Blast from the Past

27 Nov 2006

At the Christmas party last weekend, I mentioned to the people seated with us that I was Indonesian. Someone said, "Indonesia used to be a Dutch colony, right?" I said, "Yes, for three and a half centuries." Then they added, "My family is Dutch." And I was like, ummmm... Should I tell them that the Dutch were crap rulers and were so successful at keeping the Indonesian people uneducated that it actually took us three and a half frickin' centuries to smarten up and kick their collective butt out of the country? And that to this day we still secretly wish we'd been a British colony instead? Luckily for them, I got distracted by food and didn't remember having that conversation until this morning. Heh.

Posted by Firda on Monday, November 27, 2006 at 9:44 AM

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  • it's kind of like when people apologize to me for enslaving my ancestors... weird. "Thanks, I guess?," you know?

  • I wouldn't doubt it., Retno But hopefully they'll learn what really happened when they're older.

  • firda, would you be angrier if i told you that in the dutch school they teach only good thing about the colonial times? it makes me sick!



    if i have children i'll tell them the truth, war is not nice, but it's much not nicer to ignore the truth

  • Well, I doubt being any country's colony would be much fun. Though now that you mentioned it, I think the British wouldn't have done much better than the Dutch. Bigger colonies must be tougher to rule.

  • I doubt the English would have been any better, remember a little British colony known as India? Though I guess relations with the "mother country" is a little more congenial than between the Dutch and Indonesian people.

  • Hehe. We weren't really talking politics. I'm sure they didn't mean to offend me or anything. :)

  • Rhea

    It's true what they say, never talk politics or religion. It gets everyone into trouble. I always bring up politics in gatherings. Ugh.

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