Historic building: A student passes in front of an old Chinese-style building inside SMPN 32 state junior high school in Pejagalan, West Jakarta on Wednesday
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A building in Jl. Pejagalan Raya, West Jakarta, that is estimated to have been built between 1880 and 1920 to accommodate merchants from outside the city, is desperately in need of restoration.
The dilapidated building, now used by state junior high school SMPN 32, is on the list of Jakarta's cultural heritage buildings, which are required to be preserved. However, the school has waited for years to get the renovation.
Saifudin Basri, the school's deputy principal, said the old building located inside the school compound had held the cultural heritage status for years, but the city had done nothing to alleviate its increasingly decrepit condition.
'A lot of people from the city administration have visited the building, but there is never any follow-up afterwards,' he told The Jakarta Post. 'I am worried it could pose a danger to our students.'
Situated next to the school yard, the two-storey heritage site used to be a hotel called Kho Pu Tjien, run by a Chinese family during the 19th century. As the building is located near a river, it was the perfect place for travelling merchants to stay while their ships were docked nearby.
The city's official website jakarta.go.id record state that in 1920 other buildings, which now house SMPN 32, were built near the hotel utilizing a totally different mode of construction.
The other buildings are not included in the heritage list. In 1950 the entire site became part of the school facility.
However, nowadays the building gives no impression of heritage splendor, and the Chinese-style roof has been crying for attention for some years. The first floor is the school's mushola (prayer room), but the upstairs area is too dangerous to be used for any kind of activity.
Ascending to the second floor, visitors will see something akin to an unused warehouse with dusty chairs and tables scattered around the room, while the wooden floor between rooms is rickety, forcing anyone walking on it to be extra careful.
Saifudin said that few years back some of the teachers and their families lived on the building's second floor, but as major renovations ' that did not include the heritage site ' took place in 2010, the teachers were asked to find another place to stay.
'There were around 15 families there who maintained the building. Now, it has become worse as no one lives there anymore,' Saifudin continued.
He said he hoped that the city administration would give immediate attention to the building as the upcoming rainy season 'might make the roof collapse any time.' 'It could also be turned into a new classroom for the students, we need more of them here,' he said.
The school has more than 800 students that are divided into morning and afternoon classes.
Febriyanti Suryaningsih, executive director at the Indonesia Architecture Documentation Center (PDA), who has visited the site, said she agreed that revitalization must be carried out immediately.
She said with the historical background, the building was a valuable asset for the school, where students could learn about history of Jakarta firsthand.
According to her, the swallow's tail of the roof indicated that the building was owned by a very respectful family in an earlier era.
'However, I understand that a public school cannot receive funding assistance from a private party, so it depends on the city administration's willingness to restore the site,' she said over the phone.
Contacted separately, Jakarta Cultural and Tourism Agency head Catur Laswanto said he had yet to receive any report about the condition of SMPN 32.
He said revitalization of cultural heritage sites was subject to governor approval after receiving a recommendation from an independent team. The Cultural Heritage Expert Team would visit the heritage site as soon as the site owner or operator, in this case the school principal, made an official rehabilitation request, he added.
'The independent team will consider if the site needs to be revitalized or not. Afterwards they will submit their recommendation to the governor,' he said.
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