How do People Die in Indonesia?
Dear
Family, Friends and Colleagues,
This week my brother, in
February 6th, John Franklin Risakotta died. He was 42
years old. John, Farsijana’s younger brother, lived with us for about 5
years including the past three months after he married Ely. John was a
gentle soul who did not find life easy but loved to joke. He and Ely
carried various jobs to eck out a living. In our household he was always
ready to help and supported our service in the community, especially by running
errands and driving people hither and yon. We do not know why he
died. He was in good health. On the morning of his death he was
joking around, playing with our 2 year old niece, changing a flat tire for his
sister in law and (uncharacteristically for an Indonesia male), washing the
dishes. He gave his wife a hug and kiss and went to take a shower.
She found him on the bathroom floor, not breathing. There were no signs
of a heart attack or stroke and he had no known history of illness.
Perhaps he was the victim of Sudden Unexpected Death Syndrome, or Cardiac
Arrest. This is fairly common in young, Southeast Asian males. His
heart just stopped. God called him home. As he lay in the coffin in
our living room, everyone was struck by how beautiful and peaceful he
looked. Our family is now in the house of
sorrow. This week we have wept an ocean of tears.
How do Indonesians die? First of all, they seem to die more often.
When I first arrived in Indonesia, the young, high school phy-ed teacher who
taught our kids sports died of tetnus after a minor accident. Later, the
pregnant daughter of our household handyman (Sungkono) died of TB because she
couldn’t afford the medicine the doctor prescribed. Many people die of
causes that would not be considered life threatening in the West. I moved
to Indonesia when I was 40 and had only attended 4 or 5 funerals in my whole
life. During my past 20 years in Indonesia it’s more like 4 or 5 funerals
per year. Death seems so much closer.
Secondly, Indonesians die in community. I don’t know if the rate of death
is much higher than in the West. Over the past 50 years life expectancy
in Indonesia has risen from about 40 years to almost 70, because of vastly
improved nutrition, education and health care. But death is a very public
event. John died around noon. That evening and in the morning,
although John is a Christian, his death was announced over the loud speaker
from our local mosque as Berita Duka, News of Sorrow. By
afternoon, our Muslim neighbors had already brought chairs to set up in our
garden and street to accommodate the many guests who would begin to
arrive. By evening village leaders had closed off the street and set up
huge tents to keep the sun and rain off those who were already arriving to
mourn. The villagers all came to melayat, share in our
mourning. People came from our Christian university, but also the Islamic
university and the national university where we teach. Many came from his
church and our church. Women came from various chapters of the Indonesian
Women’s Coalition (KPI) in part because John often drove KPI members for
meetings, cultural events and disaster relief. Many came who had never
met John, just because they knew us. The funeral service and burial were
held the day after his death. By that time hundreds had passed through
our house where we served them snacks and they viewed John’s body. Most
left an envelope with a monetary gift to lighten the sorrow.
Thirdly, Indonesians die ecumenically. Traditionally, everyone who knows
a grieving relative of a person who died, will come to grieve with them,
without regard for their religion, race or ethnic background. On the
night of John’s death, leaders from his church came to pray and sing around the
body. Some Muslims observed and others sat outside under the tents.
The next morning church leaders held a more formal service, followed by an
ecumenical ceremony including speeches from village leaders. I shared my
impressions of Johns gentleness and toughness. “Blessed are the meek, for
they shall inherit the earth.” John has inherited a new earth. The
coffin was closed amid unbearable lamentations. Then we pushed the coffin
on a cart to the village graveyard, where a few Christian graves are
interspersed with many Muslim ones. In Indonesia there is a disturbing
growth in religious intolerance, discrimination against minorities and attempts
at religious separation (apartheid). Fortunately the intolerant are still
a small minority who are running against the grain of centuries of relative
harmony between different religious communities. Our family, like many in
Indonesia, includes both Christians and Muslims.
Fouthly, Indonesians, like people everywhere, experience great sorrow at the
death of those they love. Traditionally Indonesians of different
religions hold services not only on the days of death and burial, but also 7
days, 30 days, 100 days and 1,000 days after a person dies. It is never
easy. Frankly, just days after his death, I find it hard to move, hard to
breathe. I feel like I am stumbling around in darkness. I’m still
not pasrah, “submitted to the will of God.” I rushed home when
they found his body and vainly used CPR to try to make him breathe and start
his heart. At home and all the way to the hospital: blow, pump, blow,
pump. But he was gone.
My son Peter wrote, “Dad, I love you. I wish I could
be there to breathe with you. I guess I am.” So that is the task of
the living: to breathe. And more than that, to breathe together.
Yours in sorrow,
Bernie and Farsijana (Nona) Adeney-Risakotta
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