I

t was a cloudy morning in a small town in North Sumatra, just a few days after New Year's Day, 2014. On that day I witnessed the death of a patient in a hospital for the poor, and the reluctance of villagers to receive corpses from Jakarta. Their beautiful village is located only meters from the famous Lake Toba.

First of all, I must tell you that I often mention Jesus in this testimony. There is no Christianization intended at all. I am just a satanic verse of a religion. I just want to cover up my evil deeds from my relative because he ' baselessly ' thought that I was a religious man.

I was visiting my paternal auntie at a government-run hospital's intensive care unit (ICU) in Pematang Siantar. She was suffering from a severe cerebral hemorrhage ' bleeding in the brain, in my own terms ' and this was the second such attack she had suffered.

She was unconscious. There were five critical patients in the room.

Her eldest son looked inconsolable about seeing his mother's condition. He and his five siblings had spent tens of millions of rupiah for her treatment in a private hospital before he had taken my auntie to the practically free hospital. He complained a lot about the behavior of his four sisters and one brother, whom he described as being too demanding of him. They lived far from the city.

Without their permission, he took his mother to the government hospital because the ICU facility was free. The government had just introduced a national healthcare program. No less than 140 million people are expected to be covered by the program this year.

'They say I should be ready to provide the best treatment for mamak [mom]. They know I am poor, but they still forced me to pay a big portion of the medical bills. Just because I am the eldest son,' he said.

''Bang [elder brother], please pray for her. I heard you are a very religious Catholic and very close to God. I am sure Jesus will listen to your prayers,'' he begged me, as though he had just met a new prophet.

I should not let my cousin know about my real life. I was also provoked by a young man who was demanding ' loudly, before being scolded by a nurse ' Jesus to instantly cure his long-bearded father. I wanted to show off my deep biblical knowledge.

'Just let my auntie walk now from her bed. Kill all her diseases. But as You say at the Gethsemane, not as I will but as You will,' I said.

To complete my drama, I told my cousin to surrender his mother to Jesus.

'Like what You say at the cross in Golgotha we will say, Father, into your hands I commit my auntie's spirit.'

Just after I finished my prayer, the young man who was praying for his father suddenly screamed. 'Jesus, why did you let my father die?' Was Jesus confused between my request and that young man's hope?

I left the ICU because we had to attend the funeral of a relative at Sipolha, on Lake Toba. Outside the room, two young women wanted an explanation about why they had heard a scream from the ICU.

'Alhamdulillah [praise God],' they said, after learning about the man's death. They said their own father had been waiting for three days to get emergency treatment because the ICU was always full. And they rushed to report to the nurse. They were grateful not for the death of the man but because their father could finally get his much-needed treatment. It was just another side of the coin.

We arrived at beautiful Sipolha later in the afternoon. It was a panoramic scene. We attended the funeral of a relative from Jakarta. Many Batak people who live in Jakarta or other cities wish to be buried in their home village. It is apparently the last glory they want to enjoy.

Around Lake Toba, it's easy to find many beautiful and luxurious tombs or monuments.

I was shocked to hear the comment of an elderly woman when the corpse arrived. 'Only after they become ghosts do people from Jakarta return to this village. When they were alive they never paid attention to our poverty.'

A gloomy afternoon at the hospital and at a Lake Toba funeral.

' Kornelius Purba