Dating Indonesian Girls
Apr 4th, 2006, in Society, by PatungDating Indonesian women may not be for everyone.
Indonesian women, particularly on the island of Java, are exceptionally beautiful. They tend towards the very feminine side, with lovely skin, are not too tall, and have knock-out smiles. There’s plenty of plus on that side of things.
If wer’e to be honest we have to recognise that many men are interested in a woman who will take care of him, do the housework without complaint, and take care of other matters similarly without much bother. Your average Indonesian girl often fits the bill in this respect, certainly more than your average western woman, the less said about them the better.
On the other hand going out with Indonesian women in a romantic way can have many mysterious pitfalls.
Some women here are clearly only interested in money. Some men are unbothered by this. Others of the female variety, can, once we get to know them very well, come across as practically insane, hysterically emotional, scheming, over-possessive, inclined to, usually fake, attempts at self-harm in order to get their way. As I said, not for the faint-hearted.
There are a few Indonesia dating websites although the area is not nearly as developed as that in nearby Phillipines or Thailand. To begin your online journey on the Indonesian dating scene our very own “Meet” section has many a lady eager for company.
4,898 Comments on “Dating Indonesian Girls”
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Achmad Sudarsono says:
Well said, Anita.
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dewaratugedeanom says:
Okay then.. learned my lesson here at IM.
Exit Marisa?
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Daniel says:
Boy this thread is wonderful. I really really relate to it as i have been going out with an indonesian girl and after almost 5 years i have been true or witnessed most of the things discussed here.
One of the main problem is see is communication. Indonesians rarely speak there mind. What they say depends on the social context and will be influenced by who is listening and what is expected of them. Social pressure is very strong in indonesia. We cannot do or say something because of what ‘people’ may say or think. Let me ask: Who is the ‘people’? The ‘people’ is always others but never us, and it is the same for everyone. The ‘people’ is a non existent entity. But my god what a strong hold it has on everybody’s life.
I find at times that indonesia is a hypocrite society. What you look like in front of the ‘people’ and what you really are is in complete opposition, two different reality. I think this duality is caused by the religion and the old traditions wich are not as flexible as the people themselves.
The difference with what you call a bule is in what you see is what you get. We got rid of the ‘people’ by totally getting rid of the religion and the traditions in the 70’s, which in turn does cause problems as well but that’s another debate. Bule are often reffered as being ‘to the point’ And I think that this is what might attract educated indonesian women to them. Basically you can choose the life as a cinetron with an indonesian men or just an honest one on one relationship with a Bule.
To set records straight, bule are often depicted as unfaithful and not willing to commit to a relationship. I call the it “hidup sana bebas ya’ dogma. People probably got that idea by watching too much HBO.
Now let us look at the alternative. How many indonesian mens are faithful? 5%? The odd exception to confirm the rule? 100% of them are good husbands in front of the ‘People’ but how many really are?I think indonesia is very interesting and complex, I’m curious to see how things develop socially. Modernity vs traditions.
Obviously I am caricaturing a bit, but I really think the biggest challenge for a mixed couple is the communication.
-Daniel
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@ Anita McKay
Anita McKay said:
I guess this perception you have is due to how you’re brought up and where you hang out as well as your workplace.
I said, previously:
That’s how I see it from how others looks at it.
I’ve already said that it’s a hypocritical society, right? Well that’s just how it is. I can’t say A, if I’m seeing B.Anita McKay said:
If I dated an Indonesian guy who had a problem with skin color and had a negative prejudice against other races, I wouldn’t have dated him in the first place. He sounds egotistical, insecure human being who will be easily threatened by woman who makes more money, has better career, and more successful.
I said, previously:
Not sure. Maybe because that is how the patriarchal society is, pak Achmad.
That’s how a social stigma is.@ dewaratugedeanom
Does it matter? As pak Achmad said, the 20s can be full of perils as well as triumphs.
To *exit* is simply to close this window.Thanks for asking though
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@Daniel: totally agree. Even now dating different ethnic group is still a big issue for certain people. Indonesians are superficial. Everything important is on the surface. They are willing to sacrifice themselves just to save face. Sad.
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Marisa,
I’m not telling you to study it, because it sounds like you already have P-4, but I think this conversation is one of the examples of how we all need P-4 training again and again.
Pancasila – especially the bit about cooperation – can help people avoid these misunderstandings. At the very least, the sight of the Garuda, sparkling in the light, will fill people with joy and goodwill and they will be able to overcome their differences, just like in Pak Soeharto’s time.
