He was no hero

By Kuntowijoyo

"Ladies and gentlemen, and members of the Village Community Council. I have invited you to this meeting in my capacity as both the village chief and a private citizen. I have served two terms as the village chief, meaning I cannot run for reelection. That is the law.

"In my situation, the foreigner's oft-repeated 'I-have- nothing-to-lose' statement is very relevant. I don't care if anyone says I have not done my job well.

"As a private citizen, I stand here to explain to you what I have experienced, seen and heard. Please forgive me for telling stories from the past, but my intention is not to reopen old wounds.

" Ladies and Gentlemen, I'm speaking the truth, nothing but the truth. The recent speech by the sultan inspired me to say these things. You are quite aware that our sultan, in a speech he delivered at the workshop on social awareness, expressed hope that individual morality would always be in line with that of the public. All this is of great importance for the sake of our children and grandchildren, and our beloved republic, so that no citizen will be cheated."

In 1947, during our revolution, my father worked at the Office of Salt and Opium Trade. Since salt was no longer produced, they sold only opium. At that time, the government was broke and it decided to make money any way it could.

My family lived in a spacious government house, located near a sugar factory, not far from a soccer field. To celebrate my birthday, my father hired a traditional Javanese gamelan orchestra.

However, my mother warned him that he should never order alcohol, even if it was locally made, to serve the guests. Mother made it clear: "Drinking alcohol is haram, against Islamic law."

Father calmly replied: "Life is so hard today, so let the people enjoy themselves a little bit. We won't touch the drink ourselves."

The sound of gamelan welcomed guests that evening, but some people griped there were no female dancers. My mom hated the women as their presence would create a sensual atmosphere. The dancers always performed the Tayub dance, in which intoxicated men could kiss them each time the gong was struck.

Liquor removed all of the men's shame. They would tuck tips into the women's blouses, and many times they would grope deeper. After the show, some of them would drag the dancers to bed.

Sangadi was also present that evening. Yes, Sangadi. He was the only man later buried in the village's Heroes Cemetery. On every National Day, Aug. 17, and Heroes Day, Nov. 10, village officials, neighborhood security officers and schoolchildren visit his grave to pay their respects.

That evening, Sangadi wore formal traditional dress from Surakarta. He smoked a pipe while he held a stick in his hand. He ordered the gamelan player to play Kebogiro, the formal music to welcome a VIP or to accompany a wedding party. The players complied without asking any questions, although they knew the situation did not warrant such lofty music.

Earlier, upon Sangadi's arrival, father had hurriedly welcomed him and seated him with the village dignitaries.

"Where is my grandson, who is celebrating his birthday?" Sangadi asked my father -- his pet name for me was "grandson". Father told me to come near the special guest. When I approached him, he kissed me on the forehead and gave me money.

Father frowned at Sangadi's generosity. "You should not give him money," he said. His guest seemed displeased at the comment.

"I'm sorry, what I meant," father said quickly, "is that it is not good for a child to keep money."

Sangadi replied: "Believe me, my friend, this is a lawful present. Somebody asked me to massage his horse and paid me handsomely for the service."

Later, my mother was upset. "You should not have accepted money from the man. Give it to me, now," she said. She grabbed the money from me, and on the following day she gave it to a beggar.

Everybody, but father, seemed to hate Sangadi. Rumors circulating in the village said the man was impervious to any weapon. His skin was tough like that of a rhinoceros, his bones were as strong as iron, his fingers like steel nails, and his flesh was as elastic as the rubber used to make a truck tire.

A kris traditional dagger could not injure him, and he mocked people who tried to kill him with a spear.

People whispered that when Sangadi got angry, his body produced heat that could kill anyone around. And the story went that anyone would die at a touch of his fingers. In short, he was like Gatotkaca, the powerful shadow puppet figure.

Want to shoot him? Ladies and gentlemen, listen to the following story:

Sangadi that evening did not feel awkward sitting beside Pak Seten. The latter was head of the village administration division, also known as leader of the gang of thugs in the area. Seten was chief of criminals who operated openly, while Sangadi was the boss of the underworld.

That evening Sangadi was drunk although it was not clear whether he had drunk too much at home or the event. He ran off at the mouth and uttered dirty words the whole night.

He went berserk, kicking all the gongs and chairs. The gamelan stopped, and all the people were frightened and ran away. Father and mother begged the guests to remain calm, at least until they finished dinner. But they kept running and the party abruptly ended.

Sangadi was my father's good friend. It was perhaps an odd relationship because father was so respected in the village. At that time an officer in the salt and opium trade was regarded as priyayi, a member of Javanese nobility.

As far as the law was concerned, father also decided Sangadi's fate. The man was an opium abuser, and father supplied Sangadi with twice the quantity he sold other people. It was perhaps a kind of collusion, but father always used a false name when sending the drug to Sangadi.

My grandfather had warned father against the collusion because he said "once a criminal, Sangadi will always be a criminal. If you want to be a good man be a complete good man".

