This commemorative album from 1948 celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of Hotel des Indes. Page after page is filled with lavish praise for the enormous success of the hotel – ‘ this environment of luxury and comfort’. There is nothing to suggest that so soon after the Second World War, reality was far from festive. Not a word is said about the bloody decolonisation war that is being fought at precisely this time.
50 jaar N.V. Hotel des Indes. Batavia, 1897-1947. S.l.: s.n., [1948]. [KIT Collection; RG-194]