Living through terror: everyday resilience in East Timor and Aceh

Abstract

Rather than subordinating the author's lived experience and embodied knowledge of violence to a dialogue with a ‘rule of experts’, the essay considers how international and local responses to violence can be better integrated from the survivor's points of view. The essay traces the process that goes from the direct experience of violence to emotional healing as a spiritual journey of understanding the conditions for a sustainable, embodied peace. The essay was written over a period of two years, starting in March 2006 when the author returned to Aceh to conduct research on forced displacement after a six-year absence. In April 2006 the security situation in Timor Leste worsened and the author found herself writing the first draft in a gudang (storage room) in Gleno, Ermera, where she and her family were forcibly displaced for several months. In May 26 the author's home in Delta I, Dili, was burnt down, and, subsequently, in the space of one to two months more than two thousand homes were burnt down throughout Dili, causing thousands of people to be displaced. The first draft of the essay was completed in February 2008, after attempted assassinations on the President and Prime Minister of Timor Leste. By this time, the author was very ill, after having been evacuated three times, and in the precarious condition of being Timor Leste's ‘interim first lady’. Once the author had been able to heal and regain her strength, having initially wanted to withdraw what seemed a depressing piece of writing, the final draft of this essay was completed. Thus, the essay highlights the process of writing and re-writing of a self-reflexive, marginal female scholar who is immersed in social, political, and ecological movements in both Aceh and Timor Leste, and whose ethical responsibility is to disclose the truths, deficiencies, and weaknesses not just of herself but also of the character of the state and political leaders in these two societies. In this sense, the essay addresses more broadly the challenges faced by scholars who write ‘theory’ while living their everyday in a conflict environment.

Keywords:

• resilience
• embodying peace
• equilibrium
• agency
• speaking beyond trauma
• militarised masculinities

Notes

1. For the author's personal experience and accounts of living displacement, see for example Siapno (2003; 2006a; 2006b).

2. For a critique of human rights reporting on refugees, see for example Grewal 1999).

3. For a critical unpacking of the hypocrisy of academic methodologies in doing research in conflict and former conflict regions, the work of other academic researchers working on Palestine and Sri Lanka has been most insightful in terms of comparative analysis. See for example Ted Swedenburg's profoundly critical and riveting article, ‘With Genet in the Palestinian Field’ (2004).

4. For background on the conflict, see for example the International Crisis Group Report on East Timor, September 2006. See also the United Nations Independent Special Commission of Inquiry for Timor Leste, Report, 17 October 2006.

5. Interview with Ms E. de Sousa, IDP, Jardim Camp.

6. Internally displaced person.

7. Interview with Mr C. da Silva, IDP, Jardim Camp, also in charge of Commission of Information in the camp. 6 December 2006. Original interview in Tetum. All translations from Tetum to English are the author's.

8. Interview with Ms E. de Sousa, IDP, Jardim Camp, also responsible as Coordinator for the needs of children, 6 December 2006.

9. Interview with Ms I. da Silva, IDP, Jardim Camp, also a student at the Universidade Nasional (UNTL), 7 December 2006.

10. Interview with Mr Amoro and Mr Mateus, IDPs, Jardim Camp, 7 December 2006.

11. Excerpts from ‘Media release from Rede Feto Timor-Leste Women's Network’, 24 June 2006.

12. Komisi Nasional Hak Asasi Manusia Indonesia (Komnas Ham) (Billah, 2004, p. 84). Investigative journalists in Aceh do not seem to have read or have had access to this report. The general public's perception of Komnas Ham and this report is summarized in the following comment from several people I interviewed: ‘Komnas Ham itu seperti harimau kehilangan gigi’. [Komnas Ham is like a tiger (or other potentially powerful animal) which has been de-fanged.]

13. Komisi Nasional Hak Asasi Manusia (Billah, 2004, p. 84).

14. ‘Kekuatan dan Penyebaran Pasukan dalam Darurat Militer-I’, Section A.3.5.2, Komisi Nasional Hak Asasi Manusia, ‘Laporan Tim Ad Hoc Aceh’ (Billah, 2004, p. 96).

15. On camp life, see for example, Laporan Tim Ad Hoc Aceh, Komnas Ham (Billah, 2004); Komnas Prempuan (2006).

16. Interview with ‘Dolly’, GAM representative, AMM and KPA, Lhokseumawe, March 2006.

17. For an important and well-written report on the psychological impacts of displacement, see Good, Del Vecchio Good, Grayman and Lakoma (2006).

