GOD OF MY FATHER

I don’t remember much about the first five years of my life. I was born in Semarang, Indonesia. My father, whom we called pappie, was a printer and worked in the center of the busiest part of town. He had met our mother in Bangkok, Thailand shortly after the war with Japan. Pappie had served in the Dutch army and had been imprisoned for four years by the Japanese in Burma. Before his capture but shortly after his deployment his first wife was hospitalized and died due to some illness. Pappie had been called away from his post. He was guarding the waters of a very hot spot for casualty, and was told his wife grew gravely ill and he was needed at home. On his way there the soldier who had taken his place as guard was shot and killed by enemy fire and pappie’s wife died just as he was approaching the steps of the hospital. It was said that pappie’s life was saved by the death of his wife. At that time pappie had two children that were being taken care of by one of his brothers while he went back to war.     

I remember bits and pieces of the life pappie had shared with me while he had been in the Japanese prison camp. It was while he was there that my grandmother was taken to a Japanese concentration camp in Indonesia. She died while there. The bitterness pappie had towards the Japanese ran so deep and that bitterness continued to be there for the rest of his life. He had been afflicted with so many different jungle diseases, beriberi, malaria, dysentery, black water fever. He also suffered from tuberculosis while there but miraculously it had scarred over and didn’t show up again until over thirty years later. One story he told us many times was when he grew ill from beriberi. The Japanese doctor had given pappie a tracheotomy and placed a tube to draw out the fluid build up from his intestines. Pappies’ stomach and testicles were swollen and only a drop every few minutes came out of that tube. The guards would laugh while relentlessly poking and prodding his testicles with their machetes. The doctor had said that pappie would be dead by morning. After pappie heard the diagnosis he called out on the Lord and begged for his life. He reminded the Lord that he had two motherless children back home and that they needed him. Where did that faith come from? Somewhere in the deep recesses of pappie’s heart was a stirring of something he had known and always known all his life. God was there and it was He that could do something to save pappie from this circumstance. Shortly after that prayer pappie would muster all the strength he could to get the guards attention by hitting the side of his bed with his hand and asking him for a bowl to urinate into. As pappie told me this continued all through the night. By morning his stomach and testicles were back to normal size. The doctor said it was a miracle because they had no other explanation for it. The next day he was taken out of the infirmary and placed back to work on the railroads. He was forced to work shoeless the entire four years which caused some rather deep calluses on both his feet. He’d suffered due to those calluses all the rest of his life. Pappie had witnessed first hand the brutality of war. His meals consisted of rice and water and whatever he could find crawling or slithering the jungle floors. He’d shared with me another time when he’d been sick in the infirmary and the prisoner next to him had died leaving behind an egg next to his bed. Pappie reached over and took it deciding it was better off with him. Another time one of pappies’ fellow prisoner and close friend was tied to a tree and whipped to a pulp then left there for the tree was crawling with red ants. He’d remembered the man screaming even more fiercely while being eaten alive. Those screams stayed in pappies’ mind forever. I knew this because each time he would relate this story to me his face grew sullen and his eyes would get watery and he’d say, “oh, God,” and he would hang his head as if maybe if just maybe there could have been something that he could have done to save his friend. Pappie knew that it was his believing and his prayers that ultimately gave him the strength to go on. When he spoke of God there was a deep reverence to his tone of voice.   

After the war and before going back home he was stationed in Bangkok for a short time of rest and relaxation.  It was there that he decided to find a wife and mother for his children. He was told by a friend that there was a woman who was willing to marry him and so everything was all set up for this quick marriage. That day came but the woman decided she didn’t want to marry him after all. Pappie was very disappointed as he was to leave and go home the following day. He was then told that there was another woman who would go ahead and marry him. That woman was our mother. She had been widowed during the war and had one child. Pappie promised her that after they moved to Indonesia he would send for her daughter. He never kept that promise. My mother, whom we called mammie, left her seven year old daughter and did not see her again for over 30 years. Mammie left all she knew, her daughter, mother, siblings, and way of life for this man she did not even know. She must have thought that this new life would expand into a new life for the ones that she left. What she got out of it was a man riddled by the four years as a POW. He started a life of alcoholism that tore our family apart. The torment inside of pappie was extended to our family. He never physically abused any of us but the anger was huge in that he would scream and yell and curse at our mother and always threatening to kill her. We witnessed it all as we grew. Pappie and mammie had four children together. Pappies’ own two children were in their late teens and distanced themselves from us. When he was sober, pappie would be the sweetest man on the face of the earth. He was like a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He was known for his womanizing during this time. I remember later when mammie would say that the first time she heard pappie cheated on her she’d cried her eyes out. The second time she’d heard of his infidelity she’d decided that that was the way he was and she just had to learn to live with it. As long as he was taking care of us she would keep a blind eye to all his indiscreet ways.

