What's Behind My Fear of Peeing Outside, Society or Spirits?

"Very Superstitious" is our ongoing series on the roots of Indonesian myths, superstitions, and folk lore. Click here for more.

Indonesia is a land of myths. For most of us this is as interesting as it is a hassle. These beliefs are passed down from generation to generation, often without a clear explanation of how they came about in the first place. Who decided that masturbating can make your knees hollow? When did someone first say, "hey, you need to bury your baby's placenta"? And why does it matter if I want to shower at night?

When you ask you're often left with the same answer: "It is the way it is. There's no need to question it." It's pretty unsatisfying when you're asking why women shouldn't eat pineapples. Or why you can't pee outside.

There's a general belief in Indonesia that peeing outdoors at night is sure-fire way to invite some spooky shit into your life. This idea was so embedded in my head that there have been times when I just held it and waited forever in a long queue for the bathroom instead of wandering off somewhere private and relieving myself in public. I would take a painful abdomen over a visit from a ghost any day.

So how do you pee in public safely? Ask permission. Its pretty common to hear an Indonesia announce "excuse me sir, please let me take a leak," when they enter an unknown bathroom. Who are we asking permission of? Why, the spiritual "keeper" of the place, of course.

Indonesians, on the whole, believe in all kinds of spiritual, ghostly things. So why not believe that places have their own spiritual protectors—protectors that might be more than a bit annoyed to find you pissing all over the place?

But there's more to it than ghost stories and spooky bathrooms. Budi Gunawan, an anthropologist from Universitas Padjajaran, explained that a lot of Indonesian myths started as stories meant to control social behavior.

"Myths, or pamali, are a cultural taboo deemed by and relevant in certain communities," Budi said. "For example, the appeal to not to take a leak by a tree is an attempt to maintain cleanliness. But since there's no scientific explanation for it, so it turned into a pamali, [or myth]."

Basically, no one wants to live in a place where people pee everywhere. Piss stinks. It makes a place feel unhygienic and totally unpleasant. So someone invented a reason why you shouldn't be out there pissing as you please… a reason that, today, is a myth.

"Myths have an adaptive function," Budi said. "It's like a system to dictate the behavior of society for generations. Without realizing it, people abide by these beliefs."

So next time you're dancing foot-to-foot in a long bathroom line, don't worry about angering the spirits. But, you know, still hold it until you hit that bathroom stall. Pee is nasty.