Child of All Nations (11 page)

Learn from ideas that aren’t European! What could my mother-in-law be thinking?

“Why are you gaping like that? Did I say something wrong? Something not in accord with what your teachers have taught you? You’re looking at me as if you’ve just met me for the first time!”

“Yes, Ma, each day you amaze me more and more.”

“So what have you learned from your mama?”

“You’re truly my teacher, Ma, a teacher who isn’t European.
I will try to make your teachings not just something I possess, but something I practice as well.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Mama!”

“Child, you are all I have left in the world now. I am alone in the world now. Why should I go on working like this? I could easily see out my days without doing any more work. But this business must not die of neglect. It is my own child, my first child. It must remain my beloved child, even if it does fall into the hands of others. It may not be hurt or damaged like the others. It may not be treated just like some dairy cow.”

Her thoughts were on the predicament of her business, but she still thought of the interests of others.

“It is my first child. Soon none of it will be left. Just you, Child, my son-in-law, indeed my son. You are more to me than my own children. Sometimes my empty heart is tormented, wondering why Robert didn’t turn out like you.” She paused a moment. Then: “I often say to myself: An imperfect seedling will die before it bears fruit. Indeed it hurts, Child, to have to accept that reality. And it is more painful still when my conscience accuses me of being unable to educate my own children. That is why I talk so much, lecture you so much.”

She picked up the
Soerabaiaasch Nieuws
again and fanned herself with it. Only after a lengthy silence did her words come out, slowly and with conviction: “That Chinese boy knows how to learn from Europe, knows how to reject its sickness. He is no doubt a wise young man. He can be trusted much more than this newspaper,” and she threw the paper onto the table.

T
he atmosphere in that big house at Wonokromo became more oppressive every day. I didn’t even want to write. The office work was equally uninteresting. Working near Mama, I felt like a dwarf at the back of a giant, a pebble at the foot of a mountain. I was insignificant, my individuality drowned in the immensity of her thinking.

If I allowed things to go on like this, I would surely end up overpowered by her and in her shadow. I had already made up my mind to leave this place—Wonokromo, Surabaya—forever. But whenever my eyes fell upon this extraordinary woman, who, like me, had lost so much, I could not bring myself to carry out my decision. How lonely she would be without me. There would be no one to talk to, no one she could confront with her toughness of mind. She would be like a rock of coral in the middle of the ocean.

I must go; I must become an individual in my own right, my growth not stunted because of someone else’s sun-obstructing shadow.

Then one day in her office I told her of my intentions: “When Panji Darman returns, Ma, I will be leaving.”

I had not reckoned on how much I would regret saying that. She looked so sad and pained. She groped for something in one of her desk drawers to try to hide her face.

“I have no right to hold you back, Child. But you must know that your place here cannot be filled by anyone else, not even Panji Darman.”

She could not make herself accept my leaving.

Suddenly she asked, as if she had just finished making a judgment on the way she had treated me all this time: “What is it you really want?”

“I just want to get away from Surabaya, Ma, to Betawi perhaps. I think I will do some more study, some real study, so that one day maybe I can become like Dr. Martinet.”

“If you leave now, Child, with your heart still wounded and in turmoil as it is…no, don’t. You will never be able to study. You’ll end up just wandering around like a drifter. You won’t find what you’re looking for. You’ll be even more depressed. Stay here until you feel better. You’ll be better able to decide what to do.” Then she was silent.

There was an agreement between the two of us not to think back on what had happened to Annelies, or at least not to talk about her. Even Dr. Martinet, who started to visit us again after the charges against him were dropped, never mentioned the subject of my late wife. It was even more the case with Darsam.

During a week-long trial, Darsam, who was charged with resisting the police and the Marechausee, managed to escape conviction. Now he went on with his daily work as if a person called Annelies, who had been so much a part of his life, had never existed.

Once every three days Darsam would come to me for lessons. He could not only read and write a little, but began to read the Malay-language newspapers, and he was learning arithmetic. Sometimes he would even force himself to study how to handle the office work.

