Expats: Staying put through it all

Expats: Staying put through it all

Bruce Emond and Hera Diani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

"Nita" and her fiancee, "Jack", are living in a state of
confusion. She thinks of him all the time these days, anxious
about what he is doing. At night, she worries that someone may
come knocking on their apartment door.

Her greatest fear is that "something terrible" may happen when
he is in a taxi stopped at a traffic light.

The facts tell the story. Nita, 25, is an Indonesian Muslim
who has been living with Jack, a 29-year-old American, for the
last two years. They had planned to marry early in 2002.

Sept. 11 has thrown their plans into turmoil.

"Everything is crazy," Nita said, her voice a mixture of anger
and bemusement. "I keep asking Jack if he wants to go home, and I
will follow later."

She added that she was angry that groups were using religion
to bolster their position in anti-American protests and in urging
a "sweep" of U.S. nationals and others from countries in the
U.S.-led strikes on Afghanistan.

Nita's fears are shared by others who are married or
romantically involved with foreigners, or who work with them.
Some feel torn by their own personal condemnation of the Sept. 11
attacks and the "sweep" threat, along with their outrage at the
U.S. government's response.

Away from the tearing up of flags, the attacking of symbols of
U.S. culture like McDonald's and Coca-Cola, the inflammatory
rhetoric, there are also human stories of people caught in the
crossfire.

Rulita "Ermita" Anggraini is married to American Mark Winkle,
and they run a PR company together. Mark converted to Islam when
they married eight years ago and Ermita said his long periods
spent in different parts of Asia prepared him well to live in
Indonesia.

But Ermita added that she "understood" how some of her
countrymen were outraged by U.S. actions.

"To a certain extent, I understand what has happened. It's not
just about the events of the last two weeks, it's a cumulative
thing from the past," Ermita said. "But now it's going away from
the goal of having your voice heard, and sweeping and cutting off
diplomatic relations is off track."

Expat exodus

The problem is that it will take more than a couple of strong
statements from the government and the police to keep an
expatriate exodus from occurring if groups come true on their
threats to sweep for foreigners.

More relevant and meaningful will be community efforts to make
foreigners feel secure, such as the "anti-sweeping" campaign
launched by the residents of Jl. Jaksa, long the city's hub for
backpackers, on Thursday. The residents turned back a group of
activists from one hard-line group when they attempted to enter
the street.

The chairman of the country's largest Muslim organization
Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), Hasyim Muzadi, urged the public to be wise
and protect foreigners.

"Having solidarity (with Afghans) is OK, nothing's wrong with
that, but don't create trouble in our own country. It's other
country's conflict, why make it ours? Don't lose the sense of
nationalism in the name of solidarity," he told The Jakarta Post.

Hasyim further asked people to avoid doing things that will
put the country in a more difficult economic position.

"Sweeping is the right of the country, not the citizens. What
we should do now is ask the government to form international
solidarity to force the United States to stop the attacks. We
should also form a solidarity of humanity," he asserted.

Others, such as noted Betawi (native Jakartan) leader Ridwan
Saidi from the Betawi Cultural Institute, think it would be
better for expatriates to leave until the situation has returned
to normal.

He said it is difficult to tell the public not to express
solidarity over Afghanistan. The threats and anti-West sentiment,
he added, were the consequence of the global situation.

"Afghan people suffer more. That's why I think it's best for
expatriates to just leave the country for a while," Ridwan said.

But picking up and leaving is not such an easy decision for
people like Nita and Ermita.

Nita hopes the government will take a "strong stance", and
also that Indonesians will start to concentrate on the problems
at home instead of the war abroad.

Ermita believes she will know if and when the time comes to
leave, but she also hopes that the worst will not happen, for the
sake of her children, aged five and half years and 11 months.

"We don't want to be moving around, from place to place,
because it will disturb us as a family," she said.

After all, this is her and Mark's home, too.