Standard Bangkok Magazine
April 18, 1971

The faint aroma reminiscent of the days of the spice ships plying the
fabled East Indies in search of treasure cargos for the larders of
Europe's gourmets; ships which brought a new life to little Amboina, on
the Banda Sea.  So thoroughly did it adopt the new culture of the Dutch
traders that it stands unique in the Indonesian archipelago; a status
which is it's blessing and it's curse.

Thalia L. Brougham.

Amboina: The Spice Island close up.

AMBOINA, Island of the Moluccas, Island of Indonesia, Island of Spice!

Once known for its nutmeg and its cloves, it is now better known for its
people, the Ambonese.  Numbering only in the tens of thousands, the
Ambonese are a minority in an archipelago whose inhabitants number over
1-hundred million.  The island of Ambon, lying just south of the Equator
in the Banda Sea, likewise is small when compared with Java or Sumatera,
yet the people of this island continue to gain worldwide attention.

Initially, they distinguished themselves by being the first Indonesians to
accept the Christian faith.  Hindu and Buddhist cultures never extended as
far east as Ambon.  The Mohammedan religion, however, was spreading
rapidly, and was gaining a foothold in the Moluccas when the Portuguese
traders began to arrive.

The inhabitants of this part of the Moluccas are in many ways
distinctively different than other Indonesians.  Centuries of the mingling
of Malays and Melanesians resulted in this unique people.

It was the lure of the valuable spices which brought the first Western
traders to Ambon in the year 1511.  They vied with the Moslem traders both
for the spices and for the hearts of the people.  When the Ambonese,
therefore, accepted the Roman Catholic faith of the Portuguese, it meant
that they also aligned themselves with the Western power politically.
This path which the Ambonese chose to take was one which was to mold the
course of their history.  Today, better than 50% of the inhabitants of
Ambon are Christian from which many of the political leaders are drawn.

On a map of Indonesia looking nearly 1,400 miles from Jakarta, the
Indonesian capital, eastward toward Irian Barat (New Guinea), Ambon may be
found in the center.  The distance between Jakarta and Ambon is about the
same as that between Jakarta and Bangkok.

Ambon is an island of incredible beauty.  Every turn in the road around
the bay affords the viewer a new and breathtaking scene of blue water,
verdant mountains, and coconut palms bending gracefully over the sandy
beaches.  At dusk one can view an unforgettable scene when the fishermen
come home from their day's labor at sea in their huge Arumbai proas
chantinghaunting choruses in their resonant voices as the rythm is
accented by the sound of their oars striking the hull with each stroke.
Then there is the mystical aura of the Inner Bay at night.  Little waves
gently lap the shore like a whisper.  From somewhere across the water
comes the faint sound of drums beating.  The stillness is quickened only
by the fishermen calling eerily one to another as they skitter over the
water in their tiny outrigger canoes, their torches or lamps held aloft.
All the land is a dark, silent shape, and from it a soft breeze carries
the delicious fragrance of the clove blossoms.

It is not difficult to picture the Portuguese traders living on this
pleasant tropical island and sharing their love of music and dancing with
the Ambonese, or fishing with them in Ambon Bay.  These traders planted
groves of nutmeg trees and more clove trees.  They built churches and
houses and brought out furniture from Portugal.

Also from Portugal a missionary came.  In 1546, St. Francis Xavier visited
Ambon preaching and teaching the Christian faith to the young converts.
He was appalled at the exploitation of the islanders by his own people as
they rapaciously took the valuable spices from the Ambonese, paying them
only a pittance for what was to be turned into exhorbitant profit in
Europe.

The Ambonese may have gained little material in return for the spices they
grew but they did retain some good aspects of the Portuguese culture.
Their traditional dress reflects this influence.  Their religious
foundation may be stronger and their language and music may be richer for
the Portuguese having been there.

