Tricky Balinese Idioms

This happened about two years ago, when my roomate first came to Bali. After spending her first two days in the city center, she decided to pay me a visit (I was in my grandparents’ house at that time) and we both agreed to meet up at a cafe in Kuta. Actually, she has never travelled to Bali before; hence, the environment and the whole city routes were completely new to her. However, she arrived safely in Kuta, but after ten minutes of amazement, suddenly she got lost and completely knew nothing about the directions. Then she walked to the nearby bus and asked direction to an old man next to her, “Boleh antar saya ke alamat ini?”, then the man answered her, “boleh, tapi setelah itu saya minta pipis ya?”. She felt so offended after hearing the man’s unrelated-sudden reply, then she exclaimed,”maksudnya apa ya,pak?”. The man smiled a little while then added “pipis,pipis. Kalau situ kasih pipis lebih,,beli antar langsung ke tempatnya”. She thought that the man was trying to flirt or even insult her, yet the man kept smiling as he waited for her next reply. She felt so annoyed by the man’s rude words and she could no longer hold her temper, then all of a sudden, she slapped the man as she said, “dasar jorok!” and walked away. The man felt so humiliated that he pulled her hand and slapped her back .Once in a wink, this misunderstanding turned into a duel, simply because my friend misinterpreted that silly word. Everybody near the bus stop then tried to calm them down.


Five minutes later, after being convinced by others, the man apologized to my friend and offered his favor using the word “pipis” again. Still fully conquered by her anger, she tried to slap the man again, but somebody held her back and asked what seemed to trouble her. She then told him that the man was probably trying to flirt her. Hearing all this, the man suddenly burst into laugh and explained that he actually demanded the wages for his assistance (the word “pipis” means “money or wages). Two minutes of stillness passed, then she set a confused face as she said, “sorry I did not know”. She hurriedly left the place without saying another sorry word. She did not even want to turn around, for she was afraid of being given a sharp glance. Luckily, she found a telephone pole nearby (she left her cells at the hotel) and called me, she told everything that had just happened. My only reply was “be careful of whatever words you are going to hear or even say. We are just two strangers, here”. My friend experience has indirectly led my curiosity to have a further look on the Balinese idioms.


Modern Balinese language, however is the version that got the major influence from Dutch, Chinese, and English, as a matter of fact, modern Balinese language at least introduces further variation such as spoken language (which mostly unknown for daily communication), polite language or Basa Alus which then divided into “alus sor” and “alus singgih”, whereby “Alus Sor” means words that used to put the speaker’s status lower than his/her speaking counterpart, on the contrary, “Alus Singgih” is the words that used to put the position of his/her speaking counterpart at higher status. Another variations are formal language (Alus Media) which is a generally accepted language spoken at the public by someone as presenter, head of meeting, and among these do not know each other; and Folk language (basa kasar) which is spoken by the largest part of Balinese and mostly among Sudra cast.


My friend’s case is the real example of Balinese folk language. The words “pipis”,”madahar”(eat), “luas”(go,travel),”maang” (give), and “nyama”(relatives) are some widely spoken words or idioms in Balinese society, especially in Northern and Central Bali. Another folk idioms such as “batis”(food),”ngomong”(speak),”noleh” (see) have no limitation on the degree which means that it can be addressed to anyone (younger or older people) from any casts (Hinduism cast), and are similarly sounded as Javanese folk language (ngoko). To sum up, Balinese language is basically related with the status of Balinese people in cast system. Higher cast will be respected with special words that attribute their actions, possession, character, and others such as high priest, chief of the village, and so on. Moreover, the different between the levels of the language is not in the pattern or grammatical rule, but in the level of lexicon. Balinese language or idioms may sound a little strange and swerve much further than the expected meaning to other people’s ear or perhaps cause a big misunderstanding as stated on the example, but they actually have deeper and unique meanings due to its multi layer’s level.

Sources : http://www.wikipedia.org/balineselanguage and personal experience