Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The unique Punan cave dwellers live between the headwaters of the Mahakam and
Kapuas rivers, spanning East and West Kalimantan. Today, most have given up troglodyt-
ic living.
West Kalimantan is home to a large population of Bidayuh, most of whom are Catholic
(in Sarawak, quite a few of the Bidayuh are Anglican). Many identify strongly with the
locality they're from - for instance, Bidayuh from Terebung refer to themselves as 'Dayak
Terebung'.
The Longhouse
One of the most distinctive features of Dayak life is the longhouse (
rumah batang
or
rumah panjai
), which is essentially an entire village under one seemingly interminable
roof. Longhouses take a variety of shapes and styles, but all are raised above the damp
jungle floor on hardwood stilts and most are built on or near river banks. For reasons of
geography, traditional Dayak societies did not develop a government structure beyond that
of the longhouse.
The focus of longhouse life is the covered common verandah, known as a
ruai
to the
Iban and an
awah
to the Bidayuh; the Kelabits have two, a
tawa'
for celebrations and a
dapur
for cooking (other groups use other terms). Residents use these communal spaces to
socialise, engage in economic activities, cook and eat meals, and hold communal celebra-
tions.
One wall of the verandah, which can be up
to 250m long, is pierced by doors to individual
family
bilik
(apartments), where there's space
for sleeping and storage. If you ask about the
size of a longhouse, you will usually be told
how many doors, ie family units, it has. Tradi-
tional Iban courtship, known as
ngayap
, in-
volved surreptitious night-time liaisons in the
The Iban traditionally kept headhunted skulls out-
side the head-taker's family apartment, on the long-
house verandah
(ruai),
while the Bidayuh exhibited
theirs in a communal headhouse
(baruk or pang-
gah)
.
young woman's room.
Like the rest of us, Dayaks love their mod cons, so longhouses where people actually
live fuse age-old forms with modern conveniences - the resulting mash-up frequently
mixes traditional materials (bamboo slat floors) with highly functional features, such as
corrugated iron, linoleum, satellite dishes and, out the front, a car park. The new long-
houses built by the government for resettled Dayak villages usually follow the old floor-
plan but use unremarkable modern construction techniques.