And then the Dutch came supplanting the Portuguese rule.  In 1605, they
established the Dutch East Indian Company on Ambon.  They were a bit more
fair in their dealings with the Ambonese.  Calvinist missionaries from
Holland ministered to company employees as well as to the Ambonese.
Churches of the Protestant faith replaced those originally started by the
Portuguese.  This was the beginning of the Dutch-Ambonese relationship.
It also marked the beginning of the modern Ambonese Protestant Church.

The Ambonese like to tell how they have been Christians for over three
hundred years and that for over thre hundred years they have been
influenced by Western Culture.  As early as 1660, the Ambonese fame for
being good soldiers and their noted loyalty to the Dutch spread over all
of Indonesia, causeing some Indonesians of dissimilar ethnic backgrounds
to view them with some apprehension.

Before World War II, almost every Ambonese was literate.  Government
schooling and missionary schooling was available to them at every level.
They were being graduated from universities in Holland and from
institutions of higher learning on Java.  There were Ambonese doctors,
teachers, and clergymen.  They were clerks in the colonial offices and
they manned the Dutch naval and merchant ships in Indonesia.  Many of the
best jobs open to Indonesians were filled by the Ambonese.

Meanwhile, nationalistic movements were gaining momentum on Java, a
disturbance factor to the Dutch.  A chief complaint of those living on
Java was the lack of schooling and educational opportunities for their
people.

When I first saw Ambon in 1938 it was the kind of tropical island outpost
people dream about.  The Ambonese have a song which says,

"Ambon is sweet, oh, so sweet!"

They called it "sweet;" others have called it "idyllic," "peaceful," "a
magic island," "a paradise," and "romantic."  When all is not going well
it could also be called "isolated," "rainy," and "lacking the basic
necessities for survival."  When their shipping lines were cut off during
World War II, the Ambonese soon found out that they were not an island
unto themselves.

It would be impossible to mention Ambon or the Ambonese without saying
something about their music and their song.  It is romantic, South sea
island-type music.  Musically the Ambonese are to Indonesia what the
Filipinos are to all of the Far East.  They are the guitarists, pianists,
soloists, and band leaders.  Their songs are sung all over Indonesia: funk
songs which tell of the beauty of the bay, the mountains, about their life
as soldiers, their fighting on distant shores, and how they love their
homeland.  In one village where I lived a lone young manwould stroll
through the streets at night when the moon was full, singing a yearning
Ambonese love song in his rich tenor voice.  Even a church choir
practising or a group of youngsters singing can be a memorable expression
of music which surely will stir the heart of the passer-by.

In pre-World War II days the birthday celebration of Dutch Queen
Wilhelmina was the biggest event of the year on Ambon.  Every village had
its bamboo flute orchestra, its dance troop, and its singing group.

These people thronged to the city to participate in the festivities.  For
days they would perform in the town square before senior Dutch officials
and all who gathered in honor of their Queen, who was highly revered and
whose portrait hung in every Ambonese home.

These festivities ceased abruptly and the ordered way of life of these
contented island people was shattered as they were plunged into the war
with the Japanese which marked the beginning of an era of destruction and
deprivation.  During World War II, the Ambonese were to learn first-hand
the hardships and suffering of war.  After three fierce weeks of fighting,
 the Japanese overwhelmed the Dutch and Australian forces and occupied the
island.

During the occupation, the Japanese were to receive no help from the
Ambonese, who even had the temerity to cheer the American bombers when
they flew over the city and leveled it in two minutes time.  When an
American "badang-dua" (P-38) fighter plane made a particularly
successfulstrafing attack on Japanese installations, the story would
quickly circulate through all of the villages.

Critical shortages of food and supplies resulted in disease and
malnutrition, and survival became the chief concern of the Ambonese, many
of whom died from these causes.  The Japanese earned the hostility of this
people, which was to remain long after the war was formally ended.

