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Sleep-Deprived American Pulls Plug on Noisy Prayers in Lombok
Fitri | August 30, 2010

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rain80
12:53am Sep 10, 2010

It is truly INSULTING that people in any 'other' religion are blasted out of bed by the call to prayer and sirens at any and all hours of the night. I am not a Muslim, and I do not need or wish to hear 12 imams screaming every morning at 4:30. I cannot sleep in the privacy of my OWN HOME! This is EVERY DAY! Luke Lloyd is my HERO! He is RIGHT to stand up for the right to SLEEP. Shame on humans who let a religion allow them to deprive other humans of sleep. I don't force my religion on Islam, and it should stop forcing itself on me. I will NEVER submit. Pray whenever you want, but stop WAKING ME UP! I don't need to hear it. There are MANY people who want to do what Luke did, but they know that the people in 'the religion of peace' will either beat them up or destroy their home with no penalty from the biased government.


marko1
2:31pm Sep 7, 2010

"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated." --Ghandi

peterR
12:54pm Sep 7, 2010

And now another foriegners villa has been trashed in Lombok.

They just don't want to move out of the dark ages. No progress. And certainly no tourism.

triau
12:29pm Sep 7, 2010

@jblnor: completely agree with you.

“We hope the police will give him the proper punishment for insulting our religion and not just let him walk away because he is a foreigner,” he said.

=> I hope the police will give the villagers the proper punishment for destroying properties and not just let them away just because they're doing that as a retaliatory act / come en masse / come from Majority group of religion in Indonesia.. I'm a Moslem and Indonesian, but I don't want my country become a haven for these kind of crimes.

Xildur
12:27pm Sep 3, 2010

In Indonesia, crime toward majority is always heresy/blasphemy. Crime against minority is almost always overlooked.

@jetset24: You only have to coop with it once a week, but we must coop with mosque each day and sometimes each night. Is it fair to compare them?


Mataram, West Nusa Tenggara. The ubiquitous prayers broadcast from mosques nationwide during Ramadan usually fade into the background for those not inclined to join in them. Until one day they don’t.

An American expatriate living in Lombok for 15 years apparently reached the end of his rope on Aug. 22, when police say he barged into a late-night prayer session with his shoes on, unplugged a microphone and may have even hit one of the worshippers.

Police and witnesses said he was lucky to escape with his life as enraged worshippers chased him, then ransacked his house.

Luke Gregory Lloyd, 64, escaped a beating but is being held by police on suspicion of blasphemy and violating his visa, the deputy chief of the Central Lombok Police, Comr. Lalu Mahsun, said on Monday.

“This man really angered residents of Kuta village in Pujut, Central Lombok,” Mahsun said.

“On the night of August 22 he stormed into a musholla [prayer facility] and berated locals who were performing the Tadarus,” the traditional reading of the Koran that goes late into the night following special 9 p.m. Ramadan prayers.

“He entered with his shoes on and then unplugged the microphone used by locals to recite the Koran,” Mahsun said. “We believe he even hit one of the worshippers because, according to him, they had interrupted his sleep.”

Mahsun said the local religious affairs office would need to decide whether Lloyd had committed blasphemy, which is illegal. If officially named a blasphemy suspect, he will face further questioning.

Meanwhile, police are holding Lloyd under guard at a local hotel while they also confer with immigration officials. Mahsun said Lloyd’s visa expired in April 2006. They declined to say why he was being held at a hotel instead of a police holding cell.

Lloyd has a history of disrupting local prayer services, Mahsun said, but this was his most extreme act.

Nasruddin, a resident of Kuta village, said he had lost patience after Lloyd’s latest outburst, which he said had been deeply insulting to residents.

Worshippers chased after Lloyd, Nasruddin said, but police intervened and took the American into custody before he was injured. Nasruddin said the villagers decided to ransack Lloyd’s house instead.

They broke windows, destroyed furniture and demolished a wall.

“He should consider himself lucky that we decided not to beat him, because we didn’t want to do anything stupid, but some people were unable to control their anger and decided to damage Lloyd’s house,” he said.

After more than 15 years tolerating Lloyd, who bought land and built a house in the village, Nasruddin said his neighbors could no longer stand him.

“We hope the police will give him the proper punishment for insulting our religion and not just let him walk away because he is a foreigner,” he said.

Lloyd reportedly travels back to the United States to extend his residence permit, but has not done so for some four years.

The immigration office in Mataram could not be reached when the Jakarta Globe tried to confirm his immigration status.