Footsteps (9 page)

“From the tone of your voice, I can tell that you more and more dislike being Javanese, Child.”

“Is it so important to be Javanese, Mother?”

Before I could say anything more, I flung myself to the floor when I saw tears come to her eyes as she turned away to look at the sky outside the window. I kissed her feet and once again, for the umpteenth time, asked her forgiveness.

Fortunately Ibu Baldrun didn’t understand Javanese.

“Now I understand why you have been so unhappy in your life, Child. It’s your own fault, the result of your own actions, and because the Dutch have taught you to forget who you are. You are not happy wearing Javanese clothes, and you do not like your mother because she is not Dutch.”

“Forgive me, Mother,” I tried to stop her going on.

“You do not like the rice you eat and the water you drink.”

“Forgive me, Mother, forgive me, forgive me.”

“Perhaps you are not even happy that you were born?”

I could not stop her from continuing to talk. Her words seized hold of me, setting my nerves on end all over.

“As long as you know that this is the cause of all your suffering. Oh, my child, haven’t I told you again and again—learn to be grateful, learn to give thanks, my child. You, you must start practicing now. Nah, be thankful, be grateful for everything that you have and everything you can give to others. People are never satisfied by dreams. Learn to be grateful and to give thanks while the day of judgment is still far off.”

Her gentle voice thundered down upon me, more powerful than the thunder of the gods, than the magic spells of all the
dukun
of Java. It was the voice of a loving mother.

“If you have heard all that I have said, then stand up. If not, then remain kneeling down before me so that I may repeat it all.”

“Your son heard it all, Mother, every word, and I will never forget any of what you have said.”

“Then stand up.”

I stood, and she was still gazing at me in amazement, with half-open mouth.

“You are growing a mustache…” she said suddenly.

“Have you forgiven me, my mother?”

“A mother always forgives her child, even a child like you, whose only achievement is to bring suffering upon himself. I have come because of your suffering, Child. You have not answered any of my letters. No one will tell me what is in the papers anymore. They are all learning to forget you, Child.

They say that your blood has been judged and found wanting. But that blood is of my own blood. Your father forbade me to go to Surabaya. But I went anyway; I took no heed of his fury. It was I who gave birth to you, Child, no one else. There was no one at your most recent addresses. And the people at the old ones could not help me.”

“Forgive me, Mother.”

“I always forgive you, Child, even when you don’t ask. You always need forgiveness.”

“Mother, oh, my mother…”

“Close to me here, you call out for your mother. But when far away, you never once heard my cries.”

“Forgiveness, Mother.”

“That fine and luxurious house at Wonokromo had new owners, people said. With the help of a new acquaintance, I obtained an address in Wonocolo. I went there. She was living in a bamboo house. I stayed there. I didn’t meet my daughter-in-law. I heard that she had gone away. Ah, Child, do you not feel humiliated to be left by your wife just like that? I, as old as I am, cried in front of her. Was my son worth so little as a son-in-law? You are growing a mustache now. Why are your eyes so moist? When you were a little child you were not as sentimental as now.”

I realized I was sobbing. I wiped my eyes with a handkerchief.

“You, you, you never told me all that really happened….”

It was better that I kept quiet and absorbed all these heartrending emotions. How great were my sins against this noble woman!

She stopped talking when Ibu Baldrun brought in some drinks. The atmosphere relaxed somewhat. I found myself acting as interpreter of a strictly female conversation that meant little to me.

And things got even better when it got close to four o’clock. It was time to return to class. I promised I would ask permission to sleep out that night.

It wasn’t so easy to get permission. The European in the office refused and wouldn’t change his mind. He said impertinently that he didn’t care who had arrived—my father, my mother, my fiancée, or even a corpse!

“Well, if that’s the case, I don’t need any permission,” I said.

And at ten minutes past seven I arrived at Ibu Baldrun’s. She was very happy to see me. She hadn’t been able to communicate with her guest. Now the interpreter had returned.

