7th Euroseas: First impressions

Between 2-6 July 2013 I was in Lissabon for the bi-annual meeting of the European Association of Southeast Asian Studies. Its venu was the new campus of the Technical University of Lissabon. A huge compound at the north-western border of the town, exactly the end of the town and in the hot, sunny atmosphere making a rather desolate impression.

We came with some 650 people who earn their money with traveling, writing and teaching on things related to Southeast Asia, all of us with a paper. There were in total 96 panels, some cancelled, some with only 2-4 presentation. I was in panel 81with 11 papers! Besides a few general sessions, it was a supermarket where it was sometimes difficult to find the proper rooms, the exhibitions of new books and the places to talk a little more quietly with many old colleagues.

On the building of the faculty of social and political sciences (Sospol is the Indonesian abbreviation) there was a great sign: we value people. Does this mean that here science cares for people, of that this science judges and evaluates people? The new bureaucrats are educated here, politicians, people who are to talk and write, probably.

The opening session was a disaster: the most important speaker would be José Ramos Horta. together with Bishop Belo the Nobel Peace Prize Laureate. [I discussed with Freek Colombijn this strange combination: an absolutely secular, Marxist oriented activist, and the conservative, rather shy priest, ordained bisop of Dili. The Vatican diplomacy must have been active in promoting this peace prize and must have seen also its own profit by doing this. While the Catholic Church can be very stubborn, dogmatic and rigid, it also is able to be realistic and even opportunistic. But the aftermath of Belo is a shame. Removed to Portugal, later to Mozambique for reasons that were never disclosed openly. Colombij once had an interview with Ramos Horta and with struch by the elegant diplomacy of this warm personality.] Anyway Ramos Horta did not turn up and the second speaker, Jorge Sampaio, former president of Portugal and once the UN High Representative for the 'Alliance of Civilizations' spoke to the audience in the right way: scholars of Southeast Asia are no longer (like the generations of Hans Teeuw, Jan van Baal, Coolhaas) close to the civil administration and to the great business companies, but they are close to the NGOs. Sampaio hopes that mediation will be the new policy: not the army but the social scientists and their NGOs must choose the way of mediation and so found ways for peace and properity.
Above (below) Mieke Schouten and Gerrit Knaap, just some of the more the 25 Dutch scholars I met here in Lissabon. Just one quote: 'soft power has to play a role!'

My own panel 81 was on Friday 6th July, and for the first two days I made a selection of various other groups. I was first in Pale 11 on the colonial prejudices against other races. Then in Panel 67 on community driven development with the question about foreign workers in NGO: are they a good alternative for the local population? Can they also earn money? In Panel 89 James Fox gave a masterly presentation of  his long-term research project of ritual language in Roti: To speak in Pairs. There were some talks about Hizbut Tahrir: not concentrated on a specific person, but more as a nearly anonymous organization with some power and threat to society in Indonesia, where it preaches the international caliphate but also has some local interests. Above we we a photograph of Choong Pui Yee (working in Singapore at Nanyang University). She talked about the difficult situation of Christians in Malaysia who have to give in to the dominent Muslim Malaysian community, are not allowed to receive conversion and even must prevent the use of Allah for God.

7th Euroseas: Arrival

From 2-6 July 23013 I attended the 7th gathering of some 650 scholars who are engaged in Southeast Asian Studies, called the EUROSEAS: European Association of Southeast Asian Studies. I attended several meetings of its predecessor (1989 Bern, 7th European Colloquium on Indonesian and Malay Studies, paper on Raniri), its following conference in Göteburg, with some 100 participants (1990? paper mon Van Lith).
This conference was huge. I arrived early in Lissabon and in the morning I took the opportunity to see the Palácio Nacional do Ajuda.

It is a 19th century palace, built for a queen who was a daughter of Vittore Emmanuele of Italy and like to do shopping in Paris and other capitals. The royal system was abolished somewhere in the early 20th century and the place remained more or less as it was, not really plundered, not well kept. There were the luxurious elements of these places like, below, the cruel humiliation of Achilles killed in the battle at Troje (or was it Hector killed?)

