The Kwee Family of Ciledug by LM Publishers

from Ciledug, owners of the sugar factory Djatipiring. It aims to bring the private lives of the modern Peranakan Chinese elite in colonial Java to the fore and asks to what extent ideas about progress, development and ‘the

glimpse into the changing world of a wealthy Peranakan Chinese family as it moved forward in the modernizing landscape of Java. The existing Western images and corresponding perspectives focus mainly on the nexus between the Westerners and the native population, sharing one common theme: none of them visualized the Chinese as ‘carriers of modernity’ or as ‘agents of change’. Such a representation apparently did not ﬁt the public consciousness and general research paradigms in which change, progress and modernity were mainly attributed to Western presence in the region. The Kwee family photo albums give the opportunity to redress the balance, thereby offering a new perspective on the social dynamics of Jenny Kwee Zwan Lwan-Be Kiam Nio with Dr. H.J. van Mook, Dr. A.K. Gani (r), and Van Mook’s secretary, standing near the ﬁshpond of the Kwee family in Linggadjati, 11-13 November 1946.

The Kwee Family of Ciledug

collection makes it possible to go beyond the public eye and get an inside

Family, Status and Modernity in Colonial Java

modern’ have affected their world-view and life-styles. This wonderful

Peter Post

home movies of one Peranakan Chinese elite family, the Kwee family

with may ling thio

This book is based upon a unique private collection of photographs and

peter post with may ling thio

The Kwee Family of Ciledug Family, Status, and Modernity in Colonial Java

late-colonial Java.

ISBN 978-94-6022-492-8

Visualising the Private Life of the Peranakan Chinese Sugar Elite 9 789460 224928

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The Kwee Family of Ciledug

peter post with may ling thio

The Kwee Family of Ciledug Family, Status, and Modernity in Colonial Java

Visualising the Private Life of the Peranakan Chinese Sugar Elite

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The Kwee ﬁmily of Ciledug

LM Publishers Parallelweg 37 3533 AE Volendam The Netherlands info@lmpublishers.nl www.lmpublishers.nl

editing Tom Leighton cover photo Roos Kwee Zwan Liang-Liem Hwat Nio standing next to the family’s Buick 67, Bandung, 1936 graphic design Ad van Helmond production High Trade bv

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the copyright holder. Except where noted otherwise, all photographs in this publication belong to the private collection of the Kwee family.

isbn 978-94-6022-492-8

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Contents

Acknowledgements 7 Glossary and abbreviations 9 Maps Map of Cirebon with Kraton Kanoman and the Winaon estate of the Kwee family 36 Map of the Ciledug area with Djapiring sugar factory, 1926 112 Table Sugar production of Djatipiring and other sugar factories in the Sindanglaut and Losari-Ciledug districts, 1888-1921 120 Introduction 1

The Kwee family of Ciledug: Experiencing modernity 27 The strategic alliance between the Kwee and Tan families 28 Securing the family fortunes: The two worlds of Kwee Keng Liem Educational roads 31 Marriage arrangements 39 Emancipatory winds and the modern Peranakan women 48 A close-knit family 50

Family alliances of the modern Peranakan Chinese elite: Strategy and culture 61 A foothold in the Principalities: The Kwee-Be connection 62 The East Java Sugar Lords: The Kwee-Han connection 73 Modern Surabaya: The Kwee-Liem connection 77 The siblings of Roos 82 Cousins of Roos 85 Landowners and rice mills: The Kwee-Tan connection 89 Batavian politics and urban culture: The Kwee-Yo connection 89 Strategic marriages of the modern Peranakan Chinese elite 94

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Royal alliances: Tradition and modernity in Javaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Principalities The Be family and the courts of Surakarta 102 Major-titular Be Kwat Koen and Mangkunegoro vii 106

Behind the curtain: The private life of a Peranakan Chinese sugar elite part one Managing a Chinese family-owned sugar factory 113 Chinese sugar manufacturers in the Cirebon region 114 Resisting metropolitan capital 117 Djatipiring : The sole survivor 119 Supervisors and workforce 121 The sugar cycle 127 Crisis and the end of the Kwee sugar fortunes 130 part two Daily family life at Djatipiring 137 The interior space and domestic fashion 139 The childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s playground 143 Domestic servants 148

Going public in the twenties 153 The Kwee cars 153 Ancestors, travels and family vacations Funeral processions 166 Pasars and trade-fairs 170 Leisure and fashion 173

101

162

A memorable year: The visit of King of Siam 181 The Java travels of King Prajadhipok in 1929 182 The King and Queen visit Djatipiring 183 To Surakarta and Redjo Agoeng sugar factory 187 A king of decorations 189

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Life beyond sugar: Status and modernity in late colonial Bandung New surroundings 192 The interior space 197 Servants 199 Raising the children 199 School education 202 Travel, fashion, and the elite outlook 207 Sports and leisure in Indies society 211 The Kwee family and the Orange celebrations 215 ConďŹ rming traditional alliances: Mangkunegoro vii and the wedding of LĂ¨ne 221 An eligible partner 221 The wedding ceremony 224 The hybrid identity of a modern Peranakan elite family in the late 1930s

191

227

The end of an era: War, revolution, and family 233 Political pressures and divided loyalties 233 The China Relief Fund and the Peranakan Chinese elite 234 Mobilization, defense, and Peranakan Chinese support for the Netherlands 237 The Japanese period 241 Bersiap and the Indonesian Revolution 248 The aftermath: New perspectives and last farewells 255 Epilogue Bibliography Index 277

