He helps himself to a newspaper inside. The man, visibly shaking, quietly insists it is. Within 10 minutes it is over and everyone jumps back into the minibus, which picks up speed to get to Meulaboh. It is a five-hour trip and the minibuses often travel nearly empty. Few people travel if they can avoid it these days.
Checks are routine and can easily turn into something far worse.
Ordinary Acehnese are all too familiar with friends' or relatives' lucky escapes. Most of the security forces are non-Acehnese and many are unhappy there. Some have tried to desert. Largely ostracised by the people around them, they rarely sit down in public with Acehnese. They are liable to be shot or stabbed if they do.