Betawi people ponder their past and future

Tantri Yuliandini, Jakarta

Whenever Jakarta has an anniversary, the focus invariably reverts to the city's original residents, the Betawi people.

Not only is there a sudden burst of interest in Betawi culture at department stores, banks and television stations, but seminars also crop up on the subject.

Yet despite countless seminars, questions on the identity of the Betawi people still remain. What is Betawi culture and who are the Betawi people?

The generally accepted theory is that the Betawi were a group of people forged out of the "melting pot" that was Batavia, the former name of Jakarta under Dutch colonial rule.

Intermarriage between the people brought to Batavia by the Dutch East Indies Company (VOC) in the 17th century -- especially from eastern Indonesia -- as conscripts to help with trade expansion and expeditions led to a new cultural group called the Betawi, historian R.Z. Leirissa said.

Leirissa was speaking at a seminar titled, Betawi and Jakarta: A Cultural Perspective, organized on June 28 by the University of Indonesia's Research Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences and the Jakarta administration's Culture and Museum Agency.

In addition, intermarriages between people of other cultures living in Batavia at the time -- such as the Chinese, Arabs, Malays, the Portuguese and Dutch -- enriched the culture of the new group that would become the Betawi.

Betawi arts such as gambang kromong (traditional orchestra) and lenong theater have distinct Chinese influences, while the samrah orchestra is distinctly Malay and tanjidor music groups use European-style musical instruments.

The Portuguese left their mark on keroncong music, and the Middle Eastern influence is felt in gambus orchestras. A Sundanese influence is seen in the gamelan ajeng and gamelan topeng dances.

During this time, the VOC left social organization up to the people themselves, including the Betawi. Consequently, they became a fiercely independent people with no notions of class distinction, Leirissa said.

"The Betawi people were born from a transformation process that was consciously and actively undertaken by indigenous people living in the city at the time of the VOC," the historian said.

One distinct trait of the Betawi, he explained, was their dislike of the establishment. They were sidelined because they shied away from the imperialistic policies of the Dutch East Indies Company.

"The Betawi didn't want to enter the Dutch school system and preferred an Islamic-based education, for example, which was one of the reasons why their participation was very limited during the next order (of government)," Leirissa said.

The stereotype of the Betawi as a backward people probably originated from their refusal to integrate into mainstream life, he said. This fact was highlighted on the popular TV show Si Doel Anak Sekolahan, where Rano Karno playing Doel became the first member of his village to graduate from university.

On the Betawi side, they see it as unfortunate that the image of them as "country bumpkins" has become fresh meat for the hungry entertainment industry.

Chairman of the Betawi Intellectual Network, Ali Shahab, berated TV dramas such as MandraGade, Jodoh Apa Jodoh (Is It Kismet or Not), Kecil-kecil Jadi Manten (Young Bride) and Norak Tapi Beken (Tacky but Famous) for spreading the stereotype of the Betawi as simple, ignorant and lazy.

He said at the seminar that the Betawi had not only been evicted from their land, but were also insulted on television.

Despite the stereotype, however, many Betawi people have risen to prominence in their chosen fields, such as Jakarta's deputy governor Fauzi Bowo, Jakarta Representative Council member Biem Benyamin, former Bank Central Asia president Abdullah Ali and former University of Indonesia rector M.K. Tadjudin.

Another misconception about the Betawi is that their numbers are diminishing.

An anthropologist from the University of Indonesia, Yasmine Zaki Shahab, said that according to demographic data, the Betawi were the eighth largest ethnic group in Indonesia, with about five million people.

Furthermore, far from being immobile, as is the common perception, she said the Betawi could be found in almost all provinces in Indonesia.

"The Betawi people in Central Java and East Java are mainly those who attended pesantren (Islamic boarding schools) there and later stayed on," Yasmine said at the seminar.

In Jakarta, the Betawi are the second largest ethnic group after the Javanese, with 2.3 million people or 27.7 percent of the city's population.

Yasmine said that according to the 2000 census, Cilincing district in North Jakarta had the largest Betawi population in the capital, followed by Jagakarsa in South Jakarta, Kemayoran and Tanah Abang in Central Jakarta, Kalideres and Cengkareng in West Jakarta, and Cakung in East Jakarta.

"So it is not true that the Betawi people are being buried under (other ethnic groups) in Jakarta," she said.

Yasmine said the subdistrict with the highest concentration of Betawi residents was Kapuk in Cengkareng district, West Jakarta. However, she also posed a question about whether or not Kapuk could be called Kampung Betawi.

Along with the rapid changes in Batavia and later Jakarta, the face of the Betawi people has also changed over the years. Yasmine said that in the 1950s, intermarriage between the Betawi and people from other groups was common.

Now urbanization has prompted many people from other parts of Indonesia to move to Jakarta and call the city home. Can these people also be called Betawi?

What about the children and grandchildren of migrants to Jakarta who are born in the city? Are they Betawi?

"I have lived in this city for over 49 years, am I considered Betawi?" a attendee at the seminar asked.

Many non-Betawi artists and entertainers have started calling themselves Betawi, such as Ambonese-Javanese comedian Debby Sahertian and Manado fashion designer-cum-actor Robby Tumewu.

The secretary-general of the Betawi Native Jakartans Association, Bahrullah Akbar, provides a loose definition of the modern Betawi as those who do not take part in the exodus back to their hometowns during the Idul Fitri holiday.

"Those who take part in the mudik (exodus) still have homes outside Jakarta, so they are not Betawi," he said to the laughter of seminar attendees. He also said that in recruiting members, his association was very liberal in how it defined who was Betawi.

Yasmine said those people who should be considered Betawi were those who shared the group's historical traits and who also thought of themselves as Betawi.

"It is difficult to make a final definition about the Betawi, so it is better to leave it loose, so it can develop according to the times and the Betawi community's own participation (in the larger community)," she said.