Ethnic Chinese still grapple with discrimination despite generations in Indonesia

Prambanan, Indonesia

WHEN Willie Sebastian bought a tiny piece of land to build a storage space, government officials in the heart of Java island delivered him an unpleasant surprise. He could not register the purchase, since he was of Chinese descent, and therefore the land would belong to the local sultan.

The men at the land office knew he was Chinese, he said, even though his family changed their last name from "Lee" in the 1970s, during his country's right-wing dictatorship, to avoid discrimination.