Two weeks ago, seven Indonesians, convinced they were about to uncover vast riches, began digging up what they believed were royal burial grounds in the middle of the famous Bogor Botanical Gardens, on yet another ill-fated treasure hunt.
After being arrested, the leader said she had been told in a dream that vast amounts of gold and platinum - enough to pay off Indonesia's foreign debt of US132.8 billion - had been buried in that particular spot. She claimed to have received wangsit, or divine inspiration, from a Dutch woman in her dream, who told her to visit the graves of the Dutch buried in the garden.
That visit yielded a bag containing two stones and a letter written in Dutch, dated 1802, saying that treasures were buried in the garden, she claimed.
That night, she was again visited in her sleep by the Dutch woman who told her to return to the gardens and look for the grave of the mystical Queen Siluman, where she would find the treasure.
Although there is no grave site for Queen Siluman, according to park officials, the group's leader, her husband and five neighbours sneaked into the gardens at midnight and began digging up what is believed to be the 400-year-old grave site of a west Javanese military commander. After several hours, with no hint of gold, they were apprehended.
This escapade is only the latest in a series of treasure hunts since the Asian economic crisis dealt a particularly harsh blow to Indonesia's economy.