It was in 1945 that Indonesia became independent from the Dutch.  Sukarno ruled at that time and pappie did not like it.  In 1957 pappie decided to leave and seek his mother country, Holland.  Many of his close friends left already bound for the Netherlands and America.  It was to better our lives as pappie didn’t want to live under the leadership of President Sukarno whom he labeled as a communist.  Pappie foresaw danger ahead for us if we stayed in Indonesia.   He was right as the country was very volatile and ready to explode within. From 1965 through 1966 an estimated half a million Indonesians, mostly living in Sumatra, East Java and Bali, were slaughtered by soldiers, police and pro-Suharto vigilantes. Suharto eventually took over Sukarno as president.

We sailed from Indonesia to Holland leaving what we all knew. Pappie left his first two children, who were adults by now, his brothers and all of his memories for this new beginning. We lived in Holland for three years. I loved Holland with all of its’ pretty tulips in the spring and summer, ice skating in the winter, and very friendly people. We lived in a rural area at first and then moved to Utrecht. There was an incident while living in that rural area that would stick in my mind forever. My younger sister, Lucia and I were playing outside when a young man of 21 years of age ran Lucia over with his bike. He just kept on pedaling. Lucia and I walked back home with her screaming and crying in pain. When pappie heard what had happened he looked at my older brother, Paul and said, “come on, I’ll show you how to be a man.” Pappie then proceeded to walk to the young man’s apartment, knocked on his door and didn’t even bother to ask him why he did what he did. Pappie grabbed the man and pushed him down a flight of stairs and continued to beat him to an inch of his life. He then took Paul’s hand and walked back home. No one even tried stopping him from beating this poor guy. The fear of my dad was established that day. We never saw that young man again. I believe he avoided us like the plague. Pappie’s strength always amazed me. No one ever beat him in arm wrestling. He was built rock solid even through his later years. I also believe that his strength came from an anger deep within.

Living in Utrecht was fabulous. It was always such a big treat for us kids to take the bus to downtown Rotterdam. We loved it there even despite the fact that there were arguments between our parents. The arguing seemed so much less. I believe that pappie was quite satisfied with his position in life. We were respected in the community, he had a good job and we were the first in the neighborhood to have a television. Pappie worked for the local newspaper as a printer. Mammie became quite ill and the doctor had said that he didn’t think she would live long because of the cold Dutch winters. Mammie was accustomed to warm climate. The doctor suggested moving to Phoenix, Arizona in America. That was all it took for pappie to decide then and there that we were moving our stakes up again and leaving once more. Pappie got all the necessary papers together. He wrote a letter to the President of the U.S. John Fitzgerald Kennedy asking him to allow us entry into the U.S. We received a letter back telling us that the doors were wide open for us to come. We then received sponsorship from Covenant Presbyterian Church in Phoenix. Then off we went to another new way of life. On June 3, 1960 we harbored in New York, spent three days there then took a train to Phoenix, Arizona. This time I wasn’t thrilled. I never in my life felt so scared like I did when we set foot on American soil. The ones we’d met through the church were nice enough but things were different here. I’d never felt bigotry before this. I remember all of us going out for a ride in our new car when a group of teenage boys drove slowly up and called us names I’ve never heard before but knowing it wasn’t nice by the way they were delivering it. Pappie told us to just ignore them but my little heart was beating so hard. Pappie tried to find a job but didn’t want to join the Printers Union. He finally landed a job sweeping the sidewalk in front of Helsing’s Restaurant on the corner of Central and Osborn. He then got a job working for the First Presbyterian Church in downtown Phoenix as their head janitor. Later he worked as janitor for United Bank along with mammie who also worked as a housekeeper for some very nice and well to do families.Years later pappie got several accounts and started his own janitorial service. Pappie had us also help in this service. After school we would eat, do our homework then help with some of pappies’ accounts. We weren’t too thrilled about it but we had no choice. Pappie and mammie never complained about their work. They did what they had to do to take care of the family. However, the financial stress was there and this drove pappie to drinking even more heavily than ever before. Growing up as a child in this household was a nightmare. Watching and hearing the arguments, it was horrible. Lucia and I would sit on the sofa and hold on to each other and cry while our older brother, Paul would hold mammie back and asking her to please not say anything anymore to pappie while Lootie, the eldest, held pappie back begging him to calm down. I remember both Lucia and I crying and saying, “Please pappie, no, no, no.”  Once I called the police and it surprised pappie when they’d told him that one of us had called. That wasn’t the first time the police had come. The neighbors knew and heard us well. Yet, pappie was never taken in for domestic violence. Whenever the police would come pappie put on his best behavior. He’d calm down, apologized and promised he’d keep things quiet. 

