By Hosea MIrino
This is a story about my experience working as a facilitator, coming and living in Unurum Village, Unurumguay District, Jayapura Regency. Living there for six days, I was treated like his own child by Mr. David Goakan. He is the head of the family in the house I stayed in.
Mr. David is a hard worker, playing an important role in the family and in the village. While living there, I was involved in various activities. Starting from gardening, looking for crops in the forest, attending traditional events, and activities at church. At home, I also helped my mother cook the harvest.
Mr. David invited me to hunt. I helped set snares and check the snares that had been set a few days earlier. The distance of the snares can reach two to four kilometers into the forest. For the Unurum indigenous people, the forest is like a shop and pharmacy. From there, they get the food and medicine they need to survive.
From just six days of intensely accompanying the Goakan family, I witnessed how important communal life is in the village. Also how vital customary land rights are for the community. In this way, the community is able to maintain and protect their sources of life so that they remain sustainable.
I also gained ‘new knowledge’ from the Unurum community. For example, when one of the village elders saw a young man cutting down a large tree. “You’ve had the chainsaw for two hours and haven’t let the tree fall, how is that?” he said as he took over the chainsaw. Calmly, the man looked up at the sky once, and began to cut the tree. Until it fell.
“To cut a tree, you have to look at its veins. In the past, no matter how big the tree was, cut it with an axe, the tree could be felled. Look and feel the veins of the tree first. Look again at the wind direction, where it is strong, so that the wind can help the tree fall,” he added.
Another example, Mr. David invited us to cut down a sago tree. The trunk was cut down, then they made the remaining sago trunk cut into bait for pigs. Usually between 8 pm and 3 am, the pigs come out looking for discarded sago trunks.
Everything is done consciously. For me, the knowledge and experience shared with us, the younger generation, is very important to be passed on and continued. Honestly, most of us are not aware that this local knowledge and wisdom is gradually disappearing and no longer recognized.
Contact us
Yayasan Pengembangan Pelatihan untuk Perubahan Sosial di Tanah Papua
(YP3SP)
Jalan Karya Tanah Hitam Permai
Abepura Jayapura
Papua
Email: info@papuatransformation.org
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