Download It was not until Alexhia Cordova da Silva was 18 years old that she found out that she was in fact Timorese… not Indonesian.
She is one of nearly four thousand children from Timor Leste who were taken by Indonesians during their brutal 24 year occupation of the country.
They were taken by soliders, Indonesian aid groups and civilan families.
In most case the Indonesian foster families promised Timorese parents they would educate their children and then return them to the family.
This did not always happen.
Citra Prastuti tells Alexhia’s story that begins back in 1992 in Lospalos, in the east of Timor Leste.
Kristina Sity was just 10 year old when her baby sister was taken away but she still remembers it clearly.
“I was fetching water with a bucket, when I saw my parents with some Indonesian people inside a car. The car stopped and then I asked my mom, where’s my little sister going? How come an Indonesian is carrying my sister? My mom said, the Indonesians are taking Alexhia as their daughter.”
Their mother, Sabina Ximenes, had no warning that an Indonesian civil servant couple accompanied by soldiers would come that day and take her 9th child.
“They just came saying they wanted to take away my daughter. I did not want to give her up. So they left my house, but then they came back again when my baby was 40 days old. The Indonesians said, they were going to take care of my daughter. They gave her milk. And then we were taken to a military base, and we spent a night there. My husband asked me to stop crying, because we were at a military base and if they got angry, they could kill us, what could we do?”
Sabina was a supporter of the independence group, Fretilin.
Her brothers were senior commanders in the armed movement fighting against the occupying Indonesian army.
She said she had no choice but to hand over her baby daughter.
“I was mad at my brothers, of course I was! It was because of them that I have to suffer like this. I have had to sacrifice so many things because of them. But I had very little choice because of the political situation back then... I had to protect my brothers.”
“The foster father said, she will always be my daughter, they were just taking care of her. I did not want to give her up. But at that time you could not go against the will of a person in a military uniform,” Sabina adds.
Sabina was forced to sign a document.
She can’t read and didn’t understand what she was signing.
But she has kept the document alongside a picture of newborn Alexhia in her arms for the last 18 years .
The document she signed says that she has freely handed over her daughter.
But Sabina says nothing could be further from the truth.
“Everytime I saw another mother breastfeeding her baby, I remembered my daughter. My breasts hurt, I should have breastfed my baby, but I could not. I cried all the time. My husband said to me to stop crying, he said, our daughter was going to be fine there. He cried too. He said, if I cried, my daughter will be sick too. I couldn’t bear it....(sobbing).”
Sister Siti adds, “We have a little brother, who often asked how’s his sister in Indonesia? If my mother heard him she would become very sad immediately. Once she fainted because she missed Alexhia so bad. She asked us not to mention her name anymore if we want to see her alive.”
Alexhia spent the next 18 years with an Indonesian foster family first in Dilli and then on the main Indonesian island of Java.
She was told nothing about her family in Timor Leste and they had no news about her.
It was not till her stepfather was in hospital dying that he told her she was adopted.
“He said your real mother comes from Lospalos.” Lospalos? Hello? I could not even find it on Google! I was miserable. Where is that place exactly? On Mars? Or elsewhere? I did not know. I had no idea!”
She’s now studying law at a private university on the outskirts of the capital Jakarta.
“Maybe there’s a good side to be taken away… What future would I have had if I stay in Dili, Timor Leste? In Indonesia, I lived in a decent house with my foster parents.”
But once she found out the truth she began searching for her real family...
“I was not sure if my real parents were still alive. Because there was war… My foster mother said to me that ‘Alexhia, your mother is very poor, she might be dead by now’. But I was so sure that she was not telling the truth and that she was just saying it to stop me from finding my real parents.”
“Even if my mother was a prostitute, I will come looking for her! Whatever it takes, even if I get to get shot. All I know is that I have to go home.”
A ray of hope came via the social media network Facebook. It lead her to the current Prime Minister of independent Timor Leste Xanana Gusmao.
“Suddenly one day I got a phone call, ordering me to come immediately to meet Xanana Gusmao. Whoa... I know Xanana Gusmao!”
During the battle for independence, Alexhia’s uncle was the chief security guard for Xanana Gusmao.
Last year Alexhia made the journey back to Timor leste.
She spent a week with her family in a small village surrounded by thick forest in the east of the country.
“I look exactly like my mom! Just like seeing a mirror. I think this is the key to coming back to Timor Leste, because of our faces. It’s funny because in my real family, no one else looks exactly like mom. Just me, and I was the one given to another family. This is my key to coming home.”
Her mother was always sure that Alexhia was alive and would find her way back home.
“She’s my flesh and blood. If she died, I would have known. God knows that I did not sell her to anyone. If I sold my daughter then, God would have punished me by now. But I did not sell her. I wassure she was alive and would come back to me.”
“I was really happy to meet my daughter. But at first she was furious at me. She asked, why did you sell me to Indonesia? I explained to her that I did not sell her. I asked her to contact her foster mother to come, so I can tell her that I did not sell my daughter.”
Sabina told her daughter not to have angry or hatred in her heart..
“At first, I hated the foster parents... but they already had my daughter, so I have to love them as well so my daughter will be fine with them. If I hated them, she could have gotten sick. We have to learn to be patient. As long as your children is healthy, God will help.”
Alexhia is now back in Jakarta finishing her studies but she keeps in touch with her family in Timor Leste.
“After my first visit to Timor Leste, I realised that I have to come again… and this time it’s not just for my mother. I have little brother and sister… I want the best future for them!”
“When I go back to Timor Leste, I will learn to love the country. I just found my long lost home. Just like a relationship, you have to build on it... learn to love that person. I will definitely go back to Timor Leste again."
If you were taken as a child from East Timor and want to contact your family or parents, you can write us or go to the website www.istoriaku.org. This is a new website to help us understand about the East Timorese children who were sent to Indonesia and also to help children and parents find each other.