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266 270

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Acknowledgements

It has taken a long time to produce this book. One person, however, never failed to support us: Ir. H. Kwee (Kwee Kiem Han, M. Engr.) from The Hague. He introduced us to the photo albums and home-movies his father Kwee Zwan Liang had made about their lives in the Indies and applauded our plans to write a family history based on these visual materials. Our gratitude ﬁrst goes to him and his late wife Tante Daisy (Liem Giok Pwan) whose table was always packed with Indonesian snacks and drinks whenever we came over to interview them. In the second instance, we wish to thank the members of the extended Kwee family, who willingly received us into their homes in order to share their individual memories of the family’s daily life experiences during the Dutch colonial period, the wartime Japanese occupation, and the Indonesian Revolution. We are grateful for the hospitable and friendly welcome of Mrs. Liem-Kwee Lee Siok Nio (Eef), Kwee Kiem King and his late wife Jap Sien Nio (Sunny), the late Kwee Kiem Toen and his wife Teng Hie Nio (Helene), Mrs. Tan-Kwee Lee Sioe Nio (Irene) and Tan Soei Tjing, the late Mrs. Lie-Kwee Lee Nio (Lène), Mrs. Goei Kiem Lan, and Mrs. Lan van Mechelen-Tan and her husband Ruud. Allowing us an inside glimpse into their life histories was a privileged experience. We moreover would like to thank Mrs. Lina Schut-Kwee, daughter of Kwee Kiem Han, who, in the last year of ﬁnishing the texts, regularly sat with her father when we came over to piece together various strings of information, and who gave us precious insights into the life of her grandmother. A special debt is owed to Mrs. Monica Khoe-Lie and Khoe Liong Hoey. Monica, besides accompanying her mother Mrs. Lie-Kwee Lee Nio during our interviews, along with her husband Liong Hoey (the son of Mrs. Goei Kiem Lan), provided us with numerous private photos from the Be family, the Lie family from Yogyakarta, and the Goei family from Semarang. They also shared with us many stories about the lives of their parents and grandparents. A few photos from the Khoe family albums turned out to be essential for our research into the strategic family alliances of the Kwee family. Oei Tiang Han and his wife Lieke Tan were kind enough to allow us the use of an insightful photograph from their private collection, that of the visit of Mangkunegoro VII and his wife Ratu Timur to the Pasar Malam of Semarang in 1937, in which the royal couple is pictured together with the Peranakan Chinese elite of Semarang. Over the years, many colleagues have collaborated in the project and shared their ideas. We are grateful to Keng We Koh, Didi Kwartanada, Mona Lohanda, Bambang ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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Purwanto, Liesbeth Dolk, Madelon Djajadiningrat-Nieuwenhuis, Els Bogaert, Karen Strassler, Pui Tak Lee, Geoff Wade, Milan de Lange, and Peter Keppy. The late Steve Haryono deserves a special word of thanks. His painstaking work on the strategic marriages of the Peranakan Chinese elite, and his generosity to share his findings with us, proved indispensable for our research. We regret that Steve passed away just after the manuscript of this book was finished. Special thanks are also due to Nico de Klerk and Abidin Kusno. Both were instrumental in getting the project started, and their expert knowledge of the use of home movies and family photo albums as social science research tools greatly benefitted our work. We are indebted to George Bradley, at that time President of The Marmon Club in the United States of America, who generously invited May Ling to write an essay for The Marmon News, the International Newsletter for The Marmon Club about the Marmon cars the Kwee family came to own, surprised as he was that this magnificent American car model had found its way to colonial Java. The niod Institute for War, Holocaust, and Genocide Studies in Amsterdam provided the perfect institutional and intellectual environment to conduct the project, and we are grateful to Frank van Vree, Director, and Peter Romijn, Head of Research, for their support. From the start of the project, Ron Smit of LM Publishers has shown a great interest in publishing the book, and we thank him for his support and guidance in preparing the final manuscript for publication. Tom Leighton did a great job in polishing our English. Thanks, Tom. During the work on the book May Ling Thio regularly realized how her insights were rooted in the wisdom and stories of her parents. Her father Thio Djie Hing (in loving memory) would have very much enjoyed discussing research findings with her, giving guidance to come to her own conclusions, as mother Njo Bien Nio tirelessly searched her own memory when asked for Peranakan Chinese traditions, customs, and wordings. By always stimulating an open, discerning, and critical mind, they have contributed in various ways to this project, for which May Ling would like to express her deep felt gratitude. Last but not least, Peter Post wishes to thank Yoko Hayashi for her invaluable support during the past few years, both intellectually and stomach-wise. Yoko-san was always there to listen to yet another anecdote about the lives of the Kwee family members, despite the fact that she (and Peter) often got confused with the numerous Chinese names they encountered in an effort to figure out strategic family alliances. Her help and understanding were indispensable in completing this book. Finally, we would like to state that none of the persons mentioned is responsible for the arguments and interpretations put forward, and that, whatever deficiencies remain, they are entirely our own. Peter Post May Ling Thio 8

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Glossary and abbreviations

Glossary babu Bandung Lautan Api bibit bupati cabang atas Candi Cap Go Meh Chung Hua Fu Nu Hui cikar Djien Gee Lie Tie Sien jongos cokar desa erfpacht (D) gamelan gaplek guru haji hio lou Hoe Djien Hwee Imlek istana kampung klontong Kenpeitai kereta setan klenteng kota kraton lurah mandur

female domestic servant, nursemaid Bandung Sea of Fire young plant regent upper class, Chinese elite hillside south of Semarang celebration of the 15th night of the Chinese New Year festival Chinese Women Association ox-drawn wagon for goods Confucian Association houseboy horse-drawn buggy village long lease percussion orchestra dried cassava teacher one who has done the pilgrimage incense receptacle Chinese Housewives Association Hokkien term for Chinese New Year palace village or city quarter (Chinese) peddler Japanese military police devilâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s carriage, car Chinese temple city palace village head overseer, surveyor GLOSSARY AND ABBREVATIONS

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Nanyang oma (D) oom (D) pasar Pecinan pemuda Peranakan rampok taman tanah Tionghoa Totok tukang wayang kulit wedana

South Seas grandmother uncle market (place) Chinese quarter a youth, youth troops person of mixed ancestry rob, plunder garden land, country Hokkien term for Chinese pure, full blooded artisan, skilled labor shadow play with leather puppets district head

Abbreviations BSV CHH COVIM

DJB DP ELS HBS HCS HNDNI HVA IEV JSWB KNIL KWIII 10

Bandoengsche Schoolvereeniging (Bandung School Association) Chung Hwa Hui (Chinese Association) Commissie tot Organisatie van Vrouwenarbeid in Oorlogstijd (Committee for the Organization of Female Labor during Mobilization) De Javasche Bank Djatipiring Europeesche Lagere School (Government-run Primary School for Students with European Status) Hogere Burger School (Government-run High School) Hollandsch-Chineesche School (Government-run Primary School for Chinese) Het Nieuws van de Dag voor Nederlandsch-IndiĂŤ (Indies Newspaper) Handelsvereeniging Amsterdam (Trade Association Amsterdam) Indo-Europees Verbond (Indo-European Union) Javasuiker Werkgeversbond (Java Sugar Employers Union) Koninklijk Nederlandsch-Indische Leger (Royal Netherlands Indies Army) Koning Willem III School (Government-run High School)

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KWS LBD NHM NIHB NILM NIVAS OTHC PEB PHS PKI PSI RHS S.E.M. THB THHK THS Delft U.M.S. VJPS VOC

Koningin Wilhelmina School (Government-run High School) Luchtbeschermingsdienst (Air Defense Service) Nederlandsche Handel-Maatschappij (Netherlands Trading Society) Nederlandsch Indische Handelsbank (Netherlands Indies Commercial Bank) Nederlandsch-Indische Landbouw-Maatschappij (Netherlands Indies Agricultural Society) Nederlandsche Vereeniging voor de Afzet van Suiker (Netherlands Association for the Sale of Sugar) Oei Tiong Ham Concern Politiek-Economische Bond (Political-Economic Union) Prins Hendrik School (Government-run High School) Partai Komunis Indonesia (Communist Party of Indonesia) Partai Sosialis Indonesia (Socialist Party of Indonesia) Rechtshoogeschool (Law College, Graduate School of Law, Batavia) Solosche Electriciteits-Maatschappij (Solo Electricity Society) Technische Hoogeschool Bandung (Graduate School of Technology, Bandung) Tiong Hwa Hwee Koan (Chinese Association) Technische Hoogeschool Delft (Graduate School of Technology, Delft) Chinese football club in Batavia Vereenigde Javasuiker Producenten (United Java Sugar Producers) Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie (United East Indies Company)

GLOSSARY AND ABBREVATIONS

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Cover of album no.16 from the Kwee photo collection

