Hotel returns favor in form of foodstuffs

JAKARTA (JP): The Ibis Hotel in Mangga Dua, Central Jakarta, distributed food packages to residents who live in the surrounding area on Saturday as a gesture of appreciation for the help the locals' gave in protecting the hotel during the May riots of 1998.

The event kicked off a half an hour later than originally scheduled. About 100 people, who were mostly housewives carrying their infants, queued patiently on the hotel's plaza.

Small boys and girls, who accompanied their parents to the hotel, seemed very happy to get the opportunity to play on the plaza, a place they are not able to visit everyday.

The residents in the vicinity of the hotel mostly come from a low income background.

The mothers were busy speculating on the contents of the packages.

"I don't know what they're going to give us this time," a woman said.

"They gave us packages which contained various items for the first time in 1998, but they only gave us rice last year."

Some of the locals said that the hotel had so far held the annual event three times. The first event was held a week after the bloody unrest that rocked the capital in the middle of May 1998.

The three days of unrest which preceded the downfall of former president Soeharto on May 21, 1999, caused the destruction and looting of many buildings in the capital, claimed hundreds of lives and, allegedly, left dozens of women, particularly those of Chinese descent, raped.

"These people helped us to safeguard the hotel during the unrest," the hotel's sales manager Ahmad Hifni recalled.

"This is our way in expressing gratitude," Ahmad said, adding that the hotel had also conducted a spraying program in the neighborhood to kill mosquitoes.

A local, Sari Setiawati, 42, said that the men who live nearby the hotel had bravely fought those who came to loot it.

"I remember my husband and many other men carrying wooden sticks guarding the hotel," Sari said.

After several speeches from the hotel management and a representative of the locals, the distribution of the packages began.

Some of the women who had got their packages after handing over the coupons which were distributed a day earlier by the hotel management, were unable to hide their curiosity as to the contents of the packages.

Each family was only given one coupon.

The packages turned out to contain 10 kilograms of rice, five packs of instant noodles, two kilograms of sugar, and three kilograms of cooking oil.

Despite the 'small' value of the packages, locals seemed very grateful to received them.

"Alhamdulillah, this is very helpful," Sari who claimed to have five children said. The package, she added, would last her for three days.

Manager of the hotel, Bambang Sugeng, said that they had allocated Rp 10 million for the program.

While most of the women had already got their packages and started to go home, two young mothers were still standing a few meters from the distribution table observing their neighbors.

"I don't know why they didn't give us coupons," 27-years-old Rusmiati said.

Rusmiati, who has two children, said that she hoped she would get one of the packages but was too shy to ask since she did not have a coupon.

Public relations officer Evy Juliana Sidy said that the hotel did not distribute the coupons directly to the locals.

"We gave 150 coupons to Pak RT (the head of the neighborhood community) yesterday to distribute to the locals," Evy said.(jaw)