Quests: Last Shaman of Sarawak

Posted on 13. Jul, 2024 by Paul Sochaczewski in Articles

Paul Spencer Sochaczewski

Good bedside manner — Unding anak Libau treats a patient.

THE ALMOST LAST SHAMAN
It’s been a good ride, but Borneo healer doesn’t expect many others to follow his path.

SERUBAH ULU, Sarawak, Malaysia

To the untrained eye he seems an unlikely magician. Frail, but with a hundred-watt smile. He has two wispy whiskers, short grey hair, and he walks a bit slowly. But cut him some slack. He’s 91, thereabouts. He’s got tattoos on his neck, his arms, his legs; not much different from most elderly Iban men. Except unlike most men, Unding anak Libau can chase bad spirits and make ill people healthy.

Unding anak Libau is a manang, a traditional healer, living in a longhouse in Sarawak, not far from the Indonesian border. He’s one of the last of his profession.

* * *

I first encountered members of the large and politically important Iban tribe in 1969 when I was posted to Sarawak, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo as a United States Peace Corps volunteer. Sarawak was changing, quickly. Development was in the air, and people looked forward to improvements in agriculture, economy, education, and health care. I was a naïve 22-year-old, just out of university, and relished my new life travelling in small boats along muddy rivers to visit sometimes-shaky wooden longhouses. I advised primary school teachers (who often were much more skilled than I was, sometimes juggling two or three classes in simple schools) about how to implement a new English language syllabus more effectively. I trekked in vast swatches of rainforest, admiring the glorious hornbills, hunting wild pigs, catching (and dining on) pythons, bathing in the rivers. I helped slash-and-burn secondary forest so strong-calved men and women could plant hill rice on the steep charred slopes. I drank too much rice wine and made a fool of myself too many times trying to perform local dances. For me it was a transformative idyl, and I didn’t give much thought to Sarawak ever changing. I was far too inexperienced and idealistic — I didn’t spend much time wondering how the Ibans and other indigenous groups would adapt to the benefits and challenges that accompany the inevitable impact generated by a modern multi-cultural, increasingly well-off, healthier, and better-educated, society.

* * *

I return to Sarawak every few years, and on one of those visits more than a decade ago I sought advice from three senior Iban academics at the respected Tun Jugah Foundation in Kuching; one objective of which is “To preserve and promote Iban culture, arts and language.” Tan Sri Leonard Linggi Jugah, Robert Menua Saleh, and Peter Kedit explained the realities of modern life which threaten the professional existence of people like Unding. There’s the availability of Western education. Fluency in English and Bahasa Malaysia to complement the Iban language. Ease of transport, which means people can easily travel far from their longhouses and mingle with other people and cultures — marriage between Ibans and folks from other ethnic groups is common. Communications — it’s rare (perhaps impossible) to find a longhouse without TV and cellphones. Enough money to enjoy the consumer economy. And, perhaps most relevant for the future of manangs like Unding: Easy access to hospitals and clinics.

* * *

How pervasive are these modern realities in weakening the influence of people like Unding and his Indigenous beliefs?

I conducted a very informal, admittedly limited, and totally unscientific survey of young Iban men and women in the state capital of Kuching and the town of Sri Aman, not far from Unding anak Libau’s longhouse. I asked them two questions: How many of the major Iban bird omens can you name? And how many players in the English Premier League can you recall?

When given hints they said they had heard of the bird omens, but were hazy about what each one did. They were much more at home discussing English football, and names like Wayne Rooney and Steven Gerrard came without much prompting.

* * *

The Iban tribal group are in no danger of disappearing; they comprise some 30% of Sarawak’s population and are an important political, cultural, and economic force in the state. However, only a handful of manangs remain.

One reason why the manang culture is dying is the pervasive force of formal religions.

Religion can be a tricky subject for many families, and it’s no different when Unding sits down with his immediate clan. In 1979 Unding’s son, Galau anak Unding, had a dream in which two women in white shirts were visited by ghosts. The women lit candles and prayed and the ghosts ran away. Galau interprets this as meaning that the two women were Christian and that the Anglican religion can protect people from bad spirits.

Galau converted and asked his father to also become Christian. Unding, however, had his own dream, in which his personal spirit guide, the nyigit or cicada, appeared and told him that if he became Christian he would soon be invited to “go join the spirits.” For Unding this was a clear message that if he converted to Christianity he would die. While Unding stayed with the old beliefs, he doesn’t mind that a simple dark blue cross is displayed on the front door of his apartment in the longhouse — after all, Christians live within and they’re family. His son Galau, for his part, has become the longhouse’s lay preacher.

* * *

For the visitor the Ibans are gregarious and have a reputation of always being ready for a party.

