''Kampung Tugu'' ( jv, ꦏꦩ꧀ꦥꦸꦁꦠꦸꦒꦸ) is a historical neighborhood located in the
northwestern Jakarta in the island of
Java
Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's List ...
. ''Kampung Tugu'' grew from the land granted by the government of the
Dutch East Indies
The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies ( nl, Nederlands(ch)-Indië; ), was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which ...
to the converted
Mardijker people
The Mardijker people refers to an ethnic community in the Dutch East Indies (present-day Indonesia) made up of descendants of freed slaves. They could be found at all major trading posts in the East Indies. They were mostly Christian, of various ...
in the 17th century. From this land, a Christian settlement grew and developed its own culture. ''Kampung Tugu'' is one of the oldest Christian neighborhoods in the western part of Indonesia. Today, the Christian neighborhood of ''Kampung Tugu'' is part of the Administrative Village of Tugu in
Koja Subdistrict of
North Jakarta
North Jakarta ( id, Jakarta Utara; bew, Jakarte Belilir) is one of the five administrative cities (''kota administrasi'') which form Special Capital Region of Jakarta, Indonesia. North Jakarta is not self-governed and does not have a city counci ...
,
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
.
History
![Mardijker detail churchill 1704](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/14/Mardijker_detail_churchill_1704.jpg)
The Mardijkers had been brought to
Batavia
Batavia may refer to:
Historical places
* Batavia (region), a land inhabited by the Batavian people during the Roman Empire, today part of the Netherlands
* Batavia, Dutch East Indies, present-day Jakarta, the former capital of the Dutch East In ...
as slaves or indentured labor after the Dutch East India Company (VOC) captured
Malacca
Malacca ( ms, Melaka) is a state in Malaysia located in the southern region of the Malay Peninsula, next to the Strait of Malacca. Its capital is Malacca City, dubbed the Historic City, which has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site si ...
and
Galle
Galle ( si, ගාල්ල, translit=Gālla; ta, காலி, translit=Kāli) (formerly Point de Galle) is a major city in Sri Lanka, situated on the southwestern tip, from Colombo. Galle is the provincial capital and largest city of Souther ...
from the Portuguese in 1640. The presence of Christian slaves in Batavia became an ethical dilemma for the Dutch Reform Church and in 1661 they were freed and granted land outside Batavia on the condition that they convert from Catholicism to
Protestantism
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...
. This very land, located 10 kilometers east of
Old Batavia
Kota Tua Jakarta (Indonesian for "Jakarta Old Town"), officially known as Kota Tua, is a neighborhood comprising the original downtown area of Jakarta, Indonesia. It is also known as (Dutch for "Old Batavia"), ("Lower City", contrasting it wit ...
, was the land given for the freed
Mardijkers. This land would develop into the ''Kampung Tugu''.
Before the Mardijkers were freed, most of them married to women from
Banda Islands
The Banda Islands ( id, Kepulauan Banda) are a volcanic group of ten small volcanic islands in the Banda Sea, about south of Seram Island and about east of Java, and constitute an administrative district (''kecamatan'') within the Central M ...
and settled in a neighborhood in Jakarta now known as ''Kampung Bandan''. In 1661, following the order of the
Dutch East India Company
The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock ...
(VOC), 23 families of Portuguese were transferred to Tugu. The place was named Tugu because it was the location of the city boundary (which was marked by a ''tugu'',
Javanese word for "stone shaft"), or some said after the Portuguese themselves. ''Kampung Tugu'' is the oldest Christian neighborhood in the west of Indonesia.
In 1999, ''Kampung Tugu'' was recognized by the Indonesian governmemt as a cultural heritage.
Today, the 17th-century-established
Tugu Church
Tugu Church (Indonesian: ), is a Protestant church in Kampung Kurus (Kampung Kecil), Semper Barat Administrative Village, Cilincing, Jakarta, Indonesia. The church was located in Kampung Tugu, a village of Mardijker people, a Creole Portuguese co ...
is the oldest building in ''Kampung Tugu'', thought to be one of the first building to be built by the community between 1676 and 1678, and is still well maintained by the community.