There was so much anger built up in pappie. He was known for his temper even amongst their friends. Surprisingly he was well liked. In spite of his temper he was very personable and had a great sense of humor. Once he’d invited a group of his Dutch buddies and their wives over for food, drinks and a game of cards. He was loosing and accusing them of cheating and taking advantage of him while being in his home so he chased them all out of the house. My first child, Neko was there sleeping while my husband and I were out at a friends’ wedding. I called to check on things and when I found out what pappie had done I immediately left. The fear that overtook me because my baby was there and I didn’t want her to see or hear what I’d seen and heard as a child. There was a righteous indignation swelling up in me that I was ready to face my father and tell him what I thought of his drunken behavior. When I got there I first checked on Neko. I could hear pappie in the background telling my husband how his friends cheated on him and how he threw them all out. He’d said that none of them were his friends. Mammie was very upset and embarrassed and she let him know how she felt. When I came out of the room I took one look at pappie and walked over to him. I said, “Pappie, don’t worry about your friends. Just go to sleep and tomorrow you will see things in a different light. It’ll be ok and you were right to tell them all to go home. Tomorrow will be a better day.” He kept on and on about them and I kept on and on about how he needed to go to bed and sleep it off. He was frustrated because now he felt that maybe he’d lost his friends and I reassured him that he hadn’t and that all will be settled and that they all still remained his friends. I then took his hand and walked him to his room. There I told him to lay down, covered him up and spoke to him as a child while I rubbed his forehead until he fell asleep. Oh how pappie loved his forehead rubbed. When I came out to the front room mammie had calmed down and was lying down on her usual spot on the sofa. I picked up my baby and my husband and I left.

Pappie argued with almost everyone. When we were children he centered his anger on mammie and Freddie, our half brother who’d come to the U.S. to establish residency. When Fred and pappie would argue it was the worst because there would be fists raised and Fred had even threatened Pappie with a chain. I believe it was then that mammie told Fred to leave. Fred didn’t live with us long. He couldn’t take it and we were all grateful for his leaving.

Pappie hardly ever took his anger out on us at least not while we were children. He had gotten very angry with Lucia at one time and took the belt to her. She had run away from him and cowered in fear behind the dining room door. He raised the belt and smacked it across her neck. The fear that came across pappies’ face was evident. He had meant to hit her behind but missed when she’d moved suddenly. Lucia was barely nine years old. He never again used anything to punish us. Once he raised his voice at me for spilling something at the dinner table. I got up and ran out of the room. Later, I walked outside on to the porch and pappie was sitting there watching the rain fall. He looked over at me and told me how much he loved America. We said nothing else but I knew that pappie was glad I’d come out and sat with him.

There was a sweet, considerate, funny and generous man inside of pappie. This was the man that drew so many to him. This was the man that showed up more frequently than the other. We saw it. He would stop us at times and tell us to rub his shoulder or neck or hands and offer us a dime. It was during those times that he’d shared his stories with me. Stories of love and war and friends long ago lost. Freddie and Paul had shared some of these stories with me too. My great grand-father was a general in the Russian army during the time of the Czars. He was of mixed blood with not just Russian ancestry but Polish and Dutch. Somehow he’d ended up in Indonesia, marrying a Dutch woman and starting a new life. I’d heard stories of him fleeing Russia in fear because of internal wars and talk of revolution. I’d heard pappies’ father was a very wealthy man in Indonesia. He had many friends but only one true friend who would tell him to be careful and not place his trust on some so easily. My grandfather made one bad investment and lost his entire fortune. He died in a mental institution and at his graveside service the only other one who had come to pay his respects besides the family was his one true friend who had warned him years earlier to be careful. Even though pappie shared a lot of these stories with us there still was such a mystery to him. We didn’t hear it all. I know that he’d loved his first wife very much. It had literally broken his heart when she died. He saved a picture of her tombstone. Her first name was Anna. I don’t know how he treated her. I hope it had been better than the way he treated mammie. In spite of the way he treated mammie, I know he loved her. I remember when she’d finally taken that long awaited trip to Thailand after all those years of not seeing her daughter and how pappie didn’t have one drop of alcohol the whole two weeks she’d been gone. He would just sit around and mope and talked of how he missed her. Those two weeks of sobriety didn’t last long. As soon as she came back home he went back to his old ways. Poor mammie, the hell she must’ve gone through. In Thailand she was treated with love and respect. Everyone doted on her. Her daughter, Petue loved her so much and never showed any bitterness towards her. In Thailand, the younger are to revere and respect their elder and not question them in any way. She was back home now and back to the old way of life. 