When Sukarno declared Indonesia to be an independent country on August 17,
1945, the Ambonese found that they harbored mixed emotions concerning
their future.  On the one hand, they wished to align themselves with the
Indonesian independence movement; on the other hand, they were reluctant
to sever their relationship with the Dutch.

While the revolution was being fought against the Dutch on Java, Ambon was
just beginning to emerge from the ravages of the Japanese war.  The job
facing the construction crew brought in to rebuild Ambon was like trying
to mend the fence when the whole house needed to be rebuilt.  This Dutch
effort was handicapped by the revolution on Java, the aftermath of the war
in Europe, and their own reconstruction efforts in Holland, and the
requirement to assist other areas of Indonesia.  Thus, with the lack of
personnel and resources, reconstruction of Ambon was never fully realized.

When the Dutch concluded an agreement with the Indonesians in 1949, it
meant the end of all Dutch rule on Ambon, and the Ambonese had to face the
fact that they were going to be an integral part of a country ruled
exclusively by Indonesians.  They wavered, fearing they would be swallowed
up by the millions on the larger islands and have no real voice in the
government.

At this juncture, the Dutch invited Ambonese soldiers who had served in
their colonial army to come in Holland and live.  Preferring this to the
alternative of merging with the Indonesian army, thousands of Ambonese
military men and their families left Ambon to begin a new life in the
Western world, retaining their Dutch citizenship.

Shortly thereafter, the Eastern state of Indonesia having been tagged by
then-president Sukarno as a puppet of the Dutch and so abolished, the
Ambonese, stripped of leaders who were on good terms with both the
Indonesians and the Dutch, hastily attempted to establish a separate
government anddeclared themselves the Republic of the South Moluccas
(RMS).  Rejecting this bid for secession and failing to reconcile their
differences, the Indonesian Central Government ordered troops to Ambon to
quell the rebellion.  A prolonged period of fighting ensued with
considerable loss of life to both sides, and the town was once again
leveled.

In the next twenty years, while the old folks on Ambon dreamed of the days
when they fought alongside the Dutch and while their cousins in Holland
dreamed of Ambon as an independent country, progressive change was taking
place on the island itself.  The youth growing up entertained no illusions
of colonial grandeur.  To them Ambon is an important island in the
Republic of Indonesia, a nation in which they are proud to be a part.

The new Suharto government has done much to improve conditions on the
island.  Formerly impassable roads are now in good condition.  The
importation and availability of Japanese motorcycles provides an expanded
means of transportation for the islanders.  Improved inter-island
transportation by Garuda Indonesian Airway's modern turbo-prop fleet
thrice-weekly flights to Laha airport and by increased shipping to and
from the island is promoting opportunities for economic development.

Yet much remains to be done.  Fisheries must be expanded, forest
conservation must be adopted, agriculture and animal husbandry must be
encouraged, reconstruction must be accelerated, and--to meet the quest of
a restless world seeking the new and the different--tourism can be
promoted.

The young Ambonese in Holland who made headlines throughout the world with
their attacks on the Indonesian ambassador to the Netherlands and their
demonstrations against the Indonesian government in support of their
demands for an independent Ambon hardly know the reasons for their
behavior.  It appears that they are completely unaware of the changes
which have taken place on Ambon in the last twenty years.  In a recent
statement referring to the Ambonese abroad, Foreign Minister Adam Malik
stated that the Indonesian government would keep the door open and welcome
back those who wished to return home and participate in the opportunities
for development.  If the young Ambonese in Holland are sincere in their
concern for the future of Ambon they could respond in a positive manner to
this warm invitation.

En route to the island of Ambon recently aboard a Garuda Indonesia
Airway's modern Fokker "Friendship" airplane, I asked an elderly Ambonese
sitting next to me how things were on the island and with the people.  He
replied laughingly to my query, "Well, as you know, we Ambonese are
nothing when we are not fighting."

