Ubud residents send prince on final journey

By: I Wayan Juniartha

For many people -- tourists, international media, and romantic Balinese -- the grand cremation ceremony held on Tuesday in Ubud was a clear example of the Balinese people's devotion toward royal patrons and the splendor and grandiose nature of their cultural heritage.

With a 28-meter-tall bade (tower used to carry the deceased's body to the cemetery), gigantic petulangan (wooden sarcophagus inside which the body is cremated) in the form of a black bull with golden horns, an elaborately decorated Naga Banda (giant dragon symbolizing the deceased's worldly attachments), a holy host group of 60 Hindu high priests and a watching crowd of around 15,000 people, the royal cremation was indeed a feast for the eyes.
Yet, as in other elaborate Balinese-Hindu rituals, there were aspects of the royal cremation ceremony that escaped the public's attention.
One of those things involved the personal sacrifices made by Ubud's residents, locals and expatriates. For weeks, the residents of Jl. Suweta, where the royal palace lies and most of the ceremony's preparations took place, had to drive through a narrow alley to reach their homes.
The construction of two giant royal bade at the southern end of the street had made people reluctant to enter the street at all. The construction of 68 petak (makeshift ceremonial chambers) for the remains of the 68 non-royals that would be cremated on the same day, had rendered the southern section of the road virtually impassable.
Needless to say that several restaurants, art galleries and shops along the street suffered a significant drop in revenue.
"Sometimes, this kind of thing is inevitable when you live in Bali," a resident of Jl. Suweta said.
On the day of the ceremony, the people of Ubud made another personal sacrifice: Electricity was switched off for the whole day. Overhead electrical cables that might have hampered the movement of the cremation's giant structures were taken down. The patrons of Ubud's small-scale pensions and guesthouses had to do with cold showers on the day while Internet addicts paid through the nose to access the Internet via their cell phones.
"Another sacrifice was made by the trees along the procession's route," Bulan Nadi, a local housewife said.
On the night before the ceremony, a group of people armed with buzzing chainsaws inspected the route and then cut down trees they believed would obstruct the movement of the bade. By the next morning, dozens of trees had gone and sawdust could be seen strewn across the street.
"This street will be barren after the ceremony," Bulan lamented.
Yet, all these sacrifices seemed less significant than the ones made by the women of Ubud, who for three months had worked tirelessly to prepare both the royal cremation and the cremations of their 68 relatives.
To a large extent, Balinese-Hindu rituals are "women's business". Women make the majority of the intricate offerings and carry out most of the tasks in the rituals.
In a cremation ritual of this magnitude, the number of offerings and other ritual paraphernalia could easily reach tens of thousands.
"Do you know how exhausted we get after making and then re-counting 28,000 jaja (ritual cakes)," Bulan Nadi said.
The number of offerings for each ceremonial structure, including individual ceremonial meal portions prepared for the deceased, must be precisely in accordance with the number given by the priest and tukang banten (an offerings expert) who supervised the ceremony's preparation.
"If you make less than the given number, the ceremony will be deemed incomplete. If you make more than the given number, particularly in a cremation ceremony, then it is widely believed that more people will die in the next few days, as the number of souls will always correspond with the number of available offerings," she said.
The preparation period, which took almost three months, was a grueling, time-consuming, and, often, frustrating period for the Balinese. Consequently, a large number of people often fall ill after completing a big religious ceremony -- and Ubud is no exception.
Bulan Nadi said she had fallen ill twice during the preparation period. Her husband also suffered an acute case of exhaustion.
Meanwhile, the guardian of the royal family of Ubud, Tjokorda Raka Kerthyasa, was no longer the fresh, charming and physically fit prince he was prior to the start of the ceremony's preparation period.
"I am very tired. So many things to do, so many things to organize," Kerthyasa said.
The daunting task of organizing a grand cremation such as this one, which involved thousands of helpers from 67 different traditional villages in Bali, had certainly drained his energy.
"Not to mention that we have to do all of this while we are still mourning the loss of our loved one," he added.
He was referring to Tjokorda Gede Agung Suyasa, the Prince of Ubud, the former Bendesa (chief) of Ubud for three decades and the man whose body would be carried atop the towering bade.
Throughout his life, Suyasa was very close, emotionally and psychologically, to Kerthyasa. In Suyasa's last days, Kerthyasa was among the few individuals permitted by the elderly prince to enter his chamber and keep him company.
Many believe that upon Suyasa's passing, Kerthyasa would take his position as leader of the arguably most powerful royal family in Bali.
Similar exhaustion and sadness could be seen on the faces of the members of Ubud families that cremated their loved ones that day.
In Balinese-Hindu philosophy, a cremation releases the soul of the departed from the cocoon of his or her physical body. At the same time, it finalizes the separation between the grieving family and their dearly beloved.
"It's a mixed feeling of knowing that your loved one started his or her final journey ... after the cremation our separation will also be finalized," Bulan Nadi said.
It was before this background setting of physical exhaustion and emotional grief that the royal cremation ceremony was commenced at noon Tuesday. Dressed in purple T-shirts emblazoned with the words Kula Warga Puri Agung Ubud (The People and Relatives of the Ubud Royal Palace), some 8,000 of Ubud's men and male youths waited patiently for their turn to carry the bade and the cremation's other giant structures.
In front of the palace's southern gate, an old man lifted a sacred tawa-tawa (gong) and after a brief moment of silence, struck the gong repeatedly.
The striking of the gong, which is believed to posses the supernatural quality of being able to command legions of invisible creatures residing in woods and gorges around Ubud, signified the official beginning of the ceremony. The sound of the instrument instructed the creatures to assist the people of Ubud with the ceremony, particularly with carrying the bade's eleven tons.
As the gong filled the air with strange metallic tones, a powerful gust of wind suddenly passed through the gate, sending a cold shiver down the spines of the men who stood near it.
"They are coming," the old man said solemnly.
That was another thing that eluded the public's eyes on the day.

Source: The Jakarta Post, Thursday, 07/17/2008