Srivijaya 02: Sanfoqi = Samfhutshiaj = Jianpuzhai = Angkor??
As discussed in the previous post, in 1918 French scholar Georges Coedès came up with the idea that there had been a maritime kingdom in Southeast Asia from roughly the…
Tielman Brothers and Van Halen Brothers
The great rock guitarist Eddie Van Halen, the lead guitarist of the band “Van Halen,” passed away yesterday. I can distinctly remember the first time I heard his guitar playing.It…
On Being Southeast Asian and the Bankruptcy of Liberal Persuasion
The other day an article appeared in my Facebook feed called “Being South-East Asian.” It was written by historian, political scientist and public intellectual Farish Noor and published in the…
Dutchmen, Forest Men, and the (Blurry) Line Between Western and Indigenous Knowledge
I was recently in Sabah, on the island of Borneo, were someone told me that the local name (in Malay) for proboscis monkeys is “blanda” (or “orang blanda”) which means…
Darkness and Javanese Soldiers in Australia during World War II
On 5 September 1945 the acting premier of New South Wales, J. M. Baddeley, sent a letter to the prime minister of the Commonwealth of Australia to report about complaints…
Bengawan Solo Forever
“Bengawan Solo,” a song about the Solo River in eastern Java, was first composed by Gesang Martohartono in 1940. Recorded as a Kroncong song, it became popular on Java during…
Hawaiian Music and National Culture in Indonesia
A while ago I wrote a blog piece on “Hawaii in Southeast Asia” in which I mentioned that there was some influence of Hawaiian music on a kind of music…
Win Min Than as a Hapa Actress
Today someone posted a picture on facebook of an Anglo-Burmese actress by the name of Win Min Than who made a movie in the 1950s called The Purple Plain. A…
Down-and-Out Americans in 1902 Batavia
I came across a letter that the American consul in Batavia (now Jakarta) sent to the US secretary of state in 1902 to seek approval for spending $16.06 to pay…
Modern Indonesians and Medieval Việt
I recently started reading the famous Indonesian novel Never the Twain (Saluh Asuhan) by Abdoel Moeis. Written in 1928, it is about a young Minangkabau man, Hanafi, who has become…