Word: merdeka
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...known, found the place foul and unlivable. The gutters were full of human ordure and the air stale from the smell of "cheap death," he recalled in the story "My Kampung," from his early collection Tales from Djakarta. Its mordant stories revolve around what is now Jakarta's central Merdeka (Freedom) Square, and the streets close...
...Stranded Fish," homeless, starving former freedom fighter Idulfitri wanders by lusty foreign-movie posters with "naked thighs" on Merdeka Square near the Presidential Palace and wonders, "Why aren't there any pictures showing how hunger twists and turns in my guts?" The rest of the story is a picture precisely of that, as Idulfitri engages in Godot-like banter with a fellow revolutionary turned rake while they scrounge for a meal. Eventually they sell a monitor-lizard-skin wallet to a hawker on South Gambir Street (now Jalan Medan Merdeka Selatan, home to banks and the U.S. embassy) for satay...
...Djakarta, in which the poor bathe in the canal's toxic "yellowish water" and Japanese officers fill Menteng's villas with comfort women, obstructs those pretty views. Though not void of hope, Jakarta for Pram was a town of tough and busy griefs. The bakso sellers in and around Merdeka Square might still agree...
Since then, the Organisasi Papua Merdeka (OPM), or Free Papua Movement, has waged an independence struggle of peaceful protests and occasional attacks by poorly equipped guerrillas on Indonesian soldiers and foreign interests like the giant Freeport gold mine. Jakarta, which does not want to forfeit Papua's natural wealth or see another province break away as East Timor did in 1999, agreed in 2001 to a Special Autonomy Law. But independence supporters say little has changed since then. Access to the province is notoriously difficult but in recent years human-rights groups have documented a range of abuses by Indonesian...
...Their numbers will swell in the coming days, even as government and GAM officials debate the future of the province and the soldiers keep arriving. In many Acehnese villages, boys run up to passersby to shout "Merdeka! (freedom)." For many GAM leaders, the word is still synonymous with independence. But among their people, who have had a first, unforgettable taste of peace, it also means freedom from fear and a chance to finally live a normal life. "We want our children to be able to go to school, get educated, stand on their feet," says teacher Mariani passionately. "A military...