Bandung's celebrated sites relive history
Yuli Tri Suwarni, The Jakarta Post, Bandung
Asian and African leaders may be emulating their 1955 predecessors on Sunday morning by convening at the Merdeka Building in Bandung, but organizers are sure that the leaky roof that nearly stopped President Sukarno's speech 50 years ago will not recur.
Hours before Sukarno was to present his "Let a New Asia and New Africa Be Born" speech at 10:20 am on April 18, 1955, panic struck officials as the roof suddenly began leaking from the rain outside.
Fortunately, it was nothing that skillful carpentry could not fix, allowing for the likes of Gamal Abdul Nasser and Zhou Enlai to remain dry and hear the speech without distraction.
The Rp 12 billion (US$1.2 million) face lift to the building recently forked out by the government will ensure that the same embarrassment will not happen when President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and some 40 other heads of state stands underneath the 400 flourescent lights inside the building on Sunday.
The 110-year-old building began as a coffee house for Dutch plantation owners and bureaucrats to mingle and play billiards. Much of what stands today of the 6,500-square meter structure is a result of a 1928 renovation of the Concordia Building, as it was then known. Based on designs by architects Van Gallen and C.P. Wolff Shoemaker, the building was divided into two sections - a main assembly hall and smaller "revelry" area.
One day before Sukarno's oration in 1955 he changed the Concordia to its current name, which in English means Freedom Building.
In 1980, a new museum wing was added in conjunction with the 25th anniversary of the Bandung Conference.
Another historical landmark of the 1955 meeting that will also be revisited by the leaders on Sunday is the Savoy Homann Hotel. It is here where the leaders will begin to gather and retrace the 50-year historic walk to Merdeka Building, which is located just 50-meters away.
In 1955 Abdul Nasser, Zhou Enlai, Jawaharlal Nehru, King Norodom Sihanouk and Sukarno were all guests at the hotel.
The hotel was originally a simple house owned by a Dutch woman named Moerder Homann. After several years, Mrs Homann's residence became a guest house, which eventually underwent several renovations into its current art deco style. According to records, among the illustrious guests of the hotel, were Charlie Chaplin who stayed there in 1927 and 1935.
If President Susilo needs further inspiration for his speech on Sunday he may well find it from Sukarno's ghost in Savoy Homann's "Suite 244" - the room he booked to occupy during his stay in Bandung. The suite was Sukarno's favorite room at the hotel, and though it has since been enlarged, the personal touches of Indonesia's first president can still be felt.
For Sunday's lunch in Bandung, the leaders will convene at the governor's residence in the Pakuan Building. Built in the 1860s, the residence was first built for Dutch governors general when they ruled the archipelago.
As a formal residence for the highest administrator of the Dutch colony, Pakuan has hosted several notable names in the past century. They include French Prime Minister Georgeos Clemenceau in 1921, and Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford in 1927. And legendary guitarist Andreas Segovia once performed at Pakuan.
During the 1955 conference, many state level meetings were held here on the sidelines of the conference, among them the signing of the recognition of Chinese-Indonesian citizenship on April 22.