Photos recount WWII horror

================= Tantri Yuliandini The Jakarta Post Jakarta -----------------

A casual visitor might simply regard it as an odd assortment of black-and-white photographs of grim-faced, bare-chested, old men. But a closer look will award them greater insight; it is the story of war victims.

Each of the 24 men in the photographs, displayed at the Erasmus Huis Dutch cultural center until the end of this month, has a profound, yet dreadful story to tell. That of the horror of life along the Burma and Pekanbaru railway lines during World War II.

It was the early 1940s, and the Japanese were winning the war in Southeast Asia. For their campaign against Allied forces in Burma they planned to build a railway line linking Thailand and Burma, spanning 420 kilometers (km), for use as a supply route.

To fuel its war machinery, the Japanese also needed easy access to Sumatra's rich coal fields, and planned to build a 220- km railway line linking Muaro Sijunjung in the west to Pekanbaru in the east.

In both places the railway lines had to penetrate inhospitable jungle, swamps and rivers.

On the Thai-Burma line the Japanese put to work some 60,000 Allied prisoners of war (PoW), of which about 18,000 were Dutch, and 160,000 romusha (Asian forced laborers). About 100,000 romusha, most of them Javanese, and 6,500 POWs, were put to work on the Muaro Sijunjung to Pekanbaru line.

Relentless, hard labor on inadequate rations caused huge losses and, according to historians, more than half did not survive.

"It was much worse for the romusha than it was for us (PoWs), because they were tricked into working on the lines. The Japanese lied to them," former PoW George Voorneman, who attended the opening of the exhibition, said.

The suffering of the PoWs and romusha moved Dutch photographer Jan Banning to photograph survivors and research their stories.

Beginning with his father, Frans Banning, who had worked on the Pekanbaru railway in 1944, the younger Banning successfully located 24 other survivors within a timespan of one-and-a-half years. These comprised 16 Dutch and Eurasian survivors and eight former romusha, now living in Sumatra and Java.

"I started in Holland with my father and with my father's friends," Jan Banning said on the opening night of his exhibition. He said that he also placed an announcement in a military veterans' publication in Holland to grab the attention of more people.

Banning said that many people telephoned him to set up an interview, but some later canceled the appointment because it would dredge up too many unpleasant memories: "They became very emotional and started crying".

Through old acquaintances and a local non-governmental organization that had done research on jugun ianfu (comfort women), Banning got in touch with eight former romusha.

The exhibition at Erasmus Huis showcased the results of many hours of interviews and lots of unpleasant memories of the victims. Each man was photographed bare-chested.

"Because that was how they worked. See the men as they are now, but undressed as they were when they worked on the railway. It was a connection between the past and present," Banning said.

Beside the large-format, black-and-white photographs are testimonials of the men.

Frans Banning, born in Makassar, South Sulawesi, in 1921, was taken prisoner while a military conscript and sent to work on the Padang to Pekanbaru railway. When the war ended he became an expert in textile chemistry.

"In the end ... we could only try to stay alive, forage for food, try to prevent others from stealing it; the rest ... no hope! That's what numbed the mind. Everything was the same. There was no news of developments outside the camp. We didn't know about the development of the war or when it would all end."

Damin, born in Blitar in 1916, became a romusha and worked on the Pekanbaru railway. After Independence he became a cassava farmer and was known as Mbah Ubi (Cassava Grandfather).

"People died or lived, just like pebbles that got caught in a sieve. And I was like a grain of sand that escaped."

The stories of these 24 men can also be found in Jan Banning's book, Sporen van oorlog. Overlevenden van de Birma- en de Pakanbaroe-spoorweg published by IF Ipso Facto, Utrecht, 2003, which can be bought at Erasmus Huis.

George Voorneman was 20 years old when he became a PoW and was sent to work on the Burma to Thailand line. He lost his right eye in a shell blast.

"I live by following God's will," 84-year-old Voorneman said.

Tracks of War photo exhibition is open until Feb. 28 at Erasmus Huis Jakarta, Jl. H.R. Rasuna Said Kav. S-3, Kuningan, Jakarta 12950.