Seeing red over locals' Chinese New Year behavior

Natalia Soebagjo, Center for Chinese Studies, Jakarta

Everyone saw red on Chinese New Year's Day. Walk into any shopping mall and you could see the place festooned with red lanterns, red mock firecrackers, red paper decorations and red banners with gold characters wishing you prosperity. You could not get away from the color red. Likewise on television. The color red jumped at you from almost all the channels.

Presenters and celebrities wore mandarin collars, and funny, little round hats. One presenter even wore a Chinese bridal costume with what looked like a chopstick jutting out from her hair bun. In short, anything Chinese suddenly became a novelty. Chinoiserie is now officially "in".

I too was seeing red in the real sense of the idiom, angry and annoyed, because this sudden awareness of the existence of the ethnic Chinese living among us only underscores the insensitivity and ignorance of the majority of Indonesians. It is as if we are able to recognize the ethnic Chinese Indonesians, their traditions and their way of life only because it is so decreed by the government, which finally declared Chinese New Year a public holiday.

Have we been totally blind to the fact that our nation's history has always been closely linked to China and the ethnic Chinese, or, as in Onghokham's words, that the Chinese are "an integral part of the Indonesian nation as any other group"? Apparently so.

Thousands of years ago, and, some even say, as early as 1000 BC, migrants from China had already arrived on our shores. Even our great kingdom of Sriwijaya became known to historians and the world through Chinese accounts. For centuries since we have traded with the Chinese, while some settled here and intermarried with the natives, blending different lifestyles together.

To this day we can still see traces of Chinese influence in our own "Indonesian" culture, local customs and even language. Ethnic Chinese have also made their contributions and left their mark in our political and economic histories.

Admittedly, this evolutionary assimilation process was long in the making but was resilient enough to weather the political turbulence throughout our history. Unfortunately, this gradual evolution was disrupted by Soeharto's policy of forced assimilation.

His policy dulled our sensitivities and forced us into denial for some 30 years. Ethnic Chinese Indonesians had to deny their cultural and historical roots, whilst the rest of us had to deny that they also helped build this nation.

Now we have swung to the other extreme and are left with confusion. The May 1998 tragedy shocked the ethnic Chinese into an awareness of their ethnicity but since then, and particularly with the fall of Soeharto, there have been stronger demands for the recognition of their rights.

For many, it was a traumatic way of rediscovering one's identity. The recent acknowledgement of Chinese New Year as a public holiday, however, is a much more pleasant way to remind the ethnic Chinese of their heritage.

Is it a public holiday based on religious or cultural grounds? If it is based on religious grounds the government is indirectly acknowledging that Confucianism is an official religion. If so, why are so many ethnic Chinese couples who profess Confucianism as their faith still unacceptable and have such difficulty in getting married?

If the acknowledgement is for cultural reasons -- as the Chinese worldwide consider the coming of spring a time of celebration and renewal -- what is there to stop other ethnic groups from demanding their own public holiday? But such questions are brushed off as minor details that should not get in the way of the greater intention of recognizing our pluralism.

The irony is that there are many ethnic Chinese who are also confused by this state of affairs. With the pribumi's sudden curiosity of all things Chinese, our fellow Indonesians who appear to be of ethnic Chinese ancestry are being asked all sorts of questions about Chinese New Year and how they celebrate it, when all the while many have never observed it in the traditionally prescribed manner.

Many do not even know what they are supposed to do as the new year approaches; they do not quite understand the significance of reunion dinners with their families on Chinese New Year's eve and the symbolic meaning of special New Year cuisine. Many no longer carry out the customs of New Year's day, such as a prohibition on the use of coarse language and that all debts must be paid off.

Few of the younger generation pay their respects to their elders without prompting and elders do not practice the giving of red packets to the young and unmarried. How many know that the seventh day of the Chinese New Year is considered the birthday of all people and is celebrated by the tossing of raw fish salad or that the New Year celebrations last for 15 days?

What we have now is the commercialism of Chinese New Year, which unfortunately has manifested itself everywhere. However, this excess is understandable given the suppression of past decades.

It is as if the Chinese cultural revival is coming out in full vengeance, with Mandarin films, serials and pop groups constantly on television, Mandarin newspapers and books freely sold in bookshops, Mandarin language courses openly offered and even a radio station that airs in Mandarin.

Once the partying is over, however, we should examine deeper the more important issue of resolving the discrimination still faced by ethnic Chinese Indonesians today.

Many discriminatory policies still need to be revoked, and, if already revoked, need to be resolutely enforced. It is so embarrassing that even prominent individuals who have contributed to our nation's achievements and prestige still have difficulty obtaining their citizenship documents (SBKRI) as in the recent case of Hendrawan and Ivana Lie in the past.

Such cases only serve to show that the ethnic Chinese are often perceived as cash cows and easy prey for extortion by the bureaucracy. Some even wonder how long this current wave of tolerance will last and fear that it might create a backlash if there is a sudden change in the regime or political mood.

Our nationhood is so fragile that every effort should be made to move forward, away from just recognition and tolerance toward full acceptance. Acceptance also means genuine respect for our differences, not condescension.

We should refrain from stereotyping and from making a mockery of the differences, whether in private or in public. Chinese New Year is not simply a matter of seeing red all around but a time for renewed hope and working together for a better future. A future which should include everyone and build upon the long accumulated wealth of knowledge and experience of all in our colorful ethnic patchwork that we call Indonesia.