ONE THOUSAND DOORS

In Semarang, on the north coast of Java, is a building that used to house the East Indies Railway Company headquarters office. It was built between 1904 and 1907, taken over by the Japanese occupation forces during WWII and turned into an interrogation centre and prison, and after the war held by the Indonesian Army until it was returned to the railways, eventually acquiring the reputation of being haunted and lapsing into disrepair.

An impressive building. Kind of ugly in an imposing way.

Lawang Sewu. One thousand (s'ewu) doors.
Foetid, mildewy, with grime-streaked walls. As all tourist attractions should be, especially if they have a connection to WWII. Wherever we Dutch went in the tropics we left our mildewed mark.
One of its alleged inhabitants is the ghost of a woman who died in childbirth, in the form of a pananggalan: a floating head and upper torso with twitching entrails and spine dangling where it separated from the rest of the body, drifting through the darkened rooms occasionally hooting or moaning, searching for the blood of children.

A charming tale. Quite. There are many things in the tropics that search for fresh blood. Most of them make a soft buzzing noise and can spread malaria and dengue.

Semarang was an important city for the Dutch Empire, and when it was connected by road to the other metropoles of Java, the brutal exactations of Daendels and his engineers on natives to build the Great Post Road guaranteed ghosts and hauntings for decades to come.
Puntianak in the countryside districts, panangalan in more urban areas.

One of the doors in the building leads to another world.

One where the living are mere ghosts.
And daemons are citizens.




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