Introduce Myself: Who am I, a Former Aceh Combatant, Became a Novelist

Nice to meet you, all member of the cool hive.blog community. I am one of the least famous writers in this world. Here, I want to know all friends. Even though I grew up in a village on the outskirts of the world, I am determined to be a universal human being. Through the cool @hive community, I want to get in touch with different cultures and thoughts, as a free-thinking human being.

I lived my childhood in a remote village between the hills. Almost every day with my friends, I go down into the small ditch on our village road. Sometimes we bathe, sometimes we just catch baby fish, sometimes we just catch baby frogs, tadpoles, just having fun.

Photo 1st-3rd: Our parents' house and the road in front of it, now. Still in the same place.

Photo 4th-5th: View of the small hills where you live in Paloh Dayah, Lhokseumawe, Aceh, Sumatra. Between these two hillsides is the where our house is located.

Photo 6th-8th - Ditches and rice fields, where we caught baby fish and frogs, in the past.

Sometimes, we go to the fields to plant cassava, harvest coconuts, bananas, and cut grass for cattle, namely cows and goats. I also burn straw to make smoke billow as an anti-mosquito for our parents' livestock. We are a family of farmers there who live among the small hillsides near the forest.

That's how it is in my hometown, Paloh Dayah, Lhokseumawe, Aceh, Sumatra. Born there on February 1, 1979 and spent my childhood and youth there and at a boarding school, about two kilometers north of our parents' wooden stilt house. I was there until I graduated from Madrasah Aliyah (high school level), in 1999, which is also in my village.

Growing up I was faced with so different realities, without coercion from anyone, I made a choice, enlisted to become part of an armed combatant group, which at that time was already so well known in the region. I'll tell you a little about that.

How I Became a Military Member of the Aceh Combatant

In 1999, a few months after I finished school, I signed up to become a member of the ASNLF (Aceh Sumatra National Liberation Front) military. Later, ASNLF became known as GAM (Free Aceh Movement). Some people call him a rebel. It's okay for them to call us anything, because they have a rich vocabulary.

In the guerrilla field, in the mountains of North Aceh, I occupied makeshift barracks made of wood and sago leaves. We made it a temporary base, because if the Indonesian soldiers surrounded us, we would leave the place, move to another place, or return there, if they left. If the base was intact when they left.

There are several barracks in the mountains in the western part of North Aceh. Some of the occupants numbered about forty people, some less. There are about seven large barracks in the mountains in the western part of North Aceh. One of them is the barracks of my group, the GAM Military Police in the western region of North Aceh. Our members are the fewest when compared to members of other barracks, only ten people. In other parts of North Aceh and Aceh, there are many more bases. I don't know any of them.

In 2000, after completing the third training session, I was ordered to rehearse a parade for several dozen GAM police recruits on the western coast of North Aceh. With my friend, I did it, but I can't remember anymore, somehow the training was stopped after a week or two, then it disappeared on its own.

In those years, the number of GAM members increased and weapons also increased. However, with the intensification of the war, the GAM police sub-forces that were formed were barely able to carry out their duties. That's a bit strange indeed. For some reason we thought of upholding the law while we were still at war, the pirates were still trying to seize territory for us to make a new State, which has shown no signs of succeeding. Meanwhile my sub-army, the Military Police, has a presence that is needed. That's because GAM has a lot of soldiers, and of course some of them like to make trouble that they don't like, which then tarnishes our reputation as fighters.

Inside the base, I usually do the usual routine that anyone would do. Our main duty is to guard the security of our comrades and weapons, taking turns. Our base was given four assault rifles, three M16s and an AK-47. We use it in shifts during night or day pickets.

Photo 9th: This is me (Three from the right, carrying M16) and trainers from various bases in western North Aceh. Photo by Teungku Jamaica, 2003.

When we were on picket duty at the Military Police headquarters, the Indonesian military never once came, so there was never any fighting there. My comrades in the base had fought in other groups at other times directly with the Indonesian army, but not me. They were recruited from the best combat troops. While I was recruited from the general army for the first generation of the GAM Military Police, because of achievements in the intellectual field and the like. Two of our members died when they fought with Indonesian soldiers outside this base.

