I wish I could directly talk to Geert Wilders, the Dutch politician who severely scolded the Netherlands Ambassador for Indonesia Nikolaos van Dam for writing a very balanced article on Islam, an excerpt of which also appeared in The Jakarta Post on May 1, 2009.

The article actually originally held little attraction for me as I was prejudiced about how a politician would write. I just skimmed it and moved on to the next page. But when a story about Wilders’ response appeared in this newspaper’s May 7, 2009 edition, I regretted ignoring the article.

I wish I could tell Wilders that although I know little about him personally, I am very willing to have an intimate dialogue with him. The German philosopher Jurgen Habermas once said everybody who cares about improving people’s lives around the world should get to know each other through “communicative actions”.

I will start with something mild but meaningful. In our country, Indonesia, which has the world’s largest Muslim population, many Indonesians love to watch live Dutch football matches (you call it Eredivisie) on the weekends for free because a local TV station broadcasts them regularly. We also spend our time watching Spanish La Liga, English Premier League, Serie A Italia, and German Bundesliga as you do there in Europe.

Does Wilders know that nobody cares whether the players are Muslims or Christians, Jews or atheists? We also do not care about the past things happened in the history related to colonialism or the present so-called neo-imperialism and so on. It seems that we have been united by football unintentionally as a common pastime with our counterparts in all over the world.

Why does such thing happen? Even though some of us saw and read Wilders’ words and acts, Ajax Amserdam or PSV Eindhoven are still two football clubs that have many fans here, in a country where Islam has different local wisdoms as Ambassador van Dam has brilliantly discussed in his paper. I myself, have had an Ajax sticker on my Vespa steering wheel for more than five years. And I never think about how it is actually a club from Europe where some people intentionally show their dislike to some things in our country or whether the owners are Christians or Jews.

Here are some more stories about my experiences as a student with strong Islamic background. I wish I could directly talk to Wilders about how I was educated in an environment frequently suspected as the melting pot and beehive of terrorists or anything negative about Islam.

My hometown is called Bukittinggi in West Sumatra. If Wilders ever went there he would see many Western people around. There are tourists from all over the world. As the town has a history intertwined with Dutch colonialism, it has many historical things from that period as well as memories that attracts many Dutch visitors.

But I guarantee you, Meneer Wilder, the people will offer you a hospitable welcome. We are very accustomed to accepting other people with warmth and without suspicion. And there are two big churches in the middle of the town, situated in more strategic areas than the mosques themselves.

The tourists there were my first native-speaking foreign language teachers. After attending my course, I climbed down Sianok Canyon and found three Americans, two females and one man. We then went through the canyon floor and after a short adventure arrived at my school, what we call madrasa or pesantren. Without any hesitation, I took them to meet one of my teachers. He warmly welcomed them and offered them drinks and tried to speak very broken English. I should mention that the three guests were wearing tank top with shorts. But we laughed a lot and were impressed with one another.

What do you think, Meneer Wilders? If you came to the pesantren and met the religious teachers smilingly and without suspicion or any hesitation they will absolutely accept you with even more friendliness than they usually accept their own guests or students!

My other extraordinary encounter happened when I was in the 11th grade at the same madrasa. We had a professor from Canada as our esteemed guest. She was accompanied by her husband and an official from the Religious Affairs Ministry.

Since we usually use the great mosque for almost all activities involving many people, the professor delivered her lecture there and all of us listened to her and never debated whether she was a Muslim or not. The old teachers just told us that we must appreciate and thank her for her visit and speech. “Look at what someone intends to say, do not look at who says it.”

Does not it taste sweet? If Wilders really wants to prove what Meneer van Dam has delivered in his speech he will find him entirely correct. There are thousands of differences that are regionally formed in Islam. So that I think Wilders might have found something terrible that a generalization or exaggeration was then made.

Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi beautifully described how people looked for the truth as if they were blind men trying to define an elephant. When one of them touches its tail he told the others that an elephant is like a snake. Perhaps you have only touched a side of the regionally and culturally varied Islam and made a hurried conclusion.

My senior teachers at the madrasa, encouraged the students to have mutual respect and tolerance. Some of them who had businesses or sold the crops to the market practiced what they taught us directly because some of their connections were Chinese or people with different religions. This is then to prove that we should be going beyond the religious issues as such and look at the positive advantages of being different.

Does Meneer Wilders believe it is impossible that many people here prefer the Dutch football team in the World Cup to any other team from Middle East? Or that they might choose Russia or England instead? I have never heard of an Islamic jurist prohibiting the Muslims from supporting any of the Europe teams.

That’s why the Dutch Ambassador for Indonesia has suggested that we discuss and share what we have in common rather than to sharpen the differences; to each do the best thing rather than ask the other to do their best and have a part that remains silent.

We should be looking at the filled part of the glass and trying to make it full rather than looking at the empty part and then reproaching one another.

My last question to Meneer Wilders: Do you like football even though you are a politician? If yes, what is your favorite team? Which team do you think will win the European Champions League?

Thank you so much.

The writer graduated from Sharia Faculty of  State Islamic University (UIN) Syarif Hidayatullah in 1999 and attended philosophy courses at STF Driyarkara. He is currently a teacher at Lazuardi Global Islamic School – Cinere.

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