Cilok, Lolly Ice, and The Commentary

My father used to take me out to watch football matches. Even when we were on a trip, he usually made it his business to pull over if there was a match in a road-side football pitch we happened to pass by. We simply lingered for a while, or longer—depending on the urgency of the trip, and the attractiveness of the match in question.

On more planned occasions, he would take us on his motorbike or hitching on a flatbed minivan to places like Srandil, Wangon, or Adipala to watch local competitions, especially when the team from his office, the Nusakambangan State Penitentiary, was playing. If I remember correctly, the team consisted of convicts as well as guards. They were kind of good, even without the psychological advantage of being affiliated with one of the most notorious prisons in the country.

You can always feel the excitement even before you get to the venue, courtesy of an army of cone-shaped loudspeakers. The far-from-stereo sound of Indonesian national songs can be heard from miles away. Most of the time, the ‘stadium’ took the form of local football pitch encircled by woven bamboo wall. It was a poor attempt at keeping the ticketless away. These resourceful people could easily craft a hole at strategic locations, or alternatively, climbed the nearest tree to get what I imagined as a much better view of the proceedings.

And it’s not just about the football. It’s all sort of things around it that makes these outings quite memorable.

There’s always the food. Old ladies with simple bamboo tray of boiled and roasted peanuts. With or without shells. Boiled soybeans. Hard-as-nail cassava rings and cassava crackers. And more often that not, there’s the lolly ice vendors. It’s basically shredded ice compacted into a circle and laced with syrup of various color and was held by a small bamboo stick. Voila, lolly ice. Yes, there was the question of whether the vendor wore gloves and the legality of the syrup’s coloring agent. But we were just kids, we couldn’t care less. In that sense, we were equally less hygiene-conscious in our appreciation of cilok. A chewy ball of steamed tapioka dumplings with fish flavor of highly questionable origin. Nevertheless, at Rp.25,- , cilok was very popular among kids at that time.

And of course, what would a local football be without the hardcore local fans and football enthusiasts? These guys had an unshakable belief that they know more about football than all players, coaches, and referees combined. They never hesitated to share their views regarding the players, officials—especially the referee, and the quality of the football they were watching. Loudly and, most of the times, not very politely. The milder of these guys usually commented on the the referee’s eyesight or, if the particular ref is card-happy, the quality of his sex-life.

An then there is the on-pitch commentary, our own local version of Max Sopacua or Andy Gray. His job description included sitting on the best seat of the ‘stadium’, usually a couple metres high, and presented a blow-by-blow account of the match. He delivered his account with an obvious sense of urgency, rhytmic emphasis, and loads of drama. “ANGkat bola ke depaaan, KUTak-kutik sebentaaar, TENDang ke gawaaang, SAYANG sekali Saudara-saudara…masih melenceng dua sentimeter di sisi kiri gawaaang...(lift the ball forward, twisting and turning, shoot on goal, WHAT A SHAME it missed the left post by 2 centimeters)”. He must have been sitting some 50 meters away from goal. But apparently all commentators are blessed with outstanding geometric abilities enabling them to determine precisely how much the ball missed the goal posts. And the crowd loved them for it.


Singing the national anthem along with some 80,000 fans in Indonesia's National Stadium is admittedly an experience beyond description. But really, basking in the afternoon sun with cilok in one hand and lolly ice in the other while watching two local teams slug it out in a pitch surrounded by bamboo walls is not that far off.