Amidst this old stuff there was a modern exhibition of great objects by Joana Vasconcelos, all made of modern utensils. So, amidst this vanished 19th glory we saw some tables made of smoothing irons.

In the great reception hall the old thrones for king and queen were empty. Are they more or less a symbol for the Portuguese nation that experienced a sad Republican period under Salazar and has not yet found its new spirit as a modern and democratic nation? If you look closely you will notice that the giant pumps, placed in front of the empty thrones are made of kitchen utensils, all sizes of pots and pans, just simple cookeware.

There is in the same great hall and oversized, really gigantic chandelier. Only when watching closely one can see that it is all made from small white tampons. The material is here handled with great care and precision. The past modernized but its modernity is still very close to the presentation of the past and fits, without too brutal or chocking confrontation, although at closer look we can see that it hurts and that this modernity is absolutely different from the style of the palace that could no longer be modernised.

The Act of Killing: the Indonesian version of Hannah Ahrendt and the banality of evil.

Last week we saw the movie The Act of Killing in a theater in Utrecht. It was announced in newspapers, in the TH magazine as an exceptional piece of art, comic and serious at the same time. So it was. The movie plays in the Medan area, close to Lake Toba, among Batak people.  The background is sometimes a playground close to the waterfall where the river pours out of Lake Toba. So is the advertisament for the movie as below.

In this region Muslims and Christians count about the same number: there is no religious element in the movie and from many names it is also not clear whether the people are of either religion.
The movie concentrate on two people who are proud that they were among the killers of those terrible Communists. They like to illustrate the effective way of killing, so that not too many blood comes out of the bodies and the cleaning of the balcony on top of their shop (the place where the killings took place) is so difficult.
They were just the two small people: the victims were indicated by the army, but they had to do the dirty work.With some proud and pleasure they show again and again (somewhat too often!) how with simple instruments, a piece of wood and an iron thread, the killings could be executed. The imitate the fear of the victims, but then all of a sudden they change from laughter to anguish themselves and acknowledge that it is very difficult sometimes too sleep, because they cannot chase the images from their minds.

There is no running story and sometimes I wondered whether the movie was already at its end, because there were some repetitions. There were several shots of great demonstrations of the Pemuda Pancasila where also the killing of 1965-6 were praised and all enemies of Indonesian unity and integrity were declared as the big enemies (without identifying anyhow the Muslims as a threat for the unity of Indonesia).
One specific comin episode is the song, with the dance as shown above, where some of the victims of the killings praise and thank their killers, because they are now living as martyrs in heaven.

An American filmmaker, Joshua Oppenheimer did the interviews and people talk to him. It is quite astonishing to see how a prominent man as former Vice-President Yusuf Kalla and some generals, a former governor and other politicians defend the atrocities of Pemuda Pancasila and stimulate these people to start brutal acts, in this fact shown against Chinese shop keepers. It is a sad image also of modern Indonesia, ruled by corrupt military, that is shown here.

Recently I read several novels by Ayu Utami that mention the killings: in Larung it is first the Communists who start to act in a furious way, but then followed by the military and others. A military man is one of the key figures of the novel Manjali and Cakrabirawa and he was a severe accomplice in the killings. I also read a novel by Ahmad Tohari, Ronggeng Dukuh Paruk, (The Dancing Lady from my Village), in fact a trilogy published in the 1980s but re-written in a more open style after the abdication of Suharto as a description of the cruelty of the Communists but also of the killings after 30 September 1965. And, of coure the book by Tinuk Yampolski, Candik Ala, already mentioned in this blog earlier this year.

We are now also seeing the movia on Hannah Ahrendt who described the German killer Eichmann as a loser, a small bureaucrat, not as the ultimate evil, but somehow a mixture of naivity, simple-mindedness, the banality of evil.

