While Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has worked hard to maintain the hip easygoing “man of the people” image, which helped propel him into the presidency, he also has to constantly worry about maintaining the image and dignity of Indonesia’s highest office.
Or at least his wife, First Lady Iriana, has to.
During a speech to thousands of members of the Indonesian community in Singapore on Wednesday evening, President Jokowi’s hair fell slightly out of place in the middle of his talk, which clearly alarmed and stressed out Iriana. A video of the event focusing on the first lady’s attempts to quietly alert her husband to his follicular malfunction has quickly gone viral on the Indonesian internet.
You can watch the full video of Jokowi’s speech here, but this package put together by Detik shows the hair folly highlights.
At first, the first lady only looks on in horror and clutches her bag as a large strand of her husband’s hair parts way with the rest. Her hopes that Jokowi will notice and fix it himself quickly fade away as he is clearly engrossed in his speech. When Jokowi turns to address Indonesian Ambassador to Singapore Ngurah Swajaya, Iriana attempts to tell her husband to brush his hair back through the power of charades but still her message goes unnoticed.
Finally, she asks a member of the presidential security forces (Paspampres) to pass a small piece of paper to Jokowi. The speechifying president briefly glances at the note but apparently not close enough to get the message.
Iriana then writes a note to Jokowi on a piece of paper and hands it off to the ambassador who then passes it to the Paspampres agent from earlier who then hands it to the president while whispering something in his ear.
Jokowi finally gets the message and with a flick of his hand his hair is back in place.
With only the slightest look of embarrassment on his face, the smiling president tells the audience, “He just whispered to me, ‘Pak, fix your hair,” which earns him a huge round of laughs and applause from the crowd.