On certain days he would go to Kalisosok jail to visit those who were imprisoned as a result of that earlier rioting when Annelies was taken away. Mama always examined the parcels that
were going to them, and told Darsam to pass on her greetings. Once she even wanted to go herself, but Darsam forbade her.

About eighteen people had been caught in the fighting against the police. The sentences ranged from two to five years of hard labor, in chains. Their great sympathy and support for us was something we could never fully repay; all we could offer was our equally great gratitude and the monthly assistance Mama provided for their families. Yes, it was true: The river stones, pebbles, and rocks could also make their feelings known. Never belittle or scorn a single person, or even two, because every individual contains unlimited possibilities.

That morning too I sensed a loneliness in Mama’s heart. To alter the mood, I summed up the courage to begin: “Ma, there was Annelies’s hope, Ma, that Mama would give me a little sister, Ma. Shouldn’t we respect that hope?”

“Come here!” she said. She stood up and moved away from the desk. “Here is the key to the drawer. Open it and examine the letters inside.”

I didn’t understand what she was getting at. I opened the drawer. Inside there were only letters. Some were tied together with thread.

“Yes, read from that bundle.”

I pulled one out. The envelope hadn’t been opened. From somebody with a European name, a cashier in a bank.

“Read it,” she said.

“The envelope hasn’t been opened, Ma.”

“Open it, and read it. No need to read it out to me, just read it for yourself.”

It proved to be a letter proposing marriage to Mama.

“You can read them all; they’re all the same. I’ve only read three of them. Count how many there are, Minke.”

I counted them one by one. Among the names I came across were: Doctor Frans Martinet, Controller H. Sneedijck, Lieutenant ter Zee Jakob de Haene…and also Kommer! My heart fluttered; maybe even Jean Marais’s name would be among them. Letter by letter I counted, but his name wasn’t there. Before I could total them up, Mama’s voice came to me: “Enough, Child, put them back. What do you think?”

“Mama is still young.”

“When I see those letters, yes, I do feel young. How old is your mother?”

“A little over forty I think,” I answered.

“Then I would be her youngest sister.”

“Mama, I’m glad Mama intends one day to carry out that hope.”

“Yes, Minke, but my intentions are based on hard calculations. Life like this is so lonely. But who knows how long a human being will live? So it is you, who are with me now, whom I value most of all. It is you who I hope has learned from these last experiences. Don’t worship Europe in its totality. There is good as well as evil everywhere. There are angels and devils everywhere. There are devils with the faces of angels, and angels with the faces of devils everywhere. And there is one thing that stays the same, Child, that is eternal: The colonialist is always a devil.

“You live in a colonial world, you can’t get away from that. But it doesn’t matter, as long as you understand: He is a devil until the end of the world. He is Satan.”

I heard the bitterness in her words. I recognized that she was confronting an enemy who could be neither opposed nor threatened, a devil immune to insults, blows, tears, or pain.

“If you understand and know the satanic nature of colonialism, then any action you take against it will be justified, except collaboration with it.” She blew out a great breath.

“Mama.”

“Yes?”

“What do you mean by colonial?”

“It’s something that must be not only explained but also experienced. You will never understand by reading alone. I’ve already tried to find it in the dictionaries, Child, three dictionaries. All in vain.”

“It should be able to be explained, Ma.”

“I can’t. It is you who should be able to explain it.”

“What if we define it as ‘that which has the character of conquest.’”

Mama laughed. I was glad to see her laugh but my heart was not really happy, for she was laughing at me. She went on, ignoring my suggestion. “Everybody in authority praises that which is colonial. That which is not colonial is considered not to have the
right to life, including Mama here. Millions upon millions of people suffer silently, like the river stones. You, Child, must at least be able to shout. Do you know why I love you above all others? Because you write. Your voice will not be silenced and swallowed up by the wind; it will be eternal, reaching far, far into the future. As to defining what is colonial, isn’t it just the conditions insisted upon by a victorious nation over the defeated nation so that the latter may give the victor sustenance—conditions that are made possible by the sharpness and might of weapons?”

