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that Kenanga made. She is, I must say, the strongest young woman I have ever met in my life.

Interviewing Tante Surti was the most troubling one for me, because I’ve known of her and her family ever since I was a kid. Someday I’ll show you my filmed interview with her — after it’s been edited, of course.

I finally managed to get an interview with Pramoedya Ananta Toer, whose works I had read in English translation. Now Alam has lent me the original Indonesian versions to read. I went to a discussion of the Buru Quartet with Alam, Bimo, and Gilang (the head of Satu Bangsa). In the end, the discussion got around to his autobiographical work,

The Mute’s Soliloquy

, which made me very happy indeed. I’m extremely pleased with the footage I captured of Pramoedya that day. He is so very much alive that I’m sure viewers will find the material interesting. He didn’t just answer previously scripted questions. He was spontaneous. It was a standing-room-only crowd, and questions were fired at him from all directions. There were good questions, clever questions, clichéd questions, questions from fans, critical questions, blow-mouth questions (a term I got from Alam meaning talking just to hear oneself speak). It was a very thorough discussion and I was able to record everything.

After the question-answer session, I got the chance to

interview Pramoedya, though not for very long. He briefly told me about his imprisonment, his exile on Buru Island, how he was able to write, and about his family as well. Most of the information he gave me I already knew from books and interviews with him I’d read in the press, but it’s always different hearing something for yourself.

I think I might have come up with a title for my film: in Indonesian, “Mendengar Suara dari Seberang” and, in English, “Voices from the Other Side.” (Professor Dupont has insisted that besides French, I also give the film English subtitles).

Just as we were leaving the site of the discussion on Jalan Proklamasi, Alam and Bimo suddenly told me to get into Gilang’s jeep, fast. After getting in, Gilang took off from the place like a bat out of hell. Turns out, he had spotted a number of “flies” at the discussion, that being the term activists use for undercover military intelligence agents. I myself hadn’t noticed anyone out of the ordinary, because all my attention had been on Pram.

Things are heating up here. After the government raised the price of fuel, all other prices rose as well, bringing people out to the street to demonstrate in ever greater numbers. The military has attempted to engage in “dialogue” the student activists who are coordinating the demonstration, but the students have continued to demonstrate. Student demands are not confined to the price of fuel and the Rp. 100 trillion the government has provided in subsidies for certain banks (many of them owned by the president’s cronies); they are demanding sweeping governmental reform, including that President Soeharto step down. Even with all of this going on, the president has decided to attend the upcoming High Level G-15 Conference, in

Cairo — as if the problems affecting this country are minor and will soon blow over and go away.

Alam and Bimo are up to their necks in work, determining strategy, supervising the students, and helping them to unite in a coordinated mass movement. According to Gilang, this is one student movement that both political activists and the mass media are happy to support because their demand is also the same: Reform!

Rama, an alumnus of Trisakti University, found it hard to believe when Alam told him that a free-speech platform had been set up on the campus, where anyone was free to speak, even to criticize the New Order government.

All because of me, I’m afraid to say, Rama was called in by his superiors for an “interview” and subjected to intensive questioning. How was it, his superiors wanted to know, that a person like him from a “tainted background” could get by undiscovered and find a job at a state-owned enterprise? I feel very guilty for what happened, even though Om Aji insists that incident that night was a blessing in disguise.

With Alam and Bimo busy setting up free-speech platforms at campuses and elsewhere, I’ve had to go to interviews on my own. One was with Djoko Sri Moeljono — a former political prisoner who was exiled to Buru Island because of, he guessed, his activities with SBBT, the Trikora Steel Workers Union. Before being sent to Buru, Pak Djoko was first imprisoned in Serang in 1965. After that, he was held at the Nusakambangan penal island and only after that was he sent to Buru, where he remained until his release in 1978.

Pak Djoko described for me in great detail life on Buru Island, where he served as head of the barracks in which he and

other prisoners lived. Until the day of his release, he said, neither the government nor the military authorities ever informed him of his alleged crimes. What I have found to be most tragic — both for him and the other political prisoners I’ve come in contact with — is the difficulty all of them had had in finding gainful employment after their release because of the stigma of having been a political prisoner.

I’d love to tell you about all the other interviews I’ve conducted, but there is not enough time for that right now, plus I think it will be more satisfying to watch my documentary film, which will both give a bigger picture and be more in-depth than anything I could put down on paper.

I was happy to hear that you had dinner with Nara at the restaurant. What did you cook for him? I hope it wasn’t too spicy. I’m guessing that he will come to the restaurant often now that I’m away.

Give my love to Maman, Om Nug, Om Tjai, and Om Risjaf. Take care of yourself and remember that I always love you.

Your loving daughter,

Lintang Utara

BEKASI, MAY 1998

That day was a fateful one. It started in the afternoon when Alam took the time to accompany me to Bekasi, to the east of Jakarta, and to the home of “Mrs. D,” a former member of the Kediri branch of GERWANI, the leftist Indonesian Women’s Movement. Although I know the woman’s real name, I think it best not to reveal it because of the trauma she continues to feel. Mrs. D is a woman of about sixty, but still in quite good physical shape: she walks erectly, her eyes are clear, and she’s able to speak in a clear and crisp voice.

In my interview with Mrs. D, she told me that when she was a member of GERWANI, her job had been to teach village women to read and write. After the events of September 30, she and her husband, who was a member of the Kediri branch of the Indonesian Farmers’ Front (BTI), were arrested and imprisoned in separate incarceration facilities for nine years. After their release in 1974, they came to see firsthand the difficulty their entire extended family was having in finding and keeping steady employment, all because they had relatives — Mrs. D and her husband — whose identification cards included a numerical code indicating that they were former political prisoners.

Her father, Mrs. D said, was imprisoned for two years simply because of his relationship to her; her brother, who was also arrested, was sent to Nusakambangan prison and not released until sometime in the early 1970s. (She wasn’t sure of the year.) Except for their home, almost all their goods and belongings had been confiscated by the military.

My interview with Mrs. D lasted for almost four hours, after which she invited Alam and me to share a simple meal with her. Finally, when we were ready to go, she gave both Alam and me a hug.