Mark Twain: Comments on the Moro Massacre (1906)

I first read about the forgotten Massacre in the Philippines while visiting a friend who had just gotten a book on Mark Twain's writings. Skimming through the hundreds of pages, I stumbled upon this essay. More than 100 years after it was written, it's still sharp, highlighting the irony in America's foreign endeavors and the responsibility of journalists to hold our leaders accountable. For whatever reason- perhaps because I write, or perhaps because I was in Indonesia, a neighboring country, at the time I read it- this article stuck in my memory. Today, I serendipitously (is that even a real word?) rediscovered it on Wikipedia (thank you free archives!) and I'm posting it here again (1) so I don't lose it, and (2) so you read it.

*Note- Not sure why some of the text is highlighted in funny....guess I'll figure that out another day

This incident burst upon the world last Friday in an official cablegram from the commander of our forces in the Philippines to our Government at Washington. The substance of it was as follows: A tribe of Moros, dark-skinned savages, had fortified themselves in the bowl of an extinct crater not many miles from Jolo; and as they were hostiles, and bitter against us because we have been trying for eight years to take their liberties away from them, their presence in that position was a menace. Our commander, Gen. Leonard Wood, ordered a reconnaissance. It was found that the Moros numbered six hundred, counting women and children; that their crater bowl was in the summit of a peak or mountain twenty-two hundred feet above sea level, and very difficult of access for Christian troops and artillery. 

Then General Wood ordered a surprise, and went along himself to see the order carried out. Our troops climbed the heights by devious and difficult trails, and even took some artillery with them. The kind of artillery is not specified, but in one place it was hoisted up a sharp acclivity by tackle a distance of some three hundred feet. Arrived at the rim of the crater, the battle began. Our soldiers numbered five hundred and forty. They were assisted by auxiliaries consisting of a detachment of native constabulary in our pay -- their numbers not given -- and by a naval detachment, whose numbers are not stated. But apparently the contending parties were about equal as to number -- six hundred men on our side, on the edge of the bowl; six hundred men, women and children in the bottom of the bowl. Depth of the bowl, 50 feet.

Gen. Wood's order was, "Kill or capture the six hundred."

The battle began-it is officially called by that name-our forces firing down into the crater with their artillery and their deadly small arms of precision; the savages furiously returning the fire, probably with brickbats-though this is merely a surmise of mine, as the weapons used by the savages are not nominated in the cablegram. Heretofore the Moros have used knives and clubs mainly; also ineffectual trade-muskets when they had any.

The official report stated that the battle was fought with prodigious energy on both sides during a day and a half, and that it ended with a complete victory for the American arms. The completeness of the victory for the American arms. The completeness of the victory is established by this fact: that of the six hundred Moros not one was left alive. The brilliancy of the victory is established by this other fact, to wit: that of our six hundred heroes only fifteen lost their lives.

General Wood was present and looking on. His order had been. "Kill or capture those savages." Apparently our little army considered that the "or" left them authorized to kill or capture according to taste, and that their taste had remained what it has been for eight years, in our army out there - the taste of Christian butchers.

The official report quite properly extolled and magnified the "heroism" and "gallantry" of our troops; lamented the loss of the fifteen who perished, and elaborated the wounds of thirty-two of our men who suffered injury, and even minutely and faithfully described the nature of the wounds, in the interest of future historians of the United States. It mentioned that a private had one of his elbows scraped by a missile, and the private's name was mentioned. Another private had the end of his nose scraped by a missile. His name was also mentioned - by cable, at one dollar and fifty cents a word.

Next day's news confirmed the previous day's report and named our fifteen killed and thirty-two wounded again, and once more described the wounds and gilded them with the right adjectives.

Let us now consider two or three details of our military history. In one of the great battles of the Civil War ten per cent. Of the forces engaged on the two sides were killed and wounded. At Waterloo, where four hundred thousand men were present on the two sides, fifty thousand fell, killed and wounded, in five hours, leaving three hundred and fifty thousand sound and all right for further adventures. Eight years ago, when the pathetic comedy called the Cuban War was played, we summoned two hundred and fifty thousand men. We fought a number of showy battles, and when the war was over we had lost two hundred and sixty-eight men out of our two hundred and fifty thousand, in killed and wounded in the field, and just fourteen times as many by the gallantry of the army doctors in the hospitals and camps. We did not exterminate the Spaniards -- far from it. In each engagement we left an average of two per cent. of the enemy killed or crippled on the field.

