This book explores an album of popular music with a remarkable
significance to a violent wave of postcolonial tensions in the
Netherlands in the 1970s. Several "actions" were claimed by a small
number of first-generation descendants of ca. 12,500 reluctant migrants
from the young independent state of Indonesia (former Dutch East
Indies). Transferred in 1951, this culturally coherent group consisted
of ex-Royal Dutch Colonial Army personnel and their families. Their
ancient roots in the Moluccan archipelago and their protestant-christian
faith defined their minority image. Their sojourn should have been
temporary, but frustratingly turned out to be permanent. At the height
of strained relations, Massada rose to the occasion. Astaganaga (1978)
is a telling example of the will to negotiate a different diasporic
Moluccan identity through uplifting contemporary sounds.