Monday, September 24, 2007

"The sweepers" and You are cutting my grass.

One thing that I have never come to grips is the fact that all the Indonesians who have the responsibility of cleaning either your hotel, bungalow, Pondok, hut or even the street start at an ungodly hour. I do see that it's a cool part of the day and the relentless heat and sun haven't started piercing the trees yet, but they seem to do it outside your door. I have enclosed a picture of one such sweeper so you can get my drift. They use long pieces of straw bundled together by twine and use a sweeping motion to get rid of ubiquitous leaves, papers and make a little pattern in the dirt so it looks well groomed, similar to our suburban beaches. Now that in itself is not the problem. Its the fact that most tourists go out and have a few drinks and sometimes get home late. So at 6.03 am this morning there was sweeping outside my room. Its not in a constant pattern like a clock ticking but it's intermittent and non rhythmical. Thats whats drives you nuts. So the Solution. I need some help here. We just have to ask the whole of Indonesia with their ingrained culture and heritage to simply change your cleaning duties from the morning to the afternoon. How do you think we'd go?
Closely related to the sweeper is who I affectionately term "The grasscutter". I actually have a conspiracy theory here and I'm going out on a limb, and that it's possible that they are one in the same person. Ok call me mad but these people use large old metal scissors or shears to chop at the grass blade by blade. They too work the early hours in the morning, usually just after you have gone back to sleep after "The sweeper" has stopped. Are you getting my drift? When the grasscutters have stopped. Its too hot to go back to sleep anyway, so you may as well get up and have breakfast. Now I have a solution to "The Grasscutter" as well. It's called Operation "Get a goat". I think its self explanatory.
Then all the tourists who come to holiday in this great country can get some fricking sleep.

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