When Paul rebelled, quit school and got busted for possession of marijuana there was an imminent threat of deportation. My brother was 18 years old and Pappie fought all the way for him. We didn’t need an attorney, pappie brought all the back up he needed in the form of letters from our sponsor, John, Covenant Presbyterian Church and the Reverend from the First Presbyterian Church. He even wrote the President of the U.S. Pappie really believed in this government and he knew they wouldn’t fail in helping our family once more. The thought of Paul living back in the Netherlands just about killed mammie and pappie. That was one of the few times pappie showed any kind of warmth towards my brother. He expected a lot from Paul yet he hardly encouraged him. When Paul got a job as a newspaper boy pappie got very angry because Paul had to get up and do his job at 4a.m. He told Paul he was stupid to take on such a job and forced him to quit. He would always tell Paul that he’d never amount to anything at the rate he was going. I could never understand that as Paul wasn’t doing anything wrong. I really believe that the way pappie pushed Paul away set the ground for Paul’s internal rebellion against all authority.

Even in my adulthood there was so much drama concerning pappie. Yet, we all loved him so much. The fact that he was a 52 year old man when we first came to the U.S. worked hard and took care of his family well gained respect from us. Mostly, we feared him because of his anger. Personally, mammie told me that pappie always had a soft spot especially for me in his heart. She’d said that it was because I had such a hard time learning to walk. I didn’t walk by myself until I was two years old. This broke pappies’ heart and every night after work he’d make mammie hold me up while he stood close by and say, “Come on baby, come on and walk to pappie.” If he felt this way about me then why I ask myself did he say the things he did to me? When my marriage failed he called me every name in the book names that no one should ever call another human being. In my heart I know that he really felt bad and he knew that he needed to do things differently. I remember how I would stand in front of his bedroom door for so long and hear him so many times crying in his room and begging for God’s forgiveness. No one cried like pappie cried. His sobbing would be so deep and I wanted so badly to walk into the room and embrace this man. Maybe if I had it would have helped. There was never anyone he could talk to concerning his problems. There was no interceding for him and no confronting him of these things. Pappie’s sobbing and heartfelt cries never changed him. He continued to live the life he’s always lived. Pappie died in 1984 eight months after suffering a stroke. For eight months he didn’t smoke, drink, curse or belittle anyone because he couldn’t move or talk. His life was left in mammies’ care and she took care of him well. She visited him everyday twice a day whether he was in the hospital or nursing home. She would embrace him, cover him with kisses and tell him how much she loved him. I’d never seen her like this with him. It was her way of telling him that all was forgiven and that she truly always loved him. Then one day she said, “We have got to take him home he needs to be home.” So Pat, my then boyfriend whom I married years later, and I put on a fresh coat of paint in the spare room. We moved in a hospital bed and took very good care of pappie for the last three weeks of his life. Mammie, Paul, Pat and I took turns to care for pappie. Paul and I would read scripture to him everyday. I would try to get him to communicate with us. I’d ask him a question and ask for him to blink once for yes and two for no. He couldn’t. There was never a question of forgiving him for all those tortuous years of mental and verbal abuse. We all loved him and it tore our hearts apart when he died. I cried and cried so many tears of loneliness for him. It literally took seven years of at least once a week of tears to lay it all aside. I remember one night when I was home alone getting ready to watch Casablanca for the first time. I was very excited about it when I looked over at pappies’ easy chair. I started to cry uncontrollable tears and calling on the Lord to comfort me. Then the tears subsided and I almost could hear pappies’ voice saying to me, “It’s ok baby, I’m ok.” I smiled, wiped my tears and lay back to watch my movie.

When someone dies and the relationship was like a rollercoaster ride there is so much regret afterwards. Those tears I shed for pappie were exactly that. I regret the fact that I didn’t spend the time knowing him better. I regret that he was an alcoholic and an awful one at that for all of my life with him. I regret that I was ashamed of him and the way he was and ashamed of his being a janitor. The shame of the latter didn’t continue all my life. I know how hard he’d worked to keep us together in our own home. I’m very proud of him for that. But there’s one regret that I will live with the rest of my life and that is that I never told him how much I loved him and how much he means to me, even now. I see pappies’ heart now and I see a man who had a large accumulation of turmoil from the past and he wanted to change so much for our sake but couldn’t because he was fighting himself. If only he would have turned completely to the Lord and allowed Him to do the fighting for him. Yet, there is a light at the end of the tunnel and all is not lost.

The Lord showed me something about pappie that I didn’t see until twelve years after his death. Those cries he shed on Jesus’ feet were heard. Pappie was allowed repentance and while he lay there not able to do one thing he was having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Pappie returned to the God of his childhood and to the Father of Abraham.