night calls

Do they really make the dead walk?

People always ask with a shudder once they hear we spent the night at Badui Dalam.

But I didn't see or feel anything vaguely threatening or sinister that whole night. Oh, I woke up shivering from cold and saw a shadow walking out of the hut we slept in. The lamps had all died and I couldn't see who it was, but the person left the door open and it felt like a hundred icy hands were running up and down my body. I had come in late into the hut when everyone else was asleep so I didn't get a mat, thus I was tightly curled down on the bare bamboo slats, breathing through my nose from the chill, wishing for the sun to come up soon. The shadow who went out took a long time coming back and I began to wonder whether I had imagined it. Surely, not one of us would dare go out alone in the middle of the night! Teeth chattering, I got up and closed the door, then pushed myself deep into the backpacks and shoes lining the wall, hoping for a bit of warmth. The odor of rubber sneakers mixed with the stink of dried foot-sweat stung my nostrils, and I would have gladly exchanged any boyfriend for the thinnest blanket in the world that night! The others seemed to have no trouble sleeping on their mats. We filled the floor of the hut--all the women in the group--head to head, lined up in rows. I heard a few fitful sighs and some soft snoring but I seemed to be the only one having trouble sleeping under my blanket of dirty hiking shoes. The door creaked open and I peered to see the shadow slipping back inside. It was the old Badui Dalam woman of the house. She was carrying a burning firewood and started lighting the lamps. Then she went back to her room and I heard her moving about, building a fire. My last thoughts before drifting thankfully into sleep were: "How long before sun up? The fire is just outside the house. Where did she go? What took her so long?" 

                                                                       ***

The Jaro had dismissed my question about magic--too casually-- with a quip about Badui children being able to carry heavy logs and believing the spirits are helping them with the load, thus making people think they were possessed of powers of some sort. He shrugged, implying it was nothing. Just media hype! Pfffft!"Now you may go and explore the village but only within the space bordered by bamboos!"

Yeah. It meant a few huts and nothing more. It might seem that the tribe has 'opened up' by allowing strangers to come into the village, but it was just a show. I realised they were not really letting any outsiders in. They only actually compromised a bit of their privacy in order to survive through barter and trade. If Badui Dalam were a house, we were just allowed on the stairwells--not even on the porch! The villagers stayed hidden in their huts, only a few children were out looking at us shyly. They were very good looking with surprisingly Arabian-like features. A colleague softly told me about the theories surrounding their origins, all the while keeping me from stepping beyond where the borders lay.

This colleague's whole body was fully inked--legs, arms, torso, back--and before we had entered the village, he was told by one of our companions to cover them, as I was told to cover my bare arms. Later that evening, he related to me how he had made sure from our Badui guide himself whether he would be let in with all the tattoos on his body. He had asked the Baduis if they were offended by the sight of  an inked flesh. The Badui had looked at him in bewilderment, he said, and exclaimed: "If you come with good intentions, why wouldn't we let you in?" My colleague related how the villager was honestly baffled by his silly question--he was genuinely wondering what the person's looks had to do with his heart. It dawned on me then that in this village in the forest where people still allow strangers to sleep in their houses without fear, where simple food is willingly shared, where the river is still the source and end of everything--the prejudice of the enlightened modern man has found no place.

Later, I watched in silence as the Baduis cooked for us, ate with us, drank coffee in bamboo cups around the fire with us. I looked at them looking at the visitors. There was nothing suspicious, calculating, or judgemental in their eyes--only amusement and a keen sense of interest at how our ways were quite different from theirs, perhaps. It soon became apparent to me what the glaring difference between 'us' and 'them' was: the villagers were calm, almost serene, almost palpably light. My companions, on the other hand, had an air of knotted tenseness surrounding them, of a habitual restlessness--as if they were temporarily freed from something  but could not let go of the chains even for the moment. I could hear it in the too loud chatter that jarred with the gurgling of the brook, in the noisy laughter that vied with the chirping of the crickets and the crackling of the bonfire nearby. I could see it in the nervously erratic flicking of battery-powered flashlights--on and off, on and off--which were completely redundant in the firelight and the moonglow. How I had wished then that we could just completely leave our 21st-century trappings for that moment and sit quietly basking in the rareness and different-ness of that night.

As the evening grew deeper, most of the visitors slowly trickled into the huts to sleep. The few Baduis assigned to us sat quietly sipping their hot brews. The flashlights went out one by one. The chatter died down to low whispers. The moon rose higher; the night breeze turned colder; the brook sang louder. A villager started playing the traditional kecapi very softly, and the beautifully haunting strains of the strings blended with the lonely nocturnal cries of the forest. I stayed on deep into the night... and listened and watched.

No. I didn't see the dead walk at Badui Dalam. I didn't hear any magical incantations or deathly ululations. But I saw far more than I bargained for, and learned far more than I thought I would.