Kodascopie projector and ďŹ lm camera

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Introduction

This book is based upon a unique private collection of photographs and home movies of one Peranakan Chinese elite family, the Kwee family from Ciledug, owners of the sugar factory Djatipiring. Its aim is to reveal the private lives of the modern Peranakan Chinese elite in colonial Java and ask to what extent ideas about progress, development, and “the modern” have affected their worldview and life-styles. This wonderful collection makes it possible to go beyond the public eye and get an inside glimpse into the changing world of a wealthy Peranakan Chinese family as it moved forward in the modernizing landscape of Java. Early in the twentieth century, the Kwee family represented a new generation of “enlightened,” ambitious and change-oriented Peranakan Chinese elites, known as the kaum muda bangsa Tjina (Young Chinese).1 This younger generation pursued Western-style modernity and, at the same time, re-invented their Chinese identity. Their ambitions were part and parcel of a larger (global) movement, in which discourses on enlightenment and modernity gained new meaning, and all over the world (from Meiji Japan to the Ottoman Empire and from Imperial China to Czarist Russia) new technologies and new communication channels challenged the traditional strongholds of feudal society. From newspaper sources we know that by the late nineteenth century the Peranakan Chinese elite, just as the Javanese kaum muda, started to appear in the streets of Java’s major cities in Western-style outﬁts publicly showing their progressive ideas.2 We also have the wonderful biographical accounts of Madame Wellington Koo, daughter of the “Sugar King” Oei Tiong Ham, the wealthiest Chinese in colonial Southeast Asia at the time, about the luxurious life she and her family lived in Java.3 In beautiful detail, she describes how her father meticulously dresses up before leaving his villa for his daily tour around Semarang. Unfortunately, Madame Wellington Koo, who was a representative of the modern Peranakan Chinese elite, only included some formal studio photographs in her biography, so we can only guess to what extent Western modernity was incorporated into their private family sphere. The other well-known biographies of Queeny Chang, Anny Tan, and, more recently, of An Utari Subidjo (Tan Sian Nio) also contain very few images of their daily life in the Indies.4 In these insightful biographies, pre-war family life is also captured in several formal studio portraits. In the studio photographs of the Chinese kaum muda, we see the men wearing a three-piece jacket, hat, pocket-watch, and shiny leather-shoes, while their pigtail is INTRODUC TION

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carefully covered. The women wear Western frocks, shoes, white socks, wrist-watches, and have a decorative ribbon in their hair. According to Jean Gelman Taylor studio photographs were choreographed events that established the social identity of the persons depicted, placed them in historical context, and linked the wearer to his own and wider community. At the same time these commissioned photographs make a statement about the wearer’s moral, religious, and political standpoints.5 The studio photographs, however, essentially show a “staged” or “performed” modernity, and circulated mainly within family circles and businesses networks as visiting cards. They say little about how modernity was incorporated in the private sphere of the modern Peranakan Chinese elite. Because of the lack of private visual materials and snapshots of daily family life, the private domain of the Chinese kaum muda remained unknown territory not only in terms of their life-styles but also in how they coped with the customs and etiquette of traditional Peranakan Chinese elite society.6 The absence of private visual materials made by the modern Peranakan Chinese elite on their own lives in the Indies had other major consequences as well, namely that the Western portrayal of the Chinese in colonial Southeast Asia and the Indies remained rather stereotyped. This Western image falls generally into two broad categories. The first category is that of the lower-class Totok Chinese, the dispossessed and the poor, exemplified in the image of the coolie, the rickshaw-man, and the opium addict. The second category of images present the wealthy traditional Chinese elite, and view them as bearers of an exotic and essentialist “Peranakan Chinese” culture, as exemplified in the complex architectural designs of temples and luxurious living compounds and the colorful robes of the wealthy tycoons and office-holders, for instance. These timehonored stereotypes entered the Western imageries in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through picture postcards and illustrated magazines, this, at the time the Qing Empire began to collapse and Western imperialism was spreading its formal control over large parts of the Asian region.7 The messages these images conveyed were powerful and long-lasting, and underscored Western feelings of superiority and racist attitudes. They argued that Western civilization and its representative “agents of change” in Asia brought modernity and progress to the region, and transformed the traditional, static, and self-contained local kingdoms and sultanates in the Malayan archipelago into dynamic centers of commerce, trade, and industry. During the subsequent decades these stereotyped images remained part of the Western view of the ethnic Chinese in colonial Southeast Asia. These Western images shared one theme in common. None of them visualized the Chinese as “carriers of modernity” or as “agents of change.” Such a representation apparently did not fit into the public consciousness and general research paradigms, in which change, progress, and modernity were mainly attributed to Western presence in the region. These stereotyped images also appear in the numerous books with photographic impressions of the Indies that have been published over the past decades. Many of 14

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these books are based on the rich photo collections of the kitlv/Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies in Leiden, and the former Royal Tropical Institute (Koninklijk Instituut voor de Tropen, kit) in Amsterdam.8 In these collections Indo-European albums, photos of Western (studio) photographers, and Dutch colonial institutions are predominant. The collections contain only a few Indies Chinese photo albums. As a result the modern Peranakan Chinese are rarely to be seen in these illustrative works.9 Even in the widely acclaimed photo books of Rob Nieuwenhuys, the Chinese – except for a few photographs – are mostly absent.10 Because these photo books are drawn from Indo-European collections, they focus mainly on the dynamic between European and native society.11 The images provide a European perspective and stress the Dutch role(s) in the modern development of state and society in the Dutch colony. The Chinese are generally nameless and seem to have no identity. They are denoted as: “a Chinese trader in Yogyakarta,” “a Chinese woman,” or “a Chinese coolie,” and figure as backdrops in an Indo-European officialdom that wanted to develop and modernize the Netherlands East Indies: the “colonial project,” as Van Doorn aptly described it.12 Over the past few decades, historians of Asia have begun to question these premises, stressing the important roles of overseas Chinese (business) communities in the modern economic development of colonial Southeast Asia, and the significant contributions they made in the cultural and political realms. But despite these powerful new insights, the images of the Peranakan Chinese elite remain rather stereotyped and focus mainly on the traditional Peranakan elites and their traditional culture, rather than on the modern and progressive Peranakan elites and their modern hybrid culture that emerged at the beginning of the twentieth century. The Kwee family photo albums and home-movie materials offer the chance to redress the balance and thereby present a new perspective on the social dynamics of late-colonial Java.

A stroke of luck As has been said, unlike Indo-European and European family albums, very few Chinese-Indonesian private photo albums have reached the public eye. There are several reasons for this. In the ﬁrst place, it should be noted that, in general, family photo albums and ﬁlms (home movies) belong to the private realm. They are meant for the inner family circle to be viewed in the comfortable sphere of the family. There is great reluctance to bring them out in the open and have them viewed by a public audience, the more so since that public has rarely shown any interest in their daily life experiences in the Indies. It is only in the past two decades or so that historians have begun to research the experiences of the Dutch-oriented Chinese-Indonesian population groups that had undergone the troublesome decolonization processes in Asia and hence actively started searching for visual materials that could be used for research purposes. Second, during the Japanese military occupation and the turbulence of the Indonesian Revolution, many family photo albums were deliberately destroyed. Upon the return INTRODUC TION

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of the Dutch, one did not wish to be accused of “collaboration” with the Japanese by the Dutch forces, and, at the time of the Indonesian struggle for independence, it was safer to hide visual evidence of their close connection with the Dutch colonial regime.13 And, finally, during their forced and hasty departure from the independent Republic of Indonesia, it was most often simply not possible to bring family photo albums nor home-movie materials out of the country.14 It was therefore a stroke of luck that about ten years ago after two years of networking in Indonesia, Singapore, and the Netherlands, we met the Kwee family from The Hague. Mr. Kwee Kiem Han (1926) informed us that his father Kwee Zwan Liang (1896-1959), head of the laboratory of the sugar factory Djatipiring, had been a keen photographer and an enthusiastic home-movie maker throughout his life, and that his photographs and films had survived the turbulent regime changes in Indonesia. He was delighted to show us the albums and some film fragments, but wondered whether they would be of any interest since they were “merely family images.”

