Rural Art

Bigaan, Mindoro, June 2010.

Coco Carabao

South of San Juan, Batangas, May 2010.

Batak wedding

Batak tradition is always there.

Jakarta, February 2010.

Kurt Cobain on Sumba island

West-Sumba, February 2010.

Chobe safari

Road block.

The Zebra view into Namibia's Caprivi Strip.

Giraffes on the move.

Lunch with a view (wine in the box...).

Hippopotamus, crocodile and African buffalo.

Tante Lotte.

Ready for hunting.

Dentist's dream.

Family bath.

Chobe, Botswana, September 2009.

Buffalo sacrifice Tana Toraja

The higher the status of a dead person, the more buffalo are slaughtered at a Torajan funeral. The ritualized Torajan way of slaughtering a buffalo may remind of an ancient but unequal fight between humans and animals. I know that most of us don't like to see such pictures but we somehow have to realize that modern society industrialized such processes, taking them away from our eyes. Anyway, we continue to eat meat...

Tana Toraja, South Sulawesi, May 2009.

No sudden death in Tana Toraja

It is often said that for Torajans, life is only a preparation to death. This is true, and untrue.

Torajan people have, or had, plenty of ceremonies also celebrating life, and especially fertility. Many of them were deemed not compatible with Christianity, and are no more carried out.

Ceremonies related to death were considered compatible with Christianity, and the Torajans still conduct very elaborate (and costly) funeral rites. Even if funeral rites according to the ‘old’ (animist) religion are much more expensive and time-consuming than a Christian, mostly Protestant funeral, they are still carried out by most families when a relative dies.

A person is not considered dead as long as the funeral rites have not been carried out. The person is only sick and referred to other people as sick. The sick person is kept in the house, food will be placed in front of the corpse, betel will be offered betel, and people will talk with the person.

The relatives will gather in the tongkonan to discuss the funeral. Should Torajan funeral rites be chosen, then it will be very costly. So much so that the funeral might have to wait a couple of years. Relatives and friends have to bring offerings in the form of pig and buffalo sacrifices, and feed and entertain large numbers of guests. Rice paddies or houses might have to be sold. Loans might have to be contracted.

Provisional buildings need to be built for the ceremony, pigs and buffaloes, food, coffee, palm wine to be bought. Once everything is ready, the sick person will be rewrapped in new cloths, and on the last day before the ceremony, the person will be put on the platform of the rice granary facing the tongkonan.

For the first reception day, the sick person will be put on the lakkean, on higher ground so she can watch the festivities given in her honor.

Hundreds, sometimes thousands of guests will then gather along family or relationship lines. After a gong is sounded, warriors will pick up the first group to lead them to the ceremonial ground dancing. Offerings are brought, buffaloes first, then pigs, followed by the rice wine carriers, men, and women (see reception blog). Once all offerings are thoroughly registered (for the family to know exactly what debts have been settled though the offerings and what new debts have emerged, and for the authorities to collect taxes on sacrificed animals, an unsuccessful way of trying to limit the slaughtering), the procession is led to the reception hall. Once the guests are seated, another procession starts, this time mourning relatives of the sick person, all wearing black, and bringing the guests betel, cigarettes, tea and coffee. Once the guests have eaten, they will leave the procession hall, to make place for the next procession. Two reception days may be necessary for a big funeral.

In between, pigs will have been slaughtered at the back of the provisional building, to feed the numerous guests (who themselves will have to bring food for the carriers of the pigs).

Unlike buffaloes, black pigs are more valuable than those of two colors. The pigs are killed with a small knife, their blood is recovered in bamboo pipes, the entrails taken apart for sausages. They are then grilled on the open fire, cut in pieces and distributed.

The slaughtering of the buffaloes will take place on the third or fourth day of the funeral. The buffaloes are standing, and their throat is cut with one sharp cut. Still on the middle of the ceremonial ground, their fur and skin is taken off, and will later be sold for the leather industry in Makassar or Surabaya.

For Tana Toraja's burial grounds follow me....

Tana Toraja, South Sulawesi, May 2009.

White buffalo and a Toyota car

What does a white buffalo and a Toyota car have in common?

Well-built albino buffaloes with long horns are a rarity. Rare goods are precious, and therefore never cheap. A nice exemplary can fetch 160 million Rupiah (approx. US$16,000) on a market in Tana Toraja, Sulawesi.

The Toyota Innovo is a most common sight in Indonesia. Previously called 'kijang' (deer) and used for collective transport or as family vehicle, the new, more modern version plies the routes of Indonesia as much as the kijang. The average Innova costs around 16 million Indonesian rupiah (they love big numbers here...). Buy it in Sulawesi, and you will contribute to the wealth of the current vice-president, Jusuf Kalla, himself a Sulawesian and the one and only Toyota agent on the island.

But the commonality stops here. If your Innova will carry you for thousands and thousands of kilometers, don’t expect anybody in Tana Toraja to use an albino buffalo for transport or work. Such an animal deserves to be pampered. Every morning, it will be taken to a nice place where there is food, sun, shade, and muddy water. After a day of eating, digesting and bathing, the animal will be brushed to shine and brought back to the house. Should it stay around the house, it will be hand-fed.

It is often said that the Torajans see life as a preparation to death. The good life of the buffaloes definitely follows this philosophy. When somebody dear dies, no (buffalo) sacrifice is big enough to ensure the dead person a safe passage in the afterworld, where s/he will reunite with the gods and return to the earth as rain, thus ensuring fertility and the preservation of the people.

The better the buffaloes and the bigger their amount for the funeral, the safer this journey will be. Should you want a tau-tau (wooden effigy) for your dead relative, 24 buffaloes will at least have to be killed.

You might have to sell your Innova (and more) for this…

Buffalo market

Pasar Bolu (close to Rantepao) is taking place every six days. Hundreds of buffalos are being traded there, some worth a motor bike, others worth a decent car.

You will see buffalos in all shapes, body and horn sizes, and some even in different colors than black.

Bolu, Tana Toraja, South Sulawesi, May June 2009.

Buffalo haircut

Rantepao, Tana Toraja, South Sulawesi, May 2009.

Carabao-go-round

The indigenous Filipino version of a carousel is related to the national Filipino animal, the Carabao.

Photo from Marikina, Metro Manila in February 2007 together with Jejomar (i.e. the genuine Tagalog all-inclusive name for Jesus, Joseph and Maria) on the carabao cart.