The driver is male, but the voice is female

THOSE WHO in May 2004 had the chance to wait at certain Transjakarta bus stops in Corridor I of Blok M – Kota, might remember cartoon works by Muhammad Reza. Six A2 panels (420 mm × 594 mm) were installed in six different bus stops, one for each of the following bus stops: Kota, Harmoni, Sarinah, Dukuh Atas, Benhil, and Blok M. Not many, indeed. But for Reza at the time, it was quite a lot already.

Reza’s cartoon works constitute a part of the works resulting from the workshop of “Komik Metropolis Gadungan Menyertai Anda” (Fake Metropolitan Comics Accompanying You), held by ruangrupa—a contemporary art group in Jakarta—in April – May 2004. Participants to the workshop created their works following a series of intense discussions for a month. Six comic artists were participating: Didoth, M. Ariv Russanto, Narpati Awangga, Rachman, Ardie—who eventually dropped out—and Muhammad Reza himself. All participants except Narpati Awangga were still students at the time.

The workshop asked the participants to discuss the daily problems in Jakarta. During the rather confounding discussion period, the participants did short researches for the bases of their works. The definition of comic—as an art form that creates sequential pictures—was loosened. The participants were encouraged to create works out of their usual tendency.

As a result, Didoth, for example, used clippings from the tabloid Lampu Merah as a part of his work, accompanied by a character that looked like him, who was always around, commenting on the content of the yellow press. The work was a far cry from Didoth’s narrative tendency before it, as we could see in his previous comic work, Suatu Saat Sebelum dan Sesudah Si Dul Mati (A Moment Before and After Dul Died, 2002). There was also the comic artists duet of Ariv and Rachman—a.k.a Abe—who used the Bekasi Station as the setting for their comic story. While previously they relied on their memory, this time they used the help of photography to maintain the accuracy of the details of the location. Meanwhile, Narpati Awangga—popularly known as Oomleo—created a book smaller than a pocket-size book. The mini book was a picture book. The left-hand page contains text with absurd narrative, but perhaps it constitutes a linguistic exploration by uncommon intellect, or perhaps we could call it ‘experimental poetry.’ The right-hand page, meanwhile, presents pixelated pictures. The pictures—which had almost no connection with the rambling narratives would be animated if we flip the pages.

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Unlike his colleagues, Reza was interested to create comics on bus users. “Why don’t you make one about the Transjakarta ‘busway’ users?” Ardie suggested. They—Ardie and Reza—subsequently agreed to collaborate. Unfortunately, Ardie later dropped out of the workshop because he was busy working. Reza went on to work on the idea by himself.

At the time, the Transjakarta bus system was still a “newborn.” It had been operating for only a few months. There had been public debates supporting and opposing the system, because Transjakarta took over a line along the corridor and many were doubtful about its ability to solve the chronic problem of the traffic jam in Jakarta. Still, the citizens of Jakarta found themselves with a new “toy.” During the discussion, we agreed that Reza should not only use Transjakarta passengers as his theme, but also display the resulting works at the Transjakarta bus stops.

Dimas Jayasrana and I, who at the time were assisting in the workshop led by Ade Darmawan of ruangrupa, immediately tried to obtain the necessary permits from Transjakarta management—who turned out to welcome our proposal with open hands. At the time, Transjakarta was still a private institution. The management was enthusiastic about their enterprise and imagined their bus stops to be free from advertisements, thoroughly functioning as a public space for the passengers. We were allowed to display Reza’s works there for two weeks, with one condition: incorporating a text appealing to the passengers to “Allow the exiting passengers to get off first before you get on” in order to prevent the big producers from being jealous with us, as they had been aggressively offering to put up their advertisements. “They might say, if we allow you to hold an exhibition there, then why we wouldn’t allow them to put up their ads?” reasoned Ajar Aedi, the Public Relation Officer for Transjakarta at the time. We then added another small text informing that Reza’s comic works were the result of the workshop held by ruangrupa, to make a distinction between Transjakarta as the owner of the space and ruangrupa as the organization that managed the activity. The cartoon panels stayed longer than the agreed time because Transjakarta management liked them. After the exhibition, we presented Reza’s cartoon panels to them, as keepsakes.

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Indeed, Reza's cartoon works did not fully record all the awkwardness exhibited by the citizens of Jakarta as they used the Transjakarta buses; such as the near absence of the habit to stand in line, or the confusion regarding the use of the card ticket. Reza only created six panels of cartoon. We did not think that Transjakarta management would enthusiastically welcome our proposal, and thus we did not anticipate the possibility to present more works.

In any case, Reza himself did not think that creating six works would be easy. Reza, the quiet 21-year-old male who was still studying at the Jakarta Institute of the Arts, had offered to display around ten works. After a series of discussions, we settled for six works, with revisions here and there.

In his cartoon works, Reza discussed about daily events in pictures with effective backgrounds. Had we not seen the works at the bus stop, we would still be able to know that the events took place on a Transjakarta bus: from the details of the door, the position of the passengers who stand sideways, and the typical handrail of the bus. The figures have meager noses, narrow eyes, with bulbous teeth, and with their gestures and the situations in which they are placed, they rather successfully incited laughter.

