WE ARE THREE AND WE ARE FIVE

The night after our little counter-demo to Hatefest 2008 (described in Monday's posting), I had two dreams that were particularly vivid.


In the first dream a pro-Palestinian golem was trying to kill me in the Millenium Wheel in London near the Thames. No matter how many times I klopped him over the head with the small stool, he just kept on coming. I woke up in a cold sweat.
[Why was there a small stool in the cabin? So that someone could be made to sit in the corner. It seemed logical.]


The second dream was more intense, and significantly more pleasurable. No, it was not about sex.

Sometime after 1972 or 1973, in summer, some friends of mine and I were bicycling south of Valkenswaard. I've mentioned these friends before - they were Indos, and most of them were related to each other and to no one else in that part of the Netherlands. So, like my kin, they were not native to those parts and therefore not considered as belonging in that part of the world.

A short distance beyond the water mill we came to a pleasantly shaded spot in the river which looked ideal for wading or swimming.

Unfortunately some of the locals were also there. And they did not wish to share it.

"Jullie vreemdelingen denken jezelve beter dan ons, he, maar dit is niet van jullie - jullie kloten komen hier niet in".

[You foreigners think yourselves better than us, eh, but this is not yours - you testicles ain't coming in.]


Not exactly a welcoming committee. And they outnumbered us more than two or three to one.


Henri turned around and spoke to us, saying "Kami talo, kami lima; kinatein rini ura puti. U-lite bulak-bulak na bangsa dhi pangge, u-iro tarabanta matjalong'ong dhi wangi - bantaaaaaa!"

[We are three, we are five; this field is red and white, see the flowering that represents us, smell the fragrance of the rushing cataract - fiiiiight!]


We rushed them and they fled. At the time all I could think was 'what is he saying? We are six, we are not five, not three' (ano kata-niya? Kami mag-anem, ti lima ti talo...). I also remember realizing shortly afterwards that those who are few, if they are determined and possibly insane, will almost inevitably gain victory over those who are insufficiently committed and fundamentally cowards.

That idea was something my mother embodied all by herself. Imagine a short woman who needs a cane to walk, and is in the last years of her life as cancer eats away at her. Now imagine that same woman beating the crap out of three fine young men, each much bigger than her, but without even a half of her determination and bloody-mindedness. The cops who brought her home remarked that those men should have known better, but in any case would probably not dare show their faces around town again.


There were about two dozen of us on the library corner on Saturday, and about six or seven hundred people across the street. The few, if determined and resolute, must triumph over the many.

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NOTES

Kami talo kami lima: this is both an introductory phrase for Tamarao battle chants as well as witchdoctor rituals. In battle-chants (sasaka) it indicates the plurality of the combatants and the fundamental units of the ethnic polity (lima bandeira, talo pangge - five banners, three branches), whereas in magic it references the three colours of the rope binding the sacrifice (red, yellow, and black) and the five hues of the cords limning the sanctified enclosure (red, yellow, blue, black, and white). The phrase has emotional weight and connotations.

Kinatein: field, specifically cockpit or battle-field. A space where two sides oppose. Hence also 'kinateinan' - the forehead, where the eybrows and the hairline face each other in perpetual confrontation.

Rini: Ri ini - at here.

Ura puti: Crimson and white - the two most potent ritual colours, being blood and bones, joy and mourning, bravery and death. Ura is the colour of red hibiscus flowers (bunga galura, kumbang sapato), which signify the heads taken from other tribes, that the maidens will dance with joyously before they take their place among other skulls in the rafters. Puti are the bones bleaching in the sun, once the mud in the field of slaughter has solidified and the splattered guts have dried up and blown away.
The expression 'ura puti' has emotional weight and connotations.
'Kalawa ura atawa puti, kutamto bage na kayo' - Whether it is red (a celebration) or white (a tragedy), that is entirely up to you.

Lite: to see, to look. U-lite is the imperative form.

Bulakbulak: Blossoming, flowering. Manifestation. Poetically, the bloodsplatters of combat or the buffalo sacrifice. But also appelled to fine young girls, delicate and blushing, or smiling secretly to themselves. From 'bulak' - blossom, flower.

Bangsa dhi pangge: branch of the tribe - formulaic expression indicating that the person or the group represents the entire ethnicity or culture, and must therefore act with both determination and courage. Bangsa: tribe, nation, ethnicity. Pangge: branch.

Iro: to smell, to notice fragrance or odour. U-iro is the imperative form.

Tarabanta: A fierce charge, but also the kabakalan (tumultuousness) of rushing water.

Matjalong: Cataractness. Rushing. From 'tjalong' (cataract, river rapids).

Matjalongong: Emphatic expression of riotous rushing. Enthusiastic.

Matjalongong dhi wangi: The fragrance of the rushing stream, and, metaphorically of the people charging across the field at each other.

Banta: fight. To batter, to assault, to attack. Thus 'bantaaaaa': fiiiiight!


Henri's entire speech of that moment was derivative of formulaic phrasing in narrative and chants, and none of the elements were foreign to us. We had heard similar stuff in tales of the Japanese war, or accounts of the long struggle against the sea-borne Bugis and Ilanon, and against other tribes in the hills. Furthermore, discussing the Muslims in the former East Indies is nearly impossible without using war and witchcraft terminology.
A few years before the event described above, we had used similar expressions when playing headhunt - "see there the ranks of the smelly tribe, for whose heads the skull-vats growl, for whose melting faces the black ladles yearn. Here are crimson blooms for the virgins in the longhouse, and here rotting flesh for the worms and small carrion eaters in the forest."
Deflated soccer balls make adequate human heads. Especially when nothing more realistic is available. They have the added advantage that you don't have to boil off the flesh, or set them out on the anthill to be stripped clean.


As a final note I should mention that what I had for dinner on Saturday night was a sandwich with gefilte fish hash, bacon, and tomato. With a liberal splootch of horse-radish. The whole washed down with whiskey. It is quite likely that this affected my sleep. It certainly did a number on my digestion.