WE TAKE UP QUARTERS IN THE KAMPONG
Our first visit has turned out so well and the natives seem so friendly
that there seems to be no reason why we should not move camp so as to be
near them and thus save a long hike through the jungle every time we
wish to see them. A walk through the jungle is the occasion of a fight
with mosquitos, particularly at this time of year, February, which is
the beginning of the rainy season. With the assistance of several of the
younger men we transfer our belongings from the beach to the kampong and
settle down for a long visit. This kampong is as good as any to study
the natives in and the inhabitants seem fairly trustworthy.
Our tent is placed, this time, between two of the large family shacks,
and after a day or two we begin to feel quite at home. The natives do
not interfere with us, and as we are careful not to impose upon them,
all is well. The first night of our stay in the kampong is one of
sadness for the natives, we find, for one of their very old men has
passed away in its course. He has been ailing a long time, they tell us,
and it has surprised them all that he should last so long. They are very
much like civilized people in the affection they appear to feel for any
sick or ailing member of their immediate family.
We stumble upon a Kia Kia mourning party quite unexpectedly. When one of
these people dies the body is placed in a sitting posture in the spot
where death overtook him, if that is in the house, and his nearest
relatives decorate him with fresh paint and feathers. There is no
wailing while the body is kept in the house. One or two members of his
family hold a vigil beside him and fan the flies away, while others go
to the burial ground to prepare the grave. This is usually about six
feet deep, but as the body must be placed within it seated there is a
shelf built two feet from the bottom on which the deceased rests. When
the grave is ready—and its preparation may consume three or four
days—the body is transferred to it with much solemnity. The grave is not
filled with earth, but a framework covered with a heavy thatch of
palm-leaves is placed over the dead and the earth is piled to a depth of
two feet on that. As the body is lowered into the grave the relatives
begin a quavering chant and all present seem to feel deeply the loss of
their kinsman.
They surround their burial places with strong fences, for if any one
were to walk across a grave he must inevitably break through its thin,
ill-supported top, which would be disconcerting, to say the least. One
of our neighbor’s pigs, an exceptionally large and heavy one, one day
wanders into the cemetery and, judging from the howl of wrath that
ensues, raises havoc in the graveyard. At any rate, when the noise has
quieted down, the pig is dead, and for some reason it is buried in the
grave it has just despoiled.
The death of the old man casts a gloom over the entire kampong and for a
few days we leave the inhabitants to their own devices. The few kodak
pictures we have snapped aroused their resentment to such an extent that
we have decided discretion to be the better part of destitution. We fill
diaries, these days, with notes of happenings observed from a discreet
distance.
One of the things that comes to our notice is the way the women gather
cocoanuts. When the family larder is low, one of the men will call the
attention of one of the women to the fact and she dutifully prepares to
replenish the stock. Her preparations are interesting. It is a
considerable distance straight up in the air to the crown of a
full-bearing cocoanut-palm, and the nuts cluster well up in the lower
fronds about forty feet from the ground. The tapering trunk offers a
good grip for the legs and one could climb it easily by simply clasping
the legs about it after the fashion of our own boyhood, but the Kia Kia
has a method all his own.
[Illustration: The native climbs a cocoanut-palm in a series of humps
and stretches, like a giant inch-worm]
[Illustration: Making fire. A piece of hard wood is rotated by hand
while in contact with a softer piece]
When about to ascend the trunk, the woman first gathers a bunch of long
grass which she twists into a rope and ties snugly about her ankles.
This done, the feet are placed against the trunk of the palm, with the
soles gripping it, while the grass binding on the ankles serves as the
fulcrum of a lever of which the lower leg forms the long end. The legs
are bowed outward so that with set muscles a surprising grip is
obtained. With the feet in this position, the arms grasp the trunk and
lift the body upward six or eight inches and the legs are drawn up to a
higher position. In this manner the native proceeds upward like a great
inch-worm, in a series of humps and stretches. When the top is reached
one hand only is clasped around the trunk, while the other twists the
nuts off their stems. This is done by merely grasping the lower surface
of the nut and rotating it until the fibers of the stem are broken. The
nut is then allowed to drop to the ground, where it lands with a thud
and a bounce that make one shudder at the thought of what it might do
were it to land squarely upon one’s head. When a sufficient number of
ripe nuts are gathered, the woman descends the trunk much as she climbed
upward, though this seems to be a more arduous undertaking. Apparently,
however, this is due to fatigue rather than to the actual difficulty of
climbing down, for these people have no stamina and seem to tire
quickly.