Kwee Zwan Liang with daughter Evie and his cameras, dp, October 1927. This photograph was taken by his brother Kwee Zwan Ho

In seeing and discussing the photo albums and the film fragments with Mr. and Mrs. Kwee Kiem Han, it soon became clear that the collection was far richer than we had anticipated. In his films, Kwee Zwan Liang not only portrayed the social life of his immediate family but, throughout the period 1927-1939, aptly brought to his lens a wide range of images of pre-war Java, such as urban life in the major Java cities, official 16

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ceremonies, celebrations and festivities in colonial Java, popular leisure activities and sports of the European elite,15 and all aspects of their sugar factory Djatipiring. During the next few months, we selected several fragments of the original films and did a theater screening of them at the retrospective “All is well in the colony: The Netherlands Indies on film, 1912-1942” at the Nederlands Filmmuseum.16 The audience reacted with amazement and excitement. For most spectators, it was the first time seeing real “moving” pictures of wealthy Chinese in their own environment in colonial Indonesia. Many scholars present acknowledged that these images would force them to rethink their views of social life in pre-war Java and that of Peranakan elite life in particular.17

A unique visual record The photographs and home movies show that the Kwee belonged to the cabang atas, the upper class of Peranakan Chinese society in colonial Java – an extended group of wealthy and status-minded Peranakan families that once controlled the opium farms, had extensive interests in the Java sugar-industry, had produced Chinese officers for generations, and who from the early twentieth century onwards were increasingly attracted to Western (Dutch) education, Western value-systems, and, some of them, to Christianity. Most members within the Kwee family network belonged to the Chung Hua Hui (cch), the Dutch-oriented political party established in Semarang in 1928, which was backed by the powerful Oei Tiong Ham Concern. Their wealth and luxurious life-styles were envied by many other Chinese of Java, especially the lower and middle classes, and scorned by large parts of the Javanese intelligentsia. The Kwee private photos and home movies therefore do not tell the story of the Peranakan Chinese in colonial Indonesia. On the contrary, these images merely tell us something about the lives and works of this elite Peranakan family, their extensive social networks, and their place in colonial society as they saw it. From these visual materials, we learn that the Kwee family was fascinated by “family,” “status,” and “modernity,” and that they saw themselves as carriers of modern technology, modern ideas, and modern fashion. The lenses of Kwee Zwan Liang captured a “modernizing Java,” a world in motion, a dynamic world in which technological progress rapidly changed the lives of Java’s populations. There are only a few stereotyped images of the “Beautiful Indies” (Mooi Indie) type. For Kwee Zwan Liang, his brother-in-law Han Tiauw Bing, and his younger brother Kwee Zwang Ho, both of whom also took to photography and film-making, Java’s landscape and traditional culture were part of their natural surroundings and well known. What they marveled at was the unknown they encountered, and it was these novel aspects of modern life they wanted to preserve for the future. The Kwee photo albums therefore do not represent the practice of amateur photography, as discussed by Karen Strassler in her Refracted Visions. According to Strassler, amateurs used cameras to transform the people and topography of the Indies into objects of aesthetic contemplation, and defined INTRODUC TION

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their practice against the studio photographer and the family “snap-shooter.”18 Kwee Zwan Liang seemed to have taken a different position in the world of Peranakan Chinese amateur photographers in late colonial Java. He was definitely an amateur and not a studio-photographer, but he was more than a “mere family snap-shooter.” However, rather than emphasizing an aesthetic experience or producing “art” (which at times he tried, of course),19 he wanted to create for his family a visual documentary of the modern world they lived in. One of the most interesting features of the Kwee private albums is that women return to the scene. As is well-known in most studies on Chinese communities in pre-war Southeast Asia, because of the focus on commerce and trade, Chinese women somehow disappear, and their roles are more or less marginalized. In the private photos and films of Kwee Zwan Liang, the women take center-stage, which leads us to research their roles within the family and the outside world in detail. Compared to other family photo albums from the Netherlands East Indies, the Kwee family collection is also unique in other aspects. Most of the family albums we know were made by colonial officials or prominent Indo-European and European entrepreneurs. These albums give impressionistic views of a relatively short period of time. The Kwee family collection, however, contains photos of the lives and works of three generations. The first photos date from the late nineteenth century, and the most recent ones from the mid-twentieth century. In total there are over 24 albums with more than 2,000 photographs dealing with their life in the Indies, which probably makes it the largest private photo collection of pre-war Java in the world. We indeed see Kwee family members as infants and youngsters, see them grow up, go to school, marry, start families of their own, and pass away. The numerous photos of Kwee Zwan Lwan (18911947), managing-director of the sugar factory Djatipiring and elder brother of Kwee Zwan Liang, attest to this. Photos from 1914 show him as a handsome young man standing proudly next to his cousin’s Fiat car. Going through the collection, we see him growing older and gaining weight; his increasing body weight might have fitted his stature as director but apparently did no good to his health. Kwee Zwan Lwan died in 1947 at the age of 56, and the photos of his burial and grave are also placed in the collection. This photographic succession of personal life-histories makes the Kwee collection absolutely unique. As far as we know, there are no other family photo albums from the Indies that show the life of one family so systematically and for such a prolonged period of time.

Who took the photographs in the Kwee photo albums? In many of the photographs, we see Kwee Zwan Liang himself. He obviously did not take these pictures himself. When he is accompanied by family-members on a touristic trip or working at the Djatipiring factory, we can assume that his photo was taken by a relative. We know that his brother Kwee Zwan Ho, brother-in-law Han Tiauw Bing, and other family members also enjoyed photography. Some of their photographs also 18

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Taking pictures of each other. At the right: Kwee Zwan Ho standing opposite his wife Betty Tan (c), Roos Liem Hwat Nio – the wife of Kwee Zwan Liang (l). Third person is unknown. dp, 1925

“Pose!” Han Tiauw Bing, brother-in-law of Kwee

“The photographer.” Kwee Zwan Liang with his

Zwan Liang, with a single-reﬂex camera. Kwee Lie

Kodak folding camera, Lawang, August 1936

Siok Nio (Evie) (l), Roos Liem Hwat Nio and two nieces, South Semeru, East Java, 1937

ended up in Kwee Zwan Liang’s albums. But there are quite a few images, especially from the 1910s and early 1920s, when he is travelling alone with his wife and his eldest daughter, accompanied only by the family’s driver-mechanic and babu. These photos were clearly shot by his driver-mechanic. There are also photos included from the Netherlands, which were sent to him by his nephew Eddy Kwee, as well as numerous studio-photographs. In addition, we ﬁnd picture postcards from places like Singapore, Paris, London, and Australia. The Kwee Family photo albums therefore present a variety of visual images, which Kwee Zwan Liang found worthwhile preserving. INTRODUC TION

