Spice Islands of Indonesia, 7-15 April 2008
Robert Tyabji, Shah Alam, 2008
I went on a quick, 11,000 km. tour of the famed Clove Islands of Ternate and Tidore, and to West Timor from where sandalwood first came. The history of the spice islands is intimately entwined with the development of international commerce, especially in Europe where cloves, mace, nutmeg, pepper, cardamom and other spices and herbs were in great demand and commanded astronomical prices.
The role of spices and herbs in shaping the course of history is a long and romantic story. The trade is one of the oldest known to man. Overland trade routes across Asia antecede recorded history, and merchandise moved over coastal sea routes in both directions between Arabia and southern Cathay (China) in very early times. Cinnamon, cassia, cardamom, ginger and turmeric were known and employed by Eastern peoples thousands of years ago, and they became important items of commerce early in the evolutionary course of trade.
The spice trade between Europe and the peoples of the Indonesian archipelago abounded in adventure and discovery of new sea routes and lands, of perilous voyages, heroic deeds, treachery, piracy, bizarre transactions, and bloodshed. Arrogant and ruthless adventurers, driven by greed for vast profits and the prospects of empire building, routinely carried out shameful acts of extortion and robbery, including the torture and murder of settled Europeans and the decimation of local communities. First visited by Chinese mariners a thousand years ago, then by Indian and Arab traders and later by Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and British trading fleets, fierce competition to gain control of the vital and lucrative spice trade led to bitter confrontation and bloodshed between the Dutch and the English in the early seventeenth century, but also prompted the growth of important trading centers like Jakarta and Ambon in Indonesia and Malacca on the Malay peninsula (Malaysia).
One can say that Indonesia is a country of volcanoes, of which there are at least 147, 76 of them active.
Comprising some 13,000 islands, Indonesia is a vast country straddling two oceans and stretching 5000 km eastward from the Asian mainland to the Pacific Ocean, and about 2000 km from north to south to within a few hundred miles from Australia's northern shore. When traveling to the spice islands which are scattered in the far corners of this huge archipelago, one must depend entirely on airline routes and schedules. While the large towns are served by a selection of local airlines, getting around the country often means flying long and indirect routes; one leg of the journey involved three flights and took 20 hours.
Itinerary
7 April 2008 KL - Surabaya (AirAsia)
7 April Surabaya - Ujung Padang (Lion Air)
8 April Ujung Padang - Menado (Lion Air)
9 April Menado - Ternate (Lion Air)
10 April Ternate - Tidore (by speedboat)
11 April Tidore - Ternate (by speedboat)
12 April Ternate - Menado (Lion Air)
12 April Menado - Jakarta (Lion Air)
12 April Jakarta - Kupang (Lion Air)
15 April Kupang - Surabaya (Lion Air)
15 April Surabaya - KL (AirAsia)
My journey through half a dozen airports and as many towns and cities in Indonesia taught me a lot about Indonesia and her people. I was fortunate to be traveling with my friend Professor Emeritus K.T. Joseph who is fluent in Bahasa Malaysia and so could communicate easily with Indonesians; venturing outside the main cities would otherwise have been difficult. My main observations:
While most of the country is ocean, its geography and cultures are incredibly diverse. Bahasa Indonesia is the official language understood by nearly everyone, but other languages and dialects abound. I learned that 'thank you' on Tidore island is 'sukur dofu' but people on Ternate island just a few hundred meters away didn’t know the term!
A serene and polite disposition and simple kindness and willingness to help were obvious traits among the many people I met. Considerate airline staff, polite taxi drivers, helpful hotel personnel and a generally cheerful attitude with no hint of obsequiousness greeted me everywhere - a great work ethic seemingly devoid of uptightness.
The ethnic and religious diversity and tolerance in Indonesia was striking and reminded me of India. Some islands are all Muslim, some all Christian, and some are Hindu, or Buddhist, or mixed, reflecting the national motto bhinneka tunggal ika or ‘there are many, they are one', generally meaning 'Unity in Diversity'. Many lessons to be learned here!
I never saw evidence of extreme poverty, homelessness or sickness anywhere.
As a first introduction to the country, the trip has been very useful and memorable. Next, I would love to explore Flores Island and to visit the carniverous Komodo dragons. Komodo island can be reached via Bali, so that's a trip worth saving up for!
