In the footage, the singer, who has worked hard to leave a mark on the American music industry, says, “I actually don’t have Indonesian blood whatsoever. So, I’m actually German, Japanese and Chinese. I was just born in Indonesia and I’m also Christian. The majority there are Muslim.

“So, I’ve always been kind of — I’m not going to say that I felt like I don’t belong there because I always felt like the people accepted me for who I was, but there’s always that sense of, 'I’m not like everybody'.”

I can totally relate with her.

Agnez, whose real name is Agnes Monica Muljoto, and I are Indonesians of Chinese descent and Christians — a minority in Indonesia. We were born in 1986 in Jakarta, which allowed us to witness the fall of Soeharto’s New Order regime and the May 1998 riots.

However, unlike Agnez, I come from a middle-class family and I’m certain I have Indonesian blood running through my veins.

My paternal grandmother grew up in Cilegon, Banten, as a peranakan Chinese, the descendant of early Chinese immigrants who partially adopted indigenous customs through either acculturation or intermarriage with local people. She always wore kebaya and jarik (batik skirts). My maternal grandmother came from Bangka Island and was an expert at baking local desserts.

Both my parents grew up during the New Order. They only speak Indonesian and have adopted Indonesian names. Although they always consider themselves Indonesians, they have frequently felt frustrated when dealing with bureaucracy. In the 1980s, my father had to pay a lot to try to get an identity card (KTP), but the administration failed him, leaving him without a KTP for quite some time.

I was born with slanted slit eyes and fair skin; some strangers on the streets called me amoy, which I later found out was a Cantonese term used to address young women. However, I’ve known since I was a child that it is used as an ethnic slur against Chinese women.

Like Agnez, I have always felt that the pribumi (indigenous Indonesians), accept me, but sometimes I realized I was different.

In the early 1990s, my family moved to Medan, North Sumatra, where the culture was a bit different from that in Jakarta. While my parents only knew a few Chinese words, the Chinese-Indonesians there spoke the Hokkian dialect. My older sister was in high school and members of other ethnic groups considered her an outsider because of her physical appearance. Meanwhile, she found it hard to befriend people of the Chinese community as she could not speak the dialect.

In 1996, she experienced another act of discrimination when she submitted a form for state university entrance tests, as pribumi applications were separated from those of non-pribumi. This vague childhood memory taught me that I would never be accepted into a state university.

Fast forward to the 1998 riots: My family was one of only two Chinese families living in Bekasi, east of Jakarta. We lived in harmony with our neighbors and they protected us from the rioters. I saw houses and shops belonging to Chinese-Indonesians raided and the malls I frequently visited burned down. I also read news about Chinese-Indonesian women being raped. I realized then that it could happen to me and it frightened the 12-year-old me.

After the 1998 reforms, Chinese-Indonesians could celebrate the Chinese New Year, thanks to then-president Abdurrahman “Gus Dur” Wahid; we could also enroll in state universities and learn Chinese.

However, events like the 2017 Jakarta election and former Jakarta governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama’s blasphemy conviction reopened wounds of racial discrimination. Again, the nation was divided into pribumi and non-pribumi and we were afraid of being scapegoated.

When some people nonchalantly ask about my ethnicity, I try to avoid the question. It doesn’t mean I’m not proud of who I am, but I was taught to lay low in this kind of situation.

Many Indonesians have tried to promote unity in diversity. A recent event hosted by Historia.id and the Education and Culture Ministry revealed that no Indonesians are truly native. Newly released genealogical mapping found that the DNA of Indonesians shows mixed ancestral roots from different geographical origins. However, I don’t feel better; I will always be an amoy in the eyes of other ethnic groups.

With such experience, I feel proud of being an Indonesian who doesn’t speak Chinese. I can easily connect with other Indonesians. We are truly united by our language, unlike my experience in neighboring Malaysia.

When studying in Kuala Lumpur, I saw how the Malay, Chinese and Indians hardly mingle with one another as they feel more comfortable speaking in their own languages.

Oddly, I was accepted in both Malay and Chinese groups. My Chinese-Malaysian friends and I shared similar backgrounds and ate non-halal foods. Meanwhile, my Malay friends appreciated me because I spoke Malay with an Indonesian accent.

So like Agnez, I know that my pribumi friends treat me well, but I am and will always feel different in this country. You can’t simply ignore the racial discrimination the Chinese-Indonesians have endured. Although it has lessened, the wounds are still there and we might pass them to the next generations.

If you do not want people like me, who love and want to do something for this country, to feel less for being Chinese-Indonesian, you can actually help us heal the wounds. Not judging us for feeling that way is actually a good start.

Popular

Indonesian workers in Japan face growing stigma after viral incidents

Political motivations behind rising cyberattacks in mid-2025, report says

High rice prices, education costs push up inflation to 2.37 percent in July