No true preservation for Tugu

By Ida Indawaty Khouw

The majority of Indonesians probably do not realize that the popular Keroncong music originated in North Africa, not Indonesia as is popularly held. Tugu, a small area in North Jakarta which has been designated a preservation site by the Jakarta administration, tells the story of Keroncong's arrival in Indonesia. This is the 15th article in a series about Jakarta's historical sites and buildings appearing in the Saturday editions of The Jakarta Post.

JAKARTA (JP): Officially, the 11.3-hectare Tugu is a protected historical site, meaning any construction or renovation of the buildings in the area required the written permission of the Jakarta governor.

In reality, the area has been a designated protected site for almost 30 years, but the local administration and related officials continue to do nothing to preserve and protect Tugu.

In a 1970 gubernatorial decree signed by then governor Ali Sadikin, the Jakarta administration designated the area a preserved historical site for its unique ties with the Portuguese people, tradition and culture.

The decree, however, proved as useful and binding as a plain piece of paper.

Over the years, Tugu has developed into simply one of many residential complexes in the city. The areas history and uniqueness have been lost as property owners have built and renovated their properties with no thought for the area's history.

Tugu also has been split by Jl. Tugu Raya, one of the main routes for container trucks passing between industrial zones in East and North Jakarta to the nearby Tanjung Priok port.

The best preserved building from the old kampong is the 200- year-old Church of Tugu and its bell tower and graveyard.

At one time, the church was the center of Tugu. The administration designated in the 1970 decree the church and all of the buildings located within 600 meters of it as a preserved historical site.

While historians and preservationists might be upset with significant changes in Tugu, local residents, some of whom still have relatives in Portugal, seem unperturbed.

"The world has indeed changed. Fighting for the preservation of our community's past will be useless," Samuel Quiko, a long- time Tugu resident, said earlier this week.

"We really have no reason to complain about the current situation since we can still recall the past (through stories)," added Quiko, 61, whose parents were Portuguese-Chinese.

Tugu literally means monument in Bahasa Indonesia. The area was named after the discovery of a fifth-century Hindu memorial stone at the site.

Quiko said those people from neighboring areas who called Tugu residents Portuguese were incorrect.

He said the Portuguese no longer existed in Tugu because the locals had mixed with people of other descents through marriage.

"Moreover, none of us can speak the Portuguese language fluently," he said.

The only remnant of Portugal remaining in Tugu residents is Portuguese family names, such as Andries, Cornelis, Michiels and Quiko.

According to the eldest Tugu resident, Martha Magdalena Michiels, the area was a peaceful neighborhood during Dutch colonialism.

The area was filled with trees, including coconut and palm trees, she said.

"In the past, we had plenty of time to enjoy life. Most of our needs were filled by our environment. We had our own rice fields, fruit was provided by our land, and the males just went to the nearby sea to catch fish," the 80-year-old fondly recalled.

Oma (grandmother) Martha said that in those idyllic days of the past, residents passed their leisure time by chatting and playing Keroncong music.

Today, as in the past, guitars, mandolins, flutes and violas are the main instruments used in Keroncong.

"The neighborhood was so quiet then that when the music was played it could be heard everywhere," Martha said.

Although Martha's eyesight and hearing are no longer clear, she still can vividly recall the joyous New Year's Eve celebrations which used to take place in Tugu.

"The Keroncong musicians usually visited each houses to convey their New Year's greetings. They were then served liquor," Martha said.

"The celebration usually lasted for a week because the musicians could not skip even a single home," she said.

The party ended with the mandi-mandi feast a week after Jan. 1, when people put powder on each other's faces to symbolize the cleansing of their sins, Martha said.

The mother of eight said Tugu's tranquility began to disappear when Indonesia fell under the Japanese colonial government in 1942. The Japanese soldiers regarded the Tugu residents as Dutch due to the physical appearance.

"Tugu then became like hell, with our belongings being stolen and residents forced to flee as far as the Netherlands," she said.

According to some experts, the majority of the Tugu residents were descendants of Mardijker, or freed "Portuguese" slaves.

Historian Adolf Heuken wrote in his book Historical Sites of Jakarta the residents of Tugu were descendants of Dutch prisoners from the Portuguese colonies of Malacca, India and Ceylon, which were conquered by the Dutch in 1641.

"The poorer prisoners, who were made slaves by the Dutch, had Portuguese names but were only rarely of Portuguese origin. There were some Malays, but most were Bengalese and Ceylonese .... They were promised and given liberty on the condition that they become members of the Dutch reformed church," he said.

Heuken said these "Portuguese" moved to Tugu in 1661 after the land was given to 23 Christian families of Bengalese and Coromandel descent, who later mixed with the Balinese through marriage.

Tugu's biggest contribution to the country is Keroncong music, which originated among North African tribes, who brought it to Portugal.

An expert on old Jakarta, Ridwan Saidi, said the people of Tugu brought with them Keroncong, which they learned living in the Portuguese colonies.

"They not only played the music within their community; they also entertained people at the high-class Macao-Po brothel near Kota railway station," he said.

He said that while the musicians played Keroncong, the prostitutes paraded along the building's veranda.

"It was a beautiful atmosphere," Ridwan said.

Ridwan said the indigenous people then spread the music by playing it in their neighborhoods.

"In Kemayoran, youths played the music to attract girls," he said.

It was a Tugu Keroncong group that composed the popular lullaby Nina Bobo, which comes from the Portuguese word for little girl, Menina.

Tugu still boasts two groups of Keroncong musicians, and while their popularity in Indonesia has not spread beyond the local community, they have been invited to perform in the Netherlands several times.