Contrast these things with the great statistics which have arrived from that Moro crater! There, with six hundred engaged on each side, we lost fifteen men killed outright, and we had thirty-two wounded-counting that nose and that elbow. The enemy numbered six hundred -- including women and children -- and we abolished them utterly, leaving not even a baby alive to cry for its dead mother. This is incomparably the greatest victory that was ever achieved by the Christian soldiers of the United States.

Now then, how has it been received? The splendid news appeared with splendid display-heads in every newspaper in this city of four million and thirteen thousand inhabitants, on Friday morning. But there was not a single reference to it in the editorial columns of any one of those newspapers. The news appeared again in all the evening papers of Friday, and again those papers were editorially silent upon our vast achievement. Next day's additional statistics and particulars appeared in all the morning papers, and still without a line of editorial rejoicing or a mention of the matter in any way. These additions appeared in the evening papers of that same day (Saturday) and again without a word of comment. In the columns devoted to correspondence, in the morning and evening papers of Friday and Saturday, nobody said a word about the "battle." Ordinarily those columns are teeming with the passions of the citizen; he lets no incident go by, whether it be large or small, without pouring out his praise or blame, his joy or his indignation about the matter in the correspondence column. But, as I have said, during those two days he was as silent as the editors themselves. So far as I can find out, there was only one person among our eighty millions who allowed himself the privilege of a public remark on this great occasion -- that was the President of the United States. All day Friday he was as studiously silent as the rest. But on Saturday he recognized that his duty required him to say something, and he took his pen and performed that duty. If I know President Roosevelt -- and I am sure I do -- this utterance cost him more pain and shame than any other that ever issued from his pen or his mouth. I am far from blaming him. If I had been in his place my official duty would have compelled me to say what he said. It was a convention, an old tradition, and he had to be loyal to it. There was no help for it. This is what he said:

Washington, March 10. Wood, Manila:- I congratulate you and the officers and men of your command upon the brilliant feat of arms wherein you and they so well upheld the honor of the American flag. (Signed) Theodore Roosevelt.

His whole utterance is merely a convention. Not a word of what he said came out of his heart. He knew perfectly well that to pen six hundred helpless and weaponless savages in a hole like rats in a trap and massacre them in detail during a stretch of a day and a half, from a safe position on the heights above, was no brilliant feat of arms - and would not have been a brilliant feat of arms even if Christian America, represented by its salaried soldiers, had shot them down with Bibles and the Golden Rule instead of bullets. He knew perfectly well that our uniformed assassins had not upheld the honor of the American flag, but had done as they have been doing continuously for eight years in the Philippines - that is to say, they had dishonored it.

The next day, Sunday, -- which was yesterday -- the cable brought us additional news - still more splendid news -- still more honor for the flag. The first display-head shouts this information at us in the stentorian capitals: "WOMEN SLAIN MORO SLAUGHTER."

"Slaughter" is a good word. Certainly there is not a better one in the Unabridged Dictionary for this occasion. The next display line says: "With Children They Mixed in Mob in Crater, and All Died Together."

They were mere naked savages, and yet there is a sort of pathos about it when that word children falls under your eye, for it always brings before us our perfectest symbol of innocence and helplessness; and by help of its deathless eloquence color, creed and nationality vanish away and we see only that they are children -- merely children. And if they are frightened and crying and in trouble, our pity goes out to them by natural impulse. We see a picture. We see the small forms. We see the terrified faces. We see the tears. We see the small hands clinging in supplication to the mother; but we do not see those children that we are speaking about. We see in their places the little creatures whom we know and love.

The next heading blazes with American and Christian glory like to the sun in the zenith:

"Death List is Now 900."

I was never so enthusiastically proud of the flag till now!

