Hospitality is the friendly and welcoming behaviour towards guests. Frequently it includes sharing food and drink (and accommodation) and in doing so establishing and maintaining relationships. Mennel et al (1992), following Van Gennep, suggest that sharing food is held to signify togetherness, an equivalence among a group that defines and reaffirms insiders as socially similar. Lashley suggests that in the private domain, the sharing of food and drink between hosts and guests is based on mutual obligations and on reciprocity “ the guests becomes a host on another

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Hospitality and Tourism in Ngadha: An Ethnographic Exploration
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Cole, S. (2007) Tourism and hospitality in Ngadha: an ethnographic exploration. In
Lashley, C., Lynch, P. and Morrison, A. (Ed) Hospitality A social Lens. Oxford:
Elsevier.
Hospitality and Tourism in Ngadha, Indonesia.
An ethnographic exploration.
Introduction
Hospitality is the friendly and welcoming behaviour towards guests. Frequently it
includes sharing food and drink (and accommodation) and in doing so establishing
and maintaining relationships. Mennel et al (1992), following Van Gennep, suggest
that sharing food is held to signify togetherness, an equivalence among a group that
defines and reaffirms insiders as socially similar. Lashley suggests that in the private
domain, the sharing of food and drink between hosts and guests is based on mutual
obligations and on reciprocity “ the guests becomes a host on another
occasion”(2000:9). Furthermore, hospitality converts strangers into friends Selwyn
(2000).
The host-guest relationship is one of power and control. Being a host means having an
element of power over your guest. Selwyn (2000) suggests that there is an exchange
of honour and the guest signals his acceptance of the moral authority of the host. Erb
(2000) discusses how hosting and rituals are ways to domesticate and control the
unknown ‘other’ who penetrates the circle of the hosts home, hearth and social world
(2000:720). The hosts have control and put the guests into a relationship of
dependency and debt.
This chapter explores hospitality in Ngadha, Flores, Indonesia. It examines a feast to
explore the mutual obligations, reciprocity and public displays of connectedness of
Ngadha hospitality. Following an outline of the setting and the research process, the
chapter describes a house-building ritual and examines the importance of the feast. It
will also reveal how feasts celebrate relationships, express order, boast riches, and
enhance status (Visser 1991). The chapter also examines Ngadha’s newest guests-

3. 2
tourists- and asks how far these strangers are turned into friends, as Andrews (2000)
suggests, and if hospitality extended to them can be described as mutual or reciprocal.
The setting
The research took place in two villages in Ngadha. Ngadha is an area that
approximates to the Southwest third of the Ngada regency of Flores, Nusa Tenggara
Timor, Indonesia. The area lies between two of East Indonesia's renowned
attractions. To the east is Keli Mutu, a volcano with three different coloured lakes at
its peak. To the west lies Komodo National Park famed for its 'dragons' (Varamus
komodoensis). The villages lie in a rugged mountainous region with steep slopes and
poor soils. The villagers are largely subsistence agriculturists growing maize and
vegetables for their own consumption. A variety of cash crops are grown including
beans, coffee, vanilla and pepper. Income is supplemented by craft production, which
is subject to village and gender specialisation. The area is one of the poorest in
Indonesia and it is considered that the area's best option for economic development is
tourism (Umbu Peku Djawang 1991).
The villages began to be visited by "drifters" in the 1980s and have seen an increasing
number of tourists ever since. Nearly all tourists that visit Flores are of a “hardy type”
(Erb 2000). However there are a variety of types of tourists that visit the area (Cole
2000 and Cole 2003a) including increasing numbers of special interest tour groups
and school and college groups from Australia. The most popular village, Bena,
received 9000 tourists in 1997 (Regency Department of Education and Culture 1998).
Positioning the researcher.
The study was carried between 1989 and 2003, during which time my position as
researcher changed. Between 1989 and 1994, as a tour operator, I took groups of 12
tourists at a time to stay in Ngadha villages. In 1996 a Participatory Rural Appraisal
was carried out. Between July 1998 and February 1999 the author spent eight months
carrying out ethnographic fieldwork to in two villages investigate the values,
attitudes, perceptions and priorities of the actors in tourism. Participant observation,
interviews and focus groups with villagers were undertaken. Tourists were observed,
interviewed and surveyed. Research into guides and guiding involved a focus group,

