Faith put Kampung Sawah on the map

By Ida Indawati Khouw

Most cities have enclaves where people sharing the same beliefs, ethnic backgrounds or values come together. In predominantly Muslim Old Batavia, the Dutch colonial government established an area especially for the minority local Christian population. This is the 80th article in our series on old Jakarta.

KAMPUNG SAWAH, Bekasi (JP): We can sometimes tell the religious affiliation of someone by their family name, a truism in many parts of the world including in the Kampung Sawah community about 20 kilometers east of the capital.

People there are called Baiin, Kadiman, Sairin, Tibin, Saian, Empi, Kuding, Napiun, Pepe or Rikin, which are in keeping with the Sundanese culture of West Java but also identify them as Christians, having been passed on from generation to generation as family names.

There are also Sanglir, Peking, Sabajan, Baidan, Niman, Kadiman, Yaman, Penjol, Noron, Jaim, Natanael, Koeli, Lampung, Saiman, Kaiin, Dantjie, Bone, Sandang, Biran and Ubeng.

Other names have their origins in similar Christian kampongs like Gunung Putri in Bogor and Pondok Melati, about two kilometers from Kampung Sawah.

Some of the names, however, have disappeared because people were afraid of being considered too "provincial", said one local, Ishak Sairin, 59.

According to Debora Napiun, 75, before the people became Christians children were given simple names according to identifying characteristics.

"Thus, we often heard of strange names like si Centong (the rice ladle), si Pungut (the adopted one), si Buang (thrown away) or si Pengki (a basket for carrying garbage)," she said.

In the past, Kampung Sawah was part of the Meester Cornelis administrative area, now Jatinegara in East Jakarta, but now it is included in the mayoralty of Bekasi on the capital's outskirts.

The area is about 20 kilometers from hectic East Jakarta but the ambience is more like a remote village, with large trees, gardens and plants everywhere.

There is only one road into and out of the community and it is full of potholes even though it was just paved about five years ago. And the area is only served by one public transportation service.

But for elderly residents like Sulaeman Kadiman, born in 1919, the quiet in the eyes of most Jakartans is a din to his ears.

"There are cars and motorcycles going back and forth, it's quite noisy. It was happier for me when the surroundings were still like a forest."

Oppressed

Kampung Sawah is one of several Christian kampongs located in Jakarta's suburbs and in bordering West Java which were established by the Dutch in the 19th century.

They were meant to protect the indigenous people who were expelled and oppressed by other members of their ethnic group because they chose the "religion of the colonists".

Residents find it difficult to identify their ethnic roots. Some claim they are Betawi, the native people of Jakarta, but others acknowledge Sundanese descent. There also say the best description of them is "Jakarta Malay".

"We often just identify ourselves as the people of Kampung Sawah," said Ishak.

Sulaeman said that his ancestors came from Jepara, Central Java.

"Following divine inspiration, my Christian ancestors migrated to Kampung Sawah and Gunung Putri," he said.

Before Kampung Sawah, indigenous Christian communities had already been established in Central and East Java by Javanese evangelists Kyai Ibrahim Tunggal Wulung and Kyai Sadrach (who taught Christianity mixed with Javanese mysticism), according to R. Kurris SJ in Terpencil di Pinggiran Jakarta, Satu Abad Umat Katolik Betawi (Isolated in Jakarta's Outskirts, A Century of Betawi Catholic Congregation).

"So in Kampung Sawah was established a unique Christian community. The Javanese-speaking newcomers had to adapt themselves with the Betawi community who speak Malay and (there came about) a mix of various cultures and ancestors," said Kurris.

Today, the Kampung Sawah community speaks Indonesian mixed with Sundanese and Betawi dialects. The hodgepodge of language is shown in how they address their relatives. Aunts are called Nce and uncles Mamang, which are Sundanese words. The Betawi influence is clearly shown when they address older sisters with Mpok and older brothers as Abang.

Kurris said that the family names, which are usually used as nicknames by the Sundanese, were rooted in the Dutch legal system in which indigenous Christians were subject to regulations similar to in Western civil law.

"As in the marriage law for the westerners in which people register their family name and baptismal name, the Kampung Sawah community, some of whom are the descendants of slaves and plantation workers, were also registered with their family names even if they didn't have them. Thus, nicknames were then adopted as family names," Kurris said.

Christianity was introduced to the area in the 1800s by F.L. Anthing, a Protestant Christian who worked as the deputy chief justice in Batavia, and Kyai Ibrahim Tunggal Wulung.

At first Anthing evangelized to the convicts who came from private land areas like Pondok Gede, which had become a hiding place for criminals.

Converted convicts

The converted convicts then became evangelists "who distributed brochures on Christian teachings and sold books at public places", said Koernia Atje Soejana in his book Benih Yang Tumbuh 2, Suatu Survey Mengenai Gereja Kristen Pasundan (The Growing Seed 2: A Survey of the Pasundan Christian Church).

Adopting the local belief in "sacred" things, mostly kris, Anthing's "disciples" spread the religious word using mysticism.

Teachings like the Lord's Prayer and the Apostolic Creed were made into spells to cure illness and to conquer "darkness".

Their evangelism was so effective that in 1874 some were baptized as the first Christians at Pondok Melati, followed by Kampung Sawah.

Only after the congregation was taken over by the Netherlandse Zendings Vereniging (the Association of the Netherlands' Evangelism) following Anthing's death in 1883 was the teaching of the religion changed to conform to conventions.

However, it led to dissension among members and the adoption of Catholicism by some.

Today there is the Pasundan Christian Church for Protestants and a Catholic church in the area.

Until the Japanese occupation in 1942, locals in Kampung Sawah worked on land belonging to the landlord of the Pondok Gede mansion, about seven kilometers away.

Sulaeman still vividly remembers how his family and other local residents had to always hand over a fifth of their crops to the landlord.

"Farmers usually divided the rice crops into bundles. The fifth bundle would eventually go to the landlord," he said, adding that the allotment was increased to 50 percent during the Japanese era.

"Everything we planted on the land was also subject to taxation. For example, the tax for each coconut, rambutan and petai (a type of bean with a pungent odor) tree was 10 cents per year, while there was also a regulation that people couldn't fell trees to their roots to allow them to grow again."

The father of six and grandfather of 13 said that he never saw the landlord because the tax payments were collected by indigenous foremen.

"Wearing white apparel with a (typically Javanese) headscarf, they usually went around the kampong every month," he said.

Those who ignored the tax were subjected to the punishment of obligatory work at Pondok Gede, like sapping rubber trees or doing household work for a period of time based on how far they were in arrears.

Unfortunately, the Pondok Gede mansion, built in 1775 as an extraordinarily long building with an enormous roof, was demolished to make way for the construction of a department store some 10 years ago. The only reminder is the street name, Jl. Pondok Gede.