Two Skulls

By Motinggo Busye

I take a deep breath every time the story of two skulls buried somewhere in the restive province of Aceh, the northernmost province of Sumatra, crosses my mind. The two human body parts are very important to me because they belong to my relatives. Now I have to go to the area to unearth them.

The story started with a telephone call from Umi (Acehnese for mama) telling me to immediately present myself at Lhokseumawe, the capital of North Aceh regency.

Twice Umi called me about that. She said I had been appointed by the family as the head of a committee in charge of moving the skeleton of my grandfather from a isolated village to a better place. I fully understood the message and would soon depart for Aceh so that Umi would not need to call me for the third time.

I would shortly go there using land transportation, although I understood quite well that the road linking Lampung and South Aceh was quite rough. Moreover, the towns I would pass along the way give me no special impression.

Later, upon arrival in Aceh, I directly went to see Mak Toha, a kind-hearted old lady whom I have known since my childhood. My relationship with her is like that of mother and son. And Ali, her oldest son, was my classmate in junior high school. Mak Toha was very surprised to see me standing at her front door. She welcomed me with an Islamic greeting: Assalamu'alaikum, which means peace be on you.

"You make me feel as if Ali has come back to life," she said.

"So, is it true that he is dead?" I asked.

"Yes, it is. But our family full-heartedly accepts God's will. Ali has treaded the right path of God. For us, he is a valuable ticket to go to Heaven,alhamdulillah (Arabic for praise be to God)," she added.

Mak Toha asked me to be seated as she went to the kitchen to make tea. While doing that, she asked me how I knew that Ali had died.

"Ja'afar informed me," I said. I tried to hide the emotional battle inside me. My heart asked why Ali had been the victim of a brutal murder. Every one knew he was a smart dancer of seudati, the most popular Acehnese classical dance. He was also a gifted dramatist and an expressive poetry reader.

Ali once sent me a letter from Tripoli, Libya. After reading it, I got an impression that he was a great worshiper of Qaddafi, the controversial Libyan leader. He signed the letter as "Qaddafi's son." But as time went by, Ali changed his attitude. After he returned home from the North African country and settled in Medan, Ali also sent me a letter. This time he seemed to have freed himself from the hero worship. He said his job in the capital city of North Sumatra province was teaching English.

"Although my mother is rich, I don't want to be spoiled. I want to be self-supporting," he said. "In fact, my mother urged me to start a patchoulie plantation, an easy way to get rich. But wealth is not my aim," he said. His final sentence was the most important.

That is the last letter I received from Ali. Some friends informed me that he and some colleagues had been killed by troops. All of them were buried in a mass grave. But to Mak Toha, Ali is now a beloved missing person.

In his last days, people remembered Ali for his flawless English. He had also memorized Shakespeare's works by heart. His aptitude for languages became apparent when he was in senior high school. Nobody believed that Ali was fit enough to carry a gun or that he deserved to be a victim of military brutality. They should not have murdered him. They should have appreciated him for his artistic ability.

I remember one day Ali came to my house to tell me about a new innovation of his. Shakespeare, he said, was not only a playwright but also a great poet. He said he had just gotten a book on Shakespeare from his uncle in Singapore. Ali asked me to read one of the poems from the book: So shalt thou feed on Death/ that feeds on men/ And Death once dead/ there's no more dying then.

What impressed me deeply was his ability to translate the poems into Acehnese so perfectly. Acehnese people are known for their love of poetry. There are a lot of traditional oral poets in the province. And this time the local people had a chance to hear Shakespeare's poems read by Ali, especially the ones speaking about death. The locals believe that death only comes once.

Years ago, Mak Toha told me that Ali rejected her advise to go to Sidikalang, North Sumatra, to open a plantation because he wanted to pursue her studies in Singapore. But he did not live long in the island city. On my advice, he left for Egypt. But in the land of the Pharaohs, Ali changed his mind and proceeded to Libya.

Mak Toha denied the accusation by the military authorities that Ali was in Libya to take part in military training. "That is a lie, a poisonous lie. The truth is Ali was an English teacher there," Mak Toha said.

Ali told me in his letter that Qaddafi liked to look down upon uneducated people. A bright man, he was educated at a British military academy under the sponsorship of sultan Idris, the country's monarch whom he later ousted. Ali said Qaddafi did not only speak English but French.

Mak Toha could not hold back her tears when she spoke about her son. I felt sad too because Ali was now lying two meters underground, in an unmarked mass grave.

And that day, I told Mak Toha I could not spend much time with her because I had to proceed to Lhokseumawe to meet my relatives and prepare everything for the removal of my grandfather's skeleton.

But I had to postpone my departure to the North Aceh regency town upon the strong persistence of the old lady. "Please spend one night here so that my longing for Ali can be satisfied," she begged.

I was lucky that Ibrahim, Ali's younger brother, suddenly arrived. The young man was quite talkative but I did not mind because I could shift my focus from Mak Toha's sentimental tale. Ibrahim came fully dressed on such a hot day as that.

"Why are you dressed so in the scorching sun? " I asked.

"It is important, to show the troops I'm not an extremist. You know, I'm an busy patcholie exporter."

