Experiment
in integration
This new urban
space continues to welcome waves of new immigrants - Balinese
as well as non-Balinese. As such, it represents an experiment
in national integration. Inland Balinese indeed make up the majority
of the population. The northerners and southern princes and brahmans
were here first. Early beneficiaries of a colonial education,
they took over the professions and the main administrative positions
and constitute, together with the local nobility, the core of
the native bourgeoisie. Their villas - with their roof temples,
neo-classical columns and Spanish balconies - are the modern "palaces"
of Bali.
More recently,
a new Balinese population has settled here, attracted by jobs
as teachers, students, nurses, traders, etc. Strangers among the
local "villagers," these Balinese are the creators of
a new urban landscape and architecture. Instead of setting up
traditional compounds with their numerous buildings and shrines,
they build detached houses with a single multi-purpose shrine.
In religious matters, they are transients - retaining ritual membership
in their village of origin, praying to gods and ancestors from
a distance through the medium of the new shrine. They return home
for major ceremonies, to renew themselves at the magical and social
sources Of their village of origin.
Apart from
the Balinese majority, there are several non-indigenous minorities
in Denpasar, comprising a quarter of the total Population. Muslim
Bugis came to Bali as mercenaries as early as the 18th century.
They have their own "banjar' in the village of Kepaon, where
they live alongside the Balinese, speaking their language and
intermarrying with them. Old men of Pemecutan will show you a
"Bugis" shrine in a small temple near the family cremation
site.
The Chinese
came early as traders for the local princes. They integrated easily,
blending their Chinese and Balinese ancestry. They also have a
shrine, the Ratu Subandar or "merchant king's" shrine
up in Batur, next to the shrines of Balinese ancestral gods. New
Chinese, often Christians, have arrived, attracted by the booming
economy of Bali.
There are also
Arabs and Indian Moslems who came in the thirties as textile traders
and have since become one of the most prosperous local communities.
They live in the heart of the city, in the Kampung Arab area,
where they have a mosque.
Most migrants,
however, are Javanese and Madurese, known collectively as "jawa."
They fill the ranks of the civil service and the military (Sanglah
and Kayumas areas) as well as the working classes, skilled and
unskilled (Pekambingan, Kayumas, "Kampung Jawa" areas).
New actors on the Balinese social stage, they introduce new habits
- food selling, peddling, etc. They are also builders of new housing:
shacks and tiny houses that bring Denpasar into line with other
cityscapes of modern Indonesia.
Thus Denpasar
is very much a place where the theme of nation-building is played
out. It brings together within earshot of one another the high
priest's mantra, the muezzin's call, and the parson's prayer.
"Eka Wakya, Bhinna Srutti" - "The Verbs are One,
the Scriptures are Many" - so goes the local saying. Balinese
tolerance within a national tolerance. More..
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