With a bunch of insignificant cloves in my hand, I thought of the spice trade that thrived here for over four hundred years. The plain-looking cloves and nutmeg seeds greatly influenced the history of eastern Indonesia and changed the destiny of the Moluccas.

Several hundred years ago, Europeans called these the Spice Islands because highly prized nutmeg and cloves were abundantly grown on these islands. Because at the time the two spices were worth their weight in gold, countless European fleets risked dangerous waters to travel to the small islands.

As soon as we arrived on the island of Ternate, we wanted to see the clove trees that were once money trees in the eyes of European merchants. However, when we spread out a map and asked natives where we could find a large grove of clove trees, each person pointed to a different location.

The truth is that the whole island of Ternate is one large grove. When approaching Ternate by plane or by ship, one can see that the island is a typical cone-shaped volcano, 1,700 meters [5,600 ft] high. Ternate and its twin island, Tidore, are both active volcanoes and erupt periodically, most recently within the past ten years.

The natives deeply respect the two islands and do not take them lightly. Strictly speaking, the benefits the volcanoes bring to the residents far outweigh the damage they cause when they erupt. Volcanic ash enriches the soil, which in turn nourishes the plants. For a long time after an eruption, the clove trees thrive without additional fertilization.

The clove trade

The harvest season on Ternate falls between June and October each year. We were fortunate to visit at the right time. Early one morning, we arrived at Marikurubu, an old clove-growing village located halfway up the mountain. We watched villagers spread out cloves, each about one centimeter [half an inch] long, by the sides of the sloping road to dry in the bright sunshine.

"With beautiful sunshine like this, the cloves will turn from green to dark brown in about three days." Colie, a girl wearing a headscarf, explained to us that what we saw were the buds of the trees' flowers, which had to be picked before they opened. I asked her how they tasted after they were cooked. She shook her head to indicate that local people didn't use them as a seasoning. She explained that unlike Europeans and Americans--who use cloves in cookery and in perfume, chewing gum, toothpaste and medicine--the Indonesians use them in cigarettes. In Indonesia, the burning end of a cigarette sparkles and pops, and one can smell a pungent odor. That is the effect of the cloves.

Inside a simple wooden hut, a "home factory," a dozen female villagers squatted in a circle around a small hill of unprocessed cloves piled up in the center. Their work was very simple: all they had to do was remove the useless twigs. While they chatted, they skillfully separated the cloves from the twigs with rhythmic movements. Outside the door, a solitary old man on a bench did the same work. The other men of the village were all on the mountain picking cloves.

Earlier in the morning, we had seen the young men carrying sacks and big knives heading toward the mountain. We had intended to follow them, but our guide suggested that we ride in his jeep instead. As the car sped into the woods, we realized that the road was very dangerous. After we got out of the jeep, we hiked for another half an hour. The trail was surrounded by clove trees and the ground was covered with cloves blown down by the wind. Strangely enough, we only smelled the grass and the soil and did not smell the fragrance of the cloves. I picked one up, put it in my mouth and chewed on it for a while. There was nothing spicy about it. Instead, it was like the liquid that dentists use after treating your teeth. I realized why that girl had said that cloves were used for making medicine.

Walking on the trail, we could occasionally hear men's voices, but we didn't see anyone. Later we realized that about ten young men were working on three tall clove trees. Although they were not quite as agile as monkeys, they did not use safety ropes. They picked the cloves and put them into sacks while talking to one another between the trees. Sometimes they sang to amuse themselves, and nearby birds joined in the cheerful chorus.

Two young boys under the age of ten were burning branches and sticks to produce smoke which, we were told, would drive away snakes and insects. Young boys accompany their fathers into the mountain to help with some chores. In a few years, they too will climb up the tall trees to pick cloves. If not busy with other things, women also join in picking cloves, but they do not climb quite so high.

A nutmeg plantation

At eight in the evening, we arrived on Great Banda, the largest of a group of ten small islands in the Banda Sea, located south of Ceram and Ambon, the capital of the Moluccas. It seemed the whole island had already fallen asleep. Early the next morning, we visited Belgica Fort, halfway up the mountain. Looking down from the fort, we were taken by the beauty of the radiant morning sun shining over the blue water and the island's green nutmeg trees. The Bandas are said to be the most beautiful among the Spice Islands.

In the past, European gunboats came here for the sole purpose of getting the native product--nutmeg. Our guide took us on a speedboat to the other end of the isle to see a three-hundred-year-old plantation where we saw nutmeg fruit hanging like small pears on the trees. Though there were several bungalows for the workmen, we didn't see any workers. The owner of the plantation, a seventy-five-year-old man named Broeke, spoke fluent English, Dutch and French.

Broeke gave us a brief introduction. Nutmeg trees bear fruit three times a year, in March, June and September. When the fruit ripens and the shells crack, it is time to harvest. Workers use long poles with small cages on the end to pick the fruit. Using one of those poles, our guide picked a ripe fruit for us. When I opened the thick shell, there was a thin, bright red skin inside, which looked like a flower petal. This is peeled off and dried to form the spice known as mace. When I peeled off the skin, there were many small seeds inside which had a pungent, bitter taste. These are dried to produce nutmeg.