The cocoanut supplies both food and drink to the Kia Kia. True, he eats
many other things, but the flesh of this fruit is the great staple, the
others being sago cake, surf-fish, wild pig, bush kangaroo, and “long
pig” (human flesh), the use of each being in ratio to the order named.
When a Kia Kia is thirsty he goes to the pile of nuts beside the house
and selects one that appeals to him, walks to a shady place, and
leisurely sits down. He places the nut between his feet, which are drawn
well against the body, and with a deft blow of his stone war-club breaks
the thick husk at the small end of the nut. This he grips in his teeth
and peels off, holding the nut between his palms, with his elbows
raised. After the husk is removed one blow of the club opens the end of
the nut and the cool water is attainable.
The Kia Kias do not drink. That is, they do not drink in the sense that
we use the term. When a Kia Kia desires water, he wants it in sufficient
volume to wet his throat and stomach at one and the same instant, so he
simply throws back his head, opens his gullet, and without swallowing
lets the fluid run in and down. It goes down in one continuous stream.
Nowhere in the world can one see a similar operation. It is absolutely
unique and all Kia Kias have the same drinking—let us call it technique.
Their sago is prepared in a simple manner. The palm from which the
starch is derived is indigenous to their jungles, and we are told that
one large trunk of, say, two-foot thickness and twenty-foot length will
supply food for four persons for a year. When sago is to be prepared a
palm is felled and the pithy center is scraped from it, macerated with
pestles, and soaked in water. The water dissolves the starch content
and, when evaporated, leaves the starch ready for immediate consumption.
The moist starch is molded into cakes which are dried bone-dry, and in
this form it seems to keep indefinitely. In preparation for eating, the
cake is simply softened with water and toasted over a fire until cooked
sufficiently to suit the individual taste. With the exception of the
surf-fish, the other articles of Kia Kia diet are seldom eaten except on
some special occasion, as at a feast. The surf-fish are gathered with
each full tide, but of course only the natives on the sea-coast get
these. They are always cooked, never eaten raw. In fact, the Kia Kias
eat everything but cocoanut cooked, and even cook that sometimes.
The heads of enemies, both animal and human, are kept as trophies
denoting the prowess of the hunter or warrior. Boar tusks are made into
armlets, and the greatness of a hunter is easily determined by the
number of these that adorn his arms. In the case of a human enemy the
head is severed from the body and smoked after the brains have been
removed. It is kept carefully, within the house of the man who collected
it, until the ravages of time and multitudinous insects have removed the
last remaining traces of dried flesh from it, and it then becomes a
mural decoration for the house or graces the doorway of the shack. In
the case of the human enemy the body is always eaten; that is, when the
feast can be compassed with no great danger of news of the orgy coming
to the ears of the punishing white men who rule the country. These
feasts are becoming increasingly infrequent, but cannibalism still
exists and perhaps a dozen cases yearly are brought to the attention of
the authorities. For each of the cases that come to the notice of the
Assistant in Merauke there are many that never come to light, for the
natives have held them in great secrecy of late.
The skulls of deceased foemen sometimes litter up the place to such an
extent that the children play with them as with toys, and one little
black rascal—the son of the chief, by the way—seems to take a particular
delight in hearing his mother describe the affrays in which his father
collected them. We are so fortunate as to get a snap-shot of her
entertaining the youngster in this way, and later secure one of the
little shaver trying to pile them one upon the other, like one of our
kiddies at play with building-blocks. He is so engrossed in his attempt
to balance them that he fails to notice that we are taking his picture.