4. 3
interviews, covert and participant observation. Semi-structured interviews with
government officials were carried out in the provincial Tourism Department, in the
regency Tourism Department, and in the Regency Department of Education and
Culture. I returned to the field in 2001, 2003 and 2005.
Ngadha – a house based society
The house is the central organising principle of Ngadha society. As in the Levi-
Straussian concept of societas a maison (1983), Ngadha houses endure through time,
through the holding of property and the transmission of names. All members of
Ngadha society belong to a clan. Each clan has four or more named houses, or sa’o
that are hierarchically ordered. Members of a sa’o are an extended group of kin
related through females. Each House is headed by a donggo sa'o (keeper)1
, a woman
chosen by her extended family who must smile easily, be a good cook, be hospitable,
able to organise, able to take responsibility, and not get angry easily. They are special
women, indeed.
Houses belonging to between two and fifteen clans, are arranged in two parallel lines
or along four sides of a rectangle to form a nua. Not everybody lives permanently in
the nua. Many villagers live in the surrounding countryside but are members of a nua
just as they are members of a sa’o. In the centre of the nua are a number of bhaga
(miniature houses representing the founding female ancestors) ngadhu, (thatched,
forked, wooden posts representing the founding male ancestors), and peo (stones are
used to tether buffalo before they are slaughtered).
A sa'o has a name carried in a sacred dibbling stick belonging to the house.
Becoming a sa’o is a long and expensive process. A house begins life as a small
bamboo dwelling. Over a period of years, or generations it is successively rebuilt and
extended using more durable wood. A true named house (sa'o ngaza) is built of a hard
wood, Brassus flabellifer, has a high thatched roof, a name and a carved entry step (a
kaba pere) into the inner sacred room. The growth from a small bamboo dwelling
1
donggo = to live for; sa'o = House.

5. 4
into a true named house is likened to life from babyhood, through childhood and
adolescence to adulthood and maturity. Houses are not only symbolically living
through indigenous cosmologies but they are given life force through rituals required
for their construction (Waterson 1990). House construction rituals are still widely
practised in Ngadha and play an important part in the villagers’ lives.
Ritual life
There are two central aspects to the villagers belief system: Catholicism and ancestor
worship /veneration2
. The distinction is made locally, at least when speaking in
Indonesian, ancestral respect and its complex of beliefs and rituals are referred to as
adat and Catholicism as religion (agama). The villagers are firm believers in God and
are regular church-goers; most pray before meals and many make the sign of the cross
before drinks are sipped. Alongside this most observant and punctilious Catholicism,
the influence of the ancestors remains equally important.3
Feasting in Ngadha is competitive. Boasts about rituals are made relating to the
number of animals slaughtered and the number of guests who attend. As Daeng
(1988) explains, the ancestors always favour the host whose feast lasted the longest
and was attended by the most people. The distance that guests travel is also important.
This, in part, explains why tourists are welcome at rituals.
After Reba, the annual harvest festival ritual, the most important ceremonies
surround sa’o building and renovating. For every major house building ritual feast,
sa’o, family and in-laws will donate pigs. Pig donating and receiving is an important
public demonstration of relationships, and depends on previous exchanges. Pigs are
carried trussed up on bamboo poles and carried into a village for all villagers to
inspect, the bigger the pig the more important the relationship between donor and
recipient. The jaws of these pigs are kept and displayed outside, above the door. The
number and size of jaws signifies the number of relationships and amount of
2
Since the villagers are Catholics they prefer for their old beliefs to be described as respect or
veneration rather than worship.
3
Young people in focus groups were insistent that rituals for the ancestors remain an essential part of
their lives and that, without them, the ancestors would cause harm, sickness and bad luck in their lives.