18. Tjoet Nya’ Dhien is one of the most inspiring women in the history of Acehnese anti-colonial struggles for independence against the Dutch, who led a resistance movement in the jungles of Aceh in the early 1900s. After becoming blind, she was arrested by the Dutch police and sent to prison in Sumedang, Java, to isolate her from her base of support, the Acehnese.

19. Interview, Samsidar, Special Rapporteur on Aceh, Komnas Perempuan, March 2006.

20. Dangerous; terror-filled.

21. Interview, human rights activist, Aceh, March 2006.

22. Komisi Nasional Hak Asasi Manusia, ‘Laporan Tim Ad Hoc Aceh’ (Billah, 2004, p. 89).

23. Komisi Nasional Hak Asasi Manusia, ‘Laporan Tim Ad Hoc Aceh’ (Billah, 2004, p. 89).

24. Confidential interview, chairperson, women's rights group in Aceh, March 2006.

25. Interview with Khairani, SH, Secretary-General of Relawan Perempuan untuk Kemanusiaan (RPUK) and one of only two women members formulating the RUU PA governing law for Aceh, Aceh, March 2006.

26. Interview with Director, LBH-APIK, Lhokseumawe, March 2006.

27. Interview, Director of LBH-APIK Lhokseumawe, March 2006. For a complete chronological documentation of this particular case, contact LBH-APIK Lhokseumawe.

28. Interview, Director of LBH-APIK Lhokseumawe, March 2006.

29. This reference to the dynamics of diasporic long distance nationalism is insightful in light of the return of exile ‘revolutionaries’ from Mozambique, for example, to Timor, who are perceived to have brought back more old-style authoritarian leadership values, rather than open, inclusive and consultative governance models. In my interviews diasporic Acehnese and Timorese tended to be perceived as more urgent and extreme in their representation of conflict and violence than Acehnese and Timorese inside the country. To borrow Ben Anderson's (1998) term ‘long distance nationalism’, could it be that faraway perceptions of conflict and displacement are not as nuanced and subtle as local analysis?

30. Interview with human rights and women's rights activists, Aceh, March 2006.

31. It is interesting to note that the pattern is rather different in East Timor, where traditionally people would seek refuge in the mountains. In the most recent F-FDTL conflict, for example, people fled the city of Dili, towards the mountains in the sub-districts and districts. In Aceh, because Banda Aceh was considered relatively safe, they were moving from the villages to Banda Aceh.

32. Interview with Insinyur Samsidar, Special Rapporteur on Aceh, Komnas Ham, Aceh, March 2006.

33. ‘Akses Perempuan Aceh pada Peradilan’, p. 73.

34. MOU: Memorandum of Understanding between GAM (the Acehnese rebels) and the Indonesian Government.

35. ‘Sebagai Korban, Juga Survivor: Rangkaian Pengalaman dan Suara Perempuan Pengungsi Terhadap Kekerasan dan Diskriminasi’ (‘As victims, also survivors: Analysis of the experiences and voices of displaced women on violence and discrimination’.)

36. Confidential interview with humanitarian aid worker, Aceh, March 2006.

37. Confidential interview with human rights activist and humanitarian aid worker, Aceh, March 2006.

38. Interview with Khairani, SH, Aceh, March 2006.

39. To strengthen the front-line by supporting each other and working together effectively and strategically in a women's alliance.

40. Confidential interview with humanitarian aid worker and human rights activist, Aceh. March 2006.

41. Interview with Secretary-General of RPUK, Aceh, March 2006.

42. Ibarat seorang ibu yang melahirkan, kalau kita sendiri tidak berusaha – walaupun dibantu oleh bidan – tidak akan jadi. Just like a woman who is giving birth, if she herself does not exert – even if she is helped by a skilled midwife – the baby won't come out.

43. Stove for cooking used by village women.

44. Escape or distraction (from having to embrace pain).

45. Interview with Teungku Muhammad Usman Lampoh Awe, former GAM negotiator and long-term political prisoner, Banda Aceh, March 2006.

46. Interview and conversation with Maria Vong, Clayton, Victoria, 5 May 2007.

47. This was the topic of a workshop at Curtin University, Perth, Australia, on ‘Gendered Transportations and Mobility’, in September 2005 organised by Suvendrini Pereira and Krishna Sen with speakers and artists coming together to discuss from Sri Lanka, India, East Timor, Australia and other parts of the world.

48. Nicole Constable opens up such third or fourth space/s of interpretation in her 1999 article.