JAVA'S CAPITAL

New Zealand Herald, Volume 79, Issue 24214, 4 March 1942, Page 7

JAVA'S CAPITAL

LIFE IN BATAVIA OLD CITY AND THE NEW THRIFTY DUTCH COMMUNITY Batavia, Java s political capital, which is now threatened by Japanese invaders, is situated 10 miles inland from the Java Sea. The following description of a visit to Batavia not Ions? before the outbreak of war is from "Menacing Sun" (Murray), by Mona-Gardner, noted American journalist. Tanjong Priok, the port which connects with Batavia, is probably one of the least complicated harbours in the world. Yoi\ have the feeling a deck steward could take the ship in. as long as the bow was pointed south and the engines were shut off in time. There are no hills which come out, or even sandy strips of shore, to mark the way of a channel. The breakwater is so square and tidy, and so safe and respectable, you unconsciously look around for little boys in sailor-suits, for toy yachts, and mothers gossiping under beach umbrellas. The broad highway inland to Batavia is flat and without individuality. There are staunch bricks and mortar in the buildings the Dutch put up in old Batavia, for they were brought in ships from Holland 300 years ago. The quaint high-gabled houses stand pressed together on narrow cobbled streets, and the signs above the stores and offices are the same ones that were put there two centuries ago, or even earlier. Some people say the ways of doing business in these firms have not changed, either; that in failing to meet and recognise competition they have lost world markets to other nations. Certainly the old days are gone when Java was a synonym for coffee, when sugar and spices from the East Indies were in every well-stocked larder in Europe, and when the bolts of good, durable cotton from Dutch mills went, out by every ship for Javanese to dye and make into skirts. Ancient Town Hall The number of Javanese needing skirts has increased by leaps and bounds these past 20 years, so there has been no decrease in the demand for Holland cloth, but there is little money in the Indies to pay for it now that sugar and coffee crops are no longer selling. Rubber, tobacco, and coconuts are being substituted in the plantations, but the profits from them do not mean a revival of prosperity for Java yet. So there is no hustle and bustle now in Batavia's old financial district. The, ancient Town Hall, the Amsterdam Gate, and the cramped rows of highpeaked, brick and timbered buildings look slightly self-conscious in the lush scene which has grown up about them, as though some incorrigible romanticist had painted in too many trees The new Batavia, in the Weltevreden district, is like a buxom daughter-in-law of the thriftv old town. The buildings are wide and expansive, the driveways and gardens are extravagant accessories, and the broad streets sparkle with motor-cars and silver-harnessed ponies. Washing In Public And in utter disregard of pretensions and decorum, right down the main street is the city's washtub —a long muddy canal where the black and brown housewives come to slosh their dirty clothes and spread them out on the grassy banks to dry. More than a few men simplify the whole process by coming themselves, washing out their shirts and jackets and then, while these are drying, completing ablutions on their own bodies. Off at one side of the town are the bazaars. There are fish on one street; batik skirts on the next; and European shoes beyond; and young Java is crowding these stalls, strolling, pricing, laughing, bargaining, and buying in each street. Young Java means men with the Moslem fez on their heads, and others with a batik scarf knotted around their ears. And it also means the pointedfaced Hakkas from Kwangtung, black Arabs from the Hadhramaut, Tamil coolies and Parsi traders from India, and even the long-headed men from Mozambique. All of these are in the bazaars of Batavia, and all of them seem to have caught something of the laughter and the bubbling gaiety of the Malayans here who are called Javanese