So, there I was at the departure hall, waiting for boarding, sitting there all alone between those Arab men. There were also women, Indonesian ones, but they were wearing veils and all covered up. Me, I was in my boots, tight t-shirt and my cross necklace. I saw one Chinese man, a couple who spoke Russian, and that man, a man with a French beret and beautiful eyes. Actually, his eyebrows have made his eyes look beautiful.
Then people kept coming, the aircrew as well. Multinational aircrew: black, white, yellow. Always nice to see them walking with proud, smiling. They knew it very well that they’re the centre of the attention wherever they go. They were few selected people. They were paid to fly around the world! I always got so nervous when approaching the airport. It’s not about flying or the passengers that would make us so busy, but meeting the on board colleagues! So first impression really counts; it would be heavenly flights or stay forever in hell!
I could have been one of them, but then I wouldn’t be here as well. I would have lived in Dubai for three years, which actually could have been a great escape for me. I’ve always wanted to get out of the country, being away from everything, from everyone and have a new start. It was exactly one year ago, with Emirates. This year, they wanted me for another interview, but I couldn’t go to that interview, because I had to be abroad.
That’s why I was there at the airport, waiting for my flight to Cairo. It’s going to be a long trip. The flights were not bad at all, about 10 hours to Abu Dhabi and 4 more hours to Cairo. But the waiting was way too long! 12 hours of transit at the Abu Dhabi airport. I did my research on the web that there would be a hotel where I could spend the long transit at, or just pay for the bathroom for UAD 25. So the transit wouldn’t be that bad at all.
But I was still there at Soekarno-Hatta Airport. There was a short queue on the way to the airport and I could see that they’ve been working on the road again. Two weeks before the highway was block because the flood. The barriers were not strong enough to block the water coming from the sea. I’ve always thought it was so stupid to build a road in that area. But they chose to cut down the mangrove trees instead of keeping the flood away. So every time the highway to and from the airport got flooded, most of the flights would be delayed and there would be hours of traffic jam. What a shame! Welcome to Indonesia!
As an Indonesian citizen, traveling is not easy and cheap. Especially when one is poor like me. Everything is always too expensive when we have to calculate it with our currency; Rupiah. But I’ve always been very blessed with all those (almost) free trips I got! I believed it had something to do with all three wishes I had when I was a little girl. But then, I also believed that I forgot to ask the most important thing in the world: love.
Anyway, back at the airport. The man gave me the blue card instead of the yellow one. But that’s ok because then I could board the aircraft earlier than it should be. I just hoped that it wouldn’t be a full flight and there wouldn’t be any other passengers on my row. I asked for the aisle seat but forgot to order the special meal. I used to like the window seats because I could see everything and I had a wall to lean on when sleeping. But now, I prefered the aisle ones better because it’s easier to go to the toilets anytime I want to. But then, of course the passengers next to you would have to wake you up when they have to go.
So we boarded the aircraft. It was a new type of Boeing 777. Not too big, but it’s just perfect. I loved the color they’ve used for the interior, the color of white sand, it made the inside of the aircraft looks so specious. There it was, my assigned seat: 20D. Hope the two seats on my left side would be empty. I had the newspapers with me, although I didn’t bring any books to read, but I believed I wouldn’t get bored at all. Then this Chinese woman came and sat next to the window. Then the Arab man sat between us. That man with beret sat exactly on the aisle seat in front of me. He took his beret and jacket off. Well, he’s cute enough.
When we’re about to take off, my screen stop working! So I had to wait for a while until the fasten seatbelt sign had been switched off, to find an empty seat with a working TV screen. There was one, two rows in front of me. So I asked the male flight attendant if it’s alright for me to move there. He wouldn’t mind of course, he even told me to take the window seat next to the man with the beret.
When they’re serving the aperitif, I asked for a gin and tonic. The flight attendant who’s serving my area was actually quite surprised. I said: What? I want gin and tonic! I believed he was surprised because an Asian girl like me drinks alcohol, which he might think that I was a Moslem. But then he asked again: Are you one of us? I said that I used to be a flight attendant, yes, but not with Etihad.
So I guess once you’re a flight attendant, you’d always be one. The stereotype of a flight attendant would always be there. I always wanted to be one when I was a little girl. I had a woman on the street telling me that I should be a flight attendant, when I was just finished having a recruitment interview. When in Australia, they knew I was one, even I was wearing casual clothes. Even after three years had pass, I still had a question from a man, asking me which airlines I was working for. And then, with Etihad, that flight attendant thought I was one of them!