They are also among the most studied tribal groups by anthropologists, who have recorded Iban healing songs, their bird omens, their courtship rituals (pre-marital sex used to be no big deal), their social structure (pretty democratic, and women have a strong voice), their architecture, their weaving, their animal spirit guides — whatever could generate a PhD has been examined and footnoted.

* * *

An Iban longhouse resembles a communal single-story motel, where family rooms sit adjacent to each other. Previously made of bamboo and wood (and remarkably photogenic), many longhouses in Sarawak are now made of concrete, with tin roofs. Unding’s longhouse, however, is constructed in the traditional style, and the bamboo floors on the common porch bounce a bit when children run past. As you enter, the most striking decoration in the main living room of Unding’s family’s apartment is a commercially-printed poster, about as big as a large bedsheet. It reads Selamat Ari-Jadi-90 (Happy 90th-Birthday).

We’ll have to accept the estimate of his age on faith, since, like others of his generation, Unding isn’t sure when he was born. In the pre-literate days parents would recall that a child was born when the hill rice was grown in such-and-such a location, or when the Japanese soldiers came, or when there was a big fire and the longhouse had to be rebuilt elsewhere.

When the government decided that everyone should have an identity card, Unding’s parents fudged on the boy’s age. He tells me he was “probably” 15, but his parents told the government clerk he was 18 so he could get a passport. The official said “don’t push your luck” and decided he was 17. Since the identity card was issued in December, that’s the de facto month of his birth.

But why did he need a passport? It relates to the right-of-passage berjalai that every able-bodied Iban young man undertakes. Berjalai can roughly be interpreted as a coming-of-age journey, a leaving home journey to seek adventure, wealth, and a first tattoo. In the old days a berjalai might result in the young man triumphantly returning to the longhouse with an enemy’s head. Today a young Iban man might attend university, or work in a timber camp, or in the large natural gas plant in Bintulu. Today he might return with a flat screen TV or an engineering degree or a hard hat reading “Bechtel Saudi.” Same game, different rewards. For his berjalai, Unding went to neighboring Brunei and brought back a souvenir that hangs on his wall — a small tapestry showing the Ka’aba in Mecca. I asked him why he displays that particular image, since he is not Muslim. “Just for the memory of the trip to [largely Muslim] Brunei,” he said.

* * *

I watched him at work.

One evening a family of four came to see Unding. A woman, 24 but looking older, had been debilitated by severe migraine headaches since the birth of her last child a year earlier. She had been to see Western doctors and had spent almost $1,000 in consultations and treatments. Seeing the manang was her last hope.

Unding chats with the woman for a while and then covers himself with a pua woven blanket. He holds two machete-like parangs, claps them together and gives a hooting call. A TV in the next room broadcasts a game show. He removes the pua and chats with the woman and her husband. It’s all very social, with a fair bit of joking.

Unding takes out his bag of amulets, bundled in a few tatty plastic bags. He puts special medicated oil on her forehead and rubs a stone he described to me later as Raja Genali (King of Eels), which he found floating in the river following a dream-vison he had, on the woman’s forehead. He rubs her throat with a stone he claims is a meteorite. From a different bottle, which looks like it once contained cheap brandy, Unding rubs more oil on her back, legs and stomach, all the while mumbling incantatioins. Then Unding’s wife joins the group and serves sweet tea and everybody has a good natter.

I later asked Unding what was wrong with the woman, who had driven half an hour to Unding’s longhouse. He explains that after giving birth she didn’t follow the traditional belief to keep her lower back warm and now is suffering because spirits entered her body. The parangs are intermediary devices that asked the spirits to tell him what action to take.

* * *

When I arrived at the longhouse I gave him gifts, much as in the West when you’re invited to someone’s house you bring a bottle of wine and a cheesecake.

Some fresh fish and vegetables from the Sri Aman market. Some tinned goods. Some biscuits for the kids. A bottle of local whisky — I knew Unding himself doesn’t drink much, but my guide Bayang Penguang explained that perhaps the alcohol could be brought out in the evening to lubricate a little longhouse party. And I gave him a rather nice amulet of Ganesha, the Hindu elephant god, thinking that he might be able to use it in his work. I explained its significance, told him it had been given to me by a Thai shaman, and made a case for its usefulness and universality.

He seemed underwhelmed by the Ganesha and instead showed me his own magic charms — a wild boar’s tooth, a chunk of petrified wood, a potion made of snake venom and herbs.

* * *

I collect protection fetishes for our house in Geneva and I thought an Iban talisman couldn’t hurt.

I asked whether his charms worked at a distance.

Unding showed me some designs he had created (looking like swirls made with white finger paint) on the brown paper covers of school exercise books. He had a bunch of them, ready to go; obviously many people seek such homeowners’ insurance. I bought one for $15 and hung it in the entryway of our house in Geneva; since then we haven’t been burgled, burned or invaded by bad spirits.