On Samosir
From 2 November
You hear the boat before you see it. "Heeeeeeey, Sexy Lady" from Psy's magnum opus heralds its arrival. The earworm reverberates off the otherwise placid waters of Lake Toba. As the boat passes quiet returns to the lake shore - punctuated only by the rhythmic tapping of a fisherman's pole against the stony shallows as he drives his catch into his nets.
I find myself on Pulau Samosir, a volcanic island the size of Singapore in the middle of the world's largest crater lake which is, itself, atop a chain of volcanic mountains on the island of Sumatra. I'm forty minutes by boat from the town of Parapat and the crater's rim. From there it is another one hour by bus to the city of Siantar or four hours to Medan, the largest city in Sumatra. Medan, in turn, is less than one hour by air from the gleaming towers, high-tech gadgetry, and smoggy air of Kuala Lumpur.
The two couldn't feel further away.
This is Batak country - an indigenous group that has called this part of Sumatra home for centuries. One time headhunters, they are now some of the most outwardly hospitable people I've met. After helping me secure a minibus from Siantar to Parapt, a new friend insisted that I send him a text message when I arrived at my guesthouse so that "[his] heart may be at ease."
This is a Lutheran heartland. Although Indonesia is the worlds most populous Muslim-majority nation, this part of Sumatra is deeply and unabashedly Christian. Church buildings, reflecting both Western and Batak styles, dot the landscape. Due to the missionary work of Ludwig Ingwer Nommensen and others, Lutheranism took route and flourished here. Taken together, the Lutheran Churches in Sumatra have some 7-million members. The largest, the HKBP, has 4.1 million members - making it similar in size to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. One can also find the world's largest Lutheran University here. With campuses in Siantar and Medan, Nommensen University enrolls some 6000 students in nearly a dozen different areas of study, making it twice the size of a school like St. Olaf in Northfield, MN.
This is a tourist hotspot. At some point in the not-so-distant past, Westerners (i.e. backpacker-hippie-types) found this volcanic island on a crater lake on a volcanic island in Southeast Asia and thought it was pretty chill. They were right. Word got out and soon Lake Toba was on the "Banana Pancake" trail that stretches from Thailand to Bali. True to its roots, signs for "magic mushrooms & laundry service" still dot the tourist/resort town of Tuktuk and the omnipresent tunes of Bob Marley are sung with local accents.
This is a place in transition. Following the terrorist bombings in Bali in 2002, the tsunami in 2004, and the well-published inter-religious tensions in neighboring Aceh province, Lake Toba appears to have fallen off of the tourist map. At its peak the town of Tuktuk could easily accommodate 2,000+ tourists on any given day. As I wander the streets I see but a fraction of that; the infrastructure and local businesses are in place but the people are . . . gone. Granted I chose to come during the low season and, I've been told, that after bottoming out a few years ago, the number of visitors has steadily been climbing once again. For those whose families run the guest houses, restaurants, and shops that support the tourist industry these are undoubtedly trying times - masked by the calls of "Horas!" ('Welcome!') and hospitable gestures. . .
Away from the tourist spots, on a bike ride through rice paddies and small villages, life seems to roll on as I imagine it always has: children dismissed from local church schools race the guy on the bike before heading into their homes; women rest from their labor in the fields by sitting on a berm between paddies; men sit on raised platforms pulling on ropes and jingling bells to shoo birds from their crops. The smells of forest and field and homebrewed tuak are as old as they are new.
I'm intrigued. My curiosity has been piqued. I'm reminded of my time living and studying in Bali and what I have seen and heard among the indigenous peoples of Sabah and Sarawak on Borneo Island. The sights, sounds, tastes, and smells are all 'same-same' but intoxicatingly different.
A day and a half on Samosir was delightful but it has definitely left me wanting more.
 |
| Morning on Lake Toba - Nov 2012 |
I find myself on Pulau Samosir, a volcanic island the size of Singapore in the middle of the world's largest crater lake which is, itself, atop a chain of volcanic mountains on the island of Sumatra. I'm forty minutes by boat from the town of Parapat and the crater's rim. From there it is another one hour by bus to the city of Siantar or four hours to Medan, the largest city in Sumatra. Medan, in turn, is less than one hour by air from the gleaming towers, high-tech gadgetry, and smoggy air of Kuala Lumpur.
The two couldn't feel further away.
This is Batak country - an indigenous group that has called this part of Sumatra home for centuries. One time headhunters, they are now some of the most outwardly hospitable people I've met. After helping me secure a minibus from Siantar to Parapt, a new friend insisted that I send him a text message when I arrived at my guesthouse so that "[his] heart may be at ease."
This is a Lutheran heartland. Although Indonesia is the worlds most populous Muslim-majority nation, this part of Sumatra is deeply and unabashedly Christian. Church buildings, reflecting both Western and Batak styles, dot the landscape. Due to the missionary work of Ludwig Ingwer Nommensen and others, Lutheranism took route and flourished here. Taken together, the Lutheran Churches in Sumatra have some 7-million members. The largest, the HKBP, has 4.1 million members - making it similar in size to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. One can also find the world's largest Lutheran University here. With campuses in Siantar and Medan, Nommensen University enrolls some 6000 students in nearly a dozen different areas of study, making it twice the size of a school like St. Olaf in Northfield, MN.
This is a tourist hotspot. At some point in the not-so-distant past, Westerners (i.e. backpacker-hippie-types) found this volcanic island on a crater lake on a volcanic island in Southeast Asia and thought it was pretty chill. They were right. Word got out and soon Lake Toba was on the "Banana Pancake" trail that stretches from Thailand to Bali. True to its roots, signs for "magic mushrooms & laundry service" still dot the tourist/resort town of Tuktuk and the omnipresent tunes of Bob Marley are sung with local accents.
This is a place in transition. Following the terrorist bombings in Bali in 2002, the tsunami in 2004, and the well-published inter-religious tensions in neighboring Aceh province, Lake Toba appears to have fallen off of the tourist map. At its peak the town of Tuktuk could easily accommodate 2,000+ tourists on any given day. As I wander the streets I see but a fraction of that; the infrastructure and local businesses are in place but the people are . . . gone. Granted I chose to come during the low season and, I've been told, that after bottoming out a few years ago, the number of visitors has steadily been climbing once again. For those whose families run the guest houses, restaurants, and shops that support the tourist industry these are undoubtedly trying times - masked by the calls of "Horas!" ('Welcome!') and hospitable gestures. . .
Away from the tourist spots, on a bike ride through rice paddies and small villages, life seems to roll on as I imagine it always has: children dismissed from local church schools race the guy on the bike before heading into their homes; women rest from their labor in the fields by sitting on a berm between paddies; men sit on raised platforms pulling on ropes and jingling bells to shoo birds from their crops. The smells of forest and field and homebrewed tuak are as old as they are new.
I'm intrigued. My curiosity has been piqued. I'm reminded of my time living and studying in Bali and what I have seen and heard among the indigenous peoples of Sabah and Sarawak on Borneo Island. The sights, sounds, tastes, and smells are all 'same-same' but intoxicatingly different.
A day and a half on Samosir was delightful but it has definitely left me wanting more.
Comments