Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Ghost stories in Indonesia are the equivalent of weather small talks in the four seasons countries

These last 3 months have been busy months with the many visits from friends and family members from outside town. Mom, my brother, in law and daughter, brother in law, my sister and some friends from Bdg, Kpg and I forgot where else.

When we ran out of conversations, what do you think is the neutral 'everybody knows and experienced it at least once in their life' kind of topic? Yes, guess you know, it's ghost stories. It's everywhere in country, different styles, similar styles, plethora of them scattered in almost the entire corners of the country. Everybody at least have experienced it once. At least. Meaning, more often they experienced more than once, some have even experienced it daily! Alias, indigo. They smell it, feel it, see it, talk to it, scared to it, dare to yell to it, and only god knows what else. But you know, I have to say that it is interesting because this is a neutral topic. It is not too personal, not too specific. Pretty general, can create a good smooth conversation (yes, you have some agree, some do not agree, some believe, some do not believe, some experienced a little encounter, some embrace the whole encounter -talking with 'them', for god's sake!). A very good stimulation and good ingredients for a good conversation, right? So I'd say, the Indonesian ghost stories must be conserved, or preserved as national heritage. If Westerners have their weather small talk, we have the ghost small-to-big talk! A topic I guarantee will attract people to join and keep the conversation pretty long, will not offend anyone. 

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