This indomitable spirit I found manifested in other ways as well.  For
example, I noted it in the woman I visited who was dying of cancer.  She
greeted me in the typical Ambonese laughing and joking manner.  Her still
beautiful eyes--with a naughty look--spoke as if to say, "If I must go
soon, I am going to enjoy every moment of life given to me."

I saw this spirit also in the university professor who had found a way to
complete his education in New Zeeland.  Our conversation in his home was
spiced with Ambonese mirth and witticisms.

With prospects of foreign investment coming into the area and with the
Indonesian government showing increased interest and encouragement, the
Ambonese--at home and abroad--are now faced with the new hopes and
challenges.  Certainly the "fighting spirit" expressed by my acquaintance
will make a significant contribution in what may be the most crucial fight
the Ambonese may yet have to make...the fight to develop and rehabilitate
their own island homeland.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Chaumont Devin note:

This sister, Thalia, had a good memory for the way things felt to her, and
so her writing makes some interesting reading.  She evokes old Ambon with
such power that it is almost possible to feel as if you are there.
Unfortunately she is no longer living, and so these memories, except for
the ones she or I or perhaps someone else have bothered to write down, are
gone.

Since so very little has been written about these things, her account of
old Ambon in the first part of the above article is of very high value.  I
don't know who she talked to on the plane, but the parry sounds precisely
like what I would have expected from Oom Hank Risakota.  The lady with
cancer was my beautiful landlady, Tante Tien Seranamual Rikumahu.  The
university professor was my old friend, Albert Nikiulu.

But in various other parts of this article I must point out errors.  She
writes:

>While the revolution was being fought against the Dutch on Java,

Thalia might have done better to have written, "While the Javanese were
struggling against the Dutch on Java..."  This "revolution" had nothing to
do with the Ambonese, who were pro-Dutch almost to a man.  It was a
JAVANESE movement fought on Java.

>the Ambonese had to face the fact that they were going to be an integral
>part of a country ruled exclusively by Indonesians.

And here is precisely where I will always disagree most sharply with
Thalia.  How dare she state that the Ambonese "HAD to face the fact" of
anything?  Political issues are not dispensed by God, as many fatalists
imagine, but fought out among men, and they who are in the ascendancy
today may find themselves in the descendancy tomorrow.  The problem with
the destiny of Ambon is that it was predetermined by the US Department of
State in Washington, for whom Thalia's husband was working.  This fate of
eternal subserviance and submission to Jakarta was shoved down the throats
of millions of Moluccans and West Papuans against their will and enforced
by the military might of America, a nation whose founding fathers believed
in freedom.

>At this juncture, the Dutch invited Ambonese soldiers who had served in
>their colonial army to come in Holland and live.

This is not at all what the Moluccans have informed me.  They say that
these men and their families were aboard Dutch ships around Java when the
Dutch suddenly gave them this ultimatum: Either join the Indonesian army
(which they had just been fighting) NOW or we will bring you home with us
to Holland.  They were never even given a chance to say goodbye to their
homeland.  To most, of course, serving under this jerk, Sukarno, was
unthinkable, therefore <> 12,000 Ambonese soldiers and their families
ended up in camps in Holland.

And this Moluccan account of the situation is further corroborated by the
fact that at the outset of the Moluccan uprising there were only about 300
armed soldiers and policemen in Ambon.  The 12,000 men aboard the Dutch
ships, all hardened fighting men, were not even allowed to defend their
own homeland.  Instead they were forced to listen from afar as their
valiant friends and family members struggled hopelessly to fight off the
invaders with anything they could in Ambon.  Such was the gratitude of the
Dutch!  Such is the cinicism of the US and the Dutch, who despise "black"
people but love to use them as expendable fighting men.

>Preferring this to the alternative of merging with the Indonesian army,
>thousands of Ambonese military men and their families left Ambon to begin
>a new life in the Western world,

Only one problem.  They did NOT leave Ambon to begin a new life in the
Western world.  They left Ambon to fight on the Dutch side against
Sukarno, and because they wouldn't allow the Dutch to just hand them over
to Sukarno, the Dutch hijacked them for ever and ever to some miserable
camps in miserable, rainy, cold, flat Holland.

