After a few hours, I came to realize that the driver of Cilacap-Semarang bus I was in was a hardcore fan of Meggy Z, one of the prominent Indonesian male dangdut singers. Although I tried hard to sink my mind into the novel Return of the King that I brought along, I had to admit that Middle-Earth and dangdut were not made for each other. Before long I found myself closing the book and looking at the passing landscape instead, nodding my head in compliance to the beat. My mind were elsewhere but subliminally the lyrics of Mr. Z’s songs slowly seeped in.
It was then when I realized how the man employed mind-bending, unheard of metaphors in his songs. It’s something that singled him out from other dangdut singers although the main theme of the songs were identical, i.e. failure at love and life department, something that curiously appealed to most people. Here’s one of them:
Kalau hanya untuk mengejar laki-laki lain
Buat apa sih benang biru kau sulam menjadi kelambu?
If you only mean to go for other men,
Why did you weave blue thread into mosqouito net?
Get a load of that! He is the only man I know who managed, in a really unconventional manner, to somehow link unrequited love to mosqouito net. I racked my brain for some time trying to make a logical connection between those two , seemingly unrelated, things. Now, if you think that’s weird, wait till you hear this:
Sementara kasih sayang yang kuberikan
Engkau anggap tuk membayar hutang cinta yang ku pinjam
Kalau belum lunas mengapa tak menagih lagi?
Meanwhile the love I gave to you
Is considered as payment for my love-debt to you
If it has not been paid in full, why didn’t you ask for more?
The guy is phenomenal, isn’t he? What kind of man could come up with the concept that love could be considered as debt? How could a guy owe love? Man! It was just beyond the capacity of my simple mind. Hats off to you, Mr. Z!
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