Unique and mysterious culture of Indonesia

1. Rijan Upadhyay
BCD

2.  Type: An ethnic group indigenous to the mountainous
 Location: Pangala region of Indonesia’s South Sulawesi, about 800km northeast of Bali,
 Religion: The vast majority, at least 90 percent, are Christians, but they remain influenced
by their traditional religion, Aluk To Dolo, or Way of the Ancestors.
 Population: Half a million Torajans live in the highlands of the Indonesian island of
Sulawesi.
 Uniqueness: The ethnic group treat the dead as merely sick, offering them food, water and
even cigarettes, until the funeral is scheduled, which at a cost of up to
US$500,000, can take several years if not decades. The bodies of the dead are injected with a
preservative called Formalin, which stops the bodies from decomposing.

3.  No one knows exactly when Torajan death practices began.
 The Torajan language was written down only in the early 20th century, so most of the
old traditions are still oral.
 Only recently, through carbon dating of wooden coffin fragments, have archaeologists
concluded that there are Torajan death practices that date back at least as far as the
ninth century A.D.

4.  The ritual involves digging up the coffins of dead loved ones every couple of years and
grooming and cleaning them. Then, family members typically pose with their deceased
relatives for fresh family portraits.
 The cost of a funeral – more than US$50,000 for lower castes and perhaps between
US$250,000 and US$500,000 for the upper classes – helps explain why toma kulacan
remain in the family home for so long.