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Aluang Anak Bayang says:
Friends,
What Marisa said was very true. When a local native girl goes out with a bule or even another ethnic group like the Chinese, the locals will think she is a hooker behind her back. I have a Javanese friend who dated an Indon-Chinese man. Everytime they went out, she had to put on the jilbab so she won’t taken as a hooker by onlookers. Oigal said it is Year 2007, but this is Indonesia, bro.
The Bules are perceived as sexual predators or perverts, probably because of what happened to the Philippines and Thailand.
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Aluang,
Indeed, I agree that the Bules are perverts. But sometimes I am perplexed by the contradictions. I think it is people like the DPR members who have mistresses, right ? And also, I think most of the customers, probably well over 95 % in places like Dolly, the prostitution city in Surabaya, are Indonesians. And there seems to be a tempat lokalisasi in nearly every city or town in the country. I wonder who goes there ? They don’t seem to be Bules.
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Janma says:
yeah, but they were ‘influenced’ by bules Achmad… doncha know! Asians left to their own devices are spiritual and pure…
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If the prostitution customers in indonesia were only bule it would not be very profitable.
I was thinking hard and in all my indonesian male friends I can only think of one who is faithful and another one maybe. Thats from someone who has been traveling to indonesia for the last 15 years.
For someone who has money having a mistress is pretty cheap. From what I heard it will cost you from 1.5 million to 5 millions a month plus some gifts or shopping expedition. Usually the wife has no choice to accept the newcommer as she doesn’t want to loose face.I kind of miss the naiveté I enjoyed when I first started going to indonesia. The more I know about it, the less I like it but I keep getting back to it. It’s like a love and hate relationship. Or a bad addiction.
What I still like is riding my motorbike in the wonderful countryside around bandung. The people there are not yet suffering of the urbanisation and I feel still have the soul of the old indonesia. Hell some people cannot even speak indonesian, only sundanese and that’s not more then 10km from the city.Talk about contrast! In 30 minutes you leave the BEC were you can find any imaginable hand phone that exist on the face of the planet and go to a place were people don’t even speak the lingua franca and still do agriculture with techniques thousands of years old.
I wonder how dating a girl from such a kampung would turn out.No doubt every country and culture have positive and negative aspects. It’s a matter of were your limit is I guess. I see spending time in indonesia to be similar to practicing an extreme sport of some sort
When I started to go out with my girlfriend I was willing to leave everything and try to live in indonesia. The more problems we have, most of them family related, the less ready I am do such a thing. I’m kind of tired of the cinetron saga and the more it goes on, I am less and less ready to compromise. I guess I’m not ready to sell my soul just to save the face of people who don’t care about anything else then themselves.
If we get back on the topic I would say the dating part is easy, it’s the let’s get serious part that proves more difficult.
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Mas Sudarsono, re,
The Bules are perceived as sexual predators or perverts, probably because of what happened to the Philippines and Thailand.
My subject matter on the above is that the Bules would perform their ‘immoral’ act openly unchallenged by local authorities in the Philippines and Thailand.
Several Asian groups especially the Burmese, Chinese, Vietnamese and Indonesian Pribumis, unlike the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomarrah (Thais and Pinoys) are very reserved people. I had visited Thailand red light district many years ago, and on few occasion witnessed sex starved Bules shagging local hookers in bars, alley ways, open streets and on beaches in full view of on-lookers. These sex tourists ran wild and had no respect for the locals; that was how ALL Bules are stigmatized, unfortunately. In Indonesia or China, you can only see them tagging their 4ft 11″ 45 kg cup size D trophy in tight clothing around shopping malls, and what they do in their own privacy later on, is none of our business.
The Chinese or Indonesian authority would not condone this sort of immoral activities in public; Even if the authorities were not there to stop them, the local thugs or FPI will come knocking.
Plus, the clientele in Dolly are predominantly locals because no Bules dare venture or stray too far away from their ‘safety’ zones (Bali and downtown Jakarta).
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So Pak Alang,
Is it time for us right-minded Indonesians to take matters into our “own” hands ? Do you think it’s moral vigilante time ? If the police won’t do anything, who’s going to act ?
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Actually, Mas Sudarsono, Indoneisa will not go down to the level one sees in Thailand and the Phillipines, because we have the FPI. After the bombings, sex predators are having second thought coming to Indoneisa; unfortunately we lose alot of decent Bule tourists as well.