* * * * *
As the savages have no matches, they obtain fire in a crude but very
practical way. It takes several of them to do it, for they do not care
to exert themselves much. In a piece of soft, very dry wood they make a
small indentation into which they insert the point of a thin, round
stick of ironwood or similar hard, close-grained wood three or four feet
in length. Holding the stick between the palms of their hands, they
rotate it rapidly, meanwhile pressing it into the softer wood, the
pulverized fiber of which finally ignites from the friction. When the
wood dust is smoldering, small bits of dried tinder are piled around it
and the whole is blown gently into flame. The operation consumes about
twenty minutes and on account of this and the labor involved their
household fires are seldom allowed to go out; but a supply of the soft
wood is kept on hand for use in an emergency.
The Kia Kias are extremely lazy, we find; in many little ways they show
that they will not exert themselves in the slightest if they can avoid
doing so. If one of them is walking along and happens to see something
lying on the ground that he desires, will he stoop to pick it up? Never!
He simply grasps the object between his great and second toe and raises
the foot to his hand, and he does it gracefully, never losing his poise
or missing his stride.
On an afternoon, shortly after the heat of midday, the men gather in the
shade of the cocoas back of the kampong to discuss the latest scandal or
politics. Inasmuch as the kapala kampong, or chief, holds his position
solely by the sufferance of the others, or possibly because of some
trait of natural leadership inherent in him, changes in administration
frequently occur. These are in the main caused by the chief’s forming a
liaison with the wife or daughter of another influential member of the
tribe without giving sufficient remuneration. Then the fight is on. It
takes the form of lengthy diatribes by the injured party and much
muckraking. The daily papers (the ladies) drop in to listen at first and
then monopolize the conversation, as is the general custom elsewhere.
They settle the argument, for they get in the last word. Here in Kia Kia
Land the women literally “run the ranch.” It behooves the aspirant for
leadership to stand well with them, for in the end it is their will that
is done. The only thing that the women have not been successful in is to
make the men work. They often make them fight, but it is much easier for
them to do the chores themselves than to try to force the men to do
them. Hence, all Kia Kia men are gentlemen of leisure.
[Illustration: One little fellow takes great delight in hearing his
mother describe the battles in which his father collected his trophies]
[Illustration: After the heat of midday the men gather in the shade to
discuss the latest scandal or politics]
As the heat is almost intolerable under our tent, we, too, withdraw to
the grateful shade of the fringe of the jungle, and they clear a space
for us most genially. There is a little group of them sitting on our
left. What they are doing is very interesting. They are eating dried
mud. That’s it,—just plain dried mud. We hardly believe it when first it
comes to our notice, but upon close examination—and invitation, too, to
join them—we find it to be true. The dirt is a sort of heavy yellow
clay, of which they have several large chunks. From time to time one or
another of them breaks off a portion and crumbles off pieces the size of
a thimble which he munches with apparent relish. The dogs, of which
there are many, sit within the circle of the group and with hungry eyes
watch the proceedings. They refuse the clay if it is offered them, but
continue to gaze at their masters just as though they thought the men
were fooling them and were in reality eating something palatable to the
canine taste.
The clay is washed down with copious drafts of cocoanut water taken a
pint at a—well, “irrigation” is the only word that seems to suit the
process. In response to our stumbling inquiries as to why they eat dirt,
they indicate that it is _bagoose_, or good for them. We come to the
conclusion that it must supply some mineral substance otherwise lacking
in then diet.
Some of the men are busy with their toilets. They are all fops when it
comes to personal appearance. Several of them are sitting upon their
haunches or with outstretched legs, with the inner lid of a Malay
tobacco-box held upright for a mirror, busy with a lip-stick of bamboo
upon which is smeared a mixture of lime and water. This they spread on
in layers of varying thickness; or, if the whim strikes them, they will
besoot their already dusky skin with black and outline thereon circles
composed of white dots and red lines. One dandy, who has been leisurely
fashioning a rattan handle for a stone war-club head, pauses in his
labor and from the wicker basket or gauntlet on his arm—which, by the
way, is his only pocket—takes a small pouch of kangaroo hide containing
his war-paint. This is yellow ochre in its native state. Breaking off a
fragment of it, he pulverizes it between his palms, then, with the
powder heaped equally in each hand, bends over in the manner of one
about to wash the face and briskly rubs the color over his entire face
and neck. The surplus he blows off by protuding the lower lip and
exhaling forcibly. His exertion over the club handle evidently started
the perspiration and this is his method of powdering his nose.
