Related Articles

In Suharto’s Anti-Communist Purge, Prisoners Made an Island Bloom

Book Review: Pearls on the Prairie, A Survivor’s Story (2020) by Tedjabayu

On a wall in Jakarta’s Presidential Palace, the official residence of Indonesia’s president, hangs a 1947 painting titled Comrades in Revolution. The painting depicts 19 nationalist artists and activists who fought for Indonesia’s independence from the Netherlands. Among the freedom fighters, the painting also shows the face of a 3-year-old boy. The toddler is the artist’s son, Tedjabayu. 

Few visitors to the palace, let alone its primary resident, would be aware that the boy in the painting grew up to spend 14 years as a political prisoner in one of Indonesia’s darkest chapters—the purge of leftists in the wake of a 1965 coup attempt that the authorities blamed on the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI) and ushered in the rise of the New Order dictatorship.

You are unauthorized to view this page.

Myanmar’s Poets and Protesters “Write Democracy in Gore”

Book Review: Picking Off New Shoots Will Not Stop the Spring: Witness Poems and Essays from Burma/Myanmar 19882021 (2021) edited by Ko Ko Thett and Brian Haman

“In the event of my death, be proud of me,” writes a Myanmar doctor, addressing his mother in a short essay titled “My Will”, in which he foresees his own death just weeks later. 

Dr. Thiha Tin Tun was shot in the head on 27 March last year while setting up blockades against police and soldiers who were advancing on protesters in Mandalay. The 27-year-old had joined millions of his fellow citizens in opposing a military coup d’état launched on 1 February 2021, the day Myanmar’s second democratically elected parliament was due to sit. He was prepared to pay with his life.

To access this post, you must purchase a Membership or Tote Bag + Sticker Bundle.