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Researching the Kwee family photo albums In researching and interpreting the Kwee family photo albums, we benefitted greatly from the works of Abidin Kusno, Jean Gelman Taylor, Karen Strassler, Elsbeth LocherScholten, and others. Kusno’s sophisticated analysis of one of the Kwee family photo albums in his Visual Cultures of the Ethnic Chinese in Indonesia was a great source of inspiration.20 Particularly his suggestion to look at the juxtaposition of photographs, rather than focus on one photograph, proved indispensable. It enabled us to discover hidden meanings in the Kwee photo album, especially regarding the Chinese identity of the family and the “vacation-like” images covering the period of conflict, war, and revolution in the 1930s-1940s. Gelman Taylor’s insightful analysis of commissioned family photographs (what is represented and what is hidden?) forced us to reconsider our original ideas about similar portraits in the Kwee and Khoe albums.21 Several essays in Women and the Colonial State by Locher-Scholten were indispensable in analyzing the households of the Kwee families, the role of Kwee women in European elite society, as well as their relations with domestic servants.22 From the start of the project, we wanted to get a clear picture of the persons who appeared in the Kwee family collection so as to adequately address the richness of the material offered. Why was he or she included in the Kwee photo albums, what did he or she do for a living, what was his or her relationship to the Kwee family? They were obviously important to Kwee Zwan Liang. We hoped that by identifying the persons depicted, including their roles and position in society, we would be able to reconstruct the Kwee family network and research in detail what the significance of such a Peranakan Chinese elite family network was in the socioeconomic and cultural development of late-colonial Java. Since many persons portrayed in the Kwee collection were, and are still alive and residing in the Netherlands, we decided to interview as many of them as possible and draw up their life histories. Their stories completed and colored the pictures, adding additional meaning to what is portrayed. The interviews were often conducted with photographs on the table. A big advantage of the Kwee photo collection is that names of persons portrayed and places visited are often written in the margin, making them an excellent and easily accessible interview item. However, trying to figure out all names and identities, the family connections, the locations they visited during their travels over Java, was at times quite difficult – even for the interviewees themselves – but made this research a special and rewarding undertaking.23 As to the dates of birth and death, and the names of the persons within the extensive networks of the Kwee family, we benefitted greatly from the genealogical data provided by www.geni.com. Over the past few years, this website has become an indispensable tool for anyone interested in family genealogies. Work-related data, as well as information on social and cultural activities of family members within the Kwee social networks, were mostly taken from the Indies newspapers available through Delpher on the website of the National Library of the Nether20

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lands.24 These newspapers provide a wealth of data on Chinese life in the Indies, which is not available in the Dutch colonial archives in The Hague. An in-depth study of these materials made it possible to contextualize the visual heritage materials of the Kwee family and disclose important new aspects of modern Peranakan Chinese life in latecolonial Java.

Themes and topics of the book This book is ﬁrst of all a visual history of the Kwee family from Ciledug. The photo albums and home movies focus in particular on the lives of Kwee Zwan Liang, his wife Roos Liem Hwat Nio, and their three children: daughter Kwee Lie Siok Nio (Evie), and sons Kwee Kiem Han (Han) and Kwee Kiem King (King).

Bottom from left to right: Roos Liem Hwat Nio, Kwee Kiem King, Kwee Zwan Liang; top from left to right: Kwee Lie Siok Nio, Kwee Kiem Han (DP=Sugar Factory Djatipiring)

One could argue that the central figure of the photo albums is Roos and that Kwee Zwan Liang compiled the photo albums specifically for his wife. She is the focal point, and, through his lenses, she shares her life history with the rest of the family and close friends. In the earliest photo of Kwee Zwan Liang (1902), he is six years old, and the final photos show him in 1956 when he is 59 years old with the camera still at hand.

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At a wedding reception, Bandung, 7 July 1956 < Kwee Zwan Liang (c), his younger brother Kwee Zwan Ho (l) and the house-boy, Cirebon, 1902

These ﬁve decades cover a period of immense changes for the Kwee family of Ciledug and the world they lived in. In 1902, they were masters of their own universe, which centered around their estate and the sugar factory Djatipiring. By 1956, their universe had shrunken to an elite city-ward in Bandung and was dependent upon policies beyond their control. These tremendous changes, which affected all population groups of the former Dutch colony, are well captured in the succession of photos in the albums. Unlike the Dutch and Eurasians who would write extensive letters to their relatives in the Netherlands, the Kwee family members left very few written documents that could be used.25 The themes and topics in this book were therefore chosen on the basis of the visual materials available. The photo albums and home movies have recurrent topics, which Kwee Zwan Liang found important to show. It is these topics we have made central in order to tell his story, and show the way he viewed the life and place of his family in the modernizing world of colonial Java. These various topics can be lumped together under the three above-mentioned themes: “family,” “status,” and “modernity.” We did not organize the themes on rigid theoretical grounds, nor did we attempt to cover all aspects related to these issues. We were interested in what family meant to them, and who they formed strategic marriage alliances with, and why. To what extent did these marriage alliances affect their status in society, and how were these alliances maintained? What was the role of women in modern Peranakan Chinese elite families? How did the Kwee family express their social status in colonial society, and how did the symbols of status and power change overtime? What did modernity look like in 22

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both their private life and in the public sphere? Did modernity affect their traditional Chinese beliefs and ceremonial practices vis-à-vis their ancestors? How did they as members of the Peranakan Chinese elite manage their own sugar factory? How was the relation with the Javanese factory personnel and domestic servants visualized? Did this differ from European images and attitudes towards their personnel? In focusing on, and researching these and other questions, the book turned out to become much more than a visual impression of the daily life of a modern Peranakan Chinese elite family. As the research and writing progressed, we noticed, much to our own surprise, that we were actually working on a Peranakan Chinese elite version of Java’s social history. Looking through Kwee Zwan Liang’s lenses, and by combining the oral history interviews and scarce personal written notes with the Indies newspaper materials, a social dynamic in late colonial Java emerged that we failed to see until we delved into the Kwee family photo albums.

Notes 1

Didi Kwartanada, “Bangsawan prampoean. Enlightened Peranakan Chinese women from early 20th

century Java,” Wacana, vol. 18, no. 2 (2017), pp. 422-454; Karen Strassler “Modelling Modernity. Ethnic Chinese photography in the ethical era,” in Susie Protschky, (ed.), Photography, Modernity and the Governed in Late-colonial Indonesia (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2015), pp. 196-197. 2

Kees van Dijk, “Sarongs, jubbahs, and trousers. Appearance as a means of distinction and discrim-

ination” in: Henk Schulte Nordholt, (ed.) Outward Appearances. Dressing state and society in Indonesia (Leiden: kitlv Press, 1997), pp.58-59. 3

Madame Wellington Koo, No Feast lasts Forever (New York: Quadrangle/The New York Times Book

Co., 1975). The Indonesian version of the book, under the title Kisah Tragis Oei Hui Lan. Putri orang terkaya di Indonesia by Agnes Davonar, appeared in 2011, and immediately became a bestseller in the country. In April 2017, Gramedia released a digital version of the work. In her earlier autobiography, Hui-Lan Koo [Madame Wellington Koo] An autobiography as told to Mary van Rensselaer Thayer (New York: Dial Press, 1943), there are no photographs at all. 4

Queeny Chang, Memories of a Nonya (Singapore: Marshall Cavendish International (Asia) Private

Limited, 2016. Originally published in 1981); Leonard Blussé, Anny Tan. Een vrouwenleven in Indonesië, Nederland en China (Amsterdam: Rainbow Paperbacks, 2000); Stuart Pearson, Bittersweet. The Memoir of a Chinese Indonesian Family in the Twentieth Century (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2008). 5

O.c. Jean Gelman Taylor, “Costume and gender in colonial Java, 1880-1942” in Schulte Nordholt,

Outward Appearances p. 87. 6

Kwartanada, “Bangsawan prampoean,” p. 422.

