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NX77799 - BUSINE, Sydney Herbert Thomas, Pte.
Asia 1989 - by Jim
Busine Unfortunately the trip to
Thanbyuzayat, Burma, had to be called off at the last moment
clue to Visa entry restrictions. A great disappointment, but
with elections scheduled for May 1990 in Burma, perhaps it may
become easier in the future to enter Myanmar.
I decided to continue with the second part of my
plans with a visit to Java, Indonesia. Firstly, to attend the
wedding of an old friend and secondly, to try and find the
village that my father had been at when the Australian Forces
capitulated on 9.3.42 in West Java. I
had acquired a colour photo copy of a sketch map detailing Black
force's (AlF) journey across the Island hoping to meet up with
the two ships HMAS Perth and US Houston. However as they were
both sunk in the battle of Sunda Straits on the way around to
rescue them the Australian force had no alternative but to stop
and wait for capitulation on 9.3.42. The
unit my father was with were assigned to a Tea Plantation area
at the Village of Pakenjeng, and this was the village I hoped to
find. After a week in Jakarta for the
wedding, my friend Barry Dean and his wife Larny, joined me on
the journey. We travelled by train to BANDOENG, passing some
spectacular country with terraced fields set against back drops
of mountains and valleys with rivers flowing way below. We
arrived in Bandoeng and to our surprise were confronted with an
array of old Holden Kingswood taxis, all of which appeared to be
in good working order. We stayed the night and then set out the
next day in a Kingswood taxi with a Sudanese driver to find
Pakenjeng. We travelled for 5 hours beside huge mountains past
the towns of Leles and Garoet and on past the small villages
following this old WWII map. We stopped in the middle of a tea
plantation to take photos and video of the women working the
fields until suddenly we were at the end of a road in a village
with the name PAKENJENG. It is a small
village with several shops and as we took photos we were greeted
at first by all the children, not used to foreign visitors. A
young man started talking to Lis and using Barry's wife Larny as
the interpreter we enquired if anyone would still be living in
the village who was there in 1942. We were guided to a house at
the end of the village and told to wait until an old man was
woken from his sleep to see us. When he
was ready we were invited into this tidy house and sat down on
some low chairs while a cup of tea was brought out for us. The
hospitality was incredible and the old man spoke to us through
Larny. As it turned out he was the village chief at the time of
the Australian forces being there and was able to tell us
everything; where the troops stayed, as he had arranged the
billets and how they left all their equipment there and he
informed us that the Australians had no food and had to be
supplied by the villagers. (We spoke for about an hour.) He was
not aware the Australians had gone into captivity. He thought
they all went home. After thanking him
for his hospitality we returned to Bandoeng for the night and
then back to Jakarta the next day. The
following week I flew to Singapore for 4 days before returning
to Australia. Whilst there I visited Major Derrick Coupland and
gave the following report. .....to be
continued
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Last updated
31/08/2021 |