For more on this, please refer to my travel notes, below.
Spice Islands Travel Notes
I visited the so-called Spice Islands in the Moluccas and the source of sandalwood in Timor in the company of a family friend, Prof. Emeritus K.T. Joseph, who is researching the spice trade in relation to the emergence of the Malacca Kingdom on the Malaysian Peninsula. The trip was very quick -- 9 days in all -- but covered about 11,000 kilometers. Following are some of my observations and background notes.
Surabaya, the capital of East Java and Indonesia's second largest city, was my entry and return airport from KL. I had read that “the city still has a harbor exclusively reserved for sail. Here more than anywhere the spice route lives on not just in exotic odors but in a way of trade and a means of travel. The quay is over a mile long and devoid of either gantries or containers. Cargoes consist of sacks and crates. The dockside is jammed with pickups, handcarts and gangplanks, all backing like excited harvesters into a forest of shipping. Vaguely termed pinisi or prahus, the ships are hand-built of teak, mostly in Sulawesi or Borneo; single or twin-masted - but nowadays with an engine as well - they may displace upto 250 tons. DaGama and Columbus used vessels of a comparable size. The pinisi are moored, not alongside the quay, but end-on to it, and so close together that the enfiladse of their projecting bows and bowsprits forms a rakish avenue. They look like tethered swordfish, their color a bleached shade of whalebone.
Rice, copra, sugar and sago now form the mainstay of their trade; spices are incidental. But once clear of the river and out into the haze-laden Java Sea, their seasonal routings still faithfully replicate those of the spice age. To Ambon and Timor, Makassar and Melaka, Palembang and Padang the pinisi sail with the same winds, buoyed by the same promise and fearful of the same dangers. A reef off the coast of Sulawesi might be the very one on which Drake's Golden Hind ran aground; of the hulks reported by divers in a bay at Tidore one could be the Trinidad, Magellan's flagship; and on a Molucan hilltop the overgrown ramparts are those of Fort Beliga, whose Dutch masters superintended the demise of the traditional trade. Little imagination is needed in such places; but to recreate the romance of the spice route, a lot of history may be helpful.”
I really wanted to visit these traditional docks and had hoped to be able to do so in the six hours available to me between flights. Sadly, though, I learned that it could take three hours or more each way by taxi, even though it was not that far from the airport; so I had to be content with a distant view of the port from the plane!
Ujung Pandang (Makassar). My first introduction to an Indonesian city. We arrived after 9 pm and, after 2 hours of struggling with the only travel agent available to the airport at that late hour, managed to book into the Horison Hotel in town. This was a great choice after the frustrating travel agent experience as the hotel rooms are large, clean and comfortable, the restaurant food was excellent and the staff friendly, polite and helpful. The city, nowadays called Makassar, reminded me a lot of India as I knew it decades ago, with narrow, poorly lit streets and chaotic traffic. The dominant linguistic and ethnic group in southern Sulewesi are the Bugis, who were once feared as pirates but now are mainly engaged in farming, fishing and business.
Manado. This attractive town nestles in the hills and along the wide Manado Bay on the northwestern tip of Sulawesi. The approach over forested hills with small, scattered villages half concealed by tall palms and the blue ocean beyond with its dramatic volcano is beautiful. The clear air, clean, flower-lined roads, pretty wooden houses and plethora of spired churches give the town a quaint, European feel. This is an obviously Christian area with dozens of churches and at least one large cross prominent on a hillside. The Boulevard Hotel was comfortable and homely and is conveniently located on the waterfront opposite a long row of seafood restaurants and warungs and within a stone's throw of stores and a supermarket.
Ternate and Tidore. Once the world's greatest producer of cloves, Ternate and its neighbor Tidore are tiny volcanic islands off the west coast of Halmahera in North Molucca. Ternate is almost perfectly circular and is totally dominated by the still active volcano Mount Gamalama with verdant, forested slopes. The town is located on the island's eastern shore and stretches some 2 kms. up the slope. We visited the town's main cemetery hoping to come across some old Chinese graves but couldn't find anything earlier than 1907.