Ayu Utami climbing mount Borobudur

In preparation for the Euroseas Conference in Lisbon, 4-6 July 2013, I read the 2d novel in the Bilangan Fu series by Ayu Utami. It is a composition of three very different sections. The first section with the colour Indigo as title (between the light blue of jeans and violet). It has as its centre the Jakarta student and mountain climber Sandi Yuda (friend of Marja who only appears for sexual pleasures, further in the background). Yuda is preparing a climbing trip for photographers and so he arrives in a photo galery, owned by a sterile, extremely beutiful lady Lalita, rich, multi-talented (art, writes telenovelas, penulis sinetron), with heavy make-up. She seduces Yuda who experiences a very special sexual sensation called axis mundi, the 'pivot of the world'.  At the presentation of photographs (of good old Kassian Cephas) also one Jisheng is present, a Chinese from Singapore.
Lalita is interpreted as Lilith, the femme fatale of nasty old boy Iblis. But also as Lalita Vistara, the classical text that was the story of the Buddha from his birth until the first sermon. But Lalita is also a chain ina circle of reincarnations that is told in four major stages on p. 49:  1. during the 5th century living in Sriwijaya (=Sumatra) and Nepal; 2. in the later 9th century in Central Java; 3. in the 15th century in Transsylvania where she was Dracula, sucking blood in order to continue life (Yuda experiences her sexual aggression also as sucking life and energy from him); 4. now again in Indonesia.
Lalita has a twin brother Janaka (or Jataka: an earlier incarnation of the Buddha; maybe also Arjuna). Both have grandparents who were Austrian Jews, living in Indonesia and members of the Theosophy. The grandfather, Anshel  Eibenschütz has written a special book: Buku Indigo and this is a special treasury for Lalita. She shows the book to Yuda and Jinseng. In the of this section she is in danger, taken hostage.

The second section is calles Hitam, Black. It is about Anshel Eibenschütz, growing up in Austria. He visits the brandnew Eiffel Tower in 1889. The family moves from Vienna to Transsylvania page 116: Vlad III, Dracula had two sons, the good one is a nice one and become a good Muslim, while the bad one is a warrior, fighting against Islam. (See the drawing above). He studies in 1907 in Vienna psychoanalysis with Simon Freud. He reads a paper on vampires as a crisis of identity. Freud is angry about his theory: the rational aspects must the irrational and not the inverse! But Carl Gustav Jung accepts this theory, that myth, the mysterious, archetypes and religious symbols can explain much of the human psyche.
Anshel comes to Java with his wife. They have children and grandchildren. He discovers the beauty of Borodbudur, as a mandala, an image of the human soul and writes or composes his Buku Indigo, with as the major theme:
Psikoanalisa Freud hanya mengajarkan manusia untuk menyadari alam nirsadarnya sendiri. Spiritualisme Buddhis mengadjarkan manusia untuk mencapai kesadaran diri dan semesta. Ya, tingkat 'kesadaran' Diri yang mempersatukan manusia dengan makrokosmos (p. 138)
The psychoanalysis of Freud only teaches that we must know that we have an unconscious level in our soul. Buddhist spirituality teaches people how to reach consciousness of oneself and of the whole world. Yes, the level of consciousness of one's Self (with a capital!) unites humans with the macrocosmos.
Page 152 has some remarks on the late Freud who started to understand this idea, through his work on Moses and monotheism, but then he died without really coming to the fulness ofthis idea.

 

In the third section we return to the world of section one: Parang Jati (with 2x6 fingers, son of the mystical leader of Central Java) is asked to bring back the stolen Buku Indigo, so also Yuda and others. Finally Jiseng has the book: he is a Chinese secret agent and the Chinese are interested in the history of Buddism in Sumatra and Java and want not have the book. He return the Buku Indigo, although he had already taken pictures to be sent to the government in China. There are many narrative complications about the main figures and some ideas, about Hinduism (can be understood, p. 184) and Buddhism (p. 191: we will never fully understand the truth of Buddhism. There is a theory of shadows, the negative part of the real world, but only in the complementarity (also in the image of the mirror) the truth can be found.

This section is called merah or red: in 2009 the Red Book (Das rote Buch) by Carl-Gustav Jung has been published, 38 years after he died. Also Yuda will one day publish the Buku Indigo: that is the last sentence on page 243. 

This is an quite complicated book with many themes that are not really elaborated. But the general symbolism in this book with elements of a detective, horror and the world of related events (à la Dan Brown) makes it fascinating reading.

