Lessons Learned From Indonesian Women: A Leader's Answer

My husband and I recently spent three weeks in Indonesia. This is the second in a series on women I met on our trip and the lessons each woman taught me.

"Can you share a story about the importance of reading with the mothers who are here?" our host asks me at a library we have been invited to tour as part of a literacy program encouraging reading on several of the 600 inhabited islands of Indonesia, a country that consists of over 17,500 islands scattered over 3200 miles from east to west across the ocean. The children have just exited to another room to hear stories and play games with others in our group.

With my experience as a preschool music teacher, I anticipated being with the children, instead, I am asked to share a story about reading. Not a lesson with facts and figures. A story. In this culture of oral tradition, it is all about a good tale.

I look out at the group of women seated in rows in the warm room. Some wear traditional head coverings and some do not, in this small Indonesian village. Most of the husbands spend 11 months each year away from home, searching for farm work as far away as Malaysia and Singapore. 

"Do you have a story?" our host asks again.

I clear my throat.

"My grandfather on my father's side had to drop out of school at a young age," I begin, "after the death of his father. My grandmother had more education," I add, knowing the value of elders in the village. "My grandfather owned a dairy farm, and every night after the farm work was done, my grandmother would read to the seven children."

An interpreter shares my words in Bahasa Indonesian. The headman's wife leans forward, her face intense and serious. Since being introduced to us an hour earlier, I have been drawn to this woman. Straight back. High cheekbones. A traditional gold and brown batik shirt above black ankle-length pants. But no smile. She seems to bear the weight of the world on her shoulders.

And maybe she does. Her world, anyway.  A world of 136 families, with half of that number having arrived recently from other parts of Indonesia. When they returned to their tribal lands, her husband--the chief since 2006--welcomed them back to their ancestral home and generously gave land to the 60 new families.

"My father was the first one in his family to go to university," I continue. "He became a teacher."

A young mother in a coordinated plum-colored outfit nods from the front row. Does she also yearn for university for her son or daughter?

"My father's success began, in part, with his mother reading to him," I conclude. "Do you have questions you would like to ask?" All eyes in the room swing to the chief's wife.

Lips closed, she gives away nothing. Her countenance provides new meaning to the phrase, stoic. A few other women ask personal questions about us and about mothering.

My eyes keep going back to the headman's wife. What is it like to carry the world of 136 families on your shoulders?Did she sign up for this? When she married, did she recognize the leadership qualities in her husband? Had she ever anticipated this in her future? As one who has experienced the weight of an office not chosen by me, but shared because of the loving of a man who chooses the caring of a church and a city, I long to ask what it is like for her. I want to ask, but her quiet reserve silences me, and my uncertainty in the appropriateness of the question in this culture.

Did she know that the two becoming one of marriage included the fine print at the bottom of the page? Of shared burdens and responsibilities? Of headaches and weight?

Did she know?

Does anyone of us know? Does anyone of us understand this oneness of marriage until we experience it? 

"What is a concern you have for your village?" we ask.

The headman's wife straightens. "The economy," she says, "It's hard with the men gone so long." 

Aha! I think. A leader's answer. Not just the wife of a leader's answer, but the answer of a leader in her own right. Whether she chose the position of not, this woman has a heart for her people and their problems. The other women in the room nod in agreement.

Later we are invited to her home where her husband joins us. When asked a similar question, he talks about education, the economy, and literacy. His wife sits with hands clasped on her lap. She is content to let her husband, the leader of the village, do all the talking.

But I am no longer fooled. I have seen that crack in her heart and the burden she carries for this village. I have seen the other women turn to her for guidance and wait for her to answer. She shoulders a responsibility she may not have asked for, but she shoulders it nonetheless. When I remember our trip to Indonesia, this woman's face is one I see. When I pray, I remember to include her village and the burden she carries for her people.

And I can't help but think of my own responsibilities and to be challenged by her response.

When asked, do I also give a leader's answer?