The vagabond children of the Dieng Plateau

The vagabond children of the Dieng Plateau

Text and photos by Helen Tainsh

DIENG PLATEAU, Central Java (JP): I had been told of the
"special children" of Dieng by my guide Yani.

"Will I see these children?" I asked.

Yani looked at her watch, and replied, "Maybe they are
sleeping now."

This made me skeptical. I thought Yani was spinning me a
mystical Javanese legend.

Suddenly, there she was -- her dreadlocks giving her away as
one of the ragged bocah gembel (vagabond children). Her hair
looked like ginger wool on an unshorn sheep.

"Yani, can I take her picture?" I asked.

"I will ask, but I think you must pay her some money," Yani
replied. I was happy to give the appealing child a few hundred
rupiah.

After taking her picture, I looked around at her environment.
The playground of the bocah gembel, who are often compared to
goblins, is the ancient crater of the Dieng Plateau. A place
where you stand fearfully on the edge of a black bubbling
volcanic cauldron of mud, where the earth's crust is thin and
hollow, and where steam wafts through cracks in the ground. It is
an area of sulfur-saturated springs. Hot and cold, their streams
crisscross the land. Noxious gasses sometimes permeate the air.
(In 1979, cyanide, arsenic and carbon-dioxide killed 149
villagers.)

Adding to this atmosphere, a silver mist flowed across the
plateau, like the sensuous veil of a dancer.

"It is a dangerous playground for children," I thought,
looking at the child with the wide, wise eyes.

The innate mysteries of these supernatural powers on the Dieng
Plateau have added mysticism to the religious rituals of the
locals, some of which feature children like my newfound friend. I
asked Yani for more information about the bocah gembel and
learned that the children of the Dieng are believed to have
inherited the mystical powers of Kiai Kaladite, a political and
religious leader of the 16th century Mataram kingdom. Desperate
after his ideas were rejected by the Mataram government, Kiai
Kaladite took his followers to meditate on the Dieng Plateau.
Legend says he looked like a vagabond with unruly hair. But he
was a generous man, always concerned for the welfare of his
community, and acted as a mediator between his people and the
gods.

Significant role

The people of the Dieng Plateau firmly believe that their
bocah gembel are Kaladite's spiritual descendants, and therefore
these children have a significant role to play in the life of the
community. Apart from their frizzy, matted hanks of hair, the
children look healthy and are well cared for.

Children who become ill and run high fevers in infancy usually
become bocah gembel. Medical help from the dukun (traditional
healer) is withdrawn if the sick child does not immediately
respond to treatment, because the Dieng people think the child is
destined to become a bocah gembel. The child is left to recover
as best it can. The families of surviving children are considered
blessed and can expect to receive further happiness.

The Dieng children lose their power to communicate with
Kaladite when their hair is cut. When a bocah gembel reaches
puberty the ritual haircutting ceremony is carried out. Before a
child's hair can be cut, however, he or she must have made three
requests for the same thing. All requests are carefully recorded
by the elders.

"The requests are usually for food, because at the time of the
haircutting ceremony there is a big celebration," said Yani.

The celebration is always performed at midnight on the child's
birthday. Seated on the floor before the village religious
leaders, the child is asked to repeat the recorded requests for
all to hear.

Prayers are said for the good fortune of the child, who is
dressed in white, symbolic of purity and holiness. The
haircutting implements are blessed, and the hair is cut in seven
lengths in accordance with tradition. The child can no longer
communicate with Kaladite, and is therefore relieved of his or
her ritual life. The cut hair will grow back straight and black.

Abode of the gods

The Dieng Plateau has more to offer than just the mystical
bocah gembel. Once a prehistoric lake, filled over the millennia
with volcanic debris, this extraordinary setting 2,000 meters
above sea level was a great temple city in 719 A.D.
Archaeologists are mystified why such a large city would be
situated on soggy land that required an underground drainage
system before building could take place.

The name Dieng comes from the word di-hyang, meaning "abode of
the Gods", an apt name for a city where only priests and temple
servants lived permanently. This ancient caldera is ringed by
steep rugged mountains and the present town of Dieng nestles in
the foothills.

I had imagined a vast area, with many more ancient Hindu
temples. There is only a group of five square temples still
standing on the soggy land, all dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva.
They are the oldest temples in Java, built of solid stone, with a
single cell with one door. Hindus still make pilgrimages to these
temples, leaving behind flower petals and the smell of incense.

By mid afternoon a blanket of thick fog had made things gray
and damp. We sought accommodation for the night, and found the
hotels dingy, dark and uninviting. In one hotel a woman squatted
over a small stove, with only the light of her burner to see by.
By lamp-light, we climbed the steep, uneven steps leading to the
bedrooms above. The bedrooms looked as if they had been built
around the bed. The windows and doors were not fitted properly,
and none could be locked. The bathrooms were outside and down the
back steps.

The only bright spot in the now dim street was the lamp light
of a mobile food vendor. Young men gathered around this focal
point like insects around a bright light.

Despite the dinginess of the hotels, I was strangely reluctant
to leave the Dieng Plateau. Its dignified mysticism and rituals
seemed supernaturally alive to me. Looking back, I caught a
glimpse of the ginger-haired figure, disappearing into the fog
that wrapped itself around the Dieng.