"Pilgrimage" to Flores

 Wayterang Beach, Flores

Last week I took a flight from Malang to Denpasar, Bali, where I was picked up by Fr. Joseph Gerungan, director of the beautiful retreat house up in the mountains of Bali, a region called Bedugul.  Once there, I was joined by a group from all over Java who were heading east to the island of Flores for "Pasca," Easter.  What a trip it was!  After a day spent at the retreat house, we arose early the next morning (3:00 AM Java time!) to catch an early flight to Ende, in the middle of the island of Flores.  Once there, we boarded a bus traveling all day on narrow mountain roads through breath-taking scenery, high mountains on either side, and lush greenness untouched all around.  That long ride got us only to Maumere, where we had a hotel for the night before boarding the bus again to get to Laruntuka, just in time for "White Thursday," or what Christians in the West call "Holy or Maundy Thursday."  Holy Week had begun. 

On the boat before the crowd 

   The traditions of Larentuka are Portuguese Catholic, and most of the people, well over 90% are Catholic, the exact opposite of the situation in Malang, where the population is well over 96% Muslim!  At Larentuka we stayed at the cathedral "guest house," but that is dignifying it a bit too much, since accommodations, designed for visiting priests, were rather primitive.  The next morning, however, we got to the beach, where we boarded a boat that would take us first to a small chapel on a nearby island, where numbers of pilgrims entered, approaching a statue of the crucified Christ on their knees.  After that moment of piety, we were off again on the boat to join dozens of other good-sized boats, each carrying increasing numbers of people, for a boat procession, that would follow a very tiny boat, rowed slowly by a couple of men, and I am told holding an image of the Child Jesus.  (I never found out why that image was the one that 500 years of tradition had employed, but I liked it that we were following an image of life and birth rather than death and suffering.)  The whole experience was fun, relaxing, and extremely scary, as our boat got so overloaded that it kept tipping to one side and the other, taking on water each time, until finally a few people got off onto yet another equally overloaded boat.  Thank God!  There were no life-jackets, and little children, three and four years old, were stationed right along the sides. 

  After the boat procession, we had just enough time to get ready (very hot and sweaty by now) for the afternoon's "Way of the Cross" and donned our second special tee-shirt of the day (both saying "Ave Maria Larentuka") for this ancient ceremony.  As usual, as the "bule," foreigner, I was asked to sit up front, and since my camera was totally out of charge, I borrowed my new friend, Josephine's, who accompanied me at the front (to the protests of the usher because she wasn't bule).  There are fifteen priests at the cathedral, and most of them were up at the altar for the veneration of the cross and Holy Communion ceremony (no Mass on Good Friday).  After our next meal (Indonesian Catholics don't seem to make much of the fasting rule for Good Friday, as snacks kept being passed around throughout the boat ride) we assembled again at church for a symbolic procession where the body of Christ was symbolically carried in a coffin accompanied by wailing lamentations and powerful drumbeats.  Girls carried sticks of bamboo, rice, fruits, and the other produce of this incredibly fertile land.  At the front of the church was the ancient Portuguese "Mater Dolorosa," Mary, Mother of Sorrows, and at Fr. Joseph's invitation, I went up to take a picture of her, seeing her strength and firm gaze on the scene. 

  Numbers of groups of Confraternities and other lay groups were called, and our group waited until finally we were able to join the long, very long candlelight procession wending its way the along the main street, also candlelit on either side, of Larentuka.  And that was only the first day of the Triduum!

Teaching at "Pascasarjana"

In March, I began my teaching assignment at the Post-Graduate School (Pascasarjana) in the area of sociology of religion.  Actually, I share a course with another professor, who is teaching a class on social analysis using the works of a group of Italian social theorists of the 19th and early 20th centuries.  It's a really weird fit.  But I squeeze my course on the world religions into the middle of it, and the students don't seem to mind.  They are supposed to be doing presentations on papers they write using those same Italian social philosophers to analyze the current social problems of Indonesia.  Huh?  But despite the incongruity of subject matters, it has been a rich and challenging experience for me.  I get to teach only twice a week for an hour and a half each time, with two different groups of students, only about 6-10 in each class (when they all show up, which is not often).  What I really like are their questions.  They are often so profound as to catch me off guard.  Yesterday I was asked what about the nature of "hyper-reality," a student's made-up term for metaphysics.  And what is the origin of the images of gods and goddesses in Hinduism.  Do they only have a destroyer god in Hinduism, and if so, how does the creation get started?  Where is the "proof" for their religion? I answered, and I hope did not destroy their faith in the process, that there is no proof in religion!  (They like to think of Hinduism as a tourist attraction for the many visitors to Bali, but I wanted to show them it is a far more serious religion than meets the eye.)  Of course, all this has to be communicated in our mutually broken languages.  Sometimes, but not always, there is a "translator," who often goes off on tangents of his own if he is there. 
  A greater challenge is meeting the unspoken paradigm of their religion of Islam (but I do have one Catholic student) as the true and perfect religion.  This idea came out forcefully when I introduced the work I was doing on comparative spirituality last semester.  A student said that since I teach all religions, I do not have enough sympathy with Islam.  I bring a pluralist perspective to some who are clearly exclusivists.  Even among the "tolerant" of this Muhammadiyah institution, I hear that it is "natural" to have separation among the religions, although Muslims are commanded to treat others well.  Muhammadiyah is known as a "purification movement" that was founded with some influence from Wahabism.  My friend, Yuli, who teaches Buddhist studies at the Buddhist college attached to the monastery up the road, believes I am here opening the door of the Muhammadiyah community just a little, and my presence will do some good.  I hope she's right.

