This is a piece of writing with warnings.  Do not read this if you have a strong feeling for your religion, and if you believe that your religion is the best thing that has ever ever ever happened on the face of the earth.  Don’t read this.  You’ll hate me.  And hate is the thing we already have in enough supply in the world for thousands of centuries.


Let me put a background for this writing.  I’m a girl in Banda Aceh.  Under contract for limited time to work here.  I come from Java, Central Java, to be a bit more precise.  And I am a Christian.  So this is a very personal and subjective recount of my personal experience through my perspective.

Let me put a background for this writing.  I’m a girl in Banda Aceh.  Under contract for limited time to work here.  I come from Java, Central Java, to be a bit more precise.  And I am a Christian.  So this is a very personal and subjective recount of my personal experience through my perspective.

Just yesterday, I got two SMS from long time friends of mine.  Not really my best friends, because if they were, they wouldn’t have felt the need to send me those SMSes.  In essence they were saying, “don’t get carried away.”  And I know instantly what they meant, meaning, I should stay a Christian.  And you know, guys, you bet I do.  Not a good one, yes I know, but I’m happy enough to bear that writing on my KTP.

Do you guys have any idea why there are two Christian staffs coming here from Java instead of Moslem ones?  We do have Moslem staffs you know, and good ones, too.  Meaning they are praying five times a day, doing their fasting obidiently, listening to their parents, giving donations, going to mosques on big days, and very very nice people.  And yet their families were appalled even by the mere offer of going to Aceh, the verandah of Mecca, with the fact that they have to wear headdress because they have to, and not because they really want to and really feel the calling to do so.

And  here, fo course I see a lot of women with headdress.  But ask them why, and a lot come up with the answer, I don’t want to get caught in the razia by WH, the sharia police.  And you can feel the fear, you see it.  And you feel the penetrating stare right cruising through your bones as if by looking at you they can see through the color of your blood and the kind of faith running in it.  If you ask me, am I scared?  No, I’m not.  If the question is, are you worried, yes…you bet I am.  I am compromising all I believe on my personal freedom and mobility, because I simply can’t stand the stare.

I never walk out of my guesthouse without my KTP with me.  Some people told me to wear a cross around my neck, but it’s just too much for me.  I freak out whenever I accidentally left my wallet at home, or in the other bag.  I wear my mask of confidence on the street instead of my headdress, but I know that one day I might end up having to show my KTP (knock on wodd, I hope I won’t experience it…) and to point out the information on the fifth row “Christian”. 

I have high respect for moslems, I really do. Especially since I’ve come across a lot of wonderful moslem people.  And even here. If it wasn’t so easily distinguishable, I won’t care, I won’t see.  And to be honest, I have never really thought about people’s religion until just the last couple of years.  And I want to tell my friends back home, that no, what I see does not interest me.  There are a lot of interesting things I have seen about religion, christianity, islam, buddhism, hinduism and others…even traditional beliefs…  But to be honest, what I see and what I feel right now is different stages of oppression.  A different sort of chain and boundaries.

Isn’t it enough to deal with economic constraint?  Cultural ones?
Isn’t enough to love our one and only GOD by respecting and admitting that differences DO exist?
Isn’t is the proof of the greatness of GOD our creator that He (or She, by the way…) is able to create such diverse humanity?  That men and women are so different and yet so alike?  That people are simply different, and that differences are not threat?

Some years ago, I remember a christian friend of mine, a girl, who was in love with a moslem guy, brought her crush to a Sunday service at a chapel.  You see, this guy was affiliated (and still is, I suppose) to one of the contoversial political parties around late 90’s.  And she came home saying that this Mr. X commented that the Sunday preach by the priest was very close to brainwashing, that he had the right to speak in front of such a big crowd, and that they would buy what he said.  She was so enthusiastis, and being a univ student majoring in psychology, she was more than ready to buy the opinion of the guy she was really in love with (and you thought she could have applied all her theories to process this opinion clearly?).  And years after that, I began asking, what about the Friday prayers?  Isn’t it the same?  Isn’t it even somewhat more limited because the men heard the preach, and understood it they way they wanted to understand it, brought it home and taught their wives and children of THEIR understanding of what the preacher said?

Look at what organized religion have done to our world.
How come people claim the right to do horrific things in the name of all loving GOD?
Or don’t they believe that GOD is loving?
Have we stopped believing in loving GOD and turning to ever ravaging, angry, punishing GOD, since love doesn’t seem to solve the problems of the world?

Different organized religion have taken their turn to claim as the most righteous one: passing jugdment over others, discriminating, across the span of human history, and after two thousand years…we still haven’t learnt.
If God were a woman (which is not impossible, you know, who anyway has seen GOD and returned to tell us?), then She would cry Her heart out looking at her children. At the beautiful earth She created with all love and care, ravaged by nature and wet by blood.  That instead of vast green plants and grass, we are planting red hatred and chains of revenge.

If someone ask me, are you christian? Yes, I am.  Maybe my own understanding of Christianity, like I’ve heard a lot of broken hearted people said to me.  But more than being a christian, I believe in one GOD, and that there is only one GOD, and that THAT GOD is loving.  And that this loving GOD only wants peace, and love to prevail. 

Though, I know, life won’t be this exciting if everyone agrees with me.

My dear friends, I’ve had enough trouble trying to be a good christian (which I haven’t managed really successfully, by the way), so I won’t start trying other things, at least for now.  Be rest assured, I’m coming home.  A different, yet the same person.

Banda Aceh, September 9, 2006.