If interested in knowing more, en.wikipedia broadcasts an overview of the Free Aceh Movement Free Aceh Movement

Even though I have the status of a guerrilla soldier, but as a person who has a high interest in learning, in the 2000s, I started to get interested in reading books. I carry reading books and writing books wherever I go, even if it's in the guerrilla field, in the mountains or in the villages. I write poems. For me, the line between the fact that we were at war and my delusion of being a bard became blurred. In terms of language, our daily life as GAM members is to write and speak or read in Acehnese, but I write in Malay or Indonesian.

Know that actually, it's not a heroic story, but a sad story, which leaves wounds that can't be healed by anyone, which can only be understood by those who experienced it. Forget it.

Why GAM Reintegrates, MoU Helsinki on August 15, 2005

On August 15, 2005, GAM and the Government of the Republic of Indonesia signed an agreement, Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in Helsinki, Finland. The event, later known as the Helsinki MoU. After that, the political plan to separate Aceh from Indonesia was agreed to be stopped by our leaders. All submit and comply with what has been determined by our leader that "we are at peace!".

One of the reasons for the existence of the Helsinki MoU was considering the December 2004 tsunami disaster. People have already suffered from the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami, we will not add more endless wars. Therefore, GAM is also willing to make peace with RI, reintegrate into a country that obeys the laws of the Republic of Indonesia.

Since then, all GAM members have agreed to become Indonesian citizens and engage in politics in a democratic manner. Our weapons are chopped up, including four guns at our base, hand them over. In politics, Aceh was given the opportunity to fight for the fate of Aceh through local parties in the Indonesian political system, and former GAM fighters and the people founded the Aceh Party.
How I Became a Novel Writer

According to my unstoppable interest, in 2005, I started writing novels. The novel was later published in 2009 under the title "Teuntra Atom". At that time I had become a journalist at a local print media, called Harian Aceh. The novel “Teuntra Atom” is my first book. I can direct the reader to find out the synopsis at www.sastra-indonesia.com “Teuntra Atom, Anak Haram Konflik Aceh”, maybe in English is “Teuntra Atom, Bastard of the Aceh Conflict”

Photo 10th: My first novel: Teuntra Atom

Then, my second work was published in 2014, also a novel, entitled “Aceh 2025”. I printed the novel 'Aceh 2025' with borrowed money, and what's worse, the book didn't sell well in the market. I can not pay the debt for a long time. While at the same time, my friend also published a book, his book was in great demand and he benefited. "Oh, my bad luck," I wailed at that time.

Photo 11th: My Second novel, “Aceh 2025”

All Photos by: My brother Jamaluddin.

After that, I wrote several novel scripts, until when this article was published, none of them have been able to be completed. The circumstance that the writer has to think about his own printing costs is a complicated problem for me to experience.

The history of writing my work, in my opinion, is also strange. I wanted to be a poet, but my published book is a novel, not one, but two already. As for poetry books, I haven't been able to publish any of them yet.

Why I'm on the Cool Hive.blog?

I had heard of hive.blog a few times before, but just that evening, I decided to be a part of this great hive.blog community.That night, at the end of the day, near midnight --- around 23.00 local time on December 19, until 00: (24) early December 20 2022 ---- on the edge of the Lhokseumawe City dam, with views of mangrove trees stork nest, @vannour and @anzirpasai, helped me open an account on hive.blog.

After that, for a few days, I leafed through the Hive Whitepaper, studied all the rules, but I didn't understand all of them yet, maybe with time I will understand them myself.

On December 27, 2022, with the help of @vannour, I decided to invest 1,070,944 Hive, with the intention that I can have a voting impact on community members, of course there will be content, even if it's small. However, a few minutes later, I thought that it was still lacking. Fortunately, when I saw my savings, there was still a little more, so I added another investment from all my savings, amounting to 653 Hives, all of which I power up to 1,723,957 Hive Power. After that, I wrote introduce myself and posted it.

Writing a book requires great effort and a long time, requires struggle. While here I wanted to share a story for fun with the great people of the @hive community.

There are several people in this community that I know directly, apart from @vannour and @anzirpasai, I also know @keuudeip, @ichsannanda, @ayijufridar. There may also be other people I know directly, but I don't know yet.

So, that's my first post at the end of 2022, and Happy New Year 2023!

May I be your new best friend
Kind regards

Thayeb Loh Angen

Banda Aceh, December 30, 2022.