First, you must read the news.....
Borneo Post, 28/02/2012, Tuesday
"Of Skull And Sago Worms"
Wow..when I bought the Borneo Post on 28
February 2012 during my breakfast, I right away sighted the article on the
front page. It really did attract attention with the big column with big photo
of Sibu well known lawyer, Mr Chambai. I thought..what happen now?
And after I finished read it, I also knew
that the article will definitely sparks a lot of reactions. Especially from the
subject, that is our people, Ibans.
No one know just how much I am proud to be
born as pure Iban. Both my parent also purely Iban, no mixed blood, also our
grandparent and great grandparent. Now, what make a purer Iban than that? But
just how much I love to be one, sometimes, I also upset by my own people thinking.
Well, not that they thinking bad only that for me, we should be more open
minded in this kind of situation. I am not agree to any humiliation or insult
throw at my people but at the same time, I want my people to look into this
kind of matter at different angle of view. For me, think outside the box. Do
not going berserk over something before we think through of the cause of why it
happened.
Iban beauty
I respect Mr Chambai for defending our
people but let us think and look deeper…just a little bit deeper.
“WHY?”
I like Y question. It gives answer.
Let us ask ourselves why do other people
always think negatively towards our lifestyle? For my own experience, we gave
them the reason. We gave them something to see by their own eyes, something to
experience. I do not think the writer of the article is a stupid person. He is
a missionary. For me, he is just being honest in what he himself experience
about our culture or lifestyle. Can we blame him if he came to the subject’s
place or longhouse during festival and saw some of our people having the ‘tuak’
and got drunk and then of course most knew, when we said drunk, meaning some
might acted immorally out of soberness.
Who do we want to hide it from? Our people
did drink tuak and got drunk and when drunk, will create some not really nice
scene. Fighting among themselves, hitting their wives..but then, people can’t
say only The Ibans doing it. Am I right? Some people from other group of races
also have the same social problem, abusing and hitting their wives. And to make
it worse, they were doing it even when they were not drunk but when they were
sober. Just to make themselves felt stronger or mightier than the victim. But
of course there is no legit reason that allow any man to abuse his wife. NONE.
And most of the things that was written in
the article, from my own experience, he might have seen it happened himself.
May be I can try to straight up few things here.
this is how modern Iban longhouse looked - Ulu Sebauh, Bintulu
Photo courtesy of wikipedia.
(i)
About drinking ‘tuak’ – yes,
our people do drink ‘tuak’, a kind of drink that was made from vermicelli rice
and some sort of ‘ragi’, when consumed in huge amount will get us drunk.
According to my grandmother (she likes to tell us story when we were very
young) ‘tuak’ previously some time ago was taken only during festival times or
if there was any worshipping ritual, tuak was taken in just little amount as
part of the ritual or when we were having big ceremony like wedding or memorial
services, giving ‘tuak’ to our guests meaning respect or welcoming them to our
home. It is not supposed to be taken in huge amount and purposely got drunk by
it. As for the immoral act that mentioned I have to disagree because, in our
society, we have structure of leadership. We have ‘tuai rumah’ that act as
leader to the people in one long house. And this ‘tuai rumah’ usually with his
some AJK will ensure that his people to act properly and they have their own
rules to control their people. My long house, the ‘tuai rumah’ is my own
grandfather. He set the rules that in our longhouse, no one is allowed to
gamble such as ‘nyabung’ or with cards, no one allowed to start any fight
regardless of the reason, and anyone that was provoked and responded to it (the
provocation) by way of fighting, also will be put on trial by the wise men and
penalty will be imposed or they will involve the authority if the case is
serious. Spreading bad rumors’ about
others also wrong, stealing is wrong, leaving their home too long without
attending to its maintenance and cleanliness also wrong. They were among other
rules that were set by a ‘tuai rumah’ to take care of his people harmonies.
And after so many years living in a long house community, I
never seen any drunken man in my long house purposely or randomly, sexually
attacked any other female resident or a guest. And never did happen in my place
a woman willingly surrendered herself to any man other than her husband even
after getting drunk. God forbid, our moral is not that low yet. So, if as what
the article said that sexual activities might be high I am very sure it was
only happened in individual bedroom, with individuals’ own wife.
For what happening in a more modern society in urban area,
I can’t say it is fair to include everyone in the same boat. Youngsters in big
city, they are more sociable. We just can’t control their sexual desire or
activities right? And again, if we talk about youngsters, sex and the city, it
is not just our people, The Ibans right?
(ii)
About the parent offered their
own daughter to a man just to get the man to marry her…that was sooooo wrong!
Let me share this, my parent marriage was arranged by their parents. In our
earlier generations, marriage was arranged so that parents can get their own
people (or long distance family) to be their son or daughter in law.
The reason is : they will know the history of the family’s
social life and health.
My mother is a cousin to my father, because their parent
likes the way each other bringing up their kids, they believe they will have a
good new generations by match made my parent. For example, my mother’s father
was a very talented man in doing ‘kampung’ jobs such as crafting and planting
crops. And her mother was a very hardworking lady that bore 7 children so in
our society; this is a sign that my mother, their daughter will become a good
person as her parent due to the example set by her parent. And I think this
really worked well. My parent now has been married for more than 30 years and
we are very close as a family. I know all of my cousins.
And look and compare to this modern day, where the kids
choose their own partner of life and how the divorce rate increase each year?
Both parents do not know each other well, and at the end only they recognized
the incompatibility. Well, I can raise my hand as one of the person that made
the wrong choice and end up with one fail marriage. But I am a lucky person; I
have a better second chance.
