I’ve never seen an English translation of Pramoedya’s book Jalan Raya Pos, Jalan Daendels. Pramoedya Ananta Toer (1925-2006) was one of Southeast Asia’s most important writers, often regarded as a candidate for the Nobel Prize for Literature. During the dictatorship of Suharto, known as the New Order, Pramoedya was imprisoned without trial, and even forbidden to use pencils or paper. His books were banned in Indonesia, but circulated at great risk through underground networks. Although known as a novelist, his book about the Great Post Road offers a guided tour across Java, from city to city, around 1,000 kilometers, along the road built in 1809 under the command of Herman Willem Daendels, governor-general for the Dutch East India Company. The road was built with forced labor, conscripted natives, thousands of whom fell by sickness or attrition, but were never counted or named, and have been mostly forgotten: a violent past erased from the landscape. The following is my translation of an excerpt.
Buitenzorg/Bogor
Twenty-two kilometers south of Depok, the Great Post Road, Jalan Raya Pos, reaches Bogor. In the colonial period it was better known as Buitenzorg, a translation of the French Sans Souci, which means: untroubled thoughts, simply at peace. The construction of the Great Post Road from Batavia to Bogor was said to have proceeded smoothly, meaning without reports of victims. That there were no victims is unlikely, since the project was based on forced labor, directed by the corrupt bureaucracy of the [Dutch East India] Company and local officials who were similarly corrupt. So it was much like the construction of the road from Anyer to Batavia, “safe and sound.”
Buitenzorg is famous worldwide for its great gardens, which at one time contained the world’s richest collection of plants, and which still draws foreign tourists from many countries, and also appeals to domestic tourists. Furthermore, it is known for its palace, the residence of a succession of governors-general, who would usually stay no more than a day or night in the palace of Batavia. However, this luxurious single-story palace is not the original, but rather a replacement for the old two-story palace, which was destroyed by the earthquake of October 11, 1834. The current single-story palace, with its broad and impressive front lawn, where deer roam freely, constitutes part of the great garden, which is no less expansive, and is also equipped with a laboratory and an institution for the study of gardening and agriculture.
This region is known for its heavy rainfall, on average 432 centimeters per year, so that the city of Bogor, or Buitenzorg, is known as the City of Rain. The cool, comfortable air makes the people of the national capital enjoy running away to this region during their holidays. Furthermore, the area is also famous for an inscribed stone from 1433. The inscription is written in ancient Sundanese, and beside it there is another stone engraved with two footprints. Due to the presence of these stones, this place is known as Batutulis (inscription-stone).
Around two centuries before the arrival of European nations in Java, Buitenzorg/Bogor—according to research, the results of which are increasingly clear—was the capital of the Kingdom of Pajajaran, known as Pakuan, founded in 1433, as is recorded in the aforementioned stone inscription. This Sundanese-Hindu kingdom disappeared from history after being conquered by the Islamic Kingdom of Banten. Another aspect of Bogor’s heritage, which draws many tourists, is known as Arca Domas, a collection of 800 stone sculptures in rough Polinesian-style, which depict ancestors.
At an elevation of 264 meters above sea level, at the foot of Mount Salak, the land is fertile, a gateway to the region of Priangan Si Jelita [Priangan the Beautiful], a source of colonial power, which originated from the cultivation of commodities: coffee, tea, and quinine. Not surprisingly, at the beginning of the Revolution, Holland, having lost its coffers, tried to retake control of Bogor. Thus, from Jakarta to Bogor, the Great Post Road is stained with the blood of Indonesian youth.
Of course I have often passed through this city, and even a few times attended meetings at the Palace of Bogor. The last time was during the New Order, after being released from prison on Buru Island. I attended the marriage ceremony of one of Vice President Adam Malik’s children. In a corner of the palace yard stood a statue of a woman, Si Denok, a sculpture made by Trubus, an artist cherished by Bung Karno. As the New Order established its power through killing, destruction, and robbery, Bung Karno summoned Trubus to Jakarta, in an attempt to save his life. Trubus promptly departed from Solo, headed for Jakarta by motorcycle. Along the way, he stopped at his birthplace. He was never heard from again. He disappeared because he was a member of Lekra, a group of artists who supported Bung Karno, and who were despised as enemies of the New Order. Trubus disappeared in the village, city, and province of his birth: Central Java.