An authentic descendant of French Louis XIV in Bali?

An authentic descendant of French Louis XIV in Bali?

By Jean Couteau

UBUD, Bali (JP): "I assure you. There is a Frenchman in the
village of Banjar. You must see him. He has become Hindu and even
reached the status of holy man. He is now an Empu, endowed with
magical healing powers, which he gained in the jungle of Myanmar
during the war."

This description of Empu Landring by my Balinese friend
invited curiosity. It stirred in my soul what remained of my
French nationalism, and invoked promises of an encounter with a
compatriot who had reached a step further up than me in "going
native". How could one be French and a Hindu healer, an adept of
Descartes and a Balinese medicine man? If he was French, was Empu
Landring fraudulous? And if he was Balinese, how could he be
Frenchman?

My curiosity aroused, I decided to check with my own eyes and
looked forward to going to Banjar. But it was several months
before I got the opportunity. My Balinese friend, a former
patient and admirer of the man, decided to take me so I could
judge for myself the truth of this enigma -- a Balinese
Frenchman.

Situated twenty kilometers east of the major coastal town of
Singaraja, Banjar sits at the foot of the island's central
volcanic range. Its historical ambience is a pleasant relief for
someone traveling across this island of rapid modernization. The
village is mostly known for its war against the Dutch late last
century. This was the Banjar war and most of the area and its
people were savaged remorselessly. Banjar also famous for its
lettered Brahmins, who had given Bali some of its best writers of
geguritan (Balinese traditional poems). The town has become well-
known for its Buddhist monastery, the product of the conversion
of a local brahmins and his Balinese following. Another of
Banjar's more recent claims to fame is its hot spring, which
attracts the attention of backpackers in nearby Lovina.

But, arriving by car, I paid little attention to any of these.
I was only interested in finding this Frenchman? Led along
rundown dirt roads, stinky trenches and wildly colored warungs, I
was eventually brought to a small back-street and to the famous
healer's home. To my disappointment, though, Landring was not
there. He was dead! Before I could excuse myself and take leave,
though, I was ushered inside into the presence of the a tall and
handsome youth of vaguely Eurasian appearance.

"I am Empu Landring's son," he said, "And I'll tell you about
my father. Was my father French?" he said and then asked in
answer too my query, while slightly stiffening his posture on his
stool. As he talked, a measure of western confidence was
beginning to reassert itself. The idea of being a Frenchman's son
was obviously changing his poise and his idea of himself. This
was metamorphosis right before my eyes. He was turning French in
front of me, to the point of cloaking himself in Gallic
arrogance. I half expected him to put on a beret.

"My father's father," he said, adding pride to earnestness,
"was born in Nice, an authentic descendant of King Ludovic the
14th." He paused unnecessarily for effect because in me he had
met a staunch supporter of Jacobins. Nevertheless, polite as
ever, I looked for signs of Versailles splendor around me. There
was none, except perhaps for the lone photographs of a long-
haired man with piercing eyes and a goatee. His racial origins
were not at all apparent. Indeed, he could have come from
anywhere. Or nowhere. But this mattered little to the youth.

Royal blood

Indeed, it was this racial anonymity, with its whiff of royal
French blood, that provided him his raison-d'etre. It gave him
roots. And purpose. As it must have done with his father too. To
both, claiming royal French blood was obviously their way to gain
prestige and power in their village. As healers, I was awed by
the claim. But the son carried on, forfeiting the father for the
holy man.

"Empu Landring was a man of great magical powers," he said,
"He could heal all sorts of illness, hidden and visible. And
people would come from as far as Jakarta and Surabaya to see him
for his word and a cure. On some days, high officials would come
too. They needed him, they said. He saw to it that they healed
and often succeeded." Then, brandishing a book in front of me, he
added, "This was my father's book of knowledge. And, it is now
mine."

I wondered in silence. Of which arcane knowledge was he the
bearer? I was about to ask to see the book when he handed it to
me spontaneously, probably sensing in me a Frenchman's quality,
partaking through my blood its deepest secrets. What was
extraordinary about the book, however, was its extreme banality.
Old and dog-eared, parched, tattered and yellow, with minute
worm-holes in its outside cover. It read: Wolters, Groningue,
1927, Dictionaire Francais-Neerlandais. It was a French-Dutch
dictionary.

Thus the power of this unique vestibule of knowledge -- this
dictionary of no intrinsic value in a village where no one spoke
French -- rested on the laurels of its historical misuse and on
the faded memories of the might of French kings of a bygone era.
Ignorance, or rather misknowledge, was thus made into healing
power. A dictionary of ignorance had been sealing the fate of
Empu Landring clients. And now after his death, the same
yellowing book was supporting his son's claims to power and to a
transplanted, nouveau kind of Frenchness.

Meanwhile, in the backstreet of Amsterdam, lost Balinese of
nouveau origins are also claiming to be princess and magical
healers. What do they show off to clients? Palm-leaf lontar
books, to boot.