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A taste of Java, Caribbean style

Courtesy of Erasmus HuisTo mark 125 years of connections between Indonesia, Suriname and The Netherlands, the Erasmus Huis, the Dutch cultural center in Kunigan, Central Jakarta, is launching the Surinam Java Festival on Saturday

Hans David Tampubolon (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Fri, September 19, 2014

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A taste of Java, Caribbean style

Courtesy of Erasmus Huis

To mark 125 years of connections between Indonesia, Suriname and The Netherlands, the Erasmus Huis, the Dutch cultural center in Kunigan, Central Jakarta, is launching the Surinam Java Festival on Saturday.

'€œWe'€™re trying to connect and make people again aware of the shared history we have,'€ Ton van Zeeland, the theater and gallery director for the Erasmus Huis, said.

'€œIt is very important to not forget about this history '€” the good things and the not so good things,'€ he added. '€œWe do not avoid to talk about the not-so-good things, but we also plan to look into the future.'€

The festival'€™s opening will feature concerts by @Six and Steelwave.

@Six is a Surinamese-Javanese band that earned its spurs in the Caribbean music scene and beyond, mixing Javanese pop, Bollywood, Latin and R&B influences, while Steelwave, also from Suriname, uses steel-based materials, such as barrels, to make music ranging from Rumba to bossanova.

Visitors can also enjoy a feast of Surinamese food on Saturday, served by Sherwin Alexander and chef Jethro Wirht, top chefs from Suriname who have won many national and international cooking competitions.

The chefs will prepare food on the spot with students from the Sahid Institute of Tourism in Jakarta and give live commentary as part of a culinary show featuring famous dishes, such as cassava soup and the popular moksi alesi rice dish.

Van Zeeland said that Indonesian visitors would find Surinamese food an interesting mix of the cuisines of Java, South America and India. '€œSome of the Surinamese foods are very spicy, so I guess Indonesians will be able to enjoy them during the festival.'€

He urged Indonesians conversant in Javanese to speak with the artists and exhibitors at the festival to get a sense of the close cultural ties between the nations.

The festival will also feature a documentary and photo exhibition titled '€œStille Passanten'€, which runs to Nov. 15, featuring portraits of Javanese who chose to settle in Suriname and images of contemporary people of Javanese descent who live in Suriname or the Netherlands.

Van Zeeland said that the photographs would show young people in Indonesia what became of their brothers and sisters in the small South American country.

'€œPeople often ask '€˜Why do you do something with Suriname, aren'€™t you Dutch?'€™. We think it is a part of our cultural heritage too. Like Indonesia is also part of our cultural heritage[....] We still have different feelings about Indonesia because we share the same genes and, in some parts, cultural genes,'€ he said.

It was in 1890, when the first Javanese, then colonized by the Dutch, pulled up stakes to settle in Suriname, another Dutch colony, in the Caribbean.

The migration reflects the shifting social and political landscapes of the era, particularly on the abolition of slavery.

After abolition, freed slaves in Suriname left their plantations, leading the Dutch to seek cheap labor by offering five-year contracts to work there on a trial basis.

After the contracts expired, the Javanese were free to stay, migrate to the Netherlands or return to Java.

Many stayed in Suriname, fearing the long and risky passage by sea back to Southeast Asia.

Their decendants have kept their Javanese cultural identity intact for more than a century, speaking Javanese and holding traditional Javanese rituals for special occasions, such as marriages.

'€œThe tradition is still there,'€ Ineke de Hoog, the Dutch embassy'€™s press and culture official who once lived in Suriname said during a recent press conference

The Javanese have also become an important and influential part of the social and political life in Suriname. Javanese language is one of the nation'€™s main languages and people of Javanese descent comprised 14 percent of Suriname'€™s population of 567,000 in 2013.

For more info, visit erasmushuis.nlmission.org.

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