The Indonesian province of Papua, formerly Irian Jaya, is one of the greatest and least-trodden natural history museums in existence. Though expensive to reach, the magnificent Baliem Valley in the middle of the western half of the island of New Guinea is probably the most accessible of Papua’s tribal destinations. The valley was only "discovered" in 1938 by a wealthy American explorer, Richard Archbold, during a botanical and zoological expedition.
How did this happen? Flying south from the Dutch capital of Hollandia, when the clouds cleared that day 65 years ago the expedition members beheld vast, meticulously tended gardens of checkerboard squares with neat stone fences, clean-cut networks of canals, and arduously terraced mountain slopes. Newspapers at the time reported that the valley was the realm of a lost civilization.
Inhabited by tribes of Neolithic warrior farmers, the first outsiders to settle the valley were American missionaries who landed by floatplane in 1945 on the Baliem River. The Dutch established a settlement in Wamena in 1956, bringing civilization to the native Dani people in the form of schoolteachers, new breeds of livestock, modern clothing, radio technology and metal tools. Wamena remained under Dutch control for just six short years, until Indonesia wrested West New Guinea from Holland in 1962.
Offering unlimited and unexploited tourism potential, the Grand Valley of the Baliem measures 72 kilometers long by 30 kilometers wide. There are no dangerous animals and disease; droughts and pests are rare, the temperature mild, the rainfall moderate. No wonder that its discoverer believed that this mile-high valley was a Shangra-La, the life of its people later immortalized in Peter Matthiessen’s Under a Mountain Wall.
The Baliem River, pouring down from 4750-meter Mount Trikora to the north, snakes through the valley, then drops into a spectacular gorge system 60 kilometers southeast to run itself out in the extensive marshes and mud of the Asmat lands bordering Papua’s southern coast.
Among the Baliem’s most arresting sights are the Dani’s elaborate chessboard-patterned drainage and irrigation systems which look more like New England farmlands than the home of a Stone Age people. The Dani have practiced horticulture for 5000 years and are today among the most ingenious gardeners in the world.
Sweet potato (hiperi), grown on raised plots and cultivated only with digging sticks, is the Dani’s staple crop, making up 90% of their diet. Just as the Eskimo language contains countless words for snow and Arabic tongues feature scores of terms for camels, so do the Dani have hundreds of different words for the sweet potato. For obscure reasons, some varieties are thought to taste particularly good while others are fit only for pigs.
Wamena: Settlement turned Town
Set beneath cloud-wreathed mountain peaks, Wamena is the main town, the "capital" of the Baliem. It is a small community with row upon row of mission offices, shops, houses, schools and what seem like hundreds of government offices, all sprawling across the flat valley floor. The streets are gridded but flow with very little traffic. Though it’s the center of a pig-loving culture, the largest and most opulent building is a mosque.
The town’s chief interest is its relatively intact traditional culture. Many of its residents and visitors still wear native dress and the gardening systems in the hamlets surrounding Wamena are still very much as they’ve always been, though steel tools have all but replaced traditional polished wood, stone, bone and sharpened bamboo implements. The locals are mustered as guides to the occasional outlying pig feast or enlisted as carriers for hikes around the valley.
Wamena is a study in cultural contrasts and incongruities. Strolling its streets are giggling Javanese school girls, international aid workers, backpackers and package tourists, missionary families, police and army, as well as warriors whose only clothing are penis gourds pointing proudly upward. Almost every night the electricity goes out, so be sure to carry a flashlight after dark.
The town's market, bustling with farmers selling produce, crafts and artefacts, is Wamena’s premier tourist attraction, the place to view an extraordinary mixture of cultures and customs – tall stately Minangkabaus, Western-attired Javanese, curly-haired Ambonese and flamboyantly dressed tribesmen parading themselves in full dress for the express purpose of having themselves photographed at Rp10,000 per click of the camera. Fourth World meets Digital Age.
Stay and Eat
As everything is either flown in or hauled by truck down the long perilous road from Jayapura, prices for food and everyday goods are some of the highest in Indonesia. Most of the accommodations below are near the market, airport and bus station. Rates do not include tax and service charges. Telephone area code for Wamena is 0969.
Highly recommended is Hotel Baliem Pilamo, Jl. Trikora 114 (tel. 31043/32359) with rooms set around an interior garden; standard Rp110,000, family Rp150,000, deluxe Rp180,000, VIP Rp200,000. Breakfast Rp20,000. The Nayak, Jl. Gatot Subroto 1, (tel. 31067/31030) has clean, basic rooms for Rp88,000 single and Rp100,000 double for standard, and Rp125,000 single and Rp150,000 double for suite rooms.
Wamena Hotel, Jl. Trikora 212 (tel. 31292), 1.5 kilometers from the market on the road north out of town, has rooms with Western toilets and cold-water mandi. Tariff is Rp90,000 (includes breakfast). Walk east across the bridge to Pugima or north to Yiwika for cheaper and more organic village accommodation at rock-bottom rates in traditional beehive-shaped honnay.
Wamena restaurants are run exclusively by Javanese and Sumatrans. The town’s best is the Mentari (tel. 31771) which serves Indonesian food for around Rp45,000 per person.
Walks from Wamena
Wamena serves as an excellent base from which to take in the valley’s breath-catching scenery. Walking on the numerous, safe and generally well-maintained dirt footpaths and hard-gravel roads of the valley is an invigorating experience forever etched in the visitor’s mind. Just outside of town are jungled ravines, suspension bridges over deep stony riverbeds and villages made up of clusters of round houses (for men) and long houses (for women).
Further afield are panoramas, smoked and decorated ancestor mummies,
centuries-old salt pools, bat caves with stalactites and stalagmites, pyramid-shaped mountains and canyons of soaring rock walls. Allow yourself at least three weeks for some of the most superb trekking Southeast Asia has on offer.
E-mail : pakbill2003@yahoo.com
Copyright@2003 PakBill
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