By the way, back to our topic, in our society, even if the
parent sometimes ago can arranged their kids marriage, it is still required the
said person’s approval. And maybe some people do confuse with ‘ngayap’ ritual
and took that as offering their daughter to have sex with a man, let us check
the real meaning of this culture. But before that, I would like to stress out
that, this activity is considering illegal now. At my long house, you can be
put to trial by exercising this, especially if the lady is not giving her
consent.
Actually, during the times that ‘ngayap’ was exercisable,
about fifty years (or more) ago, it was supposed to be a culture where a guy
can court a girl and know her before he decided to take her as his wife. But
not once in history did this ‘ngayap’ should end up in sexual activity. Like I
always said, we made the culture become ‘dirty’ by acting ‘dirty’ in the name
of the culture.
During ‘ngayap’ the couple was to talk and ask question
about each other so that they can know each better or they were suitable to be
each other’s life partner. It was allowable only when the lady was agreed to
the meeting. At that time, open courtship considered not nice so, this was the
only way that allowed them to meet and talk. But of course, some might has used
it the wrong way and tempered the good purpose in it. Never ever did a parent
will let their daughter to be an object of sex. This I guarantee. Most of the
men married the girl and be responsible for her good care after their courtship
and Iban’s men only allowed one legitimate wife at one time.
(iii)
About the things, leeched, I
can say that it is just not a correct fact but we do eat fried ants and their
eggs. I had tried that and I believe it was scientific proven that they contain
good protein and the taste was also good what….:) But what is wrong with eating
the thing that can be eaten? The sago worms for sure referring to ‘ulat matar’
or ‘tindoh’, a kind of white, fat, oily larva (some sort of) that live and
breed in ‘sago’ log. Actually this ‘tindoh’ is a traditional food for Melanau
people that is now kind of an international ‘banquet’ when everyone likes to
try and have them. Even the tourists tried them and there is no harm in taking
this ‘tindoh’ so far. But leeches, no no no…. never heard or seen any Iban ate
leeches la sir..that is really disgusting.
'tindoh' @ 'matar' or in Malays 'ulat sago'
(iv)
About we do not have any
refrigerator..well can say it is correct there. In my long house, we do not
have a refrigerator because we do not have an electricity power to operate the
refrigerator but we should not be confused by the fact that most Ibans nowadays
are living in urban area. This is due to their occupational need and living
standard that have improved. Most of our people have purchased town house that
suited their living needs such as a school for their children and their
workplace. So, they won’t put a generator at their long house where there is no
one living there. We only going back to our long house for Gawai festival and
we do not need the refrigerator for we have so much sources of food at our
hometown.
Please do not forget sir that Iban people are recognized
for their talent and ability to grow vegetables, planting fruits, hunting for
wild animal for food supply and breed chicken, pigs and other animal to support
their living. We do have salted fishes or meat but that do not mean we are having
them as our daily meals. And so that not to give the wrong facts, ‘kasam’ the
preserved salted food that was referred to in the article (I am sure of it) is considered
a luxury food and only taken occasionally because only few people know how to
prepare them now. It is totally not true that we pictured so poor and desperate
for saving our food but we are not allow to wasting any either.
Do not forget too, if our leader or the government did not
missed out our place in their map to supply with electricity and clean water,
we sure won’t migrated to big city and will definitely have at least one
refrigerator in our house back home. Now when other pictured us as poor and not
developed, this group of people (the so called leader) do not like it very much
pulak…of course everyone have their own agenda in defending the Ibans now.
But let us take all this as a lesson. A lesson that can
make us more motivated in improving ourselves and our lifestyle. Be more
cautious in our living choice of style. Sometimes denying the half fact also
not good for our ‘society health’. I do not denying that many of our people
leading a not healthy lifestyle but I deny it if people make it sound like only
our people the Ibans that having that problem. All of our society, be it Iban,
or Malays, or Bodayuhs, or Indias or Chinese, have the same problem. I am
pretty sure of it. But the way we handled it, that makes a different. When we
knew we really have the problem but we only getting mad when others talked
about it, it is not getting us anywhere. Handling it by facing the problem and
try to solve it, that will make the better of it. So, let just not being mad
over the article but let us take it as a wakening call. Try to change now so
that in future our children will not have any one say the wrong thing about us,
their elder generation. We cannot blame it if our ancestors came poor in
history because for me, in history, no one can be judged as poor or rich
because we have different life structure and cultures. We, Iban considered rich
if we have many great great grand children, we will feel proud if our young
generations success in their life. That makes us rich. Not the monetary value.
We are considered rich when our children completed their degree. We are rich
when all of our relatives coming during our death ceremonial.
Maybe next time, other people can write about us but please
do not forget the good side of us. Do not leave the good spirit of Iban. It
will be fair that way because if we only picture the bad side, other people
that read it will have the wrong impression. We are not that bad. We have good Samaritan
spirit.
In our padi field, we do it together with our relatives and
hometown friends. We do not have to pay their wages to work in our padi field
but in return, we are to give them hands in theirs too. Whenever people or
guests come to our home, we are to feed them with whatever we have. We never
chased people out from our home because that is rude and Iban people never
treat others rudely. Whenever our in laws family coming, we are to get ready
our guest room for them, get ready the place for them to spend the night.
As children, we are to take our parent into our home
whenever we are able to support them and we teach our children to treat them
with respect. Sending our old folks to old folks home consider discourteous act
of a child. So Iban parent less likely to die alone.
So from now on, do not give the outsider to have any reason
to think negatively towards us. We do not have to scold people or act roughly
towards theirs comment but just help ourselves by getting more positive in our
life and act more sensible. Practice a good life style so people will respect
us more. Read and say more good things.
Until next time, please always deeper inside ourselves
because there is a lot in there to be find and thank you if you read this till
the end.
