The Indonesian rice table was declared intangible heritage of the Netherlands last week. It is meant to be a recognition of the Indo-Dutch food culture. Many of them are happy with it. But many Dutch Indonesians think it’s a mistake.
“Indisch food is actually Dutch food as a variation of Indonesian cuisine. It’s a colonial product,” says Rochelle van Maanen, co-founder of the Decolonization Network.
“But when you call rice table dishes ‘Indian’, that’s cultural appropriation. Then you’re claiming elements of another culture that don’t belong to you. These dishes were invented by the original inhabitants of the Indonesian islands.”
Many people in the Netherlands who consider themselves Indisch, see the addition of the rice table to the cultural heritage positively. The photographer Armando Ello, who, among others, created the online magazine Why Indo? founded, he calls it a “confirmation of their right to exist”. She thinks it helps Indians process their traumas. Even if you understand that Dutch Indonesians have difficulty with the cultural claim.
Jeffry Pondaag of the Indonesian foundation Committee of Dutch Honorary Debts (KUKB), for example, is extremely critical, just like Van Maanen. He mainly calls it a colonial legacy. Due to the painful history, this heritage issue is extremely sensitive.
After the Indonesian struggle for independence, many Indians and Indo-Europeans came to the Netherlands in the 1950s and 1960s. They fought for the Netherlands to keep the Dutch East Indies colony, where they had more rights than the indigenous population. The Netherlands has around two million people with Indonesian roots.
The indigenous population, made up of Indonesian people, has been oppressed and massacred by the Netherlands for centuries. In 1945 they united the archipelago with Indonesia and declared independence. There are nearly 350,000 people in the Netherlands with Indonesian ancestry.
De Indische rijsttafel
- Bij de Indische rijsttafel horen gerechten als rendang, ikan pedis en sambal goreng-boontjes. Verschillende gerechten worden tegelijk in kleine porties geserveerd met witte rijst als bijgerecht. Deze eettraditie begon tussen de zestiende en twintigste eeuw in de Zuidoost-Aziatische archipel die door Nederland werd gekoloniseerd. De koloniale overheersers noemden het destijds Nederlands-Indië.
“Dutch East Indies is no more”
In Indonesia they cook the same dishes that the Indo-Dutch call ‘indish’. But then according to the original recipes of the original islanders. “Indonesians have adapted these dishes, for example, making them less spicy, so that the Dutch like them,” says Van Maanen. “But also because the spices for authentic Indonesian dishes are not all available in the Netherlands.”
Van Maanen understands that Indonesian cuisine and Indonesian rice table are now claimed by the Netherlands as intangible heritage. From research it turns out that is, half of the Dutch are proud of their colonial past. So are some Indo-Dutch people.
“But Dutch East Indies is no more. When you claim something like ‘indisch’, you show that you are dealing with a colonial past. You also maintain a colonial identity,” he says. According to Van Maanen, this makes it more difficult to take a critical look at colonial history. “It hinders decolonization, the process needed to recognize indigenous identities suppressed by the Netherlands.”
The Dutch settlers found the Indonesians dirty and uncivilized
“The rice table was actually invented by the njais, indigenous women who were employed by Dutch men during the colony as domestic workers, companions and concubines,” says Indonesian history teacher and curator Noor Fatia Lastika. She participated in a rice table exhibition, which was shown last month in the Indonesian capital Jakarta.
Njais often had to live against her will with Dutch men with whom they had children. “Slowly, the food tradition in the njai family became a social status symbol,” says Lastika. “It was intended only for the wealthy, including the white Dutch and the children they had with the njais. The indigenous population was not part of it. The Dutch settlers found them dirty and uncivilized. That is why serving and eating the rice table was meant primarily to be a chic affair. This is how the Dutch wanted to distinguish themselves from the indigenous population.
“That’s why the Indonesian rice table is mostly a colonial legacy from the Netherlands,” says Pondaag. His KUKB foundation launches lawsuits against the Netherlands for Indonesian victims and relatives who survived Dutch colonial violence.
He thinks Indonesians misappropriate Indonesian culture “and pretend the rice table is theirs”. “This is very colonial. As if Indonesians are still ‘uncivilized’ towards Indians.”
In 2020, the cabinet 20.4 million euros made available to the Indisch community in the Netherlands. The purpose of this ‘extra boost’ is to ‘make visible the appreciation for Indian identity and Indian heritage’. “But where is the recognition of the Netherlands for Indonesians? Then I’m not talking about apologies, but about reparations,” says Pondaag.
More recognition for the Indisch community in the Netherlands
However, the Indisch community in the Netherlands also deserves recognition, says photographer Ello. He published the book in 2017 Indo doubt to make the Indo-European Dutch aware of their history. Since 2004 you have been photographing Indians of all ages and generations. Like Van Maanen, she has both Indonesian and Indonesian relatives.
“Especially the first generation of Indonesians who came to the Netherlands want recognition from the Netherlands. They suffered during the Japanese occupation of the Dutch East Indies and the Indonesian struggle for independence when they served for the Netherlands,” he says . “When they came to the Netherlands, the Indonesians were also not well received by the Dutch.”
With the recognition of the Netherlands, the Indisch people can work through their traumas and past pain, he thinks. “Without the recognition of the Netherlands, the Indians keep going back to the colonial times to indicate that it really happened. With this they seek confirmation of their right to exist. Now you can see it even with the Indian rice table,” he says she.
“Indonesian food is related to my identity. Every family has its own way of preparing the rice table. Even my Indonesian family sometimes eat it.” That’s why he understands why some Dutch Indonesians have difficulty with cultural affirmation. Also, more Indonesians than Indians suffered in the colonial period, she says.
But it is also understandable that the Indonesian rice table is now claimed by the Netherlands as intangible heritage, says Noor Fatia Lastika. “People want to understand and justify their place in history. This is very normal,” says the history teacher. “But if you want to understand history as a whole, you have to realize that indigenous cultures also play a role in it. That’s why you can’t really say that the rice table belongs only to the Indian community. It’s a shared history.”
