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Jakarta urban legend: Sweet maiden ghost of Ancol Bridge
To unaware passersby, a bridge of Jl
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T
o unaware passersby, a bridge of Jl. RE Martadinata in North Jakarta may seem like an ordinary piece of infrastructure to get across the Ancol River or to take shelter beneath from sun or rain. The highway bridge is busy with a never-ending stream of cars and container trucks emitting fumes mixed with dust into the air, while several people stand in the middle attempting to ease the traffic flow.
But there is more to it than meets the eye, some insist, giving birth to an urban legend that has earned the ordinary-looking bridge a sinister reputation in Jakarta and beyond.
It is said that, one fateful night several decades ago, a beautiful maiden was kidnapped and killed by a bandit and her body was thrown into the Ancol River.
Legend has it that, after the rumored crime, her ghost lurks around the bridge at night, lamenting her untimely death.
Betawi culture and history expert Ridwan Saidi describes in his book Ketoprak Betawi (2001) that the urban legend emerged sometime around the 1950s. At the time, news outlets reported a high rate of traffic accidents in the area. Several survivors claimed that, just before the accidents befell them, they had seen a beautiful woman suddenly cross the road in front of them.
Even though some newspapers sought to explain the claimed experiences, saying the drivers most likely had been hallucinating because of exhaustion, the story of a beautiful but dangerous ghost around Ancol Bridge quickly spread among locals and was believed by many.
Ridwan said some people later connected the ghost story with the disappearance of a teenage girl named Aria in the area in 1870 or 1871. Locals speculated that Aria had, in fact, been murdered and that her body had been thrown into the river, leaving behind a restless soul.
The story of the wandering ghost of Ancol Bridge is one of several popular urban horror stories in the capital, with other popular “haunted” sites including the abandoned Saidah Tower in East Jakarta, the Bintaro railway crossing, the Jeruk Purut Cemetery and the Casablanca underpass — all in South Jakarta.
The bridge attracted thrill-seeking residents ahead of Halloween on a recent tour of several sites.
Putting a damper on the creeps, the founder of the Historia Indonesia Community, Asep Kambali, said that, even though the story of a girl murdered near Ancol Bridge was widely believed true, there was no concrete evidence to corroborate it.
“At the end of the day, it’s just an urban legend, where nobody really knows who first told the story and whether or not it really happened. The source of the story is very unclear, and I have never found any evidence that such events really happened,” he told The Jakarta Post recently.
Due to its popularity, the urban legend inspired a horror movie titled Si Manis Jembatan Ancol (The Sweet Maiden of Ancol Bridge) in 1973. The movie tells the story of a Betawi girl named Mariam who falls in love with a half-Dutch man named John. Their relationship is an uphill struggle as both of their families object to their liaison due to differences in race, religion and social status. After a series of events, Mariam runs away from home and is captured by a bandit and murdered.
The urban legend gained further fame after a TV series of the same title began airing on national television in 1993.
In a twist from the movie, the horror-comedy series depicts Mariam as a sexy, friendly ghost who tries to help people solve problems together with a circle of eccentric fellow ghosts.
Due to the urban legend’s popularity — and apparent profitability — a remake of the 1973 movie is to be released by the end of the year.
Yono, a 45-year-old man living not too far from Ancol Bridge, said he had never seen anything out of the ordinary on the bridge, which he had passed every day for years as he ran a nearby motorcycle repair shop.
“Since I was still a child, I had heard the urban legend of a beautiful ghost roaming around the bridge at night. I’ve also heard a story about a magical white crocodile in the river. But honestly, in all these years, I’ve never seen anything unusual at the bridge,” he told the Post.
