Marek Farewell
The funeral in Tana Toraja is a very important ceremony, as interesting as the previously described Indian Varanasi. As a ceremony symbolizing farewell to the deceased and his passage to the afterlife, where he is reunited with the spirits, it must take place with due splendor. Preparations take a long time. Usually about two years, but not less than a year.
The funeral itself lasts a week, and the invited guests are counted in the hundreds, and in the case of more famous people in thousands. The whole ritual of saying goodbye lasts a week. Only after this time are the earthly remains enclosed in a wooden coffin buried in one of four ways, which will be discussed in the next post. But let’s start from the beginning. The spiritual element remains in the body of the deceased for some time after death. His relatives then assume that he is a sick person. They place the body in one of the three rooms of their house, the tongkonan (typical in Tana Toraja). Using preservatives, once herbs, now more and more often chemicals protect the body from decomposition. Their methods are very effective, suffice it to say that a visitor to the hut on stilts may not even realize that a corpse has been resting in one of the rooms for over a year.
The deceased is considered by the family to be ill. The family brings him food, water to drink, and also offers him cigarettes. The same information is announced to relatives and friends. Of course, there is no way that these people are not aware of the true state of affairs. They believe that until the soul leaves the definitive body, their relative is merely a sick person.
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Ceremony
When the moment of spiritual death comes after a dozen or twenty months, the funeral ceremony begins. The family managed to raise funds for the lavish ceremony over the past period. It takes place in a ceremonial village. An invitation is received by everyone who has ever come into contact with the deceased, their family, neighbors, distant and very distant acquaintances. The fact of being invited to a funeral imposes on the invited person the obligation to come with an appropriate gift. As a rule, pigs are accepted, in the case of richer participants, the gift is usually a water ox. Poor people bring small gifts, such as cigarettes. Dozens of piglets brought into the ceremonial village cause the area to be filled with the screams of these animals, loud and difficult to bear.
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Guests
Guests come together in long columns of several dozen meters, leading on strings or carrying gifts on bamboo poles. The master of ceremonies reads the list of the newcomers, along with the city of residence. Only thanks to the fact that his voice comes out of huge speakers, he breaks through the noise of terrified animals. Almost immediately after assembly, they are killed, groomed and then roasted over a fire. Each guest must eat. For the visitor, the ceremony gives the impression of great food. Tourists are eagerly allowed into the ceremonial area (although today there are not too many of them outside of us). Their presence means gifts, as well as the fact that the memory of the deceased crosses the borders of Indonesia and even Asia.
Since many months have passed since the actual death, it is in vain to look for sadness at the ceremony. The atmosphere is more like a picnic or an outdoor party. On the other hand, the fact that the soul of the deceased has passed is a reason for joy. He leaves for a better world, he will meet his ancestors. They are Christians, so they believe that the deceased will unite with god. The ceremony ends after a week, when the coffin in a solemn procession goes to the burial place. In a few, a dozen or several dozen years, new bones will land on a pile at the foot of the cliff.
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