How confusing were this morning’s experiences. Everything was indistinct and without a central focus. Every issue and problem was traveling about, crossing back and forth over previous paths, without direction.

“Your hopes for me are too great, Mama.”

“No. You have only one deficiency. You don’t really know what the word
colonial
means. You must learn to understand. Your new Chinese acquaintance—what’s his name again?”

“Khouw Ah Soe, Mama.”

“A very difficult name. From what I can tell from your story about him, he has come to understand that which you don’t yet understand.”

“But China has never been conquered, Ma.”

“Every nation that is backward is conquered and colonized by every nation that has progressed.”

That morning’s conversation, cluttered with crisscrossing traffic heading in no particular direction, was followed by a mutual silence.

Then one evening Khouw Ah Soe arrived. It was obvious he was in trouble. He was still wearing the same Shantung silk pajamas, but they were dirty and torn.

We sat in the small garden next to my room, on the concrete bench. Mama observed his round face intently (it was no longer reddish, but already going brown), as well as his thin reddish pigtail, his narrow eyes. I heard her mumble in Dutch: “So young, leaving country and family, to come so far—what for?”

Khouw Ah Soe bent to catch her words, then said he was sorry, he didn’t understand. I put it into English.

“Thank you very much for such kind words. Thank you.”

Unasked, I became the interpreter.

“My child here is confused, Mr. Khouw, after reading the report published about you. It was the opposite of what he wrote.”

“Only to be expected.”

“Not that. I worried that you would be angry with my son.”

“No. That’s the way it had to be. Their own actions will educate the people to hate them and oppose them—that has also been the case with the Western enclaves in China.”

“My Child had already sent a letter of protest…tell him yourself, Child.”

Khouw Ah Soe laughed happily on hearing my story, as if he wasn’t at that moment being harried by his own troubles. Then he added: “That is how they are—those who hold power in the conquered nations. It is sickening to witness the behavior of those whites who live in countries they consider to be their colonies. To hope for anything else from them is a big mistake.”

“Yes,” added Mama, “my guess is proved correct, Child. But don’t translate that for him. This person is very clever. You can learn much from him.”

Khouw Ah Soe looked at me, waiting for the translation.

“Mama says,” I said, “that you are now in trouble because of the
Soerabaiaasch Nieuws.
Mama guesses you would find it difficult to find anywhere to stay.”

Khouw Ah Soe offered neither a denial nor an affirmation. He dropped his gaze to the floor. At once we understood that things were as we imagined. Someone strong like him would not get into some minor, trifling trouble. His problem would be that he had run out of friends.

“Let me arrange a place for him in Darsam’s house,” Mama said. Then she excused herself.

Khouw Ah Soe continued his talk. I listened carefully to his every word. “How happy I am to have met your mother-in-law—a very advanced woman.” He tapped on the table as a way of channeling his nervousness.

“You will stay here, in Darsam’s place. He is a fighter.”

“The Darsam who was arrested by the Marechausee? He’s free?”

Perhaps Darsam too had been mentioned in the newspapers of foreign lands to the north.

“No doubt he is a fighter,” he suddenly affirmed. It seemed he didn’t know what else to say. He was nervous.

Not long after arriving in Surabaya he received news: A comrade who had been sent to Fiji had been murdered. Another who had been sent to South America was found murdered not far from the saltpeter mines of Chile.

Finally I summoned the courage to ask: “What is it that you actually do?”

“Call out, no more than that. Call out to my fellow countrymen who have wandered overseas that the times have changed, that China is no longer the center of the world, that China has made great contributions to human civilization, but that it is not the only civilized nation in the world, as so many Chinese believe.”

So they were like my own people, I thought, the Javanese, who looked upon themselves as the most polite, most civilized, and most noble of all people. A smile appeared on my face.