The Muezzin

Landlord Adhi's mother identified the man positively. Yes, she was sure, Pak Yatin. A little shy smile at the challenge. Sorry to appear doubting Ibu.

         Where had those sandals gone?... In the sarong ten metres along the gang was quite alright, numerous men attended Nurul Huda in sarongs.

         Nurul Huda Masjid in Gang 2, Sosrowijayan, this one particular muezzin was a standout.

         A few days before Wahyu the day-shift manager at the losmen had suggested a chap named Pak Yatin. Adhi the landlord confirmed: the chap in question could only be Pak Yatin.

         The problem was a definite match for the particular voice. There were now three or possibly four muezzin making the various calls from Nurul Huda, one at least a newbie introduced in the last few months. The new chap and the old mainstay were the clearly distinct voices; one other certainly in the mix and possibly two. 

         No pattern was evident. How the men organised themselves was unclear. A roster of some kind was doubtful.

         With his prima donna straining the newest, younger voice positively irritated. Earlier in the year Nurul Huda had been free of this kind of put-on, all the voices emanating from older men reaching through mature contemplation for the call to their brethren. This new chap suggested he had opened a direct line to the beyond. It made painful listening; made one positively wince in the room and out along the paths. 

         Given the example of the other this fellow was a travesty. The chap seemed to be auditioning for a recording contract, the volume on the amplifier always turned up to the max. In the case of the other, Pak Yatin—if Yatin was truly the man—the volume was often erratic, sometimes barely audible in the beginning, and at other times oscillating as the call progressed.

         The stand-out muezzin was not on top of the technology. An old guy, a grey-beard one suspected, one with plenty of inner fibre retained. Landlord Adhi's uncle who lived in back, a kind of classic Byzantine saint in aspect, would have been perfectly fitting were the man not in fact an old Javanese animist. (At first meeting earlier in the year he had wanted the matter known.)

         The reconnoiter that evening following Landlord Adhi's mother's identification bore no fruit. Looking into the mosque from the gang the men within could not be differentiated. In the far corner the pulpit stood with microphone attached. From the gathering of men it was impossible to tell who had just delivered the call. One still hesitated on a touristic pass through a mosque, especially a small neighbourhood house of worship.

         The reason Pak Yatin was dismissed at first sight when the man of that name unexpectedly turned up one morning for some repair work at the losmen was because he was too young to fit the bill. Unlikely-looking in person and too young.

         For a number of weeks on this last visit the chaps passing along the gang out front of the losmen were scanned. Two or three weeks previously when the hunt began in earnest Wahyu had suggested an older fellow who always wore a songkok, with hair grown out behind. In his seventies, Wahyu guessed. The man usually wore a sarong when he attended the mosque and called the azan, Wahyu added. Promising.

         There were a couple of prospects penciled as they passed one way or the other along the gang, one thin old chap in particular who looked about right coming from houses somewhere toward the station. A slow-stepping fellow like him, spare frame, still healthy, with fairly thick grey strands a few inches behind seemed close to the mark. 

         The man sought was perhaps an ex-smoker; the remaining strength of voice suggested the habit had been overcome. Retired, an honoured paterfamilias; quiet and unassuming. If one could lay eyes on the man before the microphone the sight would be something to behold. 

         To date the only muezzin who had ever been seen in action was at another small neighbourhood mosque in a narrow gang not far from Nurul Huda. Chap had been glimpsed passing the open doorway and footsteps needed to be retraced. The example of this man had suggested that muezzin required some privacy in the mosques in order to perform his particular duties. At this mosque a five or ten minute walk on the other side of Sosro the muezzin had stood in the front corner turned to the wall, microphone in one hand and the other providing some firm bracing it appeared clutching the back of his head just above his shirt collar. 

         Amplification in the last decades meant muezzin no longer needed to climb up into their minarets to deliver their calls to the four quarters.

         Like any great vocalist, this particular man's phrasing at Nurul Huda was unique, quite inimitable. (There was in fact a hint that the prima donna had given it some study.) Some part pleading might have been involved in it; at his age the question of personal salvation, while not necessarily the specific burden carried, must have been bound up. One heard a predicament, a certain fraught position implied in the rendition of the verses sounded by this muezzin. 

         Allahu akbar / Allahu akbar.... Hayya 'ala salahh / Hayya 'ala 'l-falah.

         God is great / God is great.... Come to prayer / Come to victory 

         In this man's vocal posture there might have been sufficient enough sense of individual worth and dessert, a not unreasonable hope maintained; that however of course remained entirely for Allah to determine. Certainly there was no room for complacency in this muezzin's stance. Modesty, frankness and perhaps above all submission such as one had never heard in a Christian context. 

         The man was compelling. As an Intercessor, if that were possible in Islam—which seemed not to be the case, despite the prayers of others always being valued and actively sought—a chap like this would be highly esteemed. Under the sway of the man's rhythms and elongated notes one stumbled in pursuit. Tellingly the year before, Faris the Arizonan convert had revealed it had been an Iranian muezzin in the Shah's time who had finally brought the American over to Islam. (No-one ever converted from Quranic readings, Faris had added.)

         After three or four other voices in recent days, on the Friday the maghrib had been delivered by the man, Pak Yatin. All were in agreement.

         A day or two prior a workman had appeared at Red Palm beginning repairs on the sagging eaves out front over the entryways. Mid-year a couple of other chaps had worked on the division of a room at the losmen, constructing a party-wall of bricks and mortar, a pair of bathrooms, floor-tiling, architraves and jambs labouriously chiseled from the timber. For the present Adhi could only afford aircon in one of the rooms. The pair of workmen were fine jovial sorts, the chief with his moustache and flatcap a kind of character leapt out from the pages of a children's picture book—Happy Jack the candle-stick maker, whose product was delicious sherbet. The repairman for the eaves was another kind of fellow.