Ibrahim informed me that he and relatives would immediately leave for the village of Dayah Baureuh to unearth the bodies of the victims of an indiscriminate massacre by the troops. They arbitrarily accused innocent people of being members of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM). The victims were buried in a mass grave beside a field where they were gunned down.

"We want to find the victims' identity and rebury them in a proper burial place with full respect," he said.

I was shocked to hear Ibrahim's story because what I heard from Yacob, a friend of mine, the massacre was less inhuman. I told Ibrahim that I would take part in the digging job. And with Mak Toha's permission, we left for Lhokseumawe.

Arriving home, it was Umi's turn to be surprised because my arrival was much earlier than she had expected.

I told my mother that we would have to delay the unearthing of grandfather's body. Personally, I never met the old man because he was shot to death in 1942 by the Japanese occupational troops. I was touched, however, every time Umi told me the story of his death.

I hoped the delay would not upset Umi. Although consistent at all times, if she had to choose between unearthing her father's skeleton and those of DOM officers, those notoriously brutal military operation officers, she would, of course, prefer the second. I knew that for sure.

When I told Umi how lively Mak Toha told the story of Ali's excellence and how she tried to persuade me to spend a night there so that she would be able to speak more about her son, Umi shed dears and wiped them with the edge of her head scarf. "I wish it were you who had been killed by the military so that our family would have a medal from God for the next life," she said firmly.

Umi also related how sincere Ali was. She once attended a poetry reading in four languages by him. That took place in Langsa, the capital of East Aceh regency.

"When was that, Umi?"

"It was right after he returned from Tripoli. Ali was fluent, not only in English, but also in Arabic. Foreign consuls, who attended the show, could not believe their eyes at what they witnessed. It was par excellence. I broke into tears for over his accomplishment. I was sorry you were not there," she said.

I did not say anything. I knew when Acehnese women spoke about death they were fully overwhelmed by the spirit of holy war. For them, Ali's death was an expression of love for God and a promise to those he left behind.

At a meeting with relatives, we agreed to go Dayah Baureuh to unearth the bodies of the victims of the military brutality. The decision certainly pleased Mak Toha. And on that day, I received a telephone call from Ibrahim in Sidikalang. He said he and his family would arrive in Dayah Baureuh on Wednesday with food and drinks. "I want to meet you there," he said.

Arriving at the appointed place on Wednesday, I hugged all the people who had come to help dig the mass grave.

We worked extra carefully in order not to affect the bodies. Some of the victims were neatly dressed, while others were complete with ID cards. I was also surprised to find high school class mates among the victims. But there were also many without an identity.

One of the victims wore a bronze ring with an agate. "This must be my son, Amir," said a woman, who was his mother.

Another woman shouted:" This must be Buyung, my son. Look at his ring with the Persian emerald. Mak Toha, who was standing nearby, kept silent.

"Ali tried to resist the execution," said Udin, an eyewitness of my age.

"What happened after that?"

"He was gunned down by an army captain," said Udin.

Udin's statement pushed me to ask an officer who was there. "If the executioner was a commandant, did he use a long or short gun?"

"Usually, a pistol," he said.

I picked up one of the skulls, which had a hole in the forehead.

"If Udin's story is true, this must be Ali's skull," I said while cleaning soil from it. I was surprised to find a projectile inside. I showed the bullet to the officer and asked whether it was shot from a pistol.

"It is from a Vickers pistol," he said.

I asked Mak Toha whether she was satisfied, and she said: "Alhamdulillah," adding, "But please clean it further because a platinum-capped tooth will determine the truth."

I cleaned it until the old woman shouted in happiness because there was no doubt any more; It was Ali's skull. I removed the tooth and gave it to her. She kissed it with deep respect. Afterward, she put it into her purse. At the same time, I also put the bullet into my shirt pocket.

"If that is Ali's skull, this must be Rozak Harimau's," said a young man who was standing nearby, whose name was Tengku Jajaj. He attested that Rozak's canine teeth were similar to those of a tiger. That is why he was called Razak Harimau (Razak the Tiger).

Mak Toha was happy to see me cleaning the rest of skulls in the way Muslims bathed the dead. When they were all clean, I wrapped them in a clean white cloth. After that, all the skulls were placed in a row for a special prayer service. This was all done according to Islamic tradition. The last ritual was burying the skulls properly in a special grave.

But the following week, as I was unearthing my grandfather's skeleton in another place, I had almost the same feelings. My grandfather's skull also had a hole in the forehead. But I did not find any bullet. What I saw was a bigger hole at its back. My grandfather was also gunned down by a soldier, but he was a Japanese soldier during the occupation of Indonesia in World War II. Military fascism was extremely cruel during the Japanese occupation.

When we held a family gathering in Lhokseumawe some time later, one of the participants urged me to beg to the authorities to confer my grandfather with a special medal of honor for his heroic deeds in resisting the Japanese occupation. But I opposed the proposal saying, "No, it is not necessary."

"But your grandfather was a victim of the Japanese brutality," my uncle said.

"Okay," I said, "what about my friend Ali, a victim of our own military's operations?"

Everyone was quiet. It seemed we needed time for contemplation.

Translated by TIS

The story is taken from "Dua Tengkorak Kepala (Two Skulls), Kompas selected short stories, 2000.