>progressive change was taking place on the island itself.

Progressive to the imaginations of rich Americans like Thalia, vut hardly
to the miserable and suffering Moluccan people.

>The youth growing up entertained no illusions of colonial grandeur.

And instead of being educated were systematically terrorized and
brainwashed in order to implant such things as hatred for the West, the
denial of any desire for freedom, acceptance of the "Republic of
Indonesia" (which was always a US fabrication and a deception, and never
any kind of a republic at all), acceptance of the meaningless "Pancasila,"
etc.  I say that the Moluccans were so terrified of the consequences of
breathing even the very slightest thing against the "Republic of
Indonesia" that it eventually became impossible for them even to THINK
anything against this "Republic of Indonesia," for such are the mysterious psychological processes that operate in the minds of oppressed peoples.

>To them Ambon is an important island in the Republic of Indonesia, a
>nation in which they are proud to be a part.

And in which were they to exhibit anything less than this "national pride"
it might cost them their very lives.

>The new Suharto government has done much to improve conditions on the
>island.  Formerly impassable roads are now in good condition.

Which gave the Indonesian military immediate access everywhere in order to
further tighten their control over the people.

>The importation and availability of Japanese motorcycles provides an
>expanded means of transportation for the islanders.

I think she means wealthy Chinese merchants and dishonest locals who
managed to get their hands into the Jakarta till.

>Improved inter-island transportation by Garuda Indonesian Airway's modern
>turbo-prop fleet thrice-weekly flights to Laha airport

Again for rich Chinese and dishonest locals with their hands in the
Jakarta till, and this time also for rich American tourist ladies!  What
honest local man could possibly ever take one airplane flight on his/her
own wages?

>and by increased shipping to and from the island is promoting
>opportunities for economic development.

True, but this only after a much BETTER shipping service was driven from
Indonesia under Sukarno out of nothing more than racist hatred for the
Dutch.  I was there when this happened, and saw and felt the brunt of all
the misery it caused.  When Thalia wrote these words I was riding back and
forth to Buru on boats that were so rusty that I could look out the rust
holes at the scenery from inside them.  The only reason they floated at
all was that the men who worked them had laid cement in the bottoms of
them to keep the water from entering.  Many people were lost at sea, and
many drowned.  And the overcrowding upon this "improved" transport was
such that bodies were so jammed against each other on the decks and in the
holds that people were unable to escape contamination from all manner of
filth including human excreta and vomit.  I have slept in situations in
which it was impossible to turn over in the night because someone was
jammed in fromt of me while someone else was jammed up tight behind me.  I
have slept on a pile of coconut, I have slept suspended on ropes, I have
slept sitting on a bench when I might have lost my life but that No Behuku
saw me and grabbed me when the boat rolled over.  I have had a baby born
on the deck of a landing craft not ten feet from me.  I have slept through
wind and rain and lashing spray.  And I am sure I have yet to remember all
of these things here.  I was young, healthy, and of great strength and
endurance, but beside me were withered old men, ladies, and children.

Yet in all fairness to Thalia, I think she may have been writing about a
few large ships which WERE purchased during the time of Suharto, and which
greatly improved transportation between West Papua, Ambon, Sulawesi, and
Java although they did nothing whatsoever for local interisland travel.
And I believe it was aboard these same ships that the Jihad later arrived
in Maluku and aboard which people were murdered for being Christians.

>The young Ambonese in Holland who made headlines throughout the world
>with their attacks on the Indonesian ambassador to the Netherlands and
>their demonstrations against the Indonesian government in support of
>their demands for an independent Ambon hardly know the reasons for their
>behavior.

