Tenaga Dalam - Pukulan Cimande Pusaka

Story 1
The Keris Pusaka
Uncle Frans is a nice Indonesian guy and
usually well dressed. His behavior is very quiet
like with most people from his generation, he’s
very kind and helpful. This was not always the
case. In his youth he was a bit wild. He earned a
lot of money in the restaurant were he started as a
young helper and became a famous chef. It didn’t
take long before Uncle Frans got an offer to start
a restaurant in Amersfoort, Holland together with
his nephew, as equal shareholders. Before he
went to Holland an Uncle gave him an old
Pusaka Keris. He was told exactly how to take
care of it. Grateful Uncle Frans took the Pusaka.
The restaurant was a big success. Uncle Frans
married a Dutch wife and got a daughter and a
son. Many years later he went back to Indonesia
to visit his family. In the house of his Uncle Boetje
he saw “his” old Pusaka Keris. “Did you have
two identical ones?” Uncle Frans asked
surprised. “No, but since you never bothered to
treat this Keris well, it came back to me,” his
Uncle said. At that moment Uncle Frans
remembered that years ago in Holland there were
months of strange nightly sounds, as if someone
was in the corridor. But there was never someone
to be seen. The lamplight’s swung from the
ceiling, without a breeze. It gave Uncle Frans
sleepless nights. The unexplainable sounds gave
him goose pimples and he lost pounds from sheer
fear. Never did he find out what caused them.
After a year the noises stopped. Uncle Frans got
his rest and gained weight again. After he told all
this to his Uncle Boetje, he could explain what
had happened. Uncle Frans was very hard
spoken to: “A Keris Pusaka is not an ordinary
dagger. Generations of family honor and respect
for the ancestors and the keeping of our century
old traditions are personified in this Keris. A
Keris Pusaka lives! An unrespectable treatment
of such a Keris is absolutely intolerable. Because
you treated our Pusaka so badly, the Keris came
back to me. Because here he gets treated well,
the way it should be.” Uncle Frans dared to ask,
“How can this Keris get to Indonesia by himself?”
A bit angry his Uncle said, “My God, Frans, I just
gave you the explanation, what do you want
more? Two follows one! You’re not stupid are
you?”
Back in Holland Uncle Frans went to the
box, which held the Keris when he got it from his
Uncle Boetje. It was at precisely the same place
were he left it. And the red ribbon still was wound
around it the way he had left it. Uncle Frans had
never taken time for the Keris. He opened the
box. The red velvet cloth was still in it, but the
Keris was gone. Nowadays Uncle Frans lives
from his pension. That he didn’t take care of the
Keris then, he still regrets it. Years ago he bought
a Keris at a market, which he takes care for and
treats according to tradition. “I will try to bring
‘the spirit’ of the Pusaka in this Keris, for my
son. And maybe, if my son takes over the
tradition, maybe then Uncle Boetje will give ‘our’
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