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Again, it appears I neglected to contact anyone for about a week at this stage, so this is from memory...
Everyone told us we'd want to get out of Makassar as soon as we could but personally, I quite liked it. It's a midsize city, modern but not trying to be too westernised, or pretend to be anything it isn't, and it's on the sea, which is always cool. The feel of the place reminds me a little of Phnom Penh! We had a stressful morning trying to figure out where on earth to buy tickets from in a city where no one spoke any English and there was nothing catering towards 'tourists' at all. Feeling a bit more relaxed with a night bus to Tana Toraja booked, we headed to Fort Rotterdam, and stumbled on the Makassar English Literature Festival. a Literature Festival, in MAKASSAR, where NO ONE goes, has there ever been anything more random? Anyway, I was over the moon.
Some friendly students and their teacher, who all wanted to improve their English, took us to this awesome port for sunset. We had some more heavenly food (for some reason it was incredible, and cheap, in Makassar) before a grim night bus. We arrived in Tana Toraja at 7am, figured out it was THE big funeral and market that day at 8am, therefore booked a guide between the 5 of us (we were a bigger group by then) at 9am, and set off at 10am.
It's difficult to describe the Torajan culture... it basically revolves around death and funerals. They spend all their money on funerals and gifts for the family of the dead, which are usually pigs and buffalo which cost up to $10,000 (crazy). And then they have a MASSIVE party in the summer, the more important the person the bigger the celebration/more people attend/more buffalo gifted/more days spent celebrating. At the funerals they dance, sing, have buffalo fights, and just slaughter all the animals as sacrifices. Afterwards, they bury their dead in cliffs and caves, with wooden statues watching over them.
As I said we heard that the day we arrived was THE day to go. First we visited the big market, with thousands of livestock being bought and sold to be given as gifts, which was amazing to see. The Albino buffalo are the most prized, and they cost more than a small car! Next we were taken to the funeral, which was held in a nearby village. It was a big one! Tonnes of people there, really quite moving to see how big a celebration they make for the dead.
The part that was a bit more tricky to digest was the sacrificing. There were 200 buffalo given to the family, and well over 1000 pigs - they would ALL be killed over the 3 days. It was truly brutal, shocking and fascinating - they slaughter them out in the open in front of everyone, and it was obviously difficult to watch - I do have a video if anyone wants to stomach it!
Anyway, a real experience. We were loving Sulawesi - far off the beaten track, especiallyas the tourists were mainly domestic (indonesians on holiday - there's actually quite a prominent middle class there!). Far more than anywhere else, we were stared at wherever we went and were constantly stopped and asked to have our photos taken with a group. Whilst it got a little tiresome(!) it's nice that the island is a bit more untouched than where we'd been before, although unsurprising I suppose.
We had another couple of days in the area - one day hiring out motorbikes and visiting all the caves, graves and places to see in the area - before once again clambering into a minibus for a long, long journey to Ampana, to catch the ferry to the Togean islands. We had some pretty high expectations for somewhere so bloody difficultto get to!
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