The police or us need not do anything, we have the FPI keeping their eyes on them. haha.
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Friend,
I tried to join, but they didn’t like my songs or my poetry. I think some types of Indonesian feel threatened by a man who is not merely a lover nor a fighter – but both !
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Bro, being a fellow Javanese, I understand what you are saying. We are overtalented.
Why join FPI when we can manoeuvre them with money? Why get our hand dirty when others are eager to follow command for peanuts? The Madurese are aggressive and living amongst us. We have the numbers but unlike the Dayaks, no Javanese will fight tooth and nail with them. Why? Cos we are different. The only other pri group that has brain like us is the Melayus; but even so they are way below being a nemesis. Don’t forget Admiral Cheng Ho was impressed by Javanese culture, not Melayus. We are the elite of the elites, the romeo of the romeos, the hero of the heroes. No Javanese is stupid enough to strap bomb and blast himself to kingdom comes.
No need to join FPI if you are a Javanese. FPI may be a nuisance, but sometimes they do come handy especially keeping English teachers in line. For now, we just enjoy, bro like dating.
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Michael says:
Here…Here…YES I fully agree with you Daniel…I married a beautiful Indonesian woman who I brought to Australia and who was so wonderful from the inside and outside, educated and lived a good life mostly in Jakarta and Bandung. She was a quiet, respectful woman but had a hard life due to her father being married four time and she had 18 step brothers and sisters etc etc and as you said “Indonesians rarely speak their mind” and this was the main problem with her which eventually lead to us completely losing touch with each other! (btw she speaks perfect English) She would never talk and express her mind and feelings! We had a beautiful son that I love so dearly and now we are apart! Which btw really breaks my heart each day that I don’t see him? The problem with us was that I got sick and couldn’t work as hard as I did when I meet her. Then, and this was four years after she came to Australia, unfortunately she had to go to work for a period of time which didn’t suite her at all and mind you she only worked four hours a day and that was on a part time basis and that was not as a cleaning lady or servant but as receptionist . What I’m trying to say here is that she was use to living with her sisters and brothers who are all well off with servants, drivers etc and she never had to do any of the chores you know what we all have to do here…cooking, cleaning ironing etc and btw she couldn’t do any of that anyway.
And also as you said Daniel “To set records straight, bule are often depicted as unfaithful and not willing to commit to a relationship”…how true…and as far as Indonesian men are concerned you hit it right on the head!!! What a lot of hog wash that is in the Indonesian psychic about bule men!!! We are hard working, family orientated and most men that go to Indonesia who are looking for a wife are dedicated people who want a different cultured and a good woman!!! It’s a very big pity that I didn’t read this thread before I went over there as I would have definitely had a change of heart and mind as I thought that all middle class Indonesians were dedicated and family orientated women who would love to be taken by a dedicated, hard working and family orientated man to a western country and given a good life. Now my x-wife is on social security here getting 18% of my wage maintenance money from me, but at least she has free medical, dental treatment which she didn’t have in Indonesia and living a good life, typhoid free. In conclusion the problem is that most Indonesians expect an easier life in the west and that is the main problem with mixed marriages.
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Aluang Anak Bayang Said…”The Bules are perceived as sexual predators or perverts, probably because of what happened to the Philippines and Thailand”
Just as an example and I’ve read some of the posts above on sexual predators, pedophiliacs, what about the great Indonesian foreign minister or one of them anyways who was a minister in the Suharto government who raped one of the room service waiters in a leading hotel here in Sydney Australia and it was well kept hushed up case and he never ever came back to Australia…this was a very well known fact in Indonesia, but anyways most of the gays from Indonesia, Malaysia are and doing the same thing here in Australia or the USA, so please don’t just compare a very small minority of undesirables out of the bules as I could do the same in return as pedophilia is far more common in third world countries than it is in the west and I won’t go into detail about that!!! Pedophilia is a very serious crime here in Australia with very serious jail sentence and consequences and when these perverts and undesirables go to jail most of them don’t survive long while in there!!!
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Hi Michael,
I feel your loss and pain and probably disapointment. I think that if the middle-higher class indonesians cling to social status so much it’s that some of them are so useless without the fortune they have. No initiative, no ability to work, no ability to survive on there own. Just a good amount of skill at spending large sums of money in the most useless fashion and at giving orders.
Reading your story makes me wonder. I’m at the crossroads and i have big decisions to make as i am leaving for indonesia pretty soon.
