Oorlogsliefdekind

The story of son Jan Tigchelaar

Our story is the reverse of that of the Indonesian warlovechildren. When my father went to the Dutch Indies as a young soldier at the end of 1945, my sister and me were already born. Maybe my father met a girl overthere, because he has never come back to the Netherlands. My mother was left alone with two young children. I've never seen my father ever since.

Saturday 7 April 2012 the documentary Tuan Papa will be screened in the CineMasia Filmfestival in Amsterdam.

Location: De Balie, Kleine Gartmanplantsoen, Amsterdam

The screening will start at 1:00 pm.

The film will be screened with English subtitles! Director Annegriet Wietsma is present to answer questions from the audience. Join us!

The story of Tetty Geertruida Sahusilawane

“I visited the Netherlands twenty-one times. Friends of mine always said: “Why do you always go to the Netherlands? As if there is no other country to spend your holidays.” I did not care what they said. I have a personal mission. I am looking for my biological father.”

When we visit Tetty Sahusilawane on a wet Friday morning in February in Jakarta, she is awaiting us with the proverbial Indonesian hospitality and a table full of snacks and drinks. But according to herself, Tetty has so many Dutch habits that it seems as if she grew up in the Netherlands: she likes things like herring, wet cold, punctuality. Yet her only real bond are her origins: her unknown Dutch military father.

Unlike most of his military comrades who returned home with the promise to their warlove girls to take care of them and bring them to the Netherlands, 1st class soldier Jan does not want to leave his pregnant girl behind. When the troops leave, Jan stays with her ​​in Indonesia. Only after their baby is born, they can make the trip to the Netherlands together.

A week ago, in August 2011, my mother called me with the words: "There is a child in Indonesia, from your father." She had just heard it from a cousin who was visiting her. I've always felt that there was something peculiar about my father’s military service period in Indonesia, and now it suddenly became a reality. It probably is a boy. Since this telephone call, I am looking for my half-brother.

The story of Dora and the search for her half-brother

The story of warlovechild Lenny

While Lenny tells her story, every now and then her eyes fill with tears. Her house in Jakarta is full of memorabilia from the Netherlands: the famous Delft Blue kissing Volendam couple, the colored wooden tulips in a Delft Blue vase, a coffee cup with Amsterdam canal houses painted on it, Delft Blue plates on the wall with windmills or an Islamic text in Arabic script. Even the studio photo, shot in an old-fashioned Volendam kitchen in Volendam traditional clothes, is not lacking. But the looks of her own father are unknown to Lenny.

Dear all,

I would like to share with you that we visited our half-sister Edwina and her children and grandchildren in Indonesia. Last year we heard of each other’s existence for the first time. We combined this very exciting meeting with a holiday in Indonesia. The last four days of our holiday we stayed at home with Edwina, which was fun. All in all, we know each other pretty well now.

At the age of 48 years, in 1996, Henk urgently needed to hand over his genetical family history because of possible complications following a serious car accident. Only then his younger brother confessed that Henk and his twin brother Vincent have a different, unknown father. Everything is described in a diary of the man they thought was their father. Until that unforgettable moment.

In Bandung

Not all our quests for warlovechildren in Indonesia ran smoothly. When we were in Bandung, the city in Indonesia that I know best, we decided to follow a tip from the Netherlands to check on a child of a Dutch soldier. It should not be that difficult to find him? Indeed, we have found his home. But what happened next …

Annegriet Wietsma and Jean Hellwig were traveling in Indonesia in October 2009 for the filming of the documentary Tuan Papa, that was broadcast on Dutch television on July 1, 2010. While they were looking for warlovechildren and soldiers' sweethearts in Java and Bali, they filmed each other to keep the audience posted about their production developments.

Josta Rumahlaiselan and Wilma Pattinama, both employees of the organization HALIN in Jakarta, grew up in Jakarta in the fifties and sixties. One of their fellow school girls was Betty. Betty was, so it turned out much later, the child of a Dutch soldier. Wilma: “She was so beautiful that everyone at our school called her ‘Elizabeth Taylor’.”