Visiting the Baduy villages

If you ever visit Indonesia, you should never miss visiting the Baduy villages where you combine a cultural, nature and sporting experience. The Baduy tribes or Kanekes life and culture seemed to stand still for many centuries.
http://en/wikipedia.org/wiki/Baduy

One of the Jakarta local couchsurfers, Fernand Wongso, has taken a lot of efforts to organise a weekend trip to the Baduy land. We drove there during the night time and arrived at the parking lot just outside their community. Our guide Erwin who also served as the assisten lurah(assistant to the village chief) greeted us and soon we embarked on a beautiful hike through the beautiful mountainous area of the Baduy land.

The track was certainly not paved like many other forest tracks in the Western world neither is it a completely trackless area. To be honest, I was not really prepared for this and came with very low quality sneekers. During the rainy season, the rough and slippery steep hills consisting of small and big boulders were a real challenge for those who don't have the right shoes or have any physical illnesses.

The beautiful landscape however would make up for any suffering we had to endure during the trek. We climbed down the steep slippery boulders to the waterfall and then crossed a beautiful canopy walk on a bridge made of big roots. After this trek we had a home-cooked brunch at Erwin's house and had the opportunity to admire his wife's weaving skills. I slipped on one of the wet boulders and Erwin fell on me as I lost too much of my balance. Erwin was very helpful and caring while he supported me on the slippery boulders many times

I was not very tired since my stamina is quite durable due to my sporty life. But I was rather embarrased to slow down the group, had a slight fever from a flu and the bad shoes were rather a discouragement for a further hike on slippery steep hills. Apart from this, I don't have a particular liking for slippery hills and boulder hopping.


Couchsurfing of a very special nature at Erwin's place
As the others moved on to stay at the next village, Erwin invited me to stay at his place while he himself joined the others to stay at the other village. This village was further away from the outside world and has more genuine Baduy life.

So I missed a lot of the beautiful nature and other villages, on the other hand I could visit three villages on my own and spent more time with the villagers and even get to know their life better. I helped Erwin's wife and son with cooking and shopping. I thought this was Couchsurfing of the very special kind and even each of us had their own room which was a total luxury for a Baduy village. Erwin's house had a clean toilet and bathroom which was unusual for a Baduy village too. The house was located right on the border and we virtually could watch TV from the front part of his house.

The village where I stayed was located right on the border to the outside world and so they arranged 2 TVs in the neighbouring community house. A lot of the Baduy Dalam or Inner Baduys(forget their purity) came here and joined watching TV or talking to visitors. Some of the ladies in the village were very outgoing and enterprising. They told me about the many sociology researchers who spent some time in the village while a few of the scientists had concerns of how long this secluded culture could last......

Anyway, at least some small kids loved to watch English lessons on TV and immitate the words taught on the program. The Baduys themselves were friendly, hospitable and welcoming. The inner Baduys started to sell their own products while the Outer BAduys performed most of the mediating sales business. We need to be careful not to tell them our addresses, otherwise they will walk all the way down to the city to sell their products

UPDATE June 2010: Visiting the Baduy Dalam area
The Baduy Dalam areas are what they call the "tanah suci" or holy land. During the holy month, even Indonesians are not permitted into this area. The rules applied are much stricter and people who were not born in Indonesia are not permitted to enter this area. The trek to this area requires tough and steep mountaineering, allowing at least 3 hours tough trek. When the hills become slippery after rain, we can expect around twice as much time. Please be prepared with shoes with a good profile and a walking stick

Women are not allowed to bathe naked, so few sarongs or sarong dresses to bring is a good idea in case you fall into the water by accident. . I found a couple of wide, long sarong dresses very practical and well-accepted by the Baduy people. You can also wear these dasters or sarong dresses to shower because women are not allowed to shower naked. With my nearly Indonesian looks my friend could smuggle me into the Baduy Dalam area which would have normally been off limits to non-Indonesians. Cameras are not allowed either and I found it more than respectful not to take pictures of this area but rather create a lasting image in my mind....