it as a young girl. Nowadays, it’s a colloquial term for a woman.
Then the term cowok, the male equivalent of cewek, came along. Male Javanese names usually contain the vowel o. Hartono is a male name, while Hartini is female. Joko, Padmo, Handoyo and Suranto are all male names.
“Experimental woman” = Prostitute. Bimbo.
The word perek appeared in the mid-1980s when teenage girls turned up at Jalan Melawai, a street in Blok M, a jumble of bars, malls and hotels in Jakarta. The street became known as Lintas Melawai (lintas means cross or pass quickly) because crowds streamed back and forth. Women strolled, loitered outside shops, dined on bakso (meat balls) and teh botol (cold, bottled tea), and waited for men. Some wanted money; others settled for sexual experience. They looked for a type known as Oom-oom (Oom means uncle in Dutch), a sugar daddy who drove a flashy car and spent with abandon.
Perek is a common term for prostitute among the young, though many elderly people don’t know it. It used to refer only to a promiscuous woman, not a woman who required payment for sex.
Other terms for prostitute:
WTS. A term for Wanita Tuna Susila (woman without morals). It appears in newspapers, radio and television talk shows, government edicts and speeches. The male version is PTS (Pria Tuna Susila, or man without morals). PTS can also be the client of a male prostitute.
Pekerja seks komersial (commercial sex worker). A neutral term commonly used by feminists and social workers.
Kupu-kupu malam (night butterfly). An insect with beautiful wings lures its prey.
Perempuan jalang (wild, untamed woman). A rude expression.
Ayam (chicken). This rude term is similar to chick, the old English slang for a young woman. Some sociologists say the term became popular in Indonesia in the early 1990s because of the alleged tendency of prostitutes to chatter, or cluck like hens. Indonesians often use the term for the benefit of foreign men who are on the prowl.
Cabo. This term for prostitute comes from Ca-bau-kan, which means woman in Hokkien.
Players in the sex industry address each other with familiar nicknames. The regular term for pimp is mucikari or muncikari, but he’s also papi (daddy) to his charges. A madam is germo, but also mami or tante (aunt, in Dutch). They oversee anak asuh (children in their care), young prostitutes who often come from poor villages and have no other source of income.
Young prostitutes who become financially indebted to their pimps and cut off from their families are anak potong (cut child). Hefty cuts of their wages end up in the pockets of managers.
Kelas kambing (goat class) and kelas embun (dew class) refer to prostitutes who don’t charge much.
That’s because kelas kambing once referred to the cheapest seats in a movie theater. The meat of kambing (goat) is cheaper than that of a cow or buffalo.
Kelas embun also offers the cheapest seats at an outdoor cinema: spectators have to sit on grass covered in dewdrops.
Prostitution is illegal in Indonesia, but many Indonesians have a sweep-it-under-the-mat approach to the profession. The sex industry flourishes. Giant prostitution complexes operate in major cities. In some places, clients look through one-way windows at rows of seated prostitutes before making their selection.
In the 1970s, Jakarta governor Ali Sadikin advocated regulation of the sex industry, rather than an outright ban. He pushed for lokalisasi, a policy that let brothel complexes pay taxes and operate under state supervision. He made some headway, but the project died. One regulated brothel in North Jakarta has become a plush Muslim center with carpeted, brightly lit prayer rooms. Muslim groups voice their opinions more forcefully than they did under authoritarian rule, and lokalisasi is unlikely to make a comeback soon.
In 2004, hundreds of prostitutes in the East Javan city of Surabaya held a mass prayer for the success of the presidential election. They wore Muslim headscarves called jilbab, and some shed tears as they read verses from the Quran.
“Woman-man” = A transvestite/transsexual.
Bencong is another popular term.
Many cross-dressers work as hairdressers and specialize in bridal makeup. Some sing on stage or patrol streets and bars as prostitutes. They await clients at Taman Lawang, a traffic roundabout in Jakarta where trees and bushes offer discretion. Waria operate on the fringes of society, but enjoy a degree of acceptance, occasionally appearing on television soap operas and advertisements. In the final days of 2005, a group of Muslim women rallied at a local parliament building in Sumatra to protest plans for a New Year’s Eve transvestite concert sponsored by the government.
An older term for transvestite is wadam, a combination of Wanita and Adam. It hasn’t been used much in the last couple of decades.
Happy auntie.
A middle-aged woman who seeks a gigolo. Armed with cash and gifts, she lures young men into romantic liaisons.
Some well-off Indonesian wives indulge in pleasures of the flesh because their husbands ignore them. Their spouses are busy, the wives figure, so why not keep busy themselves?
Om senang (happy uncle) is a man who seeks stimulation from younger women for a price.
Both characters became prominent during the 1970s heyday of the economic boom in oil-rich Indonesia. Buoyed by the rise in global oil prices, the elite had lots of money to splurge on good times. Some people frowned on amorous adventures, warning of the deterioration of family values and neglect of children.
“Onion kid” = The runt of the litter. A nobody.
A shallot usually has a bulb that is smaller than the rest. It just seems to fill the gap.
In a school playground, kids slot into two teams for a game of tag. The youngest jumps up and down, eager to join. Her older sister smiles and tells the others: “C’mon let her into my team. But she can’t be ‘it.’ She’s only an onion kid.” Ayolah, dia ikut timku. Tapi dia gak bisa jadi. Dia cuma anak bawang.
Bawang merah (red onion) is the fragrant Asian red shallot. Bawang putih (white onion) is garlic. Bawang bombay is a big white or yellow onion that takes its name from the Indian city known today as Mumbai. Onions were noted as a digestive and treatment for the heart in India more than 2,500 years ago, though the vegetable is believed to have come from central Asia.
Malang guys.
Men from the town of Malang in the East Javan highlands get raucous when the atmosphere heats up at soccer games. They are some of the rowdiest soccer fans in Indonesia, and are notorious for getting into fights before and after matches. Arek means child in Javanese.
Soccer crowds from Malang are also called bonek, an acronym from the Javanese terms BOndo (collateral, or investment capital) and NEKad (recklessness). They are rich in recklessness, but don’t have much capital to fund their trips to other cities.
The bonek rally their soccer team, also called Arema, at outof-town games.
Batak shoots directly/immediately.
The