The Yogi and the Antichrist

Western Yoga is generally associated with peace, meditation and skinny people in leggings, but in the most conservative American households such as my own it is a contentious topic that rivals abortion and homosexuality.

Yesterday evening, when I casually suggested to my mom that I was interested in doing hot yoga- (definition: a particularly sexy type of stretching which you do in- yep you got it- a hot room) she listened quietly while I explained the benefits of stretching with warm muscles, the importance of building strength through low-impact exercise and all that jazz.

I thought that was the end of our discussion until I was called down for a discussion with my parents later that same day.

In response to the growing popularity of yoga across the U.S. and new-age beliefs, many books and websites have cropped up to warn unsuspecting Christians about the insidious nature of yoga. Here is just one example of an article posted by a senior producer for The Christian Broadcasting Network.

Well-read in such sources, my parents lovingly explained how yoga would lead me into the teachings of the antichrist (definition: generally understood as the dude who’s going to take over and position himself against the Church in the last days before the Second Coming of Jesus- see 2 John or Revelations for details)

As with most lectures, my dad began by opening up his Bible which he directed me to read out loud.

“Do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world… Every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.” I Timothy 4:1 NIV Version

Since yoga does not acknowledge Jesus (it doesn’t acknowledge any God in fact), it must be a teaching of the antichrist, they deduced.

My dad then went on to show me a Youtube video (sorry I can’t find it) of a man explaining the “true origins of yoga”. I sat for 8 minutes while a man with a long name and a voice as bland as that of a Discovery Channel narrator explained a black and white Powerpoint about how yoga is not only a physical practice a spiritual practice deeply rooted in ancient mystical beliefs, in other words paganism.

Like most Americans, I was already aware of the spiritual aspects of Yoga. Also, like most Americans, I do not plan to hire an instructor so that I can convert to Hinduism or sit on my buttocks and recite Ohm for one hour (though there are people who do, and that's fine for them). Personally, I hope to build strength and flexibility to supplement my regular workout regimen of weightlifting and running but that's besides the point.

I find it interesting that many of the same people who condemn yoga are the same people who celebrate familiar holidays such as Easter and Christmas- supposedly Christian holidays but with practices undeniably rooted in pagan beliefs.

My parents are certainly not representative of all Christians. In fact, if you google “Christian Yoga”, all of the websites that show up on the first search page are websites by Christians for Christians who have discovered the benefits of yoga and are loving it. As with customs such as the practice of making Easter eggs, these Christian writers explain how Christian-yogis take what they like from Eastern practices- the health benefits, the meditation, etc- and use it to strengthen their own beliefs.

This article from Christian Yoga Magazine, sums it up quite nicely.

“Christians who practice yoga, Zen, Aikido and similar eastern health and spiritual disciplines do so, not out of a repudiation of their own religious heritage, but as a way of deepening it. They celebrate and embrace all that is true and good and wise in these practices- and simply ignore those aspects that are not in harmony with their own spiritual outlook.”

Do you think Yoga is compatible with Christianity? Please share your thoughts.

The right ginger, the perfect tea

Although Indonesians rarely use ginger in their cuisine, they swear by the healing powers of the root which brought life to the gingerbread man and bam to the salmon filet. It’s frequently added to medications and medicinal beverages such as jamu- the Indonesian drink which allegedly solves all health problems, including lack of virility (so long as your beverage includes a crocodile penis). And for good reason- ginger is great for alleviating colds and nausea, and to boot, its wonderful on the pallet.

The testicle-free jamu is fine, but my beverage of choice is the humble ginger tea. I have made ginger tea in America before, but always with underwhelming results- bland with only the slightest hint of spice that I craved. Then one day, after throwing up seaweed pudding and breakfast into my Indonesian neighbor’s toilet, I was introduced to ginger tea as it should be. My neighbor, a former-scout leader and herb-connoisseur, fixed me the perfect cup of spicy, golden ginger tea that dissipated all nausea and made me realize for the first time, that no two gingers are equal.