Then father had a terrible experience. Somebody stole two boxes of opium from his warehouse by making a hole in the wall.

Father asked Sangadi's help in catching the suspect. Examining the hole, Sangadi told father: "This must have been done by So and So from the village of So and So. He is a real son of a bitch, who would not think twice before he committed his offense. He may be deaf and blind; look at the triangular hole. But don't worry, leave me to take care of the rest."

Sangadi, by nature, could be very polite at times, but more often he was rude. He called a deaf person "someone whose ears fester" and the blind "one-eyed Jack".

After several days, Sangadi had failed to do his job in catching the opium suspect. When Father asked him about the matter, his answer was always: "Don't worry, it is not a difficult job."

But father had heard from local residents that the suspect was at large after he had bribed Sangadi with the opium he stole from the warehouse.

My grandfather again felt uneasy and told father, "Never ask a criminal to catch another criminal".

Sangadi had also worked as a guard at a sugar cane plantation. He was a brutal guard, so people said. Sangadi severely punished anybody he caught in the act of stealing anything.

If the culprit was a little boy, he would beat his head until he became unconscious. If it was a man, he would torture the person until he begged for his life. If it was a woman, he would strip her naked.

Worse still, he did not hesitate to rape any woman who dared pass his guard post after dark. Many women had fallen victim but nobody had the guts to report it to police.

One day, Sangadi killed a fellow gambler but escaped punishment even though he was sentenced by the court. He lost the game and accused the owner of the gambling den of using black magic on him. Sangadi was so angry and killed the man.

After hearing the murder story, the whole village beat the kentongan -- the bamboo drum to sound emergencies -- to announce the tragedy. Many well-armed policemen rushed to the scene on motorbikes. It was a case of strength in numbers after they found out the suspect was Sangadi.

The officers aimed their rifles but Sangadi was calm. The court later found him guilty and jailed him for 20 years.

But he did not serve the full jail term, because the Japanese occupation troops arrived in 1942 and emptied all prisons.

The Indonesian revolution which followed the Japanese occupation saw Sangadi enjoying great personal freedom. As the crime rate rose, robbery, gambling, and prostitution flourished.

However, no villager dared open their mouth in protest because they knew Sangadi was behind each of them. Even when a neighborhood security guard admitted he had forced a poor widow to serve him in bed, nobody said a thing.

Sangadi made another unbelievable choice: spying for the Dutch colonial authorities, who were returning here to regain their paradise lost after World War II. At the same time, he also flirted with Indonesian freedom fighters but to no avail. The guerrillas kicked him out of their camps as they knew who he was.

He made his way to the refugee shelters where women were housed. He snuck into their tents and slept there every night. He should have got the death sentence for the scandals but Lady Luck was beside him. He was just asked to leave.

One day, my uncle, wielded a pistol and vowed to kill Sangadi with the gun. But my father said, "It would not as easy as killing a hen." Father reminded uncle Sangadi was invulnerable.

"Let God punish him. If He wants him dead He can send him to hell just by a touch. But if He wants him alive, Sangadi would even survive an execution by a firing squad."

Uncle called off his plan.

Sangadi was free to tour the Dutch-controlled sugar factory. But he enjoyed the Dutch whisky even more.

Gradually, the Dutch found out he was not a good spy. His reports about the headquarters of Indonesian guerrilla units, the strengths of each of the Indonesian units, the possibility to ambush them and crush them, were considered naive. He was sacked.

Sangadi could not accept his replacement. In anger, he shouted, "All Dutch are bastards, they must go home." He bared his chest and shouted: "Shoot me here, if you dare!"

Some of the colonial troops shot him, but they failed to hurt him. Disappointed by what they saw, the soldiers beat him, tied his hands with a rope and dragged him around the factory by a jeep. They stopped when it was dark and Sangadi was weak.

After the soldiers left, an Indonesian who worked for the Dutch there untied his hands. Anyone else would have been dead from the injuries.

"I think I am too weak to bear this hardship any longer, I would rather die," he moaned.

"What do you really want?" the man asked.

"Give me a pail of water."

After the helper returned with water, Sangadi told the man to pour it on his bloody body.

"Thanks," Sangadi said before he died.

Villagers later took his body home and buried him in a public cemetery. After the revolution, his remains were moved to the new Heroes Cemetery, still within the village.

Hearing of his horrible death, many believed he was a hero. Truth is he should have been condemned for his rapes and murders.

His kindness to me -- giving me money he claimed he had gained legally -- had been rewarded by my keeping quiet for 50 years.

The writer was born in Yogyakarta on Sept. 18, 1943, and is a history lecturer at Gadjah Mada University in the Central Java city. His short stories have been printed in Horison and Sastera literary magazines. He has also published collections of poems, dramatic works, novels and nonfiction on history and culture. Since 1995, Kuntowijoyo has won successive first prizes in the annual short story competition organized by Kompas daily. This short story appears in Anjing-Anjing Menyerbu Kuburan (Dogs Stormed the Grave). It is printed here courtesy of Kompas and translated by TIS.