceous reptile took a sudden, horrific dive into the swamp. It was as loud as seven coconut trees crashing down!"

  Lintang took a deep breath. "I was startled. If that ancient animal had decided to chase me earlier, the only thing people would have found would be my decrepit bicycle."

  "And what about Bodenga?" we all asked in perfect harmony.

  "Bodenga turned back and headed my way. It was clear that he didn't expect any gratitude. I didn't have the guts to look at him. My courage collapsed; with just one pull, he could have drowned me in the water. But he just passed by."

  "Passed by? Just like that?" I asked.

  "Yeah, just like that. But I feel lucky. Not many people have ever witnessed Bodenga's supernatural powers."

  I became lost in my own thoughts. It was true that I had never witnessed Bodenga in action, but I knew him better than Lintang. Bodenga provided me with my first life lesson on premonitions. For me, he symbolized all things related to the feeling of sadness.

  No one wanted to be Bodenga's friend. His face was scarred with craters and he was in his forties. He covered himself with coconut leaves and slept under a palm tree, curled up like a squirrel for two days and two nights at a time. When he was hungry, he dove down into the abandoned well at the old police station, all the way to the bottom, caught some eels, and ate them while he was still in the water.

  Bodenga was a free creature. He was like the wind. He wasn't Malay, not Chinese, not even Sawang—he wasn't anybody. No one knew where he came from. He wasn't religious and he couldn't speak. He wasn't a beggar or a criminal. His name wasn't anywhere in the village records. His ears could not hear because one day he dove into the Linggang River to fetch some tin and dove so deep that his ears bled. And then, he was deaf.

  Nowadays Bodenga was like a lone piece of driftwood. The only family that villagers ever knew was his one-legged father. People say he sacrificed his leg in order to acquire more crocodile magic. His father was a famous crocodile shaman. As Islam flowed into the villages, people began to shun Bodenga and his father because they refused to stop worshipping crocodiles as gods.

  His father died by wrapping himself from head to toe in jawi roots and throwing himself into the Mirang River. He deliberately fed his body to the ferocious crocodiles of the river. The only uncovered remain was the stump he used as a second leg. Now Bodenga spends most of his time staring into the currents of the Mirang River, all alone and far into the night.

  One evening, villagers came flocking to the National School's basketball court. They had caught a crocodile that had attacked a woman washing clothes in the Manggar River. Because I was still small, I couldn't push my way through the people surrounding the crocodile. I could only see from between people's legs. Its big mouth was propped open with a piece of firewood.

  When they split its stomach in half, they found hair, clothes and a necklace. That's when I saw Bodenga urge forward amongst the visitors. He sat down cross-legged beside the crocodile. His face was deathly pale. He pitifully pleaded for the people to stop butchering the animal. They took the firewood out of its mouth and backed off. They understood that crocodile worshippers believed that when they died they became crocodiles. They also understood that for Bodenga, this was the crocodile his father had turned into because one of its legs was missing.

  Bodenga cried. It was an agonizing, mournful sound. "Baya ... Baya ... Baya," he called out softly. Some wept with choking sobs. I saw Bodenga's tears streaming down his pockmarked cheeks. I felt my own tears stream down my face, and I couldn't hold them back. That unfortunate crocodile had been his only love in his outcast and forlorn world, and now that love had been taken away.

  Incoherent grieving escaped Bodenga's mute mouth as he lamented. He then tied up the crocodile and carried his father's carcass to the Linggang River, dragging it along the riverbanks towards the delta. Bodenga hasn't returned since.

  Bodenga and the incident of that evening created a blueprint of compassion and sadness in my subconscious. Perhaps I was too young to witness such a painful tragedy. In the years to come, whenever I was faced with heartwrenching situations, Bodenga came into my senses.

  That evening, Bodenga truly taught me about premonitions. And for the first time, I learned that fate could treat humankind very terribly, and that love could be so blind.

&n
bsp; While Lintang didn't have an emotional experience with Bodenga like mine, that hadn't been the first time he was faced with a crocodile on his way to school. It's not an exaggeration to say that Lintang often risked his life for the sake of his education. Nevertheless, he never missed a day of school. He pedaled 80 kilometers roundtrip every day. If school activities went until late in the afternoon, he didn't arrive home until after dark. Thinking about his daily journey made me cringe.

  The distance wasn't the only difficulty he faced. During the rainy season, chest-deep waters flooded the roads. When faced with a road that had turned into a river, Lintang left his bicycle under a tree on higher ground, wrapped his shirt, pants and books in a plastic bag, bit the bag, plunged into the water, and swam toward school as fast as he could to avoid being attacked by a crocodile.

  Because there was no clock at his house, Lintang relied on a natural clock. One time, he rushed through his morning prayer because the cock had already crowed. He finished his prayer and immediately pedaled off to school. Halfway through his journey, in the middle of the forest, he became suspicious because the air was still very cold, it was still pitch black, and the forest was strangely quiet. There were no bird songs calling out to the dawn. Lintang realized that the cock had crowed early, and it was actually still midnight. He sat himself down beneath a tree in the middle of the dark forest, embraced his two legs, shivered in the cold, and waited patiently for morning to come.

  Another time, his bicycle chain broke. It couldn't be fixed again because it had already broken one too many times and was now too short to be reconnected. But he wasn't willing to give up. He pushed the bike about a dozen kilometers by hand. By the time he got to the school, we were getting ready to head home. The last lesson that day was music class. Lintang was happy because he got to sing the song Padamu Negeri ("For You Our Country") in front of the class. It was a slow and somber song:

  For you, our country, we promise For you, our country, we serve For you, our country, we are devoted You, country, are our body and soul We were stunned to hear him sing so soulfully. His exhaustion didn't show in his humorous eyes. After he sang the song, he pushed his bike back home, all 40 kilometers.