Where's your manners?

I've got the back to work blues after a week's holiday. After one hour back at work, I'd counted how many work days are left this year; approximately 87. I know that's actually not much, but right now it feels like a death sentence. I have no motivation to plan for teaching 60 students, or to prepare seminars for 30 teachers, mainly because no-one cares what I'm doing here, or knows how much work goes into creating a course for teachers who get paid so little for the job they do that most of them (quite rightly to be fair) put professional development very low on their list of priorities. 

I realise I sound like a grumpy child. That's what arriving at work to find that my desk had been moved did to me. My back is to the window (a window to the hallway), exactly where I didn't want to be, and the previous teacher's junk has been left in a dusty pile on the floor for me to clean up. 

If only it was that simple...

Wanna know what else is annoying me today? People. Friendly, smiley, nosey people. Colleagues I don't know coming up to me and touching my stomach and asking me how many months pregnant I am. When it comes to work related topics, asking a direct question and getting a direct answer is almost impossible, but where other people's private lives are concerned, there is no filter. I think "say what you see" would be a good header for the way many people approach small talk here. In response, the reserved Brit in me has to force a smile and try to give an answer that provides as little information as possible while still being 'polite'. The worst aspect of these interactions is that one is often forced to lie in order to protect one's own privacy. 

Soon after I arrived in Indonesia I experienced the Indonesian art of lying, caused in my opinion by the clash of two conflicting Indonesian social standards. The first is the above-mentioned tendency to "say what you see". The second is an inherent desire to save face. Indonesians generally don't like to lose face, and there are many situations which constitute losing face to an Indonesian that, for want of a better way to describe it, are just 'no big deal' to Westerners. For example, I often have to schedule in-class observations of teachers, and I have learned not to ask direct questions such as "are you teaching then?" or "do you plan to teach your lesson in English today?" If I do, I get all manner of vague answers and excuses in response. Instead I have to say "I will observe you at this time. I expect you to teach in English."

Unfortunately it's not always that easy to get around the dishonesty issue by being direct, because giving a direct answer to a direct question is often interpreted as being rude. To me, being asked about my marriage and child-bearing status by a stranger is both direct and rude, but to the average Indonesian, a direct - and honest - answer would be just as rude, such as the words "sorry but I don't know you well enough to share that information with you".

It's so confusing here. There are examples and counter-examples of everything. I was trying to think of more examples of Indonesians shying away from being direct, but instead I remembered a female Indonesian teacher at my school telling me and my fellow expat colleague that after 5 months in Indonesia we shouldn't make cultural slip-ups anymore, because after 3 months in Europe she had it all figured out. She also said that we have no excuse not to be polite because everyone knows that people in Asia are polite. The irony of her words still astounds me.

There is no way I know of that I can tell my boss that I find it impolite that he moved my desk without him thinking that I'm an impolite employee. *silent scream*

To end, a joke from my childhood...
Two friends were playing outside. Their names were Mind-your-own-business and Manners.
Manners needed the loo so he ducked down behind a nearby bush, while Mind-your-own-business guarded the scene. Along came a policeman and asked "What's your name?" to which Mind-your-own-business replied "Mind your own business". "Ere" said the policeman "where's your manners?" and Mind-your-own-business replied "behind the bush having a wee".