10 years later

10 years ago this day, my 2 brothers and I left Jakarta to live in a factory. Just to survive.

No, this is no parallel of the story of Charles Dickens' life.

2 days before that I had seen, with my own eyes, the racial riots breaking out in my neighbourhood. Sorry, 'racial riots' is an understatement. Because even the police and military went AWOL when the riots broke out. Or did they even participate in the riots?

But point is, the riots were one of the most important, if not THE reason why I studied in Hong Kong later that year and subsequently in Singapore till today.

I still remember the mass of University students charging down my neighbourhood. I can still recall the stench of burning tyres just across the street. Fortunately the houses in my area were escaped the wrath of the rioters.

But it wasn't so fortunate for 3000 plus Indonesians.

Here's a recount from another 18-year-old girl about the riots.


I was still young then. There was no school (Hmph talk about full day). My dad just told me not to make a noise in the house throughout the day.

Yet not 5, but 10 years later, no one has been held responsible. Suharto is long (ok just a few months) dead and the country is fucking itself upside down with all sorts of nonsense in the media and its policies on certain religions.

Without international pressure, the guilty parties will continue to operate with
impunity, and gross violations of human rights will continue unabated in Indonesia. The Commission must address this situation. It must insist that the Government of Indonesia adopt the detailed recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women (E/CN.4/1999/68/Add.3, paras 111–124).
It must insist that the Government of Indonesia permit further international
investigation of the 1998 massacres. And it must condemn any failure to bring those responsible for this tragedy to justice.

This is a matter of urgency not merely for the victims of 1998, but also current and future generations of Indonesians, who continue to live under the shadow of racially motivated violence and state impunity.

http://www.ahrchk.net/statements/mainfile.php/2003statement/87/

Till today, the glass panes on the buildings outside my house hasn't been changed after the windows were broken in the mayhem. The owners of the buildings also left the place. A symbol of scarring as a result of the riots? Or just a sign of people who decided to call it quits for good?

Yet I wonder why I still like Indonesia so much...

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good
men do nothing

Edmund Burke

Mark my words, if history ever repeats itself and such racial riots occur again, I shall never return to Indonesia. Ever.