Something Happened In Bali

Paving a new path for children of terror

Clad in the niqab, the garb of the zealous Islamic Salafists, she is almost inscrutable.

I am meeting Titin, 39-year-old Indonesian wife of Mubarok, alias Utomo Pamungkas, one of the terrorists jailed for his role in the 2002 Bali bombing that killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.

Titin has never spoken to a foreigner before. Meeting the wife of a jihadi isn't easy; permission is first required from her husband, who is serving a life sentence in the Metro Jaya Detention Centre in Central Jakarta. Engaging with foreigners is against jihadic principles, rendering terrorists' wives and children largely an enigma.

Titin agrees to meet on the condition family friend, supporter and former hardliner turned Indonesian counter-terror expert, Noor Huda Ishmail, joins us.

Huda and Mubarok were classmates and "close buddies" at the Al-Mukmin Ngruki Islamic boarding school in Solo, Central Java, the Ivy League for recruits to Jemaah Islamiah according to the International Crisis Group.

Their first radicalising influence, the school's founder, cleric and jailed terrorist Abu Bakar

Bashir, also taught Bali bombers Ali Ghufron, aka Mukhlas, and his brother, Ali Imron.

A former Washington Post correspondent, Huda once aspired to fight as a mujahid (holy warrior) in Afghanistan against Soviet forces but chose a different path, which inspired his book Temanku, Teroris? (My Friend, The Terrorist?), published last year.

The book is the basis for a compelling documentary, Prison and Paradise, made with Indonesian filmmaker Daniel Rudi Haryanto, to be screened at the Gold Coast Film Festival in November.

Featuring interviews with the Bali bombers in jail between 2003 and 2007, their families - including Titin and their victims, the film examines the mindset of the terrorists and the legacy they have left their children.

Haryanto interviewed Imam Samudra, Mukhlas and Amrozi, all executed in 2008 for their roles in the 2002 bombing. A shared belief in the nearly 14 hours of interviews was that they would go to paradise. "They [jihadists] all said they wanted to go to Heaven where there would be 72 beautiful virgins ready at all times to serve them and give them sexual pleasure," Haryanto says. "They claimed to be fighters in the way of Allah, and they believed their reward would be paradise."

You won't hear this in the film: Haryanto edited it out, fearing it might spark contentious debate about the meaning of jihad.

What Happened in Bali – 2004 & Dirty Carnival 2006 « KORmerica

Ha Ji Won.  I think I would have liked her more in Secret Garden if I had seen this movie first, but maybe because I have seen her in that it helped me like her so much in this.  I did really like her in this role, she was plucky and I could relate to her attraction to both men.

This series also stars Jo In Sung, who I recently saw in Dirty Carnival , a movie that was really awesome BTW.   Jo In Sung made that film and in similar fashion his presence here was unspeakable.  He moves the screen with every scene he is in.  He isn’t afraid to show every emotion with skilled acting.  His charisma is like a drug and gives me the same feeling I had toward Lee Min Ho in BOFs.  Jo In Sung displays that same unbridled passion and I can’t help but swoon.