See, for example, the wonderful selection of postcards by Chen Ling, Wang Jia Nana, and Cai Xiao

Lin, (eds.), China’s Late Qing Period Illustrated by Postcards, 1898-1908 (Hong Kong: Chung Hwa Book, 2005). These postcards come from the collection of Wang Jia Nan and Can Xiao Lin, and are based upon original photographs made by foreign residents in China. 8

These collections have recently been brought together in the Asian Library of Leiden University.

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See, for example, Peter Boomgaard and Janneke van Dijk, Het Indië Boek (Zwolle: Uitgeverij

Waanders b.v. 2001); Leo Haks and Steven Wachlin, Indonesië: 500 oude prentbriefkaarten (Rijswijk: Uitgeverij Elmar B.V., n.d.), original English edition Indonesia 500 Early Postcards (Singapore: Editions Didier Millet, n.d.); Liesbeth Ouwehand Herinneringen in Beeld: fotoalbums uit Nederlands-Indië (Leiden: kitlv Press, 2009); Anneke Groeneveld, et al., Toekang Potret. 100 jaar fotograﬁe in NederlandsIndië (Amsterdam: Fragment, 1989); Gerrit Knaap Cephas, Yogyakarta: Photography in the service of the Sultan (Leiden: kitlv Press, 1999). 10

Rob Nieuwenhuys, Baren en oudgasten. Tempo doeloe-een verzonken wereld. Fotograﬁsche documenten

uit het oude Indië 1870-1920 (Amsterdam: Em. Querido’s Uitgeverij B.V., 1981); Met vreemde ogen. Tempo doeloe-een verzonken wereld. Fotografische documenten uit het oude Indië 1870-1920 (Amsterdam: Em. Querido’s Uitgeverij B.V., 1988). Only in Met vreemde ogen, pp. 165-179, did we fi nd photographs of Chinese. These photos too confi rm the stereotyped image of the traditional Peranakan Chinese tycoon and the poor Totok Chinese. 11

In their introduction to Het Indië Boek (2001) Boomgaard and Van Dijk caution the reader that the

photos they selected present a “Dutch” perspective, because these photos were made by Dutch photographers and the subjects chosen focus mainly on the interaction between the native population and the Dutch. 12

J.A.A. van Doorn, De Laatste Eeuw van Indië. Ontwikkeling en ondergang van een koloniaal project

(Amsterdam: Ooievaar, 1996). 13

In one interview with a member of the Kwee family, it was explicitly stated that, by the end of the

war, they were warned by a Japanese military ofﬁcer, who was their neighbor and who they were on friendly terms with, to destroy all photos in which he was portrayed together with the Kwee family. 14

An illustrative project regarding this matter is Foto zoekt familie (Photo seeks family) of the for-

mer Royal Tropical Institute (kit). When they were interned, Dutch Indies families had to hand in all private belongings to the Japanese camp ofﬁcers, including albums. After the war, the Red Cross transferred loads of these personal documents to the Netherlands, where they were kept for years in the archives of the kit. This institute now wishes to connect these albums with their rightful owners or heirs. See www.fotozoektfamilie.nl. 15

In the Netherlands East Indies, the population was legally divided into Europeans, Foreign Orien-

tals, and Natives. Most Chinese (Peranakan and Totok) were classiﬁed as Foreign Orientals. However, a minority of wealthy Dutch-educated Peranakan Chinese elites, such as the Kwee family and their relatives, held European status, just like the Japanese and Thai. In this book, when talking about the “European elite,” we mean this inclusive category and not just persons coming from and born in Europe. 16

The Dutch title of the retrospective was “Van de Kolonie niets dan goeds. Nederlands-Indië in

Beeld 1912-1942,” which featured the rich collection of the Nederlands Filmmuseum on pre-war Indonesia of (mostly) Dutch feature fi lms, documentaries, and home movies. It was only for the second time since 1949 that these fi lms were shown to a public audience. The unique exhibition ran for almost two months and attracted large crowds. For more information see www.fi lmmuseum.nl/nederlandsindie. The Kwee home-movie collection, some 16 hours of fi lm, is currently being held by the eye Film Museum. See www.eyefi lm.nl 24

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17 Subsequent screenings in the Netherlands, Canada, Japan, and Singapore, both for academic and non-academic audiences, triggered similar reactions: a unique and timely new resource for the study of Peranakan elite life and the social history of colonial Java. In Singapore, fragments of the Kwee fi lms were presented at the launch of the exhibition “Chinese More or Less” of the Chinese Heritage Centre, where they still attract interested audiences. The fi lms featured prominently in the video installation “Looming Fire-Stories from the Dutch East Indies, 1900-1940” by media-artist and independent fi lmmaker Péter Forgács, which ran in the eye Film Museum in October-November 2013. 18

Karen Strassler, Refracted Visions. Popular Photography and National Modernity in Java (Duke Uni-

versity Press, 2010), pp. 35-38. 19

Kwee Zwan Liang experimented, for example, with night photography, sometimes achieving

remarkably good results. He also tried color photography but apparently was not satisﬁed with his products, since there is only one color photo in the whole collection. In addition, he produced numerous excellent photographs of his elder brother’s famous orchids and blooming cactuses, and of course shot pictures of the touristic landscapes they visited. 20

Abidin Kusno, Visual Cultures of the Ethnic Chinese in Indonesia (London/New York: Rowman & Lit-

tleﬁeld, 2016), pp. 109-134. 21

Jean Gelman Taylor, “Costume and gender,” in: Schulte Nordholt Outward Appearances, pp. 85-116.

Elsbeth Locher-Scholten, Women and the Colonial State. Essays on Gender and Modernity in the Neth-

erlands Indies, 1900-1942 (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2000). 23

A particularly useful tool to discover the locations of the numerous small and touristic places they

visited in Java’s interior is the beautiful Autowegen-Atlas: Java-Madoera-Bali (Bandoeng: Uitgave A.C. Nix & Co., not dated, probably around 1935). This guide not only provides the roads of the islands but also contains the exact locations of the numerous agro-industrial estates, as well as hundreds of colorful advertisements of luxurious hotels and resorts, car dealers, insurance companies, art shops, etc. 24

www.delpher.nl

See, for example, Fridus Steijlen & Erik Willems, Met ons is alles goed. Brieven en ﬁlms uit Neder-

lands-Indië van de familie Kuyck (Zutphen: Walburg Pers, 2008). It was only in the ﬁ nal writing stage that we acquired some written documents of the women protagonists in our study. These documents have only partly been used.

