The myth of the uniformity and changelessness of the overseas Chinese dies hard, despite abundant evidence of their cultural diversity and capacity for acculturation to local ways of life and beliefs. The Chinese who came to Indonesia were not homogeneous even on their arrival. Although the majority of the immigrants came from Fukien and Kwangtung provinces, they were culturally very diverse, even to the extent of speaking mutually unintelligible ‘dialects’ of Chinese. Most were poorly educated, and it has been a 20th century phenomenon to have Chinese schools using kuuo-yu (Mandarin Chinese) as a means of transcending these linguistic differences.