Jakarta – Indonesian responses ranged from despair to acceptance after a tsunami on Monday killed at least 256 people on Java, the latest in a line of disasters to hit the sprawling, developing nation in recent years.
The biggest was the December 2004 tsunami that struck Indonesia's Aceh province the hardest, leaving 170,000 people dead or missing But since then, few months have gone by without landslides, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions or floods that have taken or disrupted lives.
Some have been partially or wholly man-made. Wholesale logging has slashed the ability of ground to hold water, increasing the likelihood of floods and landslides, environmentalists say. Energy exploration in eastern Java caused a flow of mud and water that displaced 8,000 people recently. Sofyan, an employee at the finance ministry in the capital Jakarta, said the disasters should be seen as a warning from God about the need to preserve the environment.
"This is a warning from the one above. We have not taken enough care of nature. All has been cut out and we just have to wait for the disasters to happen." Parimun, a housekeeping worker in central Jakarta, had similar sentiments. "This is a regular thing, a reminder and notice from God." "This is just a punishment so we will continue to remember the one above," he said.
In a country where many believe divine powers take a view on rulers, President Suslilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who took office shortly before the 2004 tsunami, gets his share of the blame.
"Many people think that the disaster is correlated with SBY," said high school student Mala, referring to the president by his initials. "This can be a reminder for the president so he can lead this nation better.." Sofyan, however, gave Yudhoyono the benefit of the doubt.
"This is not a problem of SBY. His leadership is good. I think this is the result of our previous leaders. We are just receiving the bad things that came out of it." Sudaryati Darsono, a 54-year-old old business consultant in Indonesia's second-largest city of Surabaya, questioned whether the string of disasters were anything more than natural coincidences.
"We are religious people. We should believe that God would not test us beyond our limits," she said.
Certainly one could argue that some of the problems have little to with either God or man.
Indonesia's 17,000 islands sprawl along a belt of intense volcanic and seismic activity, part of what is called the "Pacific Ring of Fire." That means a greater, if unpredictable, probability for natural disasters than in other countries.