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My father-in-law
is from Indië, my mother-in-law from the Groninger village of Tolbert.
Nowadays Tolbert is part of the council of Leek and is situated in the
province's southern Westquarter.
A fair amount of years ago I made my first visit there to meet the Groninger-Drenth
family for the first time. When the whole family was assembled on Sundaymorning,
enjoying a cup of coffee and later a drink or a "Beerenburger"
at the home of grandpa and grandma (Tolbert) they asked me: "Jan,
can you understand us?" They must have been thinking, such a boy
from town. Well I did.
The grown-together villages of Tolbert and Leek make up a service district
centre with, among other things, many services in the teaching sector.
In Tolbert you get smart, as we hope and I can't tell much more about
Tolbert. I haven't been to school there, after all!
Yes, Tolbert's reformed church dates originally from the 13th. and 14th.
century.
 My
mother-in-law Metje was born in the village (1923) and raised in a,
for today's standards, big family consisting of father, who was in assurances,
mother, six daughters and one son.
Moar pas op veur Taitje Hörn
Dei daor spookt op 't Olle Schild
In de nacht bie haarde störm...
This little poem has nothing to do with the story, but I couldn't resist
it.
My father-in-law Ruud, born in the erstwhile Duch Indies, "the
emerald girdle", in 1926, on the contrary has only one brother,
who has been living in the United States for many years.
About the Indies past many books have been written and it's not my place
to tell about them. I, as a balanda, don't know enough about it.
Perhaps though I can tell something about the Christmas celebration,
about how Dutch people over there celebrated it. A white Christmas was
and is anyhow impossible there and a real Christmas tree was not available
either. Instead, they made do with a tropical bush, a tjemara. This
was gaily decorated with balls, garlands and real candles.
And I can tell something about the wireless telephone.
Hello Bandoeng! Yes mother, here I am. We're talking about 1927, when
queen Wilhelmina addressed the people of the Indian regions live for
the first time, although the hearing was restricted and who could allow
themselves a receiver in those times. One year later over the ether
a tenuous contact was made between both countries. Telephoning was expensive
then, as it was sent about the world by means of shortwave receivers.
Den Haag, Den Haag, de weduwe van Indië ben jij... (The Hague,
The Hague, Indiës widow are you...)
And so my father-in-law, both his parents and his younger brother Maurits,
came to live in The Hague after the war.
His father had been working for the Royal Dutch Paketvaart Company before
World War II. This was an Indian-Dutch company and all those who had
been working with or for those Dutchmen, and had Dutch nationality too,
were not appreciated by the Indonesian nationalists headed by Soekarno.
So the motto was to quit.
As my father-in-law had the age to do his military service, he had to
serve under Dutch arms. There he met Arend van der Velde, original of
Tolbert. They became mates, and Arend offered my father-in-law to spend
the weekends at his home.
There were nine of them there, so another boarder was no difficulty.
There in Tolbert, you see how things turned out, young Ruud Wilkens
met the girl Metje, one of the sisters van der Velde. They were much
in love and many villagers were all eyes when they went walking, arm
in arm or hand in hand, along the Groninger village.
Such a coloured gentleman attracted many looks and without doubt there
were those who wondered "what does a Dutch lass see in such a blackie".
Well, luckily for me she did, otherwise I'd had stayed an old inveterate
bachelor untill today.
They were married in Tolbert in 1948.
Two children were born, my esteemed sister-in-law Terry and of course
my wife Inge.
The family lived in with my father-in-law's parents, on the Beeklaan
in The Hague.
Two houses alongside lived the then first minister Willem Drees, "Father
Drees", wellknown from the old-age pension service, the latter
AOW.
Also living in the same house were aunt Jo with her children Paul and
Annemarie.
Her husband/their father had died in a Japanese prisoncamp during the
war. The sisters Terry and Inge have known their Indian grandmother
only for a short time, she died in 1956.
From
the time Inge was a little child, she had her nose into the pots and
pans when her grandma was cooking, and she has learned a fair amount
"adoe she can cook Indian food so good, yes"
When there was an Indian birthday, cooking started days before the party,
because naturally all the guests stayed for dinner. Inge's granddad
and grandma had their birthdays a couple of days one after the other,
no problem, that week there was cooking and partying twice. And everybody
visited twice as well "geef niks joh" (doesn't matter!) Aunt
Dé, aunt Troel, grandma Joe, aunt Jo and whatever they were called.
For Inge and Terry, whose given name is Teresa, it was all so natural,
all those aunts and uncles. They weren't even relatives by the way,
more so, they weren't called Dé, Bé, etc. Inge's grandma's
name was Adèle Eleonora, but everybody called her Noes. Such
a different name was usual, for the men as well, Eus, Tatti, and their
real names Inge can't remember.
Grandfather Wilkens died in 1967, 70 years old.
My
parents-in-law still live in "the widow of Indië": The
Hague.
Although one is from faraway Indonesia and the other from, for Dutch
understanding, the far north of the country, it has become their "Haagje".
The "Haagje" of Couperus, Eline Vere and how apt Old People,
the things that pass.
This was a small historical piece about my father-in-law from Indië,
and my mother-in-law from the Groninger village of Tolbert.
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