At the vihara

  Today I was invited (at the last minute of course) to go to the vihara, Buddhist monastery, just up the road, and give food offerings to the bhikkus (senior monks) and samaneras (maybe something like seminarians).  The vihara has become my second home as I have gone together with friends to have long chats with Sister Mutia, a "holder of the eight precepts."  She has been there since 1995, after studying to be a Protestant theologian and deacon for six years in Holland and after that, three years as a Hindu in Bali.  What a journey!  I only had time today to gather up some cookies from my pantry, although Mutia had offered to buy some from their own store, but I didn't find her.  So I humbly, really humbly, offered my cookies to the monks who passed by with their begging bowls by the table of foodstuffs arrayed in front of a line of lay people.  I had seen this practice of monks going out begging, and lay people acquiring "merit" by offering from their own food.  But here I was participating in it.  An even bigger privilege awaited me.  While all the hundred monks or so were eating,  I sat with some of the laity in the back of the dining hall, where I was suddenly told by a very young novice nun that I would be offering my food to the Abbot!  I was feeling so chagrined, and saying, "I don't have any food left; I gave it all away," when suddenly a tray of goodies, fermented coconut and "sticky rice" appeared, and I was able to bring it up to the front of the hall, in front of the hundred or so monks and about fifty lay people, laying it at the table of the head monk, Bhanti Kanti.  There were tears in my eyes as I offered it to him, and said, "I feel so privileged" to be able to do this.  Indeed, I felt more privileged than I had ever felt as a Fulbright scholar here.  The privilege was that of a simple human being being acknowledged just for that.

Ayutheia, Old Capital of Thailand

Summer Palace of the Kings of Thailand

I could not leave the subject of Thailand without passing over the trip some of us took to the old town of Ayutheia, Thailand's capital for over 400 years.  After about an hour's bus ride north into the countryside, we arrived at the place where the kings had a summer palace, consisting of buildings spread over acres of land. There is the Golden Palace of the King, a corn cob structure in the style of the Khmer (Cambodians), the Assembly Hall for Royal Relatives (where we borrowed sarongs to be allowed inside, in case a royal relative came along), The Divine Seat of Personal Freedom (what a name!), and other structures such as the Excellent and Shining Heavenly Abode.  The whole compound apparently began with a monastery and was founded by a king who was an illegitimate son by a king who was shipwrecked on an island and befriended by a woman with whom he had this boy, who became the future king.  Such is the stuff of legends, but maybe true!  The palace grounds stood neglected for a century or more, until the mid-19th century when one of the kings began to restore them. Returning from Ayutheia, we had a most delightful river cruise. After touring the summer palace, we were taken to several "Wats," old Buddhist temples, most in ruins, where we discovered this head of the Buddha woven into the tree roots.   

 On a similar note, I could not believe the adoration and attention given to the current king of Thailand.  His picture, and that of his family, adorned medallions set above the roads and parkways.  Even scenes from his childhood!  It is adoration approaching idolatry, in this thoroughly Buddhist country.  Our host, Pontip, the Executive Director of Fulbright Thailand, told us that she "loves the king" and doesn't really sympathize with those "Red Shirts" who protest some of the policies of the monarchy (symbolized by yellow shirts).  She makes sure to wear yellow, along with many of her compatriots, at least once a week.  She avoids wearing red unless she is out of the country.  So much for color-coded politics!

Fulbright Enrichment Conference, Thailand

In March, I was fortunate enough to be able to attend a Mid-Year Enrichment Conference sponsored by the Fulbright Thailand association, bringing together U.S. scholars and students in the Fulbright programs from their respective countries all around Southeast Asia.  About 60 or more of us gathered at the luxury Dusit Thani Hotel in Bangkok, and from the first "cocktail reception" I knew it would be a party.  Wine (!) flowed freely, and I found myself having to refuse a fourth refill on that first night, having gone wineless for the six or seven months here in Muslim Malang.  Thailand is Buddhist, but that doesn't stop ordinary lay people from the finer things, and we were treated to one after another gourmet meals and buffets.  Among the treats were trays of lobster tails, I remember at one point.  The feast carried over into the various paper presentations being given, under the overall banner of "America's Engagement in Southeast Asia:  the Role of People-to-People Ties in Strengthening Connections."  Panels were organized around topics of business, public health, religion and anthropology, biology, law, politics, and human rights, art and culture, art and education, and more!  The whole conference was topped off with a beautiful, moon-lit evening at the National Museum, us mostly garbed in the dress of our host countries, and adding to the splendor of the lovely Thai dancers who performed for us. 

     After that evening, we had the choice of "study visits" and I chose to attend the Thai Traditional Medicine one, offered at the traditional medicine clinic at a hospital in Bangkok.  There I experienced a diagnosis of my body-character (I am water and fire), making a healing compress, taking a steam detox, and of course massage.  Perhaps the best part of this truly "enriching" conference was the time spent getting to know other Fulbrights.  I talked to those from Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, northern Thailand, Vietnam, and several other places that I can't even remember now.  It was a whirlwind, but really accomplished its purpose of giving us "people-to-people ties."  I am grateful for the experience.