And here dear Thalia has insulted us with the ultimate insult because
these people were struggling for their own very precious rights as human
beings.  Perhaps she assumed that SHE had a right to demand freedom
because she was an American, but that Moluccans, not being Americans, were
not endowed with this same right.  It is clearly Thalia herself who hardly
knew the reasons for these actions, and was unable to see them because of
the shortsightedness of her own biased philosophy.  These people were
fighting for freedom, and had an inalienable right to fight for freedom
just like anyone else on earth.  But I fear that Thalia's thinking was
only a reflection of that of our own State Department, in a country that
was founded upon freedom.  For more on this see Henry Kissinger's infamous
memo selling out the Papuans, which has recently been made available by
the freedom of information act.

>It appears that they are completely unaware of the changes which have
>taken place on Ambon in the last twenty years.

No, but it was precisely Thalia who did not understand these changes and
the Moluccans who did.  Thalia obviously belonged to that group of people
who believe that they know best what is and is not right for others.  And
yet it amazes me to think that my own sister believed she knew more about
Ambon than the Ambonese themselves!

>In a recent statement referring to the Ambonese abroad, Foreign Minister
>Adam Malik stated that the Indonesian government would keep the door open
>and welcome back those who wished to return home and participate in the
>opportunities for development.

But this is like the jailer inviting escaped prisoners back in, or maybe
East Germans inviting West Germans to climb up to them over the Berlin
wall!

>If the young Ambonese in Holland are sincere in their concern for the
>future of Ambon

I am ashamed of these words, which add insult to injury by infering that
Moluccans fighting for their freedom cannot be sincere.  And yet I have
posted this for people interested in getting at the truth about Maluku and
America, and for freedom.

>they could respond in a positive manner to this warm invitation.

The positive thing to do would have been to get the Javanese criminals
running Indonesia out of Maluku lock, stock, and barrel before they had a
chance to do any more killing.

Thalia knew many high-up Indonesians.  Why didn't she respond to their
great warmth by offering to become an Indonesian citizen?

>En route to the island of Ambon recently aboard a Garuda Indonesia
>modern Fokker "Friendship" airplane, ...

Uhuh, the Indonesians are modern, and they have shown us the way!

>"We Ambonese are nothing when we are not fighting."

I wonder how Thalia expected someone meeting her on an airplane to
respond?  Maybe something like: "The Javanese have stone-age minds, and
they have us by the gonads."  But this response that was given, which can
be read in so many ways, would seem to say everything except to Thalia.

Albert Nikulu didn't "manage to complete his education in New Zeeland."
He made a bargain with the Devil, and the Indonesians sent him there.

>prospects of foreign investment coming into the area

To remove every last stand of meranti wood left on Buru and Seram, sell
it, and pay off the Bapaks in Jakarta leaving the Moluccans with nothing
now to face a barren and polluted homeland.

>Indonesian government showing increased interest and encouragement

Like the interest and encouragement of those army fellows who stand watch
at Tulehu and take a tiff of all the cloves, and like Suharto's son, who
eventually got a monopoly upon all trade in cloves.  Once a friend of mine
saw a woman open her bag up and toss ALL the cloves that she had brought
into the water instead of sharing any of them with these men.

>The Ambonese--at home and abroad--are now faced with the new hopes and
>challenges.  Certainly the "fighting spirit" expressed by my acquaintance
>will make a significant contribution in what may be the most crucial
>fight the Ambonese may yet have to make...the fight to develop and
>rehabilitate their own island homeland.

Nay, but rather the fight to get rid of this "Republic of Indonesia"
albatross once and for all, and to deal with the American "masterminds"
and disinformers behind it.

And I will say plainly that everyone of my sisters and brothers that has
ever sat down to dinner in an Ambonese home or enjoyed the repartee of
Moluccan conversation only to give credence to these lies that have been
perpetrated against the people and the islands of Maluku is a traitor to
those faces that smiled upon them and to those hands that fed them.
Whether wittingly or not, they have betrayed Ambon and all the things they
ever loved in Ambon.

--Joe Devin.