From these six works by Reza, however, only a few of them specifically discuss problems typically found in the busway system—only half of them did. The rest are problems that we can actually encounter on other type of bus. Cases in point are the cartoon about the height difference between a white foreigner and a local, and the one about a standing passenger who is jealous of another passenger who has a seat. Reza talked about such seating issue again in a picture of a fat man sitting and sleeping soundly, saddening a grandmother without a seat and upsetting other passengers. Reza depicted these other passengers in rather dramatic fashion: a young man, apparently representing the male gender; and two women sitting flanking the sleeping fat man. One woman is holding her child, while the other is holding her pregnant belly. Both are looking angrily at the sleeping man. But someone who is not aware is of course not in the wrong. Sometimes some pretend to sleep to avoid such civic duty.

In other works, Reza specifically talked about the busway system. The first example of this is in the cartoon about the coolness of the air conditioning system on the Transjakarta bus. The express Patas AC buses also use air conditioning system, but it is no longer so cool nowadays, unlike the Transjakarta buses that can sometimes be exaggeratingly cold. Cleverly, to make the scene specific, Reza made his character compare the coolness of Transjakarta buses with the notoriously cold Argo Bromo trains.

In two other cartoon works, Reza finally discussed about the “new” things in the history of land transportation in Indonesia. First, the recorded voice telling passengers the name of the next bus stop. Reza’s cartoon character foolishly thinks that it is the driver’s voice, but the driver is a male, while the voice is female. Second, Reza also talked about the automatic door at the bus stop that is situated higher than the road surface. This one is based on a true event, about someone who misses the bus but gets trapped outside the bus stop as the automatic door closes behind him.

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In 2007, three years after Reza displayed his comics, the pocket book of Keliling Jakarta Naik Busway, Yuuuk! (Let’s Go Around Jakarta on Busway!, Nalar Publishing, 2007) was published. The book, which should have been published by the government, not only presents complete guide on Transjakarta, but also on other modes of land transportation in Jakarta, interspersed by cartoon works by Muh. Mirsad—popularly known as Mice, who along with Benny Rachmady, creates the comic series of Lagak Jakarta (Jakarta Exploits).

From six works by Muh. Mirsad presented in the book—notabene the same number of works as Reza’s busway cartoons—only three of them specifically discuss about the busway system; the rest talk about happenings on regular buses. Perhaps because this is a guide book, Muh. Mirsad’s cartoon works here do not have the same critical voice as they usually have in Lagak Jakarta. In one cartoon, the public appeal text of “Make priority for the elderly, the disabled, and women” precisely weakens the work, as he seems unconcerned with the notion that women are taken as weak as the disabled and the elderly. The cartoon becomes a mere portrait, and what is being discussed is not something that takes place specifically on the busway system, but instead common things such as not to bring large objects on to the bus, to give seat to the elderly, or tips to become self confident on the crowded bus by using mouth spray to freshen your breath and to apply deodorant. It is only in the new edition, Cara Murah Keliling Jakarta (The Cheap Way to Go around Jakarta, Nalar Publishing, 2008), among works about other modes of transportation, Muh. Misrad creates a cartoon that specifically talks about the busway phenomenon; i.e. about a Transjakarta bus driver wearing the obligatory suit, making him look like a company director, and a company director wearing his suit, making him look like a Transjakarta bus driver.

Comparing those works by the two comic artists, Reza’s works seem to be more interesting, with all his naiveté. A few years after 2004, certainly many peculiar things have happened. Transjakarta has changed. It serves in more corridors, and has more bus stops; at some new stops, the card tickets have changed into paper tickets; and, of course, the advertisements that were once expected never to appear, are now mushrooming, ranging from advertisements aired on plasma screens, board ads, to free internet services. Some things, however, stay more or less the same. The number of buses is still inadequate, they are often late, and still cannot respond well to the greater number of passengers. The habit of waiting in lines is still nowhere to be seen, and, certainly, Jakarta suffers from more traffic jams. These are the things that might actually enrich the content of a work if only a comic artist is willing to use the busway phenomenon as the theme for his or her works.

Reza’s cartoons had not only made people smile as they saw minute reflections of themselves at the bus stops; but the cartoons had also recorded certain social issues—although only a few and not completely, too—in simple ways. It is something that Jakarta needs, as it is changing rapidly even if we are not aware of it.




Jakarta, December 18, 2008
Translated by Rani Elsanti




ARDI YUNANTO was born in Jakarta, November 21, 1980. After graduating from the Department of Architecture, National Institute of Technology, Malang, in 2003, he returned to Jakarta, the city where he grew up. In 2004, he joined ruangrupa and since 2007 has been serving as the editor-in-chief for www.karbonjournal.org. Besides writing highly unproductively about the city and art, he also works as a researcher for several art and culture projects, as a book editor, and graphic designer, all the while trying to set aside some time to write short stories.

MUHAMMAD REZA, a.k.a Azer, was born in Jakarta, October 25, 1983. He graduated from the Visual Communication Department, Jakarta Institute of the Arts, and liked comics even as a child. He began to make comics at the age of eight. As a student, he was active in a university organization, Sekte Komik (The Sect of Comics), and often participated in many exhibitions and workshops. He broke his own record of creating comics during the event of 24 Hour Comics Day in 2008, when he made 24 pages of comic works in 24 hours. It was an achievement for him as he had never set any deadlines for his comic works. Today, he is trapped in the magazine of Highend Teen owned by the MNC media network, which forces him to make comic works for teenagers every month. He still finds time to make his own comic works.