Pontianak: A city with an increasingly lonely yet serene river
Pontianak: A city with an increasingly lonely yet serene river
Evi Mariani, The Jakarta Post, Pontianak, West Kalimantan
On one quiet cloudy day in the town of Pontianak, West
Kalimantan, Indonesia's longest river the Kapuas was a picture of
serenity, with only a few boats drifting listlessly down it.
Unlike its close relative, the Barito River in Central
Kalimantan that has a famous floating market bustling with life,
these days, the Kapuas flows mostly without people.
This was not always the case. Throughout the centuries, this
1,140-kilometer river has provided a livelihood to the thousands
who have lived on its banks.
The river used to be the most important trade route in a once
virgin land full of forests and swamps, and people traveled to
areas hundreds of kilometers away from Pontianak on its waters.
Nowadays, mostly trading ships cruise the river while the once
many passenger ships have been replaced by buses and airplanes.
However, travelers can still see traces of the river in its
heyday in the town that used to be known as the Emerald of the
Equator, named for its mines that once yielded a treasure of
gleaming gemstones.
If one takes a tour through Pontianak's riverbank settlements
and one can see how the locals still depend on the river.
In the afternoons, children take baths and row small boats as
women wash clothes in the brown-colored water. Regardless of the
river's discoloration locals continue to brush their teeth and
shower in it.
The most bustling residential area in the Pontianak is Kampung
Dalam, an elongated village that stretches along the river's
northern bank.
This village was initially the home for servants of the sultan
whose palace, called a kraton, stands nearby, overlooking the
river.
The first sultan of the Alkadri Sultanate was Syarif
Abdurahman, the son of Al Habib Husin, a noble Arab who traveled
to Sumatra to spread Islam.
The task brought the family in 1770s to Borneo. It was said
that Syarif Abdurahman took his large families and friends with
14 ships, sailing down Kapuas River whose banks were still green
forests.
He wanted to live in the area and decided to fire a cannon-
ball and build his settlement around the spot where the ball
dropped.
It dropped at the meeting place between the Kapuas and Landak
rivers where legend said that apparitions in the form of long-
haired women wandered around; creatures called pontianak or
kuntilanak in Malay.
Stories said that the Sultan scared away the pontianak with
the booming sound of his guns.
In 1771, he erected the first column of a mosque that later
became famous as the Masjid Jami. Shortly afterwards, the
cornerstone of his palace was also laid not far from the mosque.
That is the story of how the city got its name and its start.
Locals always tell new visitors to Pontianak that one has not
yet properly visited the city if they do not set foot in the
kraton.
Now Pontianak is a busy trading city, thanks largely to a gold
rush back in the Dutch colonial era in the 19th century.
Like most typical trading cities, Pontianak is a home to many
cultures. Statistics state that about 30 percent of the 482,000
population are of Chinese descent.
The remaining population also comprises Malays, Buginese,
Dayaks and Javanese, and travelers can see a little bit of each
culture in the city.
Pontianak delicacies, for example, are mostly a mixture of
Malay and Chinese recipes.
Coffee houses common in the city serve pengkang; glutinous
rice cakes filled with dried shrimps, and other Chinese
delicacies like flour cakes filled with green bean paste.
The habit of drinking coffee while chatting with friends is
both a Malay and a Chinese custom and the owners of large coffee
are generally Chinese who still speak the old Hakka dialect.
Meanwhile, travelers can savor the Dayak culture from the
colorful bead jewelry, the alluring gemstones and suits of
traditional Dayak armor sold at souvenir shops along Jl.
Pattimura.
The shops also sell silver- or gold-threaded clothes called
kain songket woven in Sambas, a small town 225 kilometers
northwest of Pontianak.
Besides Sambas, travelers can also take off to Singkawang,
which is only 145 kilometers from Pontianak, or about three hours
travel by car.
More intrepid travelers who want to experience a boat or ship
journey on the Kapuas can take crowded boats to the small
riverside towns in the Sintang area, where the Dayak people live.
Those who are up for a longer journey can continue to
Putussibau, 900 kilometers from Pontianak, or four days and three
nights on a ship.
However, nowadays most people prefer to take flights on small
planes to Putussibau.
These days it seems that only the traders of farm produce
loyally ply the Kapuas in their houseboats.