The
West
Jembrana
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A virgin
forest, lair of the ferocious Bali tiger and haunt of
highway robbers, stretching from rugged mountain chain
to ragged coast this was Jim bar Wana, the "Great
Forest" of the west, known today as Jembrana. More
than half of the regency's 842 sq km area is forested,
much of the rest is dry, and people from other parts of
Bali still consider Jembrana to be only half civilized
and not quite Balinese.
A Balinese
chronicle accounts for the emptiness of Jembrana in the
following way: When the region first came under the author
ity of the court at Gelgel around 1450, two princes were
sent to settle the remote western forests. Gusti Ngurah
Pecangakan settled near present-day Negara; Gusti Ngurah
Bakungan claimed the area around present day Gilimanuk.
Soon a rivalry developed between the two as to who could
develop the more beautiful and prosperous court.
On
one occasion, Bakungan invited his brother to Gilimanuk
to attend a lavish court ceremony, and Pecangakan left
his horse tied to a tree where a pig had been slaughtered.
The unguarded horse broke free and ran home, first rolling
in the grass and covering itself in pig's blood. Seeing
the horse return rider less and bloody, Pecangakan's wife
and family thought he had been killed, and as was the
custom they took their own lives to share his fate. Pecangakan
returned to a deserted palace and immediately declared
war on his brother out of grief and rage.
Whatever
the truth of this tale, the two brothers destroyed each
other and their kingdoms in the civil war which ensued.
All that remains of them today is a small temple. Pura
Bakungan, by the side of the main road one km northeast
of Cekek. And as a result, Jembrana remained sparsely
populated and barely civilized while the rest of Bali
blossomed with court culture. Eventually, a court of sorts
developed in the town of Jembrana, which in 1803 moved
a few kms west to the town of Negara, the present-day
capital.
Who
first settled the forbidding Jimbar Wana? The earlist
evidence of human habitation on Bali has in fact been
discovered at Gilimanuk, near the island's western tip.
Not much is known about these prehistoric people.
Later
residents came not only from Bali but from other islands
also. The Bali Strait bordering Jembrana is notoriously
treacherous, and because the Balinese are wary of the
sea anyway, parts of the coast were settled by sailors,
fishermen and merchants from Java, Madura and Sulawesi.
Many of these were Muslims and remained so. One km south
of the central market in Negara lies Loloan Timur, a village
of Muslim Balinese whose Bugis ancestors migrated here
as early as 1653. These villagers have retained elements
of Buginese culture, most strikingly the oblong houses
built of wood with living quarters on the second floor.
Loloan Timur looks unlike any other village on Bali.
Outside influences are thus very much in evidence here.
There is one mosque to every five Hindu temples in Jembrana.
And Jembrana residents themselves will tell you that prior
to the 1920s, many newcomers were people who were politically,
economically or legally in trouble in other parts of Indonesia.
And after 1920, local transmigration programs encouraged
people from the more densely populated areas of Bali to
settle in Jembrana.
Most
people in Jembrana can tell you where they are originally
from, and if you drive up one of the many side roads that
snake into the mountains, you will encounter places like
Bangsal Gianyar and Bangsal Bangli - entire communities
transplanted to Jembrana a generation ago. Some of them
had religious motives for coming here. Palasari and Belimbingsari
in Melaya district, for example, are the largest Catholic
and Protestant communities on Bali. Palasari's handsome
Catholic church is the largest in eastern Indonesia.
The
regency is today inhabited by only about 210,000 people,
and is the least densely populated area of Bali. At least
eighty percent make their living by farming, harvesting
forest products, or fishing. The Bali tiger was last sighted
in the 1930s, and the remaining wilds of Jimbar Wana have
been incorporated into the Bali Barat National Park. Jembrana
today is a beautiful agricultural region, with a unique
history and character, reflected in the stories, customs
and arts of its people.
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