After two 'Catholic novels' (Saman, Larung), Ayu has now written two anti-monotheist novels, Bilangan Fu and Lalita. Islam is only menioned in passing with the two sons of Vlad III who had to be given to the Ottoman Sultan. While reading the passage on bayangan or shadow I wondered why the Islamic images of Hamzah Fansuri are not mentioned: just one quote from Muntahi no 10, in the translation of Syed Muhammad Naguid al-Attas (The Mysticism of Hamzah Fansuri, 1970 p. 454);
Shaykh 'Aynu'l Qudat, worshipping a dog, says: Hadha rabbi! This is my Lord!, for he does not see the dog, it is only his Lord that he sees. It is just as a person looking into a mirror; only the face reflected therein is seen by him, the mirros vanishes from his sight, for the world to his sight is like a reflection, it possesses form, but has no reality. The attribute related of the Turh Most Exalted is not the attribute related of ourselves because we see him with a veiled seeing..
Catholic theologians usually do not read Qur'an, do not read Islamic mysticism. Even ultra-orthodox or Wahhabi Muslims will not accept this kind of reasoning. But these ideas are not only found in Hinduism and Buddhism, also among the best of the Islamic tradition in Indonesia as well.

Tinuk (and Philip) Yampolsky

In January this year we met the Yampolskis. They just returned from the end of the world: utmost northeast Timor Leste, where Philip (together with Tinuk) carried out research on traditional music/dance/festivities. Philip is now preparing his PhD: musicologist do not really write books, they do research, make recording, like the twenty CDs made about traditional or folklore music from Indonesia.
I had nice discussion through email with Philip about Pusat Musik Liturgi, PML, in Yogyakarta, where inculturation is the slogan with Karl Prier and the choir Vocalista Sonora, conducted by Paul Widyawan. They use element from traditional music, but it is put in 4-voices harmony and so 'tamed' or at least taken out of context and made useful for the Catholic liturgy.
 
But now I want also write about his wife Tinuk. She is an artist in her own style: a teacher of Indonesian but also a writer and she wrote a very fine, quite complicated novel, Candik Ala 1965. The title is explained as red light in the air, while the earth is already darkening. (p. 14) Something like a nice sunset. It is a book about the major events of 1965: the coup in Jakarta, the counter-coup by Soeharto and the killings that were ordered by the army. This is a book with the stories seen from the viewpoint of a little girl, only six years old at the time of this event. She has four older brothers. She is the little swan at home. Her parents are teachers, Catholic. That seems to help her from being accused of being a Communist.
Tinuk told me that her father was (one of the) first to use the wayang stories and symbols for expressing the Catholoc faith. P. 28 has such ´Catholic´ stories:  there are four boys and the parents hope that at least one will become a priest, dan berharap paling tidak seorang anaknya akan menerima panggilan menjadi seorang pastor. The parents are, ´of course´ members of the Partai Katolik, at that time very strong against PKI.
P. 38 the army is a tentara semangka green outside, but red inside.
P. 58 the book is not overtly Catholic, and often the call from the minaret is heard for prayers, but the mother prays the rosary.
People disappear, come back only ten years later; at once the mother of the girl who is the center of the story comes back home from work at school and brings a boy who will stay for a long time in the house. Only later it is suggested that his family was 'removed' or 'taken away' apparently by the anti-PKI coalition of army and those who were compelled to join them.

133: quite suddenly the style of writing changes. It is now early 1980s, the girls of six now writes from the I-viewpoint and style; grown up, has become more a personality?

There are some subtle jokes: Lennon= Lenin, Marxis= Markisa. 166: Pemuka Agama or religious leaders do not have any idea of art.

Page 140-1 has a quite difficult poem about Gethsemane:

Sebuah percintaan di taman Getsemani

Kutoreh segala belepot hidup
Ke sekujur tubuh hidupMu
Kucari segenap repot mimpi
Ke dalam kelam mimpiMu
Kutanam resah batinMu
Duh
Terlibat sangkawaMu
Gemetaran nestapaku

A love affair in the garden of Getsemane

I plough all the mud of my life
to the fulness of Thy body
I search the troubles of dreams
in the chaos of Thy dreams.
I plant the unrest of Thy soul
Oh,
involved in Thy doubt
the vibration of my misery.

