Boudewyn van Oort
The Author, Boudewyn van Oort, and his book, Tjideng Reunion
(Description taken from ABCBookworld)
Born in the Transvaal province of South Africa, near Johannesburg, on August 25, 1938, Rhodes scholar Boudewijn van Oort, who worked in the oil and gas industry as an engineer after receiving his education at Oxford, decided to write Tjideng Reunion (2008) after attending his father ‘s funeral on the Sunshine Coast, near Vancouver, British Columbia.
His superbly detailed but non-inflammatory memoir of two Dutch families who move from South Africa to the Netherland East Indies (now Indonesia), only to become victims of Japanese occupation during World War II, is sophisticated and well-researched investigation into internment camps in Badoeng and Batavia (now called Jakarta), and the remarkable post-war reunions that eventually brought his parents to British Columbia.
Prompted by the German invasion of Holland and Belgium in 1940, Dutch nationals in South Africa, such as the author’s father, felt honour-bound to form, on foreign soil, a liberating army, or join the 150-year-old Royal Netherlands Indies Army to defend the Dutch empire. After quickly selling the family home they had recently built in South Africa, the author’s family departed for Indonesia in a matter of weeks, travelling by freighter from Durban to Batavia. When the Japanese occupied Java, the two men from the Dutch families became prisoners-of-war. While incorporating historical research and politics, Tjideng Reunion concentrates on recreating the experiences of the wives, the author (as a child) and a grandmother who were sequestered in hellish internment camps.
“The Pacific war ended officially on August 15, 1945,” writes Boudewijn, “but we who became trapped in it had to register our own ending, to slay personal dragons.” This is brave, important and well-written book, worthy of a trade publisher. At 452 pages, it is too in-depth to merit commercialism, but it will undoubtedly gain its rightful place among the literature that documents the horrendous treatment accorded prisoners and internees by the Japanese army during World War II.
As the author notes with typical restraint, “The writing of this book presented a peculiar challenge: for a three-year period, March 1942–May 1945, covering our internment in Bandoeng (now Bandung) on Java, there is almost no contemporary surviving written material describing the lives of some fourteen thousand fellow citizens.”
{ 11 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank you for visiting my site, and for reading the story I wrote on Edward Kerkhoven. He lives nearby and contacted me years ago to tell his story. It was printed in our local daily newspaper, but since that printing he shared more information with me, which resulted in the piece on my site. I know there is far more he has to tell, as he uncovers the buried memories of his past, and maybe one day he will feel freedom from that past. Your comments were much appreciated.
Wat ben ik blij dat mijn aandacht werd gevestigd op jouw geweldige boek. Ook ik zat in het Tjideng kamp , samen met mijn tweelingbroer Charles ( geb. 1929 ) en zijn er gelukkig goed uitgekomen net als onze ouders. Jouw boek is een kolosaal document geworden en als naslagwerk te gebruiken. Proficiat ! Johan.
Dear Boudewyn,
Thank you for contributing this story to the world. We need more writers like you.
There is an entire network of camp survivors and their descendants throughout the world, like an invisible part of world history. “We” are coming out of the woodwork.
Our organization “The Indo Project” is focused on the Indo-Europeans that moved forward after the war emigrating out of The Netherlands. It is a call to community internationally and based on the English-speaking world. Please visit our site.
Dear Boudewijn,
My mother was in Tjideng during the war. Together with her mother and sister. My mother passed away in 1970 (at the age of only 35). I wondered if you might have known her.
Her name was Rudy (or Maria or Peusje) Verbunt . The name of her mother (my grandmother) was Jopie Verbunt-de Lagh (Kamp nummer 5111, gezin van drie) . Her sister was called Stan Verbunt. Hope to hear from you.
Thom
Beste Thom,
Ik neem aan dat Nederlandsch OK is? Leuk van je te horen. De Verbunt familie ken ik helaas niet. We kwamen laat in Tjideng aan en zij zaten er misschien van het begin af in dat kamp. Het kamp was propvol maar er was weinig normaal sociaal contact.