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The Kwee family compound in Ciledug, circa 1931. Kwee Keng Liem and his wife lived in the central buildings. Kwee Zwan Hong had his living quarters at the right side of the compound (barely visible)

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Chapter 1

The Kwee family of Ciledug Experiencing modernity

The Kwee family of Ciledug descended from Kwee Giok San, who was born in Lungtzi, a small town near Zhangzhou (Fukien). In the 1820s, Giok San traveled to the Nanyang (South Seas) and by 1840 arrived in Central Java, where he established himself as a trader in Ciledug, a small town east of Cirebon on Java’s northern coast. The Cirebon Residency had a large Peranakan Chinese community at the time, many of whom adhered to Islam, and whose leaders were closely connected to the Sultanates’ royal courts.1 The town itself was a major port-city and had, since the fifteenth century, entertained close trade relations with southern China.2 When Kwee Giok San settled in the region, the Dutch colonial government was busying itself implementing the Cultivation System (1830-1870), whereby the government forced the Javanese population to reserve a portion of their agricultural lands for the production of export crops (mainly coffee, tobacco, indigo, and sugar). To develop the System, the colonial rulers tried to control land and labor, and therefore needed the cooperation of the local aristocracy, village headmen, and the local sugar manufacturers. As elsewhere in Java, the sugar industry of Cirebon had been pioneered by Chinese millers. In the Residency, besides several smaller Chinese sugar mills, the modern Loewoenggadjah sugar factory in the Sindang Laut district was owned by Tan Tiang Keng (1825-1884), who also co-owned the Tjiledoek factory in the same district. His paternal uncle Tan Phan Long, who probably had established the Loewoenggadjah factory in 1828, became the first appointed capitan Cina of Cirebon, whereas another uncle Tan Pin Long was luitenant of Batavia.3 In 1848 Tan Tiang Keng himself was appointed luitenant Cina of Cirebon. Becoming a Chinese officer was an important position within the Dutch colonial administration. The Chinese officer system (Chineesch Bestuur or Chinese Administration) was introduced by the voc (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie or Dutch East India Company) in 1619 and was tasked with administering, taxing, and controlling the various Chinese communities in Java, and with implementing voc policies. The members of the Chinese Administration were given military ranks – lieutenant, captain, or major. Under the voc regime, the Chinese captain or major was directly subordinate to the Governor-General but, following the establishment of the Netherlands Indies colonial administration in 1820, was placed under the Dutch regional authority with the captain or major directly accountable to the Dutch colonial resident.4 The Chinese came to live in specified city quarters, while their movement was curtailed through the pass system (passenstelsel). Within these city wards, social and economic life was THE K WEE FAMILY OF CILEDUG

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organized along clan afﬁliations and family ties, including religious, business, and welfare associations. As will be shown, over the ensuing decades the Kwee and Tan formed close family ties and, through subsequent appointments as Chinese ofﬁcers, came to dominate Chinese sugar interests in Cirebon Regency.

The strategic alliance between the Kwee and Tan families Little is known about Kwee Giok San but he apparently allied himself with the Tan family and became involved in the sugar business. He married Oei Tjoen Nio, who seemed to have been a sister of the wife of Tan Kien Lien (Tan Kim Lin), the father of Tan Tiang Keng.5 By the mid-1860s, he had acquired sufficient capital to buy his own factory. During that time the Cultivation System had come under severe criticism from the public in the Netherlands, because it had led to extreme poverty, starvation, and high mortality rates among the Javanese population. There was enormous pressure upon the Dutch government to abolish the system and to allow private entrepreneurs to take over the exploitation of Java’s agricultural resources. Several owners of sugar factories in Cirebon Residency, who had made big money under a government sugar contract, thereupon decided to offer their factories for sale. In 1866-67 this also happened with the Djatipiring sugar factory in the Ciledug district, which was co-owned by J. Cézard & Co. and G.M.W. Zuur.6 It took some time, however, before the regulations under the new Liberal Regime were affected. But in August 1873, after intensive negotiations with the interested parties involved, Kwee Giok San’s second son, Kwee Boen Pien (?-1884), was able to buy the sugar factory Djatipiring. Becoming owner of a sugar factory meant wealth and power, and, in October 1874, Kwee Boen Pien was inaugurated as luitenant Cina of the districts Sindanglaut and Losari/Ciledug.7 A year before, in 1873, Tan Kiang Keng had been promoted to capitan-titular of Cirebon. Until 1873, Cirebon Residency counted only two Chinese officers for Cirebon Regency (a lieutenant and a captain), but, with the gradual abolishment of the Cultivation System after 1870, the number of Chinese migrants rose significantly, and the colonial government decided to restructure the Chinese administration in the regency. It appointed Luitenant Oei Tiam Seng of Jamblang for the three districts west and northwest of Cirebon city (Plumbon, Palimanan, and Gegesik-Lor), Luitenant Kwee Boen Pien of Ciledug for the two districts south and southeast of the city (Sindanglaut and Losari), and The Tjiauw Tjay as the second luitenant of Cirebon. Each of the luitenants was responsible for administrating the Chinese communities in their districts, and all of them worked under Capitan-titular Tan Kiang Keng of Cirebon. The installation of these three luitenants marked the formation of four influential family clans in Cirebon, namely the Tan and The families in Cirebon itself, the Oei (Oey) family in Jamblang, and the Kwee family in Ciledug.8 In 1884, both Tan Kiang Keng and Kwee Boen Pien died. The former was succeeded by his eldest son Tan Tjin Kie, who took over the family business and sugar factories and, two years earlier, had been appointed luitenant Cina of Cirebon. Kwee Keng Liem 28

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(1850-1924), the second son of Kwee Boen Pien, took over the Djatipiring sugar factory and succeeded his father as luitenant Cina of the Singdanglaut and Losari districts.9 His nephew, Kwee Keng Eng, son of his paternal uncle Kwee Ban Hok, was in that same year appointed as luitenant Cina of Cirebon and owned the Kalitandjoeng sugar factory.10 After his retirement and honorable discharge from the government office in 1908, Kwee Keng Liem was appointed luitenant-titular, while his eldest son Kwee Zwan Hong succeeded him as luitenant of Ciledug. Tan Hin Go, the first-born son of Tan Tjin Kie, held the office of luitenant of Cirebon from 1909 until 1913, whereas Tan Tjin Kie himself became Major-titular of Cirebon (1913-1919).11 After his father’s death in 1924, Kwee Zwan Hong was promoted to capitan-titular of Sindanglaut-Losari, and continued to live in the family residence in Ciledug and at the family’s estate in Winaon, Cirebon town.

Family shrine, Kwee Zwan Hong on the right, Ciledug, circa 1931

Securing the family’s fortunes: The two worlds of Kwee Keng Liem Kwee Keng Liem had two wives. His ﬁrst wife, Tjoa Swie Lan Nio, gave birth to one son, Kwee Zwan Hong (1869-1955), and two daughters, Kwee Siang Nio and Kwee Ay Lien. These children received a Chinese-Javanese education and upbringing. Tjoa Swie Lan Nio was the cousin of Major-titular Tan Tjin Kie and was raised in the shadow of the Sultanates’ courts. The Winaon district in the center of Cirebon, where Kwee Keng Liem owned a large estate that, after his death in 1924, was taken over by Kwee THE K WEE FAMILY OF CILEDUG