        Not far into his fifties, a ready and able all-rounder it was easy to see, Yatin. Sturdy and capable, moderate and well-mannered; a tradesman from two or three generations past in the Western case.

         Slight squint; at a brief encounter on his second day numerous gaps in the teeth were visible. Typical warm smile, from a face that looked incapable while the man was wielding his pliers. 

         Men like Yatin got on with their tasks, working steadily and surely. Pak Yatin had at the same time a young face and one deeply cut and creased. In the usual way, in coming days he would be difficult to recognise in passing.

         This could not be the man, Wahyu was immediately told. Too young for one thing. 

         Only thirty himself, Wahyu could not be expected to judge ages. This man the young would-be screenwriter had in his mid-sixties. (In another case Wahyu had been out fully twenty years.)

         Pak Yatin could pull rusty nails alright. Swing a hammer. You could not imagine him concentrated at the microphone up front at the mosque producing those tones that had one in such thrall.

         Sometimes a child's lullaby sounded in that voice. Many evenings one was pinned to the bed listening for the reach, waiting to hear how far it might rise and fetch. Some kind of preamble for the usual surat for the maghrib in particular carried this uncanny lulling, in

uniquely soothing tones. 

         Twice this had been clearly and positively identified as Pak Yatin. His signature hoarse voice, landlord Adhi's mother indicated on one occasion by a clasp of her throat.

         Pak Yatin still smoked, though not incessantly; during the works he was never seen with a cigarette dangling, as had been the case for the pair earlier in the year. One Friday when Pak Yatin worked under lamplight at Red Palm he was found later in a camouflage tee passing the front of the losmen on his way to the mosque. A hard body man. Shortly after he was unexpectedly encountered seated on the steps opposite the children's playground smoking. 

         Positive identification. Landlord Adhi's mother had been in that house opposite Nurul Huda almost forty years. Mystery solved; a face and form could be put to the voice. 

         Almost four months hearing the calls from Nurul Huda and studying them in some kind of fashion. In some sense it had been the muezzin who had drawn one back to Red Palm three months after the first visit, 4AM wakings notwithstanding. 

         One had long accepted the liability of a tin ear. (What must Mozart's famous discrimination in quarter tones have meant for life experience?) Still there was no expectation of a spanner in the works near the beginning of the final week of the fourth trip to Jogja.

         Tuesday 24's dzuhur call approaching noon. As the voice sounded the noisy fan on the wall of the room was as usual turned off in three not-too-rapid clicks.

         Almost immediately the realisation struck. 

         It was clear an error had been made. A confusion. This now was not Pak Yatin. Yatin stood to the side of this particular man.

         The new aircon room at Red Palm was windowless. There were glass bricks over the bed-head providing some pallid light, but no ventilation and no direct access to outdoors. 

         Better reception could be achieved by kicking open the magnetic catch on the bathroom door for the small ventilator in the ceiling that funnelled purer notes into the room.

         Pak Yatin was in a direct line with this muezzin, a descendent and pupil. The confusion was now understandable.

         Out on the front veranda Wahyu and Landlord Adhi's mother confirmed what had been immediately and abundantly clear. No, this was not Pak Yatin. This was…. 

         ....Ahmadwaji needed some short grappling.

         The description of another sarong man, minus long strands behind in this case.

         Sandal search again. Again the thin Polynesian sarong doubled in front was perfectly decent no matter which young girl might be passed in the gang.

        Once more two or three figures lurking within Nurul H. made identification impossible. It seemed too that the azanwas not delivered from the pulpit. As most of the older men here often spoke almost no English, putting the question was not possible either.

        Waiting-out the quarry was the only recourse, with Wahyu happening on hand.

        Ahmadwaji would be along shortly. (For some reason Ahmadwaji needed no dignified title.) 

         Wahyu did not attempt to mask his boredom. Ahmadwaji held even less interest for Wahyu than Yatin. The wait went on. One could be unlucky, Wahyu half-apologised, suggesting the man may have taken a snooze indoors, what with the rain started.

         Wahyu was surprised and a little bewildered at all the fuss. For Wahyu the quality of voice of the muezzin was unimportant. Wahyu had a particular ustad for his weekly Quranic classes, a respected and trusted man still in his thirties who gave what Wahyu considered wise and vital counsel. Yatin the repairman and Ahmadwaji were neither here nor there for Wahyu. Such men might be only functionally literate (Yatin had not a word of English); none of them could approach the understanding and insight of his ustad, Wahyu maintained.

         A passing shower in the event.

         — Come sir. Come.... There, you see?... The old man.... No, the one standing with cigarette.

         Two men but one cigarette. It was a familiar face. If Yatin had been slightly, ever so slightly, disappointing in his person, the figure of Ahmadwaji had nothing whatever to do with that remarkable force of delivery in his call to prayer.

         A scarecrow figure thin and slight, flap-eared, blinking behind his glasses and stooped. Later the old photographs of blind Gus Dur the former President came to mind. 

         On the way to lunch a slow march past the mosque offered a close examination. 

         More rain to come, the man Ahmadwaji agreed in a sparrow voice, returning English to the bahasa he had received. 

         With another there Ahmadwaji had been scanning the clouds. Some evenings Ahmadwaji sat on the steps opposite the mosque smoking and watching the children’s kites riding a breeze that was imperceptible on the ground. 

         Pak Yatin had been acknowledged for his striking calls. In the case of Ahmadwaji one had held back.

 

 

 

                                                                                                Yogyakarta, Indonesia