Beste Boudewyn
Hartelijk dank voor dit onderwerp bereikbaar te maken. Weet je misschien hoe ik meer van buitenkamp mensen kan lezen, spreken of in contact kan komen? Als indische chinees ben ik ook door ‘the cracks’ gevallen (=hoor nergens echt bij) maar heb als kleuter van alle kanten goede en kwade belevenissen meegemaakt in Garut. Wilde graag de laatste bezettingsjaren als achtergrond gebruiken voor een verhaal waar een kind zoals ik leert schrijven met de hulp van een buitenkamper. Maar ik wil de ‘echte’ regels weten, niet alleen eigen herinneringen die misschien niet betrouwbaar zijn. Hoop dat het geen onredelijk verzoek is. Als je wilt kan ik het begin van het verhaal sturen – het is in het Engels. Alvast bedankt. Trees [nu Terry].
Dear Boudewijn,
My wife, Lily, grew up in N.O.I., and was imprisoned in the Japanese camps, finally in Tjideng. She is writing a book (self-published) about her experiences, and she would very much like to use the photo of Sonei’s tribunal which you also use in your book Tjideng Reunion. There you refer to the photo as coming from the Nederlands Instituut van Oorlogs Documentatie. I have tried to find it through their website http://www.niod.nl but have not been successful locating it there. Could you possibly give us a lead, perhaps photo number, to get the appropriate copy right permission there? Or else, it may be sufficient to receive your permission for using your copy of it, if you would be willing to do so. We would much appreciate that. I have in fact been able to download the picture from your web site and we could use it that way. My wife’s book is intended primarily for our children, grandchildren and friends and not as a commercial effort. At best we hope to get some of our costs back. Thank you very much for your consideration. Good luck to you! Sincerely,
Frits Niemoller (Annville, PA, USA)
Hello Fritz,
I went personally to the NIOD in Amsterdam, where the staff were very helpful. I sat down with one of them behind a computer and asked to see pictures of Tjideng ( they have nothing from Tjihapit when it was a women’s camp during the war). I specified the pictures that I wanted , and a couple of weeks after my return to Canada I received a CD with my selection.
One curiosity of the visit was my stumbling, completely unexpectedly, on a picture of myself taken in the camp shortly after our “liberation”, if that is the proper term for the fiasco. This was a mind-blowing experience. That picture is in my book.
I relate this tale to remind you that the pictures that you see in various publications are merely a selection chosen by the author. You may find a hidden gem lurking in the bowels of the NIOD. I therefore encourage you and your wife to try to make the trip to Holland and check out potential sources, such as NIOD and Bronbeek.
The NIOD requested that I credit them as the source of the pictures that I used in my book. I can send you a copy of the picture, but you should seek their concurrence.
Beste Boudewijn, ben op het ogenblik een beetje afgeleid vanwege het schrijven en illustreren van een zog. picture book. Heb intussen ‘Tjideng’ in bezit en ben begonnen met lezen. Heel interessant – ook van het geschiedkundig oogpunt. Zal weer beginnen met zelf te schrijven als de herinneringen een beetje minder pijnlijk worden. Heb ook een boek gevonden [fiction] dat plaats neemt in dezelfde tijd door Lian Gouw “Only a Girl”. Niet precies wat ik nodig had, maar toch interessant te lezen hoe de geschiedenis als achtergrond gebruikt kan worden. Dank voor de navraag. Terry.
I was born in theTjihapit camp 25/2/1943.I would like to find out if i was one of the youngest persons in the camp.Also if anyone might have known my mother [Thea Castrikum] during this time. Peter
Dear Peter,
It is a miracle that you survived because the most vulnerable internees were the very young and the very old. The name “Castrikum” does not sound famliar to me and does not occur in the Tjideng name register. I have also checked Anneke Bosman’s diary which has a substantial list of names, but to no avail. Not listed among Tjideng internees suggests that you and your mother were moved to one of the camps in central Java- such as Solo, Ambarawa or Banjoebiroe ( also spelled Banjubiru). Another possibility is Kampong Makassar where Ernst Hillen (author, “The Way of a Boy”) was interned.
Did you have siblings? The Japanese segregated the strong younger women from the older and sick ones. The latter were moved out of Tjihapit earlier on, and the former were used for work parties ( also known as slave labour). There was an attempt made by the Tjihapit camp adminstration to send women , heavily burdened by a large family on early transports in order to spare them the hard work that lay in store for those who remained in Tjihapit during the final months of that camp’s existence (Jan- May 1945).
Perhaps someone else may create a link to the name Catrikum.
Boudewyn