4.5 The Chinese in Revolutionary Surabaya (interview)
Description
When the Allied British troops landed in Indonesia in 1945 to disarm the Japanese, the Indonesian revolution was already underway. An incident at the Oranje Hotel in Surabaya in which the Dutch tricolour was raised sparked off the bloodiest battle in the war of independence. The revolutionaries feared that the British would help the Dutch colonial power take back control. Everyone who the Indonesian revolutionaries suspected rightly or wrongly of spying or collaboration with the colonial power was in danger, including Indonesians. Chinese Indonesians too were often seen as representatives of the colonial regime. That was why Mr Sie and five others organized the evacuation of Chinese families from Surabaya. He talks about the violence that erupted at that time. While Indonesians remember this period as the Revolution, for the European and Indisch Dutch it is known as the Bersiap. These different perspectives on the war still reverberate today.
Interview with Mr Sie Gwan San. CIHC Oral History Collection CIHC 22-1. No place, 2013.
Transcription
S: “We slept in the rice husking mill with those… refugees, let’s call them, all of them Chinese. On the way, I saw one person, a general; apparently he was an Arab because one of the bystanders said that. He said it was the Arab Sunkar. I’ll never forget those words: Arab Sunkar.”
I: “Arab Sunkar?”
S: “Sunkar is a name, Arab because he’s an Arab and he’s called Sunkar. He was dragged from South Surabaya in the direction of Sidoarjo. I saw that.”
I: ‘What do you mean, ‘dragged’?’
S: “Dragged behind a truck, alive.”
I: “Oh no.”
S: “Dragged. Because he was a ‘mata-mata musuh’ [spy]. And I myself didn’t see it but one of my friends did, Lian Hwat – people were burned. In the square. ‘Iya mata-mata musuh.’”
I: “Were they Chinese people?”
S: “No, no. No Chinese at all. They were Indonesians.”
I: “And you went to Surabaya for the Chinese...”
S: “To fetch them.”
I: “…and take them to a safer place.”
Interview with Mr Sie Gwan San. CIHC Oral History Collection CIHC 22-1. No place, 2013.
Transcription
S: “We slept in the rice husking mill with those… refugees, let’s call them, all of them Chinese. On the way, I saw one person, a general; apparently he was an Arab because one of the bystanders said that. He said it was the Arab Sunkar. I’ll never forget those words: Arab Sunkar.”
I: “Arab Sunkar?”
S: “Sunkar is a name, Arab because he’s an Arab and he’s called Sunkar. He was dragged from South Surabaya in the direction of Sidoarjo. I saw that.”
I: ‘What do you mean, ‘dragged’?’
S: “Dragged behind a truck, alive.”
I: “Oh no.”
S: “Dragged. Because he was a ‘mata-mata musuh’ [spy]. And I myself didn’t see it but one of my friends did, Lian Hwat – people were burned. In the square. ‘Iya mata-mata musuh.’”
I: “Were they Chinese people?”
S: “No, no. No Chinese at all. They were Indonesians.”
I: “And you went to Surabaya for the Chinese...”
S: “To fetch them.”
I: “…and take them to a safer place.”