I faced my greatest
professional challenge in trying to mould a shared sense of commitment among
the member countries of ESCAP.
My
years of training as a diplomat came in good stead and enabled me to overcome
many of the hurdles we faced in trying to develop common objectives among such
a diverse diverse region and peoples. But my travels
throughout Asia and Pacific and my extensive dealings with the people in the
region also revealed a lighter side of the burden.
In
early 1974, about six months after assuming the post of Executive Secretary, I
receive an official invitation by Foreign Minister Adam Malik to visit
Indonesia as a guest of the Indonesian Government. I was accorded an official
treatment normally received for visiting foreign dignitaries as everywhere I
went I was accompanied by a police escort. During my courtesy call on President
Soeharto there were apparently some differences of
opinion between the protocol office the Palace and that of the Foreign
Ministry. The palace protocol insisted that, being an Indonesian; I should
enter the palace from the rear. The Foreign Ministry however insisted since I
was an accredited United Nations official and a foreign diplomat I should enter
the palace from the front. A diplomatic tussle was narrowly averted when it was
ultimately decided that I should enter the palace from the rear and leave the
palace from the front. It was a skilled maneuver that bore the hallmark of good
diplomacy and good sense. Before my meeting with President Soeharto,
I was approach by the official interpreter, Widodo, with the question of which
language I was going to use with the President. He was relieved when I told him
since I was an Indonesian, I should of course speak to the President in bahasa Indonesia.
Later
on in the visit, an official dinner was hosted by
Foreign Minister Adam Malik in my honour which
included members of the diplomatic corps. We toasted each other in
English. Throughout my reply I referred to “Your country, Excellency” without
mentioning Indonesia by name much to the amusement of all the guests present
since they knew I was an Indonesian too.
My
visit to outlying regions required somewhat different diplomatic maneuvering as
during one of such visit to Mongolia where I was
invited by the chieftain who received me in a nicely decorated tent. A feast of
Mongolian food was set out for lunch, and as the guest of honour,
I was served a tricolour dish that I had to share
with the chieftain. I timidly enquired what the dish was and the chieftain
politely explained ”This a desert served to special
guest only. The outer ring is horse milk. The middle yellow one is egg yoke, The inner red circle is
fresh horse blood” To my host obvious delight I stirred the dish, gulped it
down in no time and immediately washed it off with Mongolian vodka, an
extremely potent concoction. Throughout the luncheon, we continued to toast
each other, accompanied by glassfuls of vodka. By the time I rushed back to my guesthouse
I was in a mildly inebriated state.
During my official
travel, I was always accompanied by my special assistant H.Rudy Gontha. A typical
day would see us visiting various.Government
ministries for two or three meetings with high ranking officials. By the end of
the day I would sometimes feel so tired that my conservation in English would
be interspersed with Dutch expression. On such occasion Mr. Gontha
would pinch my arm while whispering, “Sir, those were Dutch words” I would
immediately corrected myself and continue again in English to the bewilderment
of the officials present.
My
ability to speak Dutch was obviously a greatest advantage in the Netherlands.
Because I had to attend the annual ECOSOC session in Geneva to present ESCAP’s
report, I usually took the opportunity to visit other donor countries in Europe
to lobby for more funds. During my visit to the Netherlands, we would
invariably begin the discussion in English. After a few minutes I would suggest
that we continue in Dutch, since both Mr. Gontha and
I speak the language fluently. The officials were delighted that I could speak
Dutch. The result was that I was able to obtain more extra-budgetary resources
from the Dutch government. As a matter of fact, in my early years in ESCAP, the
Netherlands contributed the largest amount in extra- budgetary funds. The
Japanese later overtook the Dutch as the biggest contributor.
On
one official visit to USSR Mr. Gontha and I had the
opportunity ti visit scenic and historic places like
Samarkand, Irkuts and the Baikal Lake. We were
accompanied throughout the trips by a Russian official from the Ministry of the
Foreign Affairs in Moscow. Midway through the visit he came to me with a
quizzical expression on his face and said “Sir, I have to make an embarrassing
confession. I have studied the Indonesian language and I think I can say that I
can speak the language rather fluently. I have been listening to your
conversation with Mr. Gontha
but I could not understand a word of it.
What
Indonesian dialect are you two communicating in. I replied that we both came
from the same province and therefore speak the language of our hometown. “Óh he said resignedly. That is why I could not follow your
conversation”. He had no idea that Mr. Gontha and I
were actually conversing in Dutch.