Don’t waste your time answering that comment on perverts and pedophiles.Humans are humans and social inconducts have nothing to do with your race or origins. They are just bound to happen. Statisticly with such a numerous population indonesia is bound to have a few pedophiles of there own.
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Whoa .. hold your horse, friend. I bet you are another English teacher threatening a tic-for-tac response.
What I said was when it comes to sex, Bules or Asians are just the same, only we do it discreetly.
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Michael and Daniel,
You say Bule men are family oriented, but what about Blok M ? What about JakChat ?
I think the Bule come here for the ayam.
Friend, I write a poem about Bule.
Oh ! Mr Bule,
You are so smug and sleek in your Apartemen
But do you know the suffering of the people ?Oh ! Mr. Bule,
The people of Indonesia cry out for justice,
But you just drink Bir Bintang and stroke your belly,You lure the poor girl from the village
And she becomes an AyamOh ! Mr. Bule
So too did Belanda treat Indonesia,
Who was busy developing UFO technology from the Borobudur,But Bule —
Beware, Mojopahit will rise again and then it will be YOU, Mr. Bule who pulls the becak.
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Re,
Reading your story makes me wonder. I’m at the crossroads and i have big decisions to make as i am leaving for indonesia pretty soon.
Yes, alot of English teachers are making big decision to leave. DESTINATION: Thailand, Philippines and Cambodia. WHY: no FPI
Don’t waste your time answering that comment on perverts and pedophiles.
Best to dodge this comment as you are incapable of defending what English teachers had done to the Thais and Pinoys.
Humans are humans and social inconducts have nothing to do with your race or origins. They are just bound to happen. Statisticly with such a numerous population indonesia is bound to have a few pedophiles of there own.
Pedophilia exists in every society but it is more prevalent in Bules societies. I am afraid this is a fact.
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Pedophilia exists in every society but it is more prevalent in Bules societies. I am afraid this is a fact.
bullsh*t…..! it’s just more publicized and people report it more in the west.
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-To anak -Well if you say so. You probably got you info from the FPI? Is this like the leader of Iran who claims they dont have any problems with Gays in Iran because they have no gays there. Nobody like to admit pedophiles exists…
Btw about sex, i am not sure how more discreet it is, did you ever drive into ciater when people run after saying cewek!cewek!? I have travel troughout the world and i never witnessed any of the things you mentioned seeing in thailand.But then again, in any other countries other then indonesia have i been harrased for sex in malls and on the street.
Anyhow i don’t see why you feel the need to reply my post with an insult.(for me it is not, but you clearly meant it as one) I am not an english teacher and it is of no interest for me to become one. You probably had an english teacher yourself once since you seem to speak english very well.
-To Achmad- Indonesia don’t need bules to cause trouble….indonesia is his own enemy. We are talking about corruption here.
Are you aware of that?
The social racism is the product of the indonesians themselves. I probably have more respect for the poor then you do.
I know poverty and i do help many people in indonesia and here too in my country. How about you? How much do you pay your maid or your driver?I know many indonesians who drink bintang and stroke there bellies. Thats definitly not something i am interested in.
Anyhow this discussion is really going off topic. It wont change a thing….who is right and who is wrong….the fact is indonesia is a nice country but it is not perfect. The same can be said of any country.
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Daniel,
I am afraid you just don’t like to hear the truth from a Brown Man. You want the Brown Man to serve you, to say, yeessss meeessterrrr, like Gollum in the Lord of the Rings.
Friend, I will not give you service. I will give you The Truth, though my Poetry.
Oke Friend ?
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Oigal says:
Achy Achy Achy..
Friend, I will not give you service. I will give you The Truth
But you did give the service..if fact wasn’t that scene from Deliverance all about your services and you squealing the truth…
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Did u like my poetry, Mr. Oigal ?
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It that is your truth i can only feel sad for you.
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Daniel,
What did you think of my poem ?
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I think your poem was crap. I think you meant it to be crap.
Try this haiku….It’s all in good fun
Cause all a sh*t stirrer needs
Is some sh*t to stir.
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Ouch Marisa. I’ve dated Indonesian and non-Indonesian before and there’s no problem whatsoever with my parents, family, friends, and society. I guess this perception you have is due to how you’re brought up and where you hang out as well as your workplace. If I dated an Indonesian guy who had a problem with skin color and had a negative prejudice against other races, I wouldn’t have dated him in the first place. He sounds egotistical, insecure human being who will be easily threatened by woman who makes more money, has better career, and more successful.