I later learned that there are over 1,000 varieties of ginger, but in Indonesia, there are three main kinds to look for. There’s the fat one, appropriately named jahe gajah (elephant ginger) and also known as jahe raja (king). There’s jahe mera (red), used for jamu and other herbal drinks. Surprise! It’s got a reddish tint. And finally, there’s jahe kuning (yellow)- the slim, spicy root that tastes so perfect when boiled as tea. The tricky thing about this little guy is that it’s not very yellow looking. The best way to pick out a good jahe kuning, is to peal a bit of the skin off with your finger and smell. If it smells bland, your tea will taste accordingly, but if it smells spicy, you know you’ve hit the jackpot. Here’s the simplest recipe for a sip of heaven.

Perfect ginger tea (one serving):
Bring one cup of water to rapid boil
Peal one slice of jahe kuning about the size of your thumb
Slice down the middle then crush. To do this, I usually just put the flat end of the knife on the ginger, then pound it with my fist a few times.
Add ginger to water and lower heat
Let simmer for 10 minutes or until tea turns golden
Your tea is ready to drink!
You can add a tea bag for extra flavor (black tea is fine, but I like vanilla tea), raw sugar, or honey
Selamat Minum!

So Fat, so Beautiful: An American Woman in Indonesia

I had the remnants of a cold but was feeling good as I slipped into my running shoes for the first time since my bike accident.

As I stepped out the door, Shienda, my Indonesian co-teacher, called my name, “Grace!”
I stopped in my tracks, “What?” She looked up from her laptop to study me, then pronounced, “Grace you are SO fat.”

I looked down at my 120ish pound body. I didn’t feel fat, or at least not any fatter than usual to deserve one of the most damning judgments in the English-speaking-female world. Seeing the disbelief on my face, she assured me with her matter-of-fact voice, “Yes, Grace, you have definitely gotten fatter. Look at your stomach, your face- everything is now bigger.”

I think I rambled off some lame excuses: I’ve been sick, I haven’t been exercising because of my leg, blah blah. Shienda, agreed and generously added that, it “must have been the food” from the conference in Lombok that I had just returned from.

With the causes of my fatness agreed upon, Shienda went back to Facebook and I returned to my running, making a mental note to eat less deep-fried tempe.

In Indonesia, you are either very fat or “need to eat more”, and someone must always remind you, lest you forget the size of your own waist. Perhaps one reason you need to be reminded so often is because weight tends to fluctuate in Indonesia more severely than it does in the Western world. There have been times when I have been told, “Grace your face looks like it is sinking in, please, you must eat more” only to be asked hours later, “You used to be so skinny, how did you become so fat?”

Or perhaps this is a way of looking out for your pals. In America, we expect our friends to be honest to us when we’re drinking too or dating a jerk so that we will not wake up married to God’s-greatest-punishment-to-the-female-race. But in Indonesia, your girlfriends just want to make sure that you know when you look less “cantik” (pretty) so that you can whip yourself back into shape and attract a spouse before the ever-approaching marriage deadline- age 27.

But the problem I have with that theory is, Indonesians never really sound concerned when they tell you you’re too fat. I’ve seen Indonesian students introduce their classmates as, “the fat one” with a mean-sounding laugh and even call their teachers “big and ugly” to their face. Office-banter usually involves someone pointing out the fattest person in the room.

The whole phenomenon of weight-bashing can be unsettling and even damaging to the frail self-esteem of the average, sheltered American who has been told all her life that it is “okay to have extra curves” and has only, only talked about weight publically in the following context: Girl A- I’m so fat, Girlfriends of Girl A- OMG, no you’re not.

But having grown up in a Korean-American household where every pimple and weight fluctuation has been monitored by the watchful eye of my grandparents, I wasn’t too surprised by the sudden attention my butt received and was even amused by the contrast between the matter-of-fact attitude Indonesians take towards weight (one Indonesian explained that telling someone they are fatter is like commenting that their hair got longer) compared to the culture of deceit that pervades American fat-talk. Just think: how many Americans have told their friends, “Oh you look so skinny” while silently thinking, “ those pale rolls of fat gushing from the sides of your pants are repulsive.”