Mother was being massaged in her room. I followed Ibu Baldrun into the kitchen. Her two sons were eating there, after which they helped wash the plates and bowls.

“Heh, you shouldn’t be in here, Denmas,” she reprimanded me.

“Why not anyway?”

“Don’t make it a habit, Denmas; pity on your wife later.”

“Oh, why is that?”

“She’ll be worried skinny if you’re always interfering in the kitchen.”

Early next morning I headed off to school. I was immediately summoned by the director.

I was reprimanded: “What were the reasons the Civil Service Academy rejected your application to enroll?”

“I did not meet its moral standards, sir.”

“And you acknowledge that you signed the agreement to abide by the school’s rules.”

“Yes, Director. But even so, sir, the obligation to honor one’s mother is not nullified just because of the existence of the medical school.”

“You’ve become very bigheaded since you met those VIPs,” he said, annoyed. “Don’t forget, your behavior here will determine what kind of work you’ll get later.”

“I was forced to choose between the school regulations and the obligation to honor one’s mother. I chose the second. If you consider that to be bigheaded or undisciplined, then thank you very much but I don’t think this school can teach me anything worthwhile.”

The director was silent. He sat there thinking, with angry staring eyes.

“It is all in your hands,” I said then.

“It’s a pity you’ve got such a good brain, otherwise…”

“And while my mother is in Betawi, I will not sleep in the dormitory.”

“You are a real rebel, aren’t you? Yes, perhaps you’ll be an important person one day, or a madman unable to adapt to your situation and environment.”

Finished with me, he sent me out. And without asking permission, I slept outside from then on.

Mother told me a lot of things that I already knew and so I was mainly just nodding and agreeing. She also spoke a lot about the new agricultural business being built by Nyai Ontosoroh in Wonocolo, about the new big corrals and barns, and about how it was all under the management of the Native woman. She was looking after everything herself, running off here, there, and everywhere, sometimes to look at a new barn under construction,
then to inspect some cattle. Two male supervisors were in charge of clearing the forest, carpentry, and other trade work.

“What a remarkable woman!” Mother praised Nyai Ontosoroh. “I myself saw her actually have an argument, in Dutch, with a European Pure. I don’t know what it was about. And she also built a stone building across the way from the old house.” Mother smacked her lips, relishing her memories.

“I was there a week. She was always stopping me from going back to B—–. Really, Child, I enjoyed staying there. No Javanese man could do what she was doing—so much, so quickly, and all at the same time. And she is a Native woman! And in the afternoon, inside that bamboo house, she still had time to do all her calculations. Sometimes she would receive people from the town who came to her for instructions. Incredible! Incredible! And even though she was so busy, she always made sure her guest was looked after.”

Mother said nothing about my father or my brothers. It seemed my elder brother had never told her about his visit to see me here.

Another time she said: “You don’t seem as vibrant as you were before, Child. You’re daydreaming a lot, not listening to what I say. Find a wife, a true Javanese girl, so there is someone to lighten your suffering. Don’t think about things past. What can you do anyway? Do you remember what I told you when you were getting married before?”

“I remember, Mother, I remember it well.”

“Come home when you have holidays; choose a girl you like.” She stopped talking to suck some more juice out of the betel nut in her mouth. “Are only Dutch women or women with Dutch blood good enough to become your wife?”

“No, Mother.”

“So you’ll come home in the holidays? Do you want me to come and get you?”

“No need for you to come to Betawi, Mother. I will arrange things myself.”

“Don’t you ever marry without telling me. Don’t humiliate your mother. Has your mother ever forbidden you to do anything?”

“Never, Mother.”

“Why didn’t you even tell me you were coming to Betawi?
And don’t say ‘forgive me’ again. I always forgive you. I know you are not happy. You think of yourself too much, just like the Dutch, your teachers.”

And then came a question more difficult than any school exam I had ever had to undergo: “Don’t you love your mother?”

“There is no one I love more than you, Mother.”

“Are you speaking with your lips or your heart?”