6. 5
goodwill. Past ceremonies are remembered through the number of animals
slaughtered. The constant exchange of pigs is one of the ways family ties are
maintained. All members of the nua, regardless of relationship, take a hanging basket
of rice. The baskets of rice (and now sugar and coffee) maintain other social relations
between the inhabitants of the nua.
A Ngadha feast
In the villages where the research took place, two houses are re-thatched or
refurbished each year. The rituals follow a similar format. Here I will describe the
thatching and house-building finale that I attended in August 1998.
Agreement from the ancestors is sought before any house-building begins via a ritual
called a tau tibo which establishes the date for a ritual, and who should slaughter any
buffalo. Elders carry this out in the inner sacred room of the clan’s highest-ranking
house. The liver of a chicken is examined and messages from the ancestors, in the
form of the lines in it, are read. The ancestors are then symbolically fed with the
chicken liver, rice and palm spirit in the places they dwell in the inner sacred room. A
meal is then shared between family members.
On the morning of the ritual I attended gongs were sounded, to alert villagers from the
surrounding villages. While villagers gathered and the last of the thatching grass was
collected together, guests began to arrive. Each group brought baskets of rice, a pig
trussed up on bamboo, and bamboo tubes full of palm wine. After a speech by a male
elder, recalling their ancestors, dancers from the host family made an anti-clockwise
circuit of the village and entered their house. Many of the village men and some of the
younger women climbed on top of the roof in preparation to lay the thatch. The family
took up their seating positions (as custom dictates) in the inner room, said prayers and
ate three times. At the end, screams of excitement were let out and the thatching
began. The clan’s chosen man (ngarabuu) holding some thatching grass danced,
while the remaining bundles of thatching grass were thrown to those on the roof. The
atmosphere was joyous with laughter and cheers. Meanwhile, the clan’s headwoman
sat facing the thatching and observed. When the thatching was finished more dancing
followed.

7. 6
Everyone watched as the buffalo was ceremoniously slaughtered in the centre of the
village. The men crowded around the buffalo while the women watched from house
verandas. Twenty-one pigs were then sacrificed, each by a single blow through the
centre of their heads. An area in the middle of the nua is covered with large leaves
where the innards of the buffalo and pigs are removed. The meat was then hacked
into pieces with remarkable speed and taken to be cooked in half oil drums placed
over open fires. While the men chopped up the meat, the women cooked the rice. For
every pig donated a three-kilogram basket of half-cooked compacted rice was
prepared and taken to the new house. The clan’s headwoman sat in the inner sacred
room and received the rice that was transferred into an enormous (1metre diameter
and 1.2m high) rice basket. Meanwhile her brother sat on the terrace as the half-
cooked meat was delivered from the various make-shift fires.
Each pig donor received back the front half of the pig and its innards. The innards
were cooked in pig donors’ houses and eaten during the day, while the feast (mege)
was being prepared. When the feast was ready the ngarabuu took a small piece of
meat and placed it in his waistband. Likewise the donggo sa’o (headwoman) took a
small amount of rice. This is done to ensure that the feast does not run out before the
distribution is complete. On this occasion approximately seven hundred people from
various villages were fed. The villagers sat on their verandas, and guests sat in lines in
the centre of the village. The meat was transferred into buckets and the rice into
medium sized baskets. Men then served it, by hand (literally), into the baskets of the
collected villagers and guests. The food is always served following an anticlockwise
direction. Those who donated a pig had larger size baskets (and therefore received
larger portions) than the majority who used standard eating baskets (wati). Once the
food was served, the crowd dispersed and returned to re-cook the food in their homes.
The next day, in pig donor houses, breakfast was pig head so that the jaws could be
returned to the hosts. Donating a pig required constant to-ing and fro-ing between
houses both within the nua and beyond; donating the pig, taking back the front half,
and returning again with the jawbone. Each visit was a social occasion sharing palm
wine and often a meal. The exchange of meat continued in other houses. Pig donor
families gave non-donor families pieces of pork. Payment for borrowing such things