I’m not saying that children should call their teachers fat or that you should start telling your friends what you really think about their rolls of pasty blubber. I just find the contrast between blunt honesty and deceit, well, interesting.

After all, even my tough ego was ever-so-slightly wounded after Shienda’s evaluation of my anatomy. But fortunately, there is a panacea to the wounds inflicted upon the over-sensitive.

No matter how fat you really are, if you are a female American, you will always be cantik (pretty) so long as you live in Indonesia. In fact, I get reminded about a dozen times a day how “cantik I look with my jilbob” or how “cantik my white skin is” or how “cantik I look” in my hideous school uniform. When I walk through the hallways in my school, I hear, “I love you!” “You’re beautiful!” from my students- male and female- and if I need an afternoon ego-boost, I need only to walk around my neighborhood to hear, “Beautiful woman!” from the local construction workers.

And from what I’ve gathered, this is not unique to me, but common to all the Fulbright English teachers- big and small- who live and work in Indonesia. We American women are exotic and yes- beautiful- even in our slightly-chunky state to the eyes of Indonesians.

So if you’re a little curvy or slightly malnourished, remember that no matter what Indonesians have to say about your waist size, you’re still damn sexy.

Questions from Mount Ijen

Looking down into the crater, I saw nothing but endless miles of white-streaked dirt and rocks descending into a sea of smoke. But a few obligatory photos later, I saw what we came for. A strong, sulfur-infused wind lifted the fog, revealing at the bottom of the crater, the vast robins-egg-blue lake which put Mount Ijen in Lonely Planet's guide to Indonesia and brought me to the summit of the active volcano.

The lake, which sits on Ijen's summit, is superb and certainly worthy of any backpacker- lonely or not. But what emerged from the desolate crater (kawah) impressed me more. One by one, a man appeared over the cliff, carrying two baskets filled with hefty blocks of bright-yellow sulfur over his shoulders. I crept over the edge to see where these hardy miners were coming from but the path was too steep and whatever I would've been able to see was obscured in smoke. So, I went down.

Most of the men I passed on my way down looked about my height, but thinner. My hiking buddy pointed out that the upper backs of older men- which you could glimpse through their shirt collars- had been blackened from years of carrying the sulfur (usually 70 kilos at a time) over their shoulders. They wore worn and torn rubber boots. Perhaps these protected the mens' feet from getting wet, but I wondered if they could keep a man from slipping down the steep muddy mountain paths after one of Indonesia's regular downpours. I saw at least one worker in rubber flip flops.

As I carefully made my way down path, using hands and feet to keep from falling 500 meters or so into the crater, miners briskly passed me up and down the steep, rocky path , like mountain goats seemingly unaware of the danger of one misstep. I asked a couple if they were ever afraid, "Ngak, no!" they would respond with a smile, "Biasa,"- the usual.

When the sulfur wind picked up again, the men mining below still looked like small toys in a lemon-yellow, baby-blue world. The workers continued to pass, some with cotton cloths tied around their noses and mouths, but most directly facing the toxic wind, occasionally coughing and spitting. Despite burying my nose in my shirt, the sulfur chocked me and brought back that rattling cough I'd battled my first month living in Indonesia. My vision blurred, my eyes burned and my breath became wheezes. When my friend suggested we head back up, I took the opportunity to escape the suffocating crater. My last memory from climbing out of the crater was seeing a worker near the top casually smoking a cigarette.

When we emerged from the kawah and I had recaptured my breath, questions flooded my head, nagging me throughout the day. How do the workers come back every day? They're paid about $4 for each trip they make down into the crater and few men can make more than two. That's more than you can make as a farmer in East Java, but surely the dangers are greater. Why can't the companies using the sulfur (and no doubt, profiting) invest in their workers by making conditions safer? Where are the pulleys? The gas masks?

What is the value of one life?

700 handshakes and casava bbq

I now truly understand what it is like to be "in a fishbowl". I don't think I have ever been watched by so many eyes at once. All 700 students lined up around the school courtyard, in and outside nearby classrooms and on the balcony, pointing at me and looking very surprised and amused to see that their English teacher from America, dressed in slacks, a long button down shirt, and a blue headscarf (jilbob), did not look like a bouleh (white person) at all.