The flight was ok. I didn’t sleep at all. I like the entertainment they had on board. They surely had the perfect earphones. I heard almost no noise at all! I watched four films in a row. The best one was P.S. I Love You. Gerard Butler was so HOT! (and he’s a Scorpio!). I was laughing and crying, the film was so beautiful. Better than the Lake House.
So we landed at the Abu Dhabi airport. When we’re waiting to disembark, that man with the beret turned himself facing me. I pretended that I didn’t see him at all. But I remembered that he let me disembarking first.
I didn’t know where to go, but I saw this honeycomb pattern on the ceiling of the small airport: blue, green and white. Then there was a transfer desk, and everyone was just handing his or her boarding pass to Etihad ground staff there. Some of them received blue, pink or yellow coupons. When I was queuing, the man with the beret approached me and asked me whether there’s a hotel at the airport. So I told him that there’s a transit hotel here, but I didn’t know how much it would cost. So after we had received our coupons, we looked for the hotel.
Then we found out that the hotel was so expensive, USD 240 per room, or we could stay at the lounge and pay AED 230 for four hours. It’s just too expensive, especially to me. A room at Marriott would be much cheaper than that! So, we decided to spend the long transit at the waiting hall. As we walked there, I asked him where he’s going to. He answered that he’s a German on his way home to Frankfurt, and he’s a Moslem. He asked me what my religion was. I said I have none. He said that he didn’t know that there’s someone with no religion in Indonesia. So I asked him what did he do in Indonesia. He said that he had just visited this second wife in Jakarta. Oh, OK, so I thought he got divorced with the first one and remarried again. But the next sentence was surprised me the most: I have two wives!
I was laughing and speechless for a while but then I told him that I was so against it. So against the polygamy! It strongly believed that he’s one of those men who’s taking advantages of the religion. So I was kind of attacking him directly with my statements. I said that no man should have more than one wife at the same time. Being a Moslem didn’t earn him the rights to do the polygamy at all. Then he said that actually his first wife who ask him to take another wife, it’s not his will at all. But come on, still he was agreed to it and took another wife. For me, that man was just another selfish man who thinks and acts for his benefits only.
But then we spend the long wait together. He’s nice, but his laugh was way too loud. He told me about his marriages. His first wife was five years older than him and they met in Germany. The father of his wife was a white witch doctor, just as she was. I didn’t believe in magic, and if there was a witch doctor, shaman, or whatever they’re being called, it’s never been for a good cause. So, he converted to Islam because the family of the wife was a strong believer of the religion. And they got married by the Islamic law only, not officially registered. They had two sons, which didn’t look like any Europeans at all. They didn’t even speak German or English, but Javanese!
Then he told me that his second wife was younger and earned at least USD 5000 salary per month. I didn’t how they met, but they didn’t see each other that much either. So, he just visited her when he was there in Jakarta. He said that she would retire soon and would have her own export-import business and as for him, he would build a small hotel. The second wife wanted to have four kids with him.
I didn’t understand what those women think because he said that the two wives knew each other. What was it with them that they were agreed to share a husband? They seemed smart to me and must be independent women. For me it would be such a waste to marry a foreign man who didn’t live with me, and worse that I had to share him with another woman! That’s not a marriage at all, and certainly not a family. He’s hardly there as a husband and a father. I didn’t think that he would do something better if there would be more kids coming either.
When I asked him why he decided to marry the second wife, he then told me the truth that the first wife was not “smart” enough, at least not at his level, and he didn’t feel needed by her. Also that she would get married to the third husband soon. What?!?! What kind of family was that? Wasn’t it a husband’s responsibility to make his wife smart and to be around her all the time? A marriage is supposed to make life much happier, easier and certainly to make everyone’s career grows better, not the other way around.
I didn’t understand him at all. For me, he’s just taking advantages of being a Moslem man. The religion says that polygamy is surely not a nice thing to do and there’s nothing fair in it at all. Yes, Mohammad the last prophet had four wives, but he married three widows and one virgin. The main reason was because of the wars, to help the widows surviving, so he married those old women.
But now it’s not the same anymore. Men took second wives because it’s their dicks do the thinking. And they always took much younger and prettier second, third, fourth wives than the first ones. And do you think that is fair? Come on, no single human being can be fair at all. Whatever the reason would be, it’s never fair. And that man, he seemed so proud of being a Moslem man with two wives. So why couldn’t a woman have two or more husbands?
It’s not my right to judge him at all. But what’s the point of believing in a religion when the best thing you could do was just to disgrace it? I didn’t want to be a sinner to any religion I supposed to have, when all they could see was just me doing all the wrong things against the law of the religion. I believed that religion, if there was one, was only a man made. Literary, it’s the men who made the religion so they could rule the world. And whatever my religion was, it surely was my own deal with my own God, if there was one.
