Our life must go on: Survivors

Wed, 05/13/2009 2:38 PM  |  City

Although over 10 years have passed since waves of looting and burning spread across the country's capital city, some people still vividly remember the riots that destroyed their means to make a living and their sense of helplessness. Somehow, they recovered.

"I saw it with my own eyes," Johnny, a mobile phone vendor in Mall Klender, East Jakarta said. "People rushed into my electronics shop and took everything."

He was then running an electronic shop in Glodok, West Jakarta and rebuilt his business from scratch - after a four year break.

"I won't blame anyone," he grinned. "Now I am more successful than I was before the incident."

On May 12, 1998, four Trisakti university students were shot during a massive demonstration to bring down former President Soeharto and the New Order. The next day, angry mobs took over the city burning down shopping centers and attacking mainly Chinese-Indonesians.

"My grandmother had a small building she rented out to a Chinese, who ran a photocopying service there. On the dawn of May 13, the man fled the building on a motorbike," Helda, a witness of the incident, said.

She added her Betawinese family was afraid the mob would burn down the building if they thought it was owned by a Chinese. So Helda's family had to hang a sajadah (Muslim praying mat) in front of the building to signal it was owned by a Muslim pribumi (local).

The small shop was untouched; but the three-day riots destroyed over 6,000 buildings.

The humanitarian help volunteer team recorded over 1,000 deaths, while the government's Joint Fact-Finding Team reported over 90 cases of rape and sexual violence during this period.

Kelly, another survivor, also had to take time off from her family business, selling aluminium bars for furniture, because of the financial loss.

"People broke into our house and took the bars and machines. We had to take refugee in our relatives' house," she said. "For almost a month, my family was in distress."

Nevertheless, for the sake of the children, Kelly and her husband soon managed to resume a livelihood.

"Our two kids are grown-up now, and can make their own living," she said proudly.

They now run a small restaurant selling homemade food. During this year's legislative elections, they closed the restaurant for a few days for fear the riots would recur.

"We were afraid it would happen all over again because of all the election excitement," she said.

Johnny had no such worries.

"If I have to die because of this business, then so be it," he said. "People think that people of Chinese descent are privileged, but actually we don't have many choices in this country."

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