Today instead of classes, we had an outdoor orientation ceremony (Halal bihalal) to welcome all 700+ high school students back to school after the Ramadan/Idul Fitri holiday. The ceremony, which took place in the school courtyard, consisted of every single student lining up to shake every teachers' hand- including mine- as dramatic music played in the background. I say shaking hands, but it is more accurate to say that some students lightly held my fingertips, while others kissed it, and still others pressed my hand to their cheek.

The generosity of Indonesians never ceases to amaze me. I was exhausted when school ended and my cheeks were sore from smiling but I happily joined the teachers to visit Mr. Mu'at (who works at the school) because his wife wife had a tiny, tiny baby just yesterday. After a visit to another teachers' home and a trip to the market, Shienda and I finally returned to my yellow house and I knocked out for a two hour nap. I woke up to the sound of talking from my kitchen and after finally getting up, discovered a small army of chefs at work. Shienda's mother and sister had arrived to help my cook dinner and when I opened the door to my backyard, I was surprised to see Mr. Mu'at (whose wife just had the baby) himself sitting outside fanning a small fire (made from woodchips, a cigarette box, and a flip-flop- yes a shoe) where he was grilling a casava for me. He also grilled a corn on the same fire and carved a young coconut for me.

This is just one of many examples of abundant kindness that I have been flooded with. When I first moved into my dark and empty house I wasn't worried, but I questioned whether I could ever feel at home in such a foreign place. My power and water occasionally turns off, my kitchen ceiling leaks and my house seems to to be the favorite hangout for ants and fruit flies; yet surrounded by all these wonderful people I think someday soon, I will be able to call this house my home.

New home and new friends

Finally got internet up and running in my new home! On Sunday morning at 2 a.m. I arrived in Genteng, a small city in East Java, where I will spend the next 9 months. My house is bright yellow (both inside and outside) and I think the color attracts butterflies because every day I find at least three of my flying friends perched on my walls. There is a living room, three rooms and a spacious kitchen that leads out to a backyard where soon, I will begin planting my own vegetables. Around my backyard (I just noticed this today) is a tall fence crowned with sharp pieces of glass, which I think are intended to keep intruders out. My kitchen is loaded with casava, coconuts, fruits, and cookies that people have brought over for me. There are always people at my house checking in on me and giving me food and whenever I walk around the neighborhood, people invite me into their homes. It is like being a part of one massive family.

For now, Shienda (my co-teacher/counterpart) at my school is living with me. I am very thankful for this because there are so many things that I didn't know how to do- like wearing a jilbob (Muslim headscarf that I wear to school) and taking showers. In my bathroom there is an elevated upright rectangular cube in the corner which can be filled with water. Naturally, I assumed this was a bath-tub. On my first night, I climbed inside to take an uncomfortable, cold bath, all the while wondering how I would tolerate this for one year. Later I learned from Sheinda that I'm not supposed to climb into the tub but in fact the entire bathroom is the shower floor. Thus, to wash yourself, you just stand in the middle of the floor and use the showerhead or dump water on yourself from the tub using scoopers. This was strange to me at first but now I am used to it.

A little about Shienda. She is 24, has a radiant smile, "single and very happy", and probably the most vivacious person I have ever met. She's been teaching English for only 8 months at our school but speaks wonderful English. She learned most of her English from watching American movies and listening to music- everything from Jason Mraz to heavy metal. When she was in college, she was in three different heavy metal bands (much to the demise of her more conservative parents).

In addition to Shienda, I have a friend named Mohammad Syaefulloh that everyone calls "Syaefull" (pronounced Si-full). But I call him Superman because he helps with everything- driving, shopping, and fixing things in the house as they break down. He does all this in addition to starting college (which he just began today) yet he never looks tired. With Shienda and Syaefull I have no worries except that I might burden them too much. Right now my two buddies are lounging in the living room munching on mango dipped in rujak (spicy peanut sauce) and chatting in Javanese and occasionally asking me questions. It is raining heavily and I will probably find lots of puddles in my kitchen tomorrow morning.