Tenun Lombok that we often see in various Lombok's souvenir shops are mostly produced by the craftsmen of Desa Sade. Desa Sade is inhabited by people of Sasak tribe, the indigenous people of Central Lombok.
When i was visiting Lombok Island, Alhamdulillah i have an opportunity to visit a famous village. A village whose contents so many creative people. In my first thought, i expected that this village was just an ordinary village with traditional houses in it and i have no thought that this village has turned into a tourism village, what a creative people! This village is one of Indonesia's cultural heritage, it has so many cultures that can makes a lot of domestic and also foreign tourists interested to see and visit this village. Seeing this opportunity, finally Sade's villagers turned their village into a tourism village with a rich cultural heritage.
In this village tour, we can see directly and know many things about the community systems, cultures, their attainments, lifestyle, and others. When we enter this village, we were guided by a tour guide who is a native of Desa Sade. He wears uniforms like a professional tour guide! hihi. Cool, isn't it? BUUUUUT, unfortunately i totally forgot his name ... let's just call him John.
Amak John (re: Sir John/ Bapak John) was our tour guide in Desa Sade. First of all, he described the traditions of Sasak tribe's marriage. Sasak's youth should marry a woman / man who came from the same village where they lived, they could marry women / men from outside the village, but they have to pay more expensive dowry than usual. Therefore, it's hard to find a Sasak man/woman who is married with the outsider. "Too Expensive and too much risks" Said Amak John.
Second, he describes the detail of their traditional houses. The traditional houses consists of 2 rooms, there is a room for women and children to sleep, and there is an outside room for male and the elders to sleep. The most unique thing in this house is... they wiped and coated the floor with buffalo dung. it's coated every 2 weeks. According Amak John explanation, they coated the floor with buffalo dung aim to avoid mosquitoes. AND GUESS WHAT...They still keep this culture until today. Although the floor was covered with buffalo dung, this traditional house does not smelled like dung. lol. I was also wondering why, it's really cool!!
After he described the house, then Amak John described about their barn. This barn is a place where they used to store crops, granary, etc. yeah you know, food things. Beside the barn, they also equipped with a very beautiful mosque. The mosque was made similar with the village decorations.
Oh yea, one more, if the villagers had to decide something, they usually met in an open bale called sekenam. Named row sekenam because the building has 6 pillars that support the roof. If the pillars was only 4, so the name changed into sekepat.
Earlier, i said that some of Tenun Lombok that we can see in the market were made in here. Therefore, most of the women in this village is a craftsman of Tenun Lombok. We can see them and also their attainments along the way inside the village, most of them were selling Tenun Lombok fabric. The price are quite cheap, but some are expensive. it's depending on the material and the level of difficulty of the weaving.
Actually, we can learn to weave Tenun Lombok here, but because time says NO NO to me, so i only can take photo with the looms *sit like a pro*
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| lol, what the h*ll am i doing there? |
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| The Famous Caftman (or probably i should call her craftwoman). I saw her pict at the airport! |
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| They spin their own thread! TOTALLY HANDMADE GUYS! |
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| The Barn.. behind us. |
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| Rumah Makan khas Lombok Tanjung Karanng |
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| Ayam Taliwang, Plecing kangkung, Sop Buntut. |
Big thanks for my Lord who gave me the chance to visit this land and also thanks to my parent who bring me here! and thanks again to our beloved tour guide, Amak John. hihi. See ya Amak John!!
XOXO -unemenel-