From young age Tinuk must have been suffering with the uncertainty and the rumour, sometimes also clear information about the disaster that struck Central and East Java. The book is evoking this in a very sensitive way. Next month we will see the new movie: The Act of Killing.

Islamic Art in Paris

3-4 February I was in Paris for the evaluation of IISMM, the Institute for the Study of Modern Muslim Societies, a cooperation of French scholars. I took the opportunity to see also the new section of the Musée du Louvre, L'art de l'Islam. There was long row op people waiting at the entrance, but it was a quick procedure because the first Sunday of the month it is free.
The name is quite significant. There is in Paris already a nice collection of Islamic Art. But this is in the Institut du monde Arabe. That was the condition 25-30 years ago: not Muslim, but Arab. Since then politics, culture, discourse has changed and it is not Islamic Art that is important!

 

The exhibition is on two floor: the upper floor was until recently the last open square in the middle of the oldest part of the great palace. In fact it was the central square of the mediaeval castle. Now a basement has been made as an extra floor below the ground and above this ground floor a giant construction like a bedouin tent has been placed to cover this floor. 

The collection has seldom special Islamic flavour: it show the usual art pieces of the affluent: glass work, decoration, lions and birds, beautiful carpets. It is divided in periods and geographical region. But nothing about Indonesia or Southeast Asia in general. Even in the chronological division this region has been forgotten. Curious, but very French!

Above a Persian garden with ladies that very Chinese! Below the view from another section of the museum on this central square of the old castle with the tent covering the exhibition of Islamic art.

I found also the painting of the Triumph of Thomas Aquinas over the Arabs, where Ibn Rushd = Averroes is painted as having said: vere hic est lumen ecclesiae, He (= Aquinas) is  truly the light of the church.

Crossing the boundary of death: the persisting hope of Anton Houtepen

A few months ago we visited the grave of Anton Houtepen. It is an unconventional but very moving and meaningful monument: the black stone has a true heart in the middle, a stained glass piece of art with the symbol of the ecumenical movement, a sailing boat, the cross, the symbol ot the World Council of Churches. Like Jesus amidst storm in sea, hope and trust.

The text is quite simple, just Anton Houtepen,  April 1940 and 11-12-2010. Those present still remember the heavy snow, the wonderful walk through a park to the graveyard. Silence, white snow and this powerful Latin text of the glorious hymn Te Deum. It simply reads: In the Domine speravi, non confundar in eternum. It is taken from Psalm 30, also in the last verse of Psalm 70: Lord, in You is my hope; I will never be disappointed. .. It was quite difficult to make a good picture of this monument. The black marble is shining and in some picture I stand here at the grave, broken, as we were at his untimely death.

 

The day we visited  the grave, was again one occasion when Hans Küng was in the news again because of his protests against the lasting Vatican policy about or rather against debates on celibacy, the central position of Pope and Bishops in the Catholic community. Küng wanted that the Pope should be deposed because of 'Putinism' ruling like the Russian President Putin, as an absolute ruler. What should Anton Houtepen have said about the present state of the Catholic Church, in Rome and in Utrecht?

Also in the field of his first research, the papal infallibility, Küng was more radical than Houtepen. Anton wanted to give it a true and mild hermeneutic interpretation, as a side-step, only to be used in uncontrollable situations the pope should have full authority. But this was for very restricted occasions only. Küng was more radical: he found the whole Vatican I a mistake and the teaching of the infallibility as a wrong decision.

We also passed by other graves in this graveyard. Quite prominent is the memorial for Cardinal Bernard Alfrink. There is also a monument for the very conservative promoter of Latin Liturgy Father Winan Kotte who also had a text in Latin on his grave, ab eterno requisivi Dominum, I have sought God from eternity..

Anton, here in the cold ground of Barbara´s Graveyard waiting for the Great Festive Meal in the end of times? We are not so assured about all these future promises, but with Eelkje and all old friends of Anton we still enjoy the days of Lord here on our earth.