Culture
Kampung Tugu neighborhood still exists and retains its own distinct Christian-Portuguese culture, e.g. the Portuguese-influenced musical style
Kroncong Tugu spoken in the extinct
Papia Tugu language
Mardijker is an extinct Portuguese-based creole languages, Portuguese-based creole of Jakarta. It was the native tongue of the Mardijker people. The language was introduced with the Dutch settlement of Batavia, Dutch East Indies, Batavia (prese ...
. One of the reasons of their well-preserved distinct culture is because Kampung Tugu was relatively isolated from the hustle and bustle of Batavia for nearly 300 years.
The people of Kampung Tugu are a mix of Portuguese and natives. Last names like Andries, Cornelis, Abraham, Michel, Quiko, and Browne can still be found in the enclave of Kampung Tugu. At early times, descendants of the Mardijkers could be found as far as Simpang Lima neighborhood about 500 meter west of Kampung Tugu, still within the Cakung River. Today, however, people of Portuguese mix can only be found around Kampung Tugu and Kampung Kurus.
The people of Kampung Tugu are locally known as ''warga tugu'' or ''warga serani'' by the majority of Muslims in the surrounding. The word ''serani'' came from ''
nasrani'', an Arabic term for Christians. In the past, Tugu people still spoke a creole language of local and Portuguese language. This creole culture has dwindled following the repatriation of the Dutch where many of the original Tugu people also moved to the Netherlands, or other places.
Before the industrialization of the area, the people of Kampung Tugu cultivated rice and coconuts, and hunt for boars which were made into ''dendeng'' (jerkies) known as ''dendeng tugu'' ("Tugu jerkies"), which was known for their high quality. Tugu people were also fishermen, being closely located to Cakung River and the sea. Known local food from the neighborhood are ''dendeng tugu'', ''gado-gado Tugu'' (a variant of
gado-gado
''Gado-gado'' ( Indonesian or Betawi) is an Indonesian salad of raw, slightly boiled, blanched or steamed vegetables and hard-boiled eggs, boiled potato, fried tofu and tempeh, and ''lontong'' (rice wrapped in a banana leaf), served with a ...
with a distinctive sauce), ''pindang serani bandeng'', ''lopis ketan'', ''kue pisang udang'', and ''sop snert kacang hijau''.
Today, few original houses in Kampung Tugu remain. Many of the original wooden houses in Kampung Tugu date from the 19th-century and feature distinctive features such as an open front terrace to welcome guests, typically surrounded with potted plants, and a traditional stone furnace in the kitchen. In the 1980s, only 50 of the original Tugu families were left in Kampung Tugu. The original houses declined as the area surrounding Tugu was slowly transformed into industrial storage area thanks to the lack of planning of the city of Jakarta.
Below are distinctive traditions of the Tugu community:
Kroncong Tugu
Keroncong Tugu, also known as keroncong Moresco, is a type of kroncong typical of Tugu. The kroncong Tugu is played during wedding ceremonies, New Year festivals, and funeral processions. Among the well-known kroncong Tugu musicians are Fernando Quiko and Jacobus Quiko.
Rabo-rabo
Rabo-rabo is an annual event of Kampung Tugu that is held to celebrate Christmas and the New Year. The term is derived from the Portuguese word ''rabo'', meaning "to tail" or "to follow". After a church service and a pilgrimage to the family tomb, residents will gather back to the church and then visit all the houses around the neighborhood while playing
keroncong songs and forgive each other. According to Erni L. Michiels, chairman of the Tugu Family Association, the purpose of holding Rabo-rabo is to strengthen the ropes of brotherhood among the citizens.
Mandi-mandi
Mandi-mandi is another tradition distinctive of Kampung Tugu. The mandi-mandi tradition is to smear people's face with powder, beginning with the oldest. The mandi-mandi tradition of 2017 was attended by the president of
East Timor
East Timor (), also known as Timor-Leste (), officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is an island country in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the exclave of Oecusse on the island's north-weste ...
,
Xanana Gusmão
José Alexandre "Xanana" Gusmão (; born 20 June 1946) is an East Timorese politician. A former rebel, he was the third President of the independent East Timor, serving from 2002 to 2007. He then became its fourth prime minister, serving from ...
.
References
Sources
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*
*
*
*
External links
Toegoe.nl— Website about the Tugu people of the Netherlands
— an article in The Jakarta Post (January 18, 2019) by A. Kurniawan Ulung and Gyanindra Ali
* — CNN Indonesia clip posted on October 15, 2019.
{{Portal, Jakarta
North Jakarta