The clove tree is indigenous to the Moluccas and has been known to grow since very early times on the islands of Ternate, Tidore, Mutir, Makyan and Bachian, where the first cultivated plants were valued by the natives who sold the spice to Chinese mariners. The first known references to the use of clove spice are found in Chinese books of the Han period dating from 220 B.C. to 206 B.C. In these books is mentioned the frequently quoted use of cloves by court officials to sweeten their breath with them whilst addressing the ruler. The history of the clove trade is important as it was largely connected with the development of the early Portuguese Empire in the East. The remarkable rise of Portugal as a maritime nation resulted from the influence of Prince Henry (1394 - 1460), and by 1497 the explorer Vasco de Gama had reached Calicut. Lisbon soon became the first important western market for cloves. The trade was first a royal monopoly and a valuable asset to the treasury.
Professor Joseph and I drove up the mountainside to see the clove trees and later visited a spice wholesaler in the town's market area. His warehouse was well stocked with cloves and mace in piles on the floor, sacks of cocoa and other produce along the walls and on shelves, and dozens of 20-liter tins of unrefined palm oil. He told us that his family, originally from China, has been in the spice trade on Ternate for many generations. He said he exports between one and 3 tonnes of cloves a day, indicating that business is still good. The newer part of town along the northern shore appears to be constructed on reclaimed land, behind which is a backwater and a jumble of stilted wooden shacks which could be the remnants of the old town. In my mind's eye I could see the prahus, dhows, carracks and galleons from three continents jamming the harbor and sailing through the narrow waterway separating Ternate and Tidore when the islands were ruled by kings who controlled the clove cultivation and policed the region with fleets of war boats. The hotels we stayed at were disappointing but then they were the only ones that claimed to accept credit cards and had vacancies. The Corner Palace Hotel has a restaurant which was mostly closed so that the manager and the waitresses could practice karaoke, and the Ternate City Hotel informed us as we were checking out at 4:30 in the morning that their credit card terminal was out of order. However, other hotels like the Surya Pagi and the Azzelia looked really nice, but were fully occupied. The food in the restaurants around the central mosque was scrumptuous, served in the traditional manner - a plate of rice each and about 16 bowls of meats, gravies and vegetables from the buffet.
A visit to the Ternate Sultan's palace was most rewarding as it happened to be an important anniversary and we were invited in by the Sultan's sister who graciously showed us around and explained many of the palace's features and artifacts. According to her, the royal lineage has been unbroken since 1257. She herself has experienced many political convulsions - when the Japanese invaded and the British evacuated her as a young girl and her family to Brisbane, where she spent many years, the departure of the Dutch and, finally, Indonesian independence. At our request, she had the palace prepare a complete list of the sultans, beautifully typed on monogrammed letterheads.
The boat ride from Ternate to the Rum jetty on Tidore just across the channel takes half an hour, though it was much longer on the return journey as the boat had to turn back because of engine trouble. A scenic road runs right around the island hugging the coast and lined with neat bungalows and flowering trees and bushes. A couple of ruined Portuguese forts can be seen high above, as well as stone fortifications dotting the waterline.
Kupang. Kupang, the capital of Timor, is at the southern end of the Indonesian archipelago. The journey from Tidore began at 4:00 am, involved three flights (Tidore-Menado-Jakarta-Kupang,) and took 14 hours. The vegetation here is both tropical and Australasian, with bushland dominated by eucalypts and acacias. This is the home of the prized sandalwood tree, and though we paid a visit to the Island Sandalwood University (Universitas Nusa Cendana), we didn't have time to see the sandalwood groves in the interior. The people here are an interesting mix of Muslims and Christians and I saw quite a few western visitors who were there for the snorkeling and diving in the clear blue waters of the Sabu Sea.
My 11,000-kilometer dash around Indonesia was made possible by Lion Air and its online booking service. There are about six airlines serving different parts of the country, but Lion Air is the largest and is national. The online booking service works a bit differently from I've been used to - there is no confirmation email or itinerary, so after making the booking and payment, one has to retrieve and print the booking data. As there is no way to book multiple flights each leg of a journey must be booked and printed separately. The printout is presented at the checkin counter whereupon a paper ticket is (but not always) prepared along with a boarding card. The flights were on time and the staff polite and very helpful. The airline uses Boeing 737s and MD8s on the longer sectors and Dash 8s on short-haul routes. No food is served or sold on board but passengers are given drinking water, which I suppose helps keep the aircraft cabins as clean as they are.
Postscript. Tragically, my friend and traveling companion on this trip, Prof. K T "Bobby" Joseph, passed away on 21 April 2013.