Kubu culture under threat from outside

Text and photos by Pandaya

SOROLANGUN, Jambi (JP): There are few people the Kubu tribespeople of Jambi trust like Robert Aritonang, a Batak anthropologist who has spent two years doing a study in the jungle on the "primitive" community.

If Aritonang asks them to strip to their loin cloths to pose for visiting photographers, they will dutifully do so, although being photographed is in fact taboo for them.

"They (the Kubu) can be as open as other ethnic groups to outsiders once you know how to win their hearts," said the smiling anthropologist.

Aritonang has been researching the jungle people's culture for Warsi, a non-governmental organization which offers advocacy to the tribespeople. The Kubu are fighting a losing "war" against the government-backed capitalists who fell the forest -- the people's natural home and source of livelihood.

Warsi activists have been aggressively helping the Kubu retain their ancestral right to the rain forests. They have raised the jungle people's plight in national and international forums.

"Orang Rimbo", or jungle people, as the Kubu are proud to call themselves, formerly isolated themselves from the outside world. But since the government began to exploit forests on a large scale, awarding concessionaires to capitalists in 1975, the people have been quickly losing their habitat.

The unceasing destruction of the Jambi forests has pushed them to turn to the outside world for help.

The population has been fairly stable at between 2,500 and 3,000 over the past two decades.

The population is scattered in Bukit Duabelas, Bukit Tigapuluh and along the central Trans-Sumatra highway in Sorolangun regency.

Aritonang says the child mortality rate is very high because of the lack of cleanliness, endemic diseases and poor health services from the government. Common diseases are respiratory problems and malaria. They rely on traditional herbs, abundant in the forest, for medication.

The people jealously defend their "primitive" way of life.

According to Aritonang, the Kubu are animist and nomadic. Every tribal member is bound to abide by the customary laws. Scattered in several localities, each tribal group is led by a chief called Tumenggung, who is assisted by his deputy, Dipati, Anak Dalam, Mangku, Menti and Tenganang.

"There is no strict division of jobs among the leaders in the tribal government hierarchy," Aritonang says.

Each group, usually comprising some 20 people, lives in a shacks built closely to each other. The hut consists of a bench made of twigs, with the roof a plastic sheet.

They live largely on forest products: fruits, tubers and honey. Most are already familiar with outside goods; selling or bartering products such as rattan, herbs, resin and pork with rice, cigarettes, kerosene, matches, etc. Cutting trees without the tribal chief's consent is subject to severe punishment or a hefty fine.

The jungle people are chain-smokers. Many children as young as 10 puff like a chimney. Smoking is considered a sign of maturity. As soon as one starts smoking, an individual is perceived as reaching adulthood and is subject to customary laws.

"They spend most of their money on cigarettes they buy at Rp 1,000 a pack," Aritonang says.

In the jungle, the Kubu wear loincloths, and it is taboo for the women (and female children) to be seen by outsiders. But those living in the jungle peripheries are dressed like people of other ethnic groups.

A group of outer Kubu in Bangujo near a Javanese transmigrant resettlement site have two motorcycles and women meet any outside guests.

"I need the bikes to go shopping and hunting," says Sikap, one of the group leaders.

Erinaldi, a Warsi activist who has close contact with the Kubu and speaks their dialect fluently, says the jungle people have suffered discrimination by other ethnic groups in Jambi.

"Rimbo people are considered dirty, uncivilized and frightening. Public transport van drivers will refuse to take them because other people will refuse to enter if they see any Rimbo people inside," he says.

On their part, the Kubus see outsiders, especially the Malays, as "troublemakers, people who bring in disasters and diseases" and therefore must be avoided.

The Kubu are essentially peace-loving people. They will usually withdraw and avoid confrontation as a way to solve any dispute.

Although women are barred from seeing outsiders, they play the dominant role in the family. They manage the household, run the economy and are entitled to the ancestral inheritance.

Anytime a family member dies, the group will move far away and construct a new home. They will put the corpse on an open wooden bench and his/her belongings in a secret place in the jungle and commend it to Mother Nature.

They have a long list of taboos: attending school, cutting certain trees, letting women be seen by outsiders, bathing with soap, washing clothes with detergent, dumping waste into the river and having pictures taken.

Aritonang said attending school is strictly forbidden because reading and writing is a foreign concept. "They observed that after they were shown a piece of paper by the forest concessionaire holder, they saw their trees indiscriminately felled. It is a traumatizing thing," he says.

They refuse to be photographed because they believe their pictures would be used to bewitch them, resulting in illness or even death.

Breaking the taboos and the unwritten customary law are subject to fines and punishment, which are decided in a plenary meeting of tribal leaders. The decision-making is a highly complicated process that sometimes takes several days to reach a compromise.

For example, cutting sialang, the tall tree where wild bees have their colonies, is punishable by death, or a fine of 5,000 pieces of cloth.

Anybody relieving themselves is required to announce what they are doing every so often out loud. Otherwise he/she will be fined if he/she is accidentally spotted by a passerby.

Religious rituals are strictly closed to outsiders. Even a wedding ceremony is attended only by core family members.

The tribespeople living within the jungle are more "prosperous" than those who have been displaced to the periphery.

Despite the dwindling forests, the inner Kubu are better off because they can rely on forest products to survive, while the outer Kubu have to work as low-paid workers in private or government plantation projects. Tribespeople begging along the Sorolangun highway are a common sight, especially during the dry season when food is scarce. Many of them have skin diseases.

The Kubu do not have their own art forms, such as dance or music. They do not even have basic drawings because stationery is taboo. As in other animist tribal groups, mantras are widely practiced.

Their strong rejection of outside cultures is obvious in their cold response to the government's well-intentioned plans to "civilize" the Kubu by building them a complex of 75 houses in the isolated Sungai Pelakar subdistrict, Sorolangun.

Only 26 of the wooden 6 meter by 5 meter houses are occasionally occupied. The elementary school is almost empty and the teacher from the town rarely pays a visit.

"What is the use of having a house when our tradition requires us to move when a family member dies?" says M. Husin, the neighborhood chief.

But obviously, it is increasingly impossible for the jungle people to shield themselves from outside cultures. They are losing their habitat and their culture is endangered. They need trusted people from outside their community to defend them.

Many members of the jungle tribe have had extensive contact with outsiders: entrepreneurs that buy their products, government representatives and NGO volunteers offering legal advocacy.

They have abandoned the long-held taboos. They will gladly pose for photographers or TV crews, bathe with soap and introduce their female relatives to guests from town.

"There is no ethnic group in this world who is able to maintain the purity of their culture," says Aritonang. "The Rimbo people will sooner or later open themselves to the outside world. It's about time."