“With both, Mother.”

“Why do you try so hard to become other than your mother’s son?”

Her gentle voice and her deep love were threatening my European-ness. And I felt like an orphan of the modern age, without even traditional ties to kith and kin. I had left East Java to become a person. And now the love and compassion of my mother stood before me as a judge who would allow no appeal.

“Why don’t you say anything, Child? You can’t speak with your heart anymore. You’ve become a black Dutchman in Javanese clothes. If that’s what you want, then so be it. But tell your mother what she should do in order to love you.”

“Ah, Mother, love has no conditions. Mother will always love me, as you have done in the past, do now, and will do in the future. So bless me in my struggle to achieve my ideals.”

“Keep talking. You have begun to talk. You used to have so much to talk about, you knew so many stories that you became a man of letters. Now you look so tired. Speak, Child. Tell me all, so that once again I can feel I am a mother worthy of her child. Don’t think about whether I will like what you say or not. I know your world is far away from your mother’s. But perhaps I might understand a little of what you say.”

“I once told Mother about the French Revolution.”

“I remember. If everyone had equal rights like that, then what rights would a mother have over her children?”

“She would have the right to love them, Mother, to raise them and educate them.”

“Is that all?”

Her love was now playing the part of prosecutor and judge! How must I answer?

“I’m so sorry for you, Child; you’re so tortured by my question. Listen, I demand nothing of you. As long as I can see you I am happy, and if I can touch you, then I am even happier. But
to see you knotted up inside like this makes me suffer too. Become whatever you like. Become a Dutchman. I will not object.”

“Forgiveness, Mother, please do not say that again.” I uttered my request in a pathetically pleading voice. “You sent me to school so that, as a Javanese, I would have the wisdom and knowledge of Europe. Both of those things change people, Mother.”

“I understand, Child, but should they not change people for the better, and not for the worse.”

“Your blessing, Mother, your blessing.”

“But you must not suffer so much.”

“I do not suffer.”

“Don’t you think I know my own child? I have known you since you were in my womb. I have known your voice since your first cry. Even without your letters, without seeing your face, from far away, a mother’s heart can always tell, Child. How much you have suffered so that you can become what you want. You do not even want to share any of it with your mother. Yes, I know that Europeans want to bear all their burdens themselves. But is that necessary when you have a mother?”

“Tell me, Mother,” I begged.

“You have caught the Europeans’ disease, Child. You want everything for yourself just as you tell about them in your stories.”

“Mother!”

“That is Europe’s disease. Shouldn’t you learn to think of others too? Haven’t I told you, learn to be thankful? Don’t say anything, wait. You once told me yourself that, for Europeans, when they say ‘thank you’ it is just a pretense. They do not say it with their hearts. You have become like that, Child. I haven’t forgotten your stories. The clever try to become cleverer, the rich, richer. No one has any gratitude in their hearts. Everyone is hurrying around trying to be better. Isn’t that what you yourself have told me? They all suffer. Their desires and ideals become monsters that rule over them. Do you remember?”

“I remember, Mother.”

“So what is the use of the French Revolution then?” and her voice was so gentle, as it had always been ever since the first time I heard it. “You said it was to free men from the burdens made by other men. Wasn’t that it? That is not Javanese. A Javanese does something with no other motive than to do it. Orders come from Allah, from the gods, from the Raja. After a Javanese has
carried out the order, he will feel satisfied because he has become himself And then he waits for the next order. So the Javanese are grateful, they give thanks. They are not preyed upon by monsters within themselves.”

“Mother, I have learned much in my studies. I know now that life is not so simple.”

“What teacher has told you that, my child? In bygone days, your ancestors always taught that there was nothing so simple as life. You are born, you eat and drink, you grow, bring children into the world, and do good.”

“But there is a power that just swallows up good deeds without trace.”

“The teachers of our ancestors also knew that, Child. They called such forces ogres—they came in all shapes and sizes. And they never defeated our ancestor knights in battle.”

“But today they win all the time.”