November 25, 2010
Happy Thanksgiving!
Have you been wondering where I’ve been? I was on Kadidiri Island in the Togean Islands of Sulawesi. It was a wonderful 5 days followed by another several days of traveling. Now I am back in Singapore with my wonderful friends and enjoying the comforts of AC, flushing toilets, sinks, dry bathroom floors, washing machine, and well, you get the point. I will write a blog tomorrow after I’ve had my fill of a Thanksgiving feast tonight. Even through the rough patches of my life I’ve always had so much to be thankful for and this year is no different. By good fortune I have been born into an incredible family and have wonderful friends around me. So much of life (but clearly not all) is luck and I was lucky to be born in America (despite our faults) and into a life where I never wanted for basic needs and even had more than my basic needs available. In the US (and I suspect in most developed countries) it is easy for many of us to take things for granted and view certain luxuries, like ipods and a closet full of clothes, as a right and a given. This trip is reinforcing in my mind all the things I have to be grateful for (including this trip!) and it is helping to put in better perspective my view of necessities versus luxuries.
I hope you have a wonderful holiday and have much to be thankful for, whether you celebrate American Thanksgiving or not. :)
The pictures below are from my time in Tana Toraja, Sulawesi. I wrote about my experiences there already, but wasn’t able to upload pictures before. I started with some shots of burials in the cliffs. Then you’ll see rice being harvested. You can also see the rituals and dress for the traditional funerals, but I opted to leave out the pictures of the buffalos dying. The buffalo skins are sold by the family and the price is based on weight. Therefore, the butchers rub sand into the blood to make the hide heavier. Clever capitalists!
You also see a tree that has some dark patches. The weather wasn’t suitable for pictures, but the tree is used as a grave for young babies.
In the pictures of the traditional homes you see one has a buffalo head and a wooded chicken head above the entrance. The buffalo head signifies that the first man of the family to own the home died and a funeral was held for him. The chicken symbolizes the fact that the male head of the household now living in the home is a leader for that generation. I’m not sure how large of a group or area he is a leader for, but he holds a special position and status.
I still have pictures to post of my canal tour in Banjarmasin, Kalimantan (Borneo) so will do that soon.
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