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Zwan Hong, was located next to the Kraton Kanoman, and had at its northeastern end the Chinese cemetery. The Tan family maintained close relations with the Cirebon Sultanates and was part of the entourage of the palaces. As of old, the Peranakan Chinese elites from Cirebon, sugar mill owners and merchants alike, held important positions at the kraton, sometimes married into the high and lower aristocracy, and managed to obtain all kinds of privileges. Capitan Tan Tiang Keng and Major-titular Tan Tjin Kie were aficionados of Javanese arts and, competing with the Dutch colonizer to show their status and generosity, supported topeng, wayang, and gamelan.12 In doing so, they helped the Islamic rulers to perform their ceremonial duties, and thus uphold their status and prestige vis-à-vis the rural population. This support became the more urgent when the Dutch colonial government, in 1906, further curtailed the authority of the traditional aristocratic rulers over their city and lands by establishing the Cirebon Municipality. Under the colonial umbrella, the Tan and Kwee families, and – as we will see – other elite Peranakan Chinese families within their strategic networks, continued to maintain close and intimate ties with Java’s traditional aristocracy. The children of Kwee Keng Liem’s first wife grew up in a period when the Peranakan Chinese in the Indies were still required to wear Chinese dress and the Manchu pigtail. They lived in a compartmentalized colonial society, where all ethnic groups were expected to dress according to their place of origin and to live in designated city-wards. It was illegal to appear in public attired in any matter other than that of one’s ethnic group. Ethnic Chinese were even forbidden to speak Dutch among themselves.13 But, at the same time, the Dutch had created a social-economy in which this Peranakan Chinese elite could flourish economically, financially, and socially through the revenue farm system. The lucrative opium farms, and the minor farms such as the slaughterhouse, pawnshop, and pasar, were controlled by a small number of wealthy and powerful Peranakan Chinese elite families.14 These “privileges” were all taken from them by the late nineteenth century and assumed by the colonial state. Taxing people became a prerogative of the colonial administration.15 At the same time, the dismantling of the Cultivation System, the encroachment of the Dutch colonial regime on traditional power structures, and the large-scale entrance of metropolitan capital into Java’s sugar industry threatened to undermine the sugar fortunes of the Kwee family. Managing a modern sugar factory in the new Liberal era demanded a modern education, modern technical and administrative skills, and useful Western (Dutch) connections, all things the traditional Sino-Javanese milieu of Cirebon in which the family lived was unable to provide. These developments necessitated other directions in networking strategies. In the late 1880s, after his first wife, Tjoa Swie Lan Nio, had passed away, Kwee Keng Liem married Tan Hok Nio (1870-1951), who was the same age as his first son. She belonged to the Tan family of Batavia (Weltevreden) and Bekasi and grew up in the “enlightened” Peranakan Chinese milieu of the colonial capital. Her grandfather Tan Tiang Hoa was the brother of Tan Yoe Hoa (luitenant of Bekasi) and Tan Kong Hoa (luitenant of Batavia). Her father, Tan Wie Liong and his brothers owned the slaugh30

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terhouse farm in Gedong (Kedung) Gedeh near Krawang and ran small trading businesses.16 Through her grand-uncles and her grand-nephew, Tan Wie Siong, a major landlord and prominent public ﬁgure with extremely good relations in the highest colonial circles, she was acquainted with the modernist and reformist Peranakan Chinese environment of Batavia and took these ideas with her when she moved to Ciledug to live with Kwee Keng Liem.17 She bore him three sons and one daughter. All these children subsequently received a Dutch education and were raised with western values and customs, and, throughout their educational careers, the boys were prepared to take over the Djatipiring sugar factory.18

Educational paths For Kwee Keng Liem, providing a Dutch (Western) education for his children, who were all born in the 1890s, was quite difficult at the time, and only possible for wealthy and well-connected Chinese elites. Until the late nineteenth century, the Dutch colonial government had shown no interest in educating Chinese children in the Indies. Things began to change in 1868, when new guidelines for elementary education were developed and implemented in March 1872. These guidelines stipulated that “Natives and those with Native status should have access to European schools, ‘on the conditions set or to be set by the Governor-General.’” 19 Enrollment in the Europeesche Lagere School (European Primary School, els) was possible for Chinese children not older than eight years old and with a basic knowledge of the Dutch language.20 To acquire these basic Dutch language skills at such a young age, wealthy Peranakan Chinese would send their children as interns to a Dutch or Eurasian family, or hire a language tutor. The els had several classification systems according to the fees to be paid and the curriculum offered. Wealthy Chinese parents were obliged to pay the highest fees in order to be able to send their children to the First European Schools, which had the best educational system and the best teachers. The so-called Not-First European Schools had lower school fees, accepted charity pupils, and knowledge of the Dutch language was not required.21 Chinese could also enroll in the Dutch educational system if they had acquired European status. Such a status was hard to get, however, the more so since the high colonial administration as well as the Ministry of Colonies from the mid-nineteenth century onwards constantly discussed and adapted rules and regulations.22 After 1871, it became possible for Foreign Orientals, 90 percent of whom were Chinese, to be given European status on an individual basis by decree of the Governor-General.23 There were several requirements to become such “Staatsblad Europeans” (“Government Gazette Europeans”). Until 1894, it was necessary to speak and write the Dutch language, be able to live and work in European society, and be a Christian. In that year, however, the religious requirement was abandoned. Any person of sufficient means and status, having shown mastery of the Dutch language and living in European society, was eligible for European status.24 THE K WEE FAMILY OF CILEDUG

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From left to right: tutor, Kwee Zwan Lwan, Door Kwee Der Tjie, Kwee Zwan Ho (sitting in front), Kwee Zwan Liang (standing), unknown, Winaon, circa 1906. Der Tjie is wearing the so-called bébé, which was highly popular among European girls and young women in the ﬁrst decade of the twentieth century. Zwan Liang and the boy to his left are wearing the obligatory djas tutup, short white trousers and suspenders for junior pupils of the hbs

It is not known whether Kwee Keng Liem successfully submitted a request to the Governor-General to be equated with Europeans. His granddaughter remembered her grandfather as very much China-oriented, only speaking Chinese and some SinoMalay. Living in a small rural town like Ciledug with few Europeans to mingle with and little chances to learn the Dutch language, he would probably have failed to acquire European status. But, like many of his generation, Kwee Keng Liem and his wife were eager to provide a Dutch education and Western upbringing for their children in order for them to obtain the necessary skills to live in European society and learn the Dutch language. Therefore, their children were sent off to Batavia as intern residents with Dutch (or Eurasian) families, or Dutch (or Eurasian) language tutors were hired to come to the family residence in Winaon. By pursuing Western-style modernity for their offspring, Kwee Keng Liem and his wife aimed to acquire European status as well as to challenge traditional ethnic Chinese society, which constrained their modern orientations. This dual purpose of the so-called “enlightened” Chinese elite during the turn of the century led to a hybridization of Western, Chinese, and Javanese lifestyles in both their public and private lives. A hybridization that became less pronounced as time 32

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Door Kwee Der Tjie (c), probably with her Dutch language tutor or landlady. Girl on the left is unknown. Batavia, 1910, studio photograph

went on. As will be shown in later chapters, from the early 1930s onwards, mainly because of the familyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Dutch orientations and their relocation to Bandung, Western lifestyles became more explicit inside and outside the house. Many scholars have noted that fashion and clothing were central to the modern experience, particularly because clothing was such a loaded signiďŹ er in the ethnically segmented society of the Indies.25 The photos in the Kwee family albums show this clearly. In an early photograph of 1903, taken inside their home in Ciledug, we see his two youngest sons meticulously dressed in three-piece Western-style jackets. They wear neatly pressed trousers just over their knee with socks at knee length, have shiny leather-shoes, a pocket-watch,26 a bowtie, and carry a large khaki tropical hat. It looks like they do not really feel comfortable and

Kwee Zwan Liang and Kwee Zwan Ho dressed like little dandies, Ciledug, 1903. The angle of this photograph is different from the one on the next page, but it is clearly taken in the same living room

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