I was
impressed by the open and friendly treatment in many of my visits. I recalled
one trip to Australia, where I was received by Prime Minister Cough Whitlam in
Sydney. To my surprise he invited me to join him for a talk while in the midst of a cabinet meeting. The atmosphere was
relaxed and informal, with the prime minister and some ministers sitting on the
sofa, while the rest sat on the carpet.
I was
even invited the ministers’ luncheon during which they discussed official
business among themselves. During another visit to Canberra which happened to
coincide with Commonwealth Games, we met with Foreign minister Andrew Peacock.
I jokingly remarked Australia’s rival, New Zealand had accumulated more gold
medals than Australia. To which Mr. Peacock replied, “ It
does not matter.
The
price of gold is decreasing anyway
One
of my goals in office was to bring the South Pacific islands into the
mainstream of ESCAP’s activities. As part of this commitment I made several
visits to the area to familiarize myself with the islands specific concerns. As
with all my trips. I thoroughly enjoyed learning about the local culture,
eating local food and even learning a little about the local language. The
languages of South Pacific islands seemed easy to pronounce, sine phonetically
they were similar to the Indonesian language.
And so I would delight in pronouncing the words such
as totorua or waiorau. In Nuku’Alofa, the capital of Tonga, we stayed at the main
hotel whose local name I quite proudly pronounced as “dah-tay-lee-na not knowing what it really meant. Whereupon Mr. Gontha remarked, “Sir I believe the word is pronounced
‘Dateline” in English”.
The
linguistic similarities between some of the languages of the Pacific and Asia
were pointed out to me by the King of Tonga, who remarked on the common origins
of words such as sky (langit), moon (bulan) and stars (bintang).
The
job apparently was not without risks. On one occasion the Mekong Committee
meeting was held in Vientiane, Laos. In those days you had to travel by an
overnight train from Bangkok to the border town of Nongkai.
Arriving early the next morning from the railway station we took a short drive
through the picturesque countryside to a Thai restaurant located along the
banks of the Mekong river, where we ordered a hearty and tasty breakfast. From
the restaurant we could see very clearly the Laotian side of the river. At the
time there used to occur for one reason or another sporadic episodes
of shooting between the Thai and Laotian sides. After breakfast we boarded a
ferry to take us across the river to Laos. I must confess I felt rather uneasy
scanning the Laotian side of the river and fell into deep silence. Mr. Gontha brought me back to realty when he said “I know what
you are thinking. You are pondering what we should do if both sides of the
river should open fire on each other while we are still at midstream’ “Indeed I
replied those were my thoughts.’ To which Mr. Gontha
answered matter of factly “Either jump in the river or duck”.
Throughout my tenure at
ESCAP I invariably had to make regular visits to the United Nations
headquarters in New York. During one of such visit, my
port of entry was Honolulu, Hawaii where all United Stated bound passengers are
required to embark and undergo immigration formalities. As I approach the
immigration counter, I presented my United Nations passport to the immigration
officer in charge who happened to be an American of China’s descent. She looked
at the passport and to my horror, asked in incredulous tone
”What kind of passport is this “ I replied that it is an United Nations
passport. She shot back “Yeah, but from what country” I calmly answered “From
all over the world. It is an United Nations passport”
She insisted that she had never seen such a passport before, and made a move as
if she wanted to put the passport aside. By now is was rather piqued and so I
tried to explain that the United Nations headquarter is I New York, in the
United States of America, and those passport in question was issued from the
United Nations headquarters She remained unconvinced and appeared quite
suspicious of the passport’s origins. Fortunately a
man identifying himself as a State Department official stepped forward and
informed the immigration officer that my passport was indeed valid, where upon
she grudgingly returned it while grumbling “I still don’t know what kind a
passport this is”.
Aside
from the more humorous episodes of my years at ESCAP, there were some serious
moments that reinforced my belief in the increased interdependence of our
global community. For no matter where my travels took me from Australia to
Afghanistan, from Iran to Indonesia, from Tongo to
Thailand, all shared common universal concern. In one of my visits to an ESCAP
sponsored integrated rural development project in the Philippines, I had the
occasion to interview a number of Philippines
villagers. They were very grateful for the attention the outside world had
given to their plights and promised their full participation in the project. I
returned to Bangkok with renewed faith that this project had indeed addressed
the real problems of the people, making me even more determined to strengthen
ESCAP’ concrete involvement in he problems of the
people.
It
was always mindful of my role as the leading international civil servant in the
Asia an Pacific region, and
tried to bring my duties and responsibilities to bear with the concerns and
needs of the region. In recognition of this commitment to fostering closer
regional ties, I was very honoured to have received
an Honorary degree of Doctor of Political scene from Hankuk
University of Foreign Studies in Seoul, South Korea in 1978.
Posted April
28, 2002 - rudyct
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