The lanterns are not the only things glowing tonight.

 

In Jakarta, where the air hums with the eternal promise of rain and the rumble of traffic, the red of Imlek burns soft against the grey of the concrete. I walk through the narrow alleyways of Glodok, the city's old Chinatown, my senses alight. I stop at a stall selling kue keranjang, the sticky rice cakes stacked high, each one round and dark as polished mahogany. I reach out and touch one gently, and the history I learned in school suddenly feels different. It feels personal.

My mind drifts to the decades of silence, the years when the barongsai—the lions—could only be whispered about, their dances confined to memory, their vibrant manes painted only behind our closed eyelids. But tonight, the silence is a ghost. Now, the drums are so loud they vibrate in my chest, a liberated heartbeat for the city. The lion dancers leap and tumble, their movements a defiant blur of color, while children from every background shriek with delight as they dart forward to touch the lion's head for luck.

The air is thick, a fragrant mix of sandalwood from the nearby temple and the clove cigarettes of a becak driver watching the spectacle with a smile. I watch an old woman, her face a map of history, stand at the temple entrance. Her lips move in silent Hokkien, her eyes closed in deep concentration. Is she asking for health? For family? Or is she simply offering thanks—thanks for being able to stand here, in the open, in the sound, in the light? 

The scene is a powerful reminder of how recent this freedom is. The fall of the New Order in 1998 opened the door for this monumental change. It was a long-overdue reckoning, culminating in President Abdurrahman Wahid's 2000 decree that gave the Chinese community back its cultural soul.

I imagine that later, in homes across the city, tables will groan under the weight of mie for long life and the ingredients for yu sheng, the prosperity salad. Families will gather, and the call will go out: "The higher you toss, the better your luck!" And they will laugh, flinging shreds of carrot, ginger, and salmon into the air, a confetti of hope that lands in their hair and on their shoulders. As midnight passes, the firecrackers will begin their chaotic symphony, a joyful noise that would have been unthinkable just a generation ago.

In Jakarta, the city of contrasts—where new glass towers scrape the sky and the old canals stagnate below—the story of Imlek is not just in textbooks. It is written in the light in that old woman's eyes, in the uninhibited laughter of the young cici at the market, and in the fierce grip of a child clutching his red angpao.

 Today, Imlek is not just a holiday for the Chinese-Indonesian community; it is a vibrant part of the nation's fabric. The once-banned barongsai now dances freely in shopping malls across the archipelago, and the greeting "Gong Xi Fa Cai" is heard from all backgrounds, a testament to Indonesia's ongoing commitment to Bhinneka Tunggal Ika—Unity in Diversity.

Happy Chinese New Year, my friends. Gong Xi Fa Cai. Welcome to the year of Fire Horse.