In the garden at the side of the Hatta house in Bukittinggi, Andi, a museum staff member, is cleaning ‘Hatta’s bicycle’. Young Mohammad Hatta loved cycling, he says. “After school, he could spend the whole afternoon riding around with his friends. Once, his grandfather had to search everywhere for him because he wasn’t home in time for prayer.” Hatta was punished for it. Andi points to a tree in the yard. “He was tied to that tree for several hours by his grandfather”, he says with a laugh, as if he had witnessed it himself.
On the facade of the house, next to where the bicycle is usually parked, hangs a photo of Hatta with his bike. “But this bike is a replica, of course”, says Andi. “It’s impossible to preserve a bicycle from the early twentieth century intact.”
The Hatta building at Woudestein is named after Mohammad Hatta, the first vice-president of Indonesia and a key founding figure of the nation. Between 1921 and 1932 he studied at the Nederlandse Handelshogeschool, the predecessor of Erasmus University.
Hatta was anti-colonial and fought for an independent Indonesia, which was then still colonised by the Netherlands. In the Netherlands, he was active in the Indonesian student association Perhimpunan Indonesia, the predecessor of today’s Persatuan Pelajar Indonesia. Back in Indonesia, he became politically active and eventually the first vice-president. Mohammad Hatta is a pivotal figure in Indonesian history and a national hero.
The Hatta building in Bukittinggi is a residence on a plot of around 500 square metres. It is in this two-storey house that Hatta was born and spent the first eleven years of his life. The house now serves as a museum about the national hero.
In the centre of the ground floor is a living room, where key moments from his life are highlighted. The family tree and photos charting his life story hang on the walls. The furniture in the house are replicas, but it’s about capturing what Hatta’s life here looked like, explains a guide who gives tours of the museum. Upstairs is the bedroom where Hatta was born.
Heroism, anti-colonialism and nationalism
Inside the museum, two photos – one of the board of Perhimpunan Indonesia and a portrait captioned ‘Bung Hatta being a student in Holland’ – along with a brief mention on the timeline of his life, offer a modest reminder of his time in Rotterdam. The museum pays little attention to this period, even though those years were important in shaping his anti-colonial ideas. While living in The Hague, for instance, he was in contact with Anton de Kom, the well-known Surinamese resistance fighter and anti-colonial activist. They often discussed independence and resistance to colonial rule and slavery during that time.
That Hatta’s time abroad is hardly featured is not unusual in Indonesia. In museums and in the broader narrative around key historical figures, the focus is often on heroism, anti-colonialism and nationalism. Hatta, too, is primarily presented in this museum as a purely Indonesian nationalist figure, with no visible traces of foreign influence.
Students curious about Hatta
Robila, Deri and Shania, second-year sociology students at the local university, are also visiting the museum and are curious about the figure of Hatta. “We’ve been living in Bukittinggi for a couple of years, but had never visited this museum”, says Robila.
They find Hatta fascinating. “Hatta seemed to be the counterpart to the first president, Sukarno”, says Shania. “He was calm, moderate and thoughtful, while Sukarno seemed more fiery and impulsive.”
The students didn’t know that Hatta had studied in Rotterdam. “We only knew he lived in the Netherlands for a while”, says Deri. In the living room, they discover a note on the timeline of Hatta’s life: September 1921: Hatta began his studies at the Nederlandse Handelshogeschool. “Oh yes! Here it is!”, Shania exclaims.
The Hatta building in Rotterdam
Visitors and staff at the museum are also unaware of the existence of the Hatta Building on the Woudestein campus. “Do Hatta’s family members even know about the building on your campus?”, asks the guide. The building was erected in 2009, but the family wasn’t officially informed until 2014, with help from alumnus Kwik Kian Gie.
A visitor searches for something familiar in the photo of the campus building that EM shows him. “Does the building have any West Sumatran features on the inside?”, he asks. This region is known for its rumah gadang – houses with pointed roofs. He studies the facade in the photo with visible disappointment as he can’t spot any such architectural elements.
“It’s a shame the building has no elements of the culture Hatta came from”, he says. “And why was the building named after him? Is it just because he studied there?” He looks at the photo again. In the Rotterdam’s Hatta building’s hall hangs a brief biography and an image of Hatta’s diploma. “It’s kind of funny, isn’t it? Hatta opposed the Dutch colonial government, but now they’re using his name for a building.”
