Burgers Family
pp. 26-27 · Read in the full issue
From Java Moves To Buka
By Gt
BY no means the least interestin' of the families disembarkin from MV Bulolo in early Jul at Rabaul was Jan Burgers, com plete with wife and eight childre: (including twins, and none over teE years of age).
The Burgers family was bound fo the Gordon McKenzie plantation o
Tulaen, Buka Island, which lies some 175 miles south-east of Rabau and was originally planted up be Charlie Huson in the early Twenties Jan Burgers is a fine, built, fair-haired Hollander, whi went to the Netherlands East Indie in 1948 as an accountant for Dutcle Government Forestry Department at Bandoeng.
Came the Republic in 1950, am he was transferred to the head) quarters of the Dutch High Conn missioner at Jakarta, where he rea mained for a year. But life in thr old Dutch colony was becoming toe strife-ridden, and the effect upoc his wife’s nerves was so great thas he gave Java away and wem banana-planting in Australia, when he stayed until the call of the tropio enticed him to New Guinea.
Talking with him in the lounge o the Bulolo, he gave me a word pio ture of the early days of 1950 whee the Indonesian Republic was do dared. It was by no means a happq time for the Dutch, whose house; were broken into and robbeo: Windows were broken by stone} throwing vandals and bandit! operated near the boundaries of thd large towns.
From him I gleaned: ® President Soekarno is ex* tremely anti-white. • Vice-President Hatta sends h;r children to a Dutch school. ® The leader of the Labour Parti' —Dr. Sharjir (he is a doctor o
Mr. and Mrs. Jan Burqers and their family aboard the "Bulolo" at Rabaul before these departure for Buka.
flaw) is married to a Dutch woman f a nd is pro-European. • In 1949 there were 500,000 Dutch nersons in NEI; in 1951 some 300,000 and in early 1955 only 90,000. \ • The people of Amboina and iCeram Islands desired to remain under Dutch rule.
I Commenting on the article by -Editor Robson on Java and the East in June PIM, Mr. Burgers said it gave a very true picture of the posi tion. £ And now Mr. and Mrs. Burgers, with their eight sturdy children, look forward hopefully to a life of comparative peace amidst the beauty and prolific growth of Buka.
I Here’s wishing them all long life and happiness in their new home.