One Beau Brummel whom we dub “Little Playmate” for lack of a better
name, because he is really such a hideous sample of humanity, seems to
have some difficulty with his breathing and has removed his nose tubes
to inspect his nose. The tubes are slightly over an inch in diameter,
but the facility with which he reinserts them in the widely distended
sides of the nostrils makes evident the fact that he could wear even
larger ones without serious discomfort.
The majority of the women are down at the beach, for it is high tide and
the surf-fish are close inshore. The women will bring in many of these
queer little fellows, which have an odd habit of puffing themselves up
like tightly distended rubber balloons the minute they are taken from
the water. They are of a bright-blue color when freshly caught, but the
delicate hues soon fade, after death, to a somber olive. These fish are
considered a delicacy by all of the Malay-speaking peoples, and the
Polynesians, too.
As soon as the women return the company in the grove will break up and
all will repair to their respective shacks, where they will gather
around the fires and roast the fish on spits, eat their sago cake, and
at the same time pet the dogs and pigs which wander in and around the
family circles, as much at home, and quite as welcome, as any one
present. In the waning sunlight of late afternoon these simple groups
engaged in homely intercourse at their frugal meals are a pleasing
sight. The leaping flames of the firelight cast a ruddy glow over their
naked forms, bringing into relief the rugged contours of their torsos
and faces. As the evening creeps upon them they drift away, one by one,
to the smoke-filled shacks, where the smudge protects them from the
mosquitos. By the time darkness has come they are all inside, where they
gossip and carry on for an hour or two before finally falling off to
sleep.
[Illustration: Eating mud! That’s it, just plain, dried mud]
[Illustration: “Little Playmate” readjusts his nose-tubes]
Our own meals Moh serves beneath the protecting klambu, which encloses
within its spacious tent-like interior our camp table and several
folding-chairs. The large gasolene lamp, which is a continual source of
wonder to the natives, lights the camp with almost daytime brilliance,
and we doubly enjoy our dinner in the cool, refreshing air of early
evening.
During the month of February it grows dark shortly after six in Kia Kia
Land. As we are continuing the night sentry duty, which entails somewhat
broken slumber, the one of us who takes second watch turns in after an
after-dinner pipe, while the other mounts guard and for want of better
company talks to Moh until that worthy has finished with the dishes. His
fears are slowly diminishing, which fact we ascribe in part to the eyes
one of the dusky maidens has cast upon him. We have, however, stopped
the incipient affair with threats of dire punishment. Moh has a large
respect for our ability to punish and dutifully refrains from returning
the amorous glances of the charmer, who finds it convenient to pass the
cook-tent every now and then. To complicate matters, she speaks a little
Malay. As we keep Moh near us at all times, there is little to fear and
we warn him of how her Kia Kia “husband” will prepare him for the
roasting-pit without interference from us. Moh tells us volubly how much
he loves his _bagoose prempuan_ in Jahwa (Java), and we listen with
amused tolerance. The Malay does not live that is not susceptible to the
charms of the gentler sex, and Moh is no exception.
There is a young moon, and as it rises from the palms that fringe the
point that stretches seaward on the left of our camp the dogs gather in
what seems to be an indignation meeting. Their howling makes the night
hideous. There must be fully a hundred in the pack and each is trying to
outdo the others in the most soul-rasping, blood-curdling oratorio
imaginable. This is a nightly occurrence whenever there is a moon and is
one of the things that linger long in the memory. In no other place in
the world, it seems to us, have we ever heard the equal of these Kia Kia
dogs. Their howls might be the wails of long-departed spirits in
mourning over their untimely demise and subsequent place upon the menu.