Culture
Festivals & Rituals
The celebrations and rites that only happen here, for this community — from village festivals to funerals that last for days. Never staged for visitors.
Rambu Solo, Day Five: Ma'kaburu', the Burial That Ends an Eleven-Day Farewell
The final day of Rambu Solo carries Benyamin Anthon and Kristina Lembang from the Lakian where they'd rested to the grave that completes their journey to Puya, on a tongkonan-shaped bier built specifically to carry them there, with grief loud enough that everyone nearby can hear it.
Rambu Solo, Days Three and Four: The Water Buffalo Sacrifice, Outside the Village and Within It
Mantunu, the water buffalo sacrifice, is the core of Rambu Solo, and this family spread it across two full days: one for guests from outside the village, one for the community closest to home. Together they were the most intense thing I saw during the entire ceremony, and also, unexpectedly, the most delicious.
Rambu Solo, Day Two: Where Guests Repay an Old Debt in Buffalo
The second day of Rambu Solo takes place at the same compound as the first, but the mood is unrecognizable. Guests arrive to repay old debts in pigs and water buffalo, a men's chant carries real grief through the plaza, and by the end of the day two or three buffalo have changed hands the only way this ceremony allows.
Rambu Solo, Day One: Inside a Toraja Funeral Years in the Making
A Rambu Solo funeral isn't organized in days or weeks but years, and the one I saw begin near Batutumonga was already well into its second, ritual stage. Day One opens quietly, with a pig sacrifice and an opening prayer that blends Christian faith with the older Toraja tradition it grew alongside.
Ma'nene, Day Five: The Toraja Water Buffalo Ceremony That Closes the Circle
The fifth and final day of Ma'nene delivers its most important sacrifice, closes the tomb doors that opened five days earlier, and ends not in mourning but in a shared meal and a village kicking match nobody is allowed to stay angry about.
Ma'nene, Day Four: The Toraja Ritual Where Pigs Are Sacrificed and Slow-Cooked in Bamboo
With the ancestors cleaned, redressed, and sealed back into their tombs, Ma'nene shifts from quiet care to offering and feast. Day Four belongs to pigs, sacrificed by the dozen and packed into bamboo tubes for a slow roast that won't actually be eaten until tomorrow.
Ma'nene, Day Three: The Toraja Ritual That Cleans a Tomb Before