Broeke said confidently, "The best nutmeg seeds in the world grow in the Bandas, and the best nutmeg in the Bandas comes from my plantation." Other than the weather and the soil, the major difference, according to Broeke, lies in the method of drying. On his plantation, the nutmeg seeds are dried in a fifty-meter-long wooden building which is divided into two levels by means of a bamboo partition. With a wood fire burning on the ground, the nutmeg seeds are dried on the bamboo above.

Broeke confirmed that Indonesians very seldom use nutmeg, but foreigners use the spice for all sorts of things. It is said that nutmeg is an ingredient in the secret recipe of Coca Cola.

Broeke has been to Holland, and he was in the Dutch navy when he was young. Reflecting on the turbulent fate of the Spice Islands, he became indignant. "For several hundred years, the Dutch came to the Moluccas to get our spices. In the past, they made a lot of money by using force. Even now they still make big profits by purchasing the spices at low cost and then selling them on to other countries. But we residents of the Moluccas have never gotten rich, even though we have grown spices for several hundred years. Indonesia has a lot to learn before it can become a developed country."

Strategic importance

For a long time, the nutmeg grown in the Bandas was shipped out to other countries from Ambon, which is the largest seaport of the Spice Islands and also the capital of Maluku Province.

Because the island of Ambon does not produce spices, it was developed later than many other islands. Centuries ago, spice-laden Arab fleets anchored off its northern coast to wait for calm seas before sailing on to Java or Malaysia. Later, Portuguese missionaries landed here, accounting for the large number of Catholics and Catholic churches here.

On a Sunday morning, we climbed up to the top of Soya Mountain, where an octagonal church, built in 1876, still stands. The villagers who attended the service were all clad in formal dress. The older ones, though barefooted, wore traditional black robes over their white shirts, just as their ancestors did a hundred years ago.

Ambon gained its strategic importance when the Europeans, trying to monopolize the spice trade, sought to control Ternate in the north and Great Banda in the south. In 1575, the Portuguese built a fort here. But not long thereafter, a Dutch fleet seized the fort and changed its name to Victoria. Now Victoria Port is a base for the Indonesian Army. There are several piers at which everything from large container ships to canoes can dock. Deep-sea fishing boats from Taiwan, Japan, Korea and Thailand use the port as a supply station.

The many faces of the Spice Islands

Near the harbor, we found a lively, colorful market where people communicated in different dialects. An old woman was selling a strange, red-headed fish just caught by her son. Several women with white-powdered faces swiftly shuttled through the crowd, each with a container on her head. Displayed on the ground were unusual vegetables and fruit. A dark-skinned man carrying a small kangaroo, a symbol of good luck, disembarked from a ship.

The Spice Islands, with their rich variety of plants and animals, are located between Asia and Australia. The people here are different from the Javanese Indonesians. They are more like the Polynesians and share characteristics with the natives of New Guinea. They also have Portuguese, Spanish and Dutch blood.

The Spice Islands

The Moluccas, or Spice Islands, are located in the eastern waters of Indonesia. Though there are over one thousand islands over an area of 84,000 square kilometers [32,300 sq mi], ninety percent is water and the islands make up only one percent of the total land mass of Indonesia. Most of the islands have not yet been developed.

The Spice Islands are being gradually forgotten. Because cloves and nutmeg are now successfully grown in other countries, the position of the Spice Islands is no longer so important, and though spices are still one of the traditional products of the islands, their prices have fallen. Indonesia produces a total of 6,000 tons of cloves, of which 3,500 tons are produced on the Spice Islands. The production of nutmeg is about 1,000 tons. All of these spices are exported to Europe and America.

Nutmeg and cloves change history

For centuries, Muslim traders visited the Indonesian archipelago, serving as middlemen in a trade that supplied European markets. Europeans in turn introduced the spices to China, but the Chinese did not value them as highly as did the Europeans. Fourteenth-century Arab traders sailed to Ternate to exchange rice, clothing and luxury items for cloves. They also gave the natives new shipbuilding technology, the Islamic religion, and even their name--"Molucca" comes from the Arabic expression for "land of kings." At the time, Ternate was the political and economic center of the Spice Islands.

Looking for the legendary Spice Islands, a Portuguese fleet arrived in the Moluccas in 1512. Though the Portuguese were the first to land on Ternate, they were followed later by the British and the Dutch. After the founding of the powerful Dutch East India Company in 1602, the Dutch successfully controlled the spice trade and by the early nineteenth century took direct control of the Indonesian archipelago, which became known as the Dutch East Indies. Their rule extended over the northern islands of Ternate and Tidore and the more southerly Banda islands.

After a brief Japanese occupation during World War II, Indonesia gained its independence. A brief bid for independence by the Moluccas in 1950 was ended when the islands were incorporated into Indonesia.