8. 7
as clothes, pans, and PA system were all paid in pork. While the women were busy
cutting, cooking and preserving cuts of pork while the men played cards “busy
waiting for their stomachs to be refilled”.
The importance of the feast
There are a number of general reasons that Ngadha house rituals are important:
 The house-based organisation of this society is continually reaffirmed when
members of the sa’o that live elsewhere collect in the house for the duration of
ceremonies. It also allowed members of different sa’o that live in remote
locations to meet and develop relationships. With much eating, drinking,
dancing and merriment, people told me it was an important opportunity to
meet potential spouses.
 The link between the living and the ancestors is maintained. The sacrifice of
animals is more than just killing animals to eat, it is making them sacred by
sharing them with unseen supernatural forces (Visser 1991), in this case, the
ancestors. The ancestors’ approval is sought, they are fed, and their names are
recalled during speeches throughout the house-building rituals. In return, the
ancestors protect, bless, provide health and harmony for the living. Feasts that
feed the entire village and villagers from surrounding villages are justified on
the grounds that: “ the more the food is shared the greater is the blessing.”
 The mutual indebtedness and reciprocity (the glue of the society) is continued
through pig exchange. Surplus foods are shared and will be returned when
supplies are short. Pigs are donated and repaid between sa’o at most house
construction ceremonies. As villagers explained, “ we are keeping relations
into the next generation, we will continue to be connected”.
 The rituals are an important way to affirm the status of the sa’o and the clan.
The buffalo horns and jawbones of twenty-one pigs were hung outside the
house. These will remain as a reminder of the status, number of relationships,
amount of goodwill and influence the sa’o members have. The clan gained
prestige from the redistribution of food. The clan and particularly the central
house, publicly demonstrated organisational abilities that would have value
beyond ceremonial and customary matters.

9. 8
 Hierarchy and status of individuals are also confirmed during the rituals. The
ngarubuu wore a prominent corrie shell necklace throughout the ritual leaving
observers in no doubt which man was the clan’s choice. Likewise, the clan’s
head woman sat prominently and publicly guarding the thatching grass. The
clan elder's organisational and managerial talents were advanced in the public
domain and give him individual prestige.
 The ritual provided the opportunity for men to control the distribution of food.
As I have suggested membership of sa’o is an extended group of kin related
through females. Ngadha social organisation is based around matriliny and
combined with matrilocal residence and the association of women with the
house, the women have a social structural dominance, which complements the
official state and Church ideology of male dominance (Waterston1990).
Control over food production, preparation and distribution is normally in
female hands. As with all ritual meals, the men prepared the meat and
distributed the food.
 At ceremonial meals the food is always served into baskets although plates
have largely replaced the use of baskets for eating profane meals. Observation
of tradition is particularly important during rituals. Feasts are an important
time to celebrate what has been inherited from the past (Visser 1991).
 A large part of disposable income is used for these ceremonies, underlining
the importance that this society places on them.
 The view held by outsiders, in particular the state, Church and tourists, of this
society as “traditional” is particularly prominent during rituals. The state and
Church have been instrumental in trying to cut down the numbers of animals
slaughtered at rituals (see Cole 2003b) but observing a sacrifice is especially
prestigious for the traveller seeking the “authentic exotic” which travelling to
Ngadha potentially offers.
 Finally, ethnic identity is celebrated through house building rituals, as the sa’o
is a strong cultural symbol for defining identity.

10. 9
Tourism and Hospitality
Tourists are welcomed
Tourists that visit Ngadha are seeking a view of traditional ethnic society. The
majority of them visit only the nua. They do not venture outside the ritual centre of
the villages. They walk around looking at the obvious cultural manifestations:
Houses, ngadhu, bhaga, and megaliths; they take photographs; some play with the
children and give gifts of sweets and pens to them; some, with or without the help of
guides, enter into conversations with the villagers. In one village, Bena, they may
additionally examine and negotiate to buy ikat fabrics and other souvenirs, rest at the
viewing post to take in the scenery, rest at the shop and buy drinks and biscuits. In the
other village, Wogo, if tourists just looked at the village, the visit was over too
quickly. If they lingered in the centre of the nua, the tourists were exposed and
uncomfortable (and in direct tropical sun). Tourists employed strategies to prolong
their stay. Some would sit, uninvited, on empty verandas, in which case they could be
approached and communication might ensue. More often, tourists would approach
children or communicate with children who approached them. They could use their
basic Indonesian with less embarrassment with children. Giving out sweets, pens or
balloons was frequently a strategy employed to open exchanges with children.
All the villagers in the nua are used to playing host. As occupants of a sa’o the
villagers are constantly receiving friends and relatives to stay. The villagers enjoy
receiving guests and see tourists as an extension of this. Some young villagers were
keen to practise their English and if a tourist’s visit coincided with coffee being
prepared, it was common for them to be invited to join in. I have also observed
tourists being offered a meal, if their visit coincided with a mealtime, and the tourists
demonstrated enough cultural capital to “fit in”.
The donggo sa'o is chosen for her hosting skills and is therefore the perfect person to
deal with the constant stream of visitors. This sense of duty is extended to tourists.
They are not family members with rights to be in the house, but they are “tamu
negara” (guests of the nation). It is a duty to the state to show them the utmost in

11. 10
hospitality.4
All members claim to like tourists, not to be bored with tourists, to want
more tourists and wish to strengthen and extend their hospitality to tourists.
Resoundingly, tourists are generally liked because, like most Indonesians, “the
villagers like life to be noisy, crowded and lively” (ramai) (Just 2001:55).
In Bena, the women pointed out that tourists provide them with entertainment,
something to look at and gossip about. All guests’ comings and goings in the nua
were noted and talked about and tourists are no exception. The women of Bena were
not bored with seeing tourists. Hair-styles, dress, and body shape combined with the
tourists’ origins, provided eternal conversation starters. On numerous occasions,
while sitting on the veranda visitors would be persuaded to stand up and stare at “such
a fat”, “such an old” or “such a strange” tourist.
Tourists who can converse in Indonesian, or who are prepared to converse through
willing guides, are particularly liked, because they provide kakangai otaola , “a
window on the world”5
. This important benefit of tourism is often expressed by
explaining that, through tourists, it is possible to get messages from another world
(Tuku mumu, nunga lema )6
. Through conversations with tourists, the villagers learn
what goes on outside the area.
The villagers liked the idea that they could exchange ideas with people from far afield
and reiterated the pan-Indonesian saying: “many friends bring good fortune”
(“banyak teman, banyak rejeki”). Or the local expression: “many friends much luck,
few friends little luck” (Hoga woe woso n’oe, hoga woe dhoso n’oe). A desire for
contact with the wider world, combined with a wish for their culture to be known to
the world, strengthen the villagers liking for tourists.
4
Similarly the Balinese hospitality offered to tourists is an extension of their tradition of accepting
strangers (Sanger 1988).
5
The local expression kakangai otaola would translate as “ventilation holes on the universe”.
6
Literally “to relate lips and bridge tongues”.

12. 11
A villager’s status is raised if they can boast a friend from afar. Just knowing a
tourist’s name, age and origins will make them “a friend” and thus a story to be
recounted. Increased status due to contact with the outside world is common in
Indonesia. “As in Java, guests signify a host's superior status, the greater distances
travelled reflect a greater drawing power” (Volkman 1987:167).
As with many societies in the region, travel leads to knowledge and respect. This is
summed up in another local expression: “wander away, seek knowledge; travel far,
seek wisdom” (la’a ezo, gae go be’o; la’a dada, gae go magha ). As Caslake (1993)
discusses, the tradition that a much-journeyed man can command considerable social
prestige provides a basis for social interaction with travellers.
Tourists at feasts.
Villagers are not only happy for tourists to attend rituals, tourists are actively sought
to take part in them. It is common for guides to be pre-warned of rituals so that they
can bring tourists. As has already been discussed, “the more the merrier” (ramai) is a
strong cultural value and the further people travel to attend a ritual the more
importance is attached to it.
Entertaining guests is a paramount objective of Ngadha feasting (Daeng 1988) and
status increases with the distance that guests travel (Volkman 1985:171). The news
and stories of the festivities would be spread further afield, abroad in the case of
tourists, and thus fame would be bestowed on the hosts. When tourists behave
according to local protocol, dress up in ceremonial clothes, dance and take part in
ritual meals they are fondly remembered. Rituals are identified and remembered as,
for example, the one where “that German danced so well”.
Many tourists promise to send photographs of rituals to villagers, and some do. This
used to be the only source of photographs of special events that the villagers had
which they appreciated. This is, however, becoming less important as relatives from
metropolitan centres often have cameras.

13. 12
Tourists’ attendance at rituals does, however, bring stress and incipient annoyance of
tourism to the surface. During rituals, villagers have a heightened regard for custom
and the wishes of the ancestors. They are less tolerant of the cultural insensitivity that
some tourists demonstrate. They complained about tourists not partaking in ritual
food, about the inconsiderate taking of photographs and about tourists, particularly
women, getting too close to the slaughter of buffalo.
To refuse food offered is impolite and to refuse ritual food causes even greater
offence. On a number of occasions at rituals, I would be required to eat five meals
before mid-day and to refuse any of them would have been unacceptable. Eating a
token amount or not finishing all that is provided does not cause bad feeling.
On a number of occasions, tourists who were invited to a ritual left before the ritual
meal was served. Villagers grudgingly accepted the tourists’ impatience to continue
their journey but expressed displeasure. Other tourists who were offered ritual meals
refused them, or accepted the food served to them but did not eat it. On one occasion
a village women said to me, “If they are here they have to eat, this is adat
(sacred) food” Another said, “it is not ordinary food, if they refuse it the ancestors
will be angry.” The refusing of ritual food was the most frequently mentioned
complaint about tourists’ attendance at rituals. Tourists that attended rituals but did
not partake in the meals could make the ancestors angry which the villagers believe
could have repercussions for their well-being.
Tourists and hospitality: ambivalent guests and unbalanced
reciprocity.
Tourists as ambivalent guests
Elsewhere (Cole 2004) I have discussed at length why, if tourists are considered
guests, they are in an ambivalent position. They do not wear smart clean clothes
necessary in Ngadha to show respect to their hosts. They give gifts directly to
individual children, rather than adult hosts, thus retaining control of gift distribution

14. 13
and transgressing the norms of gift giving in Ngadha culture. Tourists like to be the
only tourists at a ritual whereas the villagers like the events to be as crowded as
possible. Tourists lack patience at rituals and expect particular events at particular
times. Ngadha rituals, however, are processional and take uncountable time to
complete. Furthermore, as discussed, tourists often do not stay to eat, or refuse ritual
food; they fail to observe gendered space and are inconsiderate with their
photography. Finally many villagers say tourists fail to respond to the most basic of
hospitality – a smile. On failing to respond to smiles, greetings, and villagers’
questions, tourists fail to return hospitality and act as true guests.
Erb (2000) suggests that residents of neighbouring Manggarai associate tourists with
the unpredictable and unknown because of their cultural ignorance. However, they are
accepted as guests in the hope they will become embedded in a web of reciprocal
relations in which they will bear a debt, which theoretically must be perpetually
repaid. This means residents hope to be able to call upon them at any time to give
support, aid and protection.
Based on observations of tourist-villager interactions in Ngadha, it would appear that
hospitality fails to turn tourist strangers into friends and that through cultural
ignorance tourists fail to accept the moral authority of their hosts. While the villagers
may attempt to domesticate and control the unknown other (Erb 2000:720) it would
appear that the tourists fail to honour their obligations as guests. In the most visited
village, Bena, tourists are usually referred to as turis (tourist), whereas in Wogo they
are normally referred to as tamu (guests). Could the difference signify a new
understanding and categorising of these strangers?
Unbalanced reciprocity
The literature on hospitality suggests that it is based on mutual obligation and
reciprocity. Feasts in Ngadha involve the constant exchange of pigs, rice and toddy.
Villagers are connected through this mutual obligation to exchange food and drink at
feasts. Guests all contribute to feasts and their contributions are returned when they

15. 14
hold a similar feast. The guests indeed become hosts on another occasion as Lashley
(2000) suggested.
Tourists are welcomed guests at feasts. Few, however, ever bring donations to
contribute and they will not have the opportunity to act as hosts to Ngadha villagers.
While some tourists share the villagers’ food, they then leave. If the sharing of food is
held to signify togetherness or equivalence among groups and an affirmation as
socially similar, in the case of tourists this is, at best, very temporary.
Elsewhere, I have suggested that tourists bring inconvenience without economic
advantage (Cole 1997). I observed tourists being offered chicken (a very precious
commodity) for dinner or villagers getting sugar on credit to put in coffee for tourists.
Villagers appeared to be giving without receiving. However, tourists bring advantage
of a different kind. They are guests from afar. Contact with the outside world brings
status, and status increases with distances guests travel. Furthermore, when tourists
join in the festivities, villagers, watching them dance, sheik with excitement and
laughter. Events are made especially lively, noisy and entertaining (ramai) by the
presence of tourists.
Pig exchange between villagers is a form of balanced reciprocity – the exchange is
like for like. Usually the same size pig is returned. On the way to market to buy a pig
I was told, “we must get a big one, that’s what they gave us”. While tourists’
attendance at rituals may not appear reciprocal on the surface it is also a form of
exchange. The tourists have an exotic authentic experience (and a meal if they stay
and eat it) while the hosts obtain status, a more ramai party and the possibility of a
friend from afar.
Conclusion
This case study provides an example of how hospitality operates in two different but
overlapping social worlds. Between the villagers of Ngadha, the sharing of meat at
house-building rituals signifies togetherness and reaffirms the villagers as socially

16. 15
similar. The constant exchange of pigs is based on mutual obligations, and the
reciprocity is vital for maintaining social relations between groups of villagers. The
elements of power, status, prestige, honour and moral authority of the hosts are
demonstrated through the organisation of the ritual, slaughter of animals and
distribution of meat.
Hospitality is extended to a new form of guests – tourists. While the villagers attempt
to convert these strangers into friends this is frequently a one-way process. A tourist
may become a villager’s “friend” and the villager may hope for an on-going
relationship, but most tourists do not feel any mutual obligation. Some tourists
experience a connectedness during rituals but this is of a temporary nature and the
hospitality is not repaid.
While the hospitality between villagers continues generations of pig exchange, the
temporary reciprocity between villagers and tourists is less material. The former is a
form of balanced reciprocity, while, in the latter case, the gifts brought by tourists are
intangible.
References
Andrews, H., (2000) Consuming hospitality on holiday. In C Lashley and A
Morrison (eds.) In search of hospitality: Theoretical perspectives and debates. Oxford:
Butterworth Heinemann.
Caslake, J., (1993) Tourism, culture and the Iban. In King, V. (Ed.) Tourism in
Borneo. Borneo Research Council proceedings: Papers from the biennial International
conference. Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, July 1992.
Cole, S. (1997) Anthropologists, local communities and sustainable tourist
development, In M.Stabler (ed). Sustainable tourism: From principles to practice,
CAB International, Oxford
Cole, S. (2000) Post-modern tourist typologies: Case study from Flores, Indonesia,
Reflections on International Tourism, Business Education Publishers Ltd, ed. Mike
Robinson, Philip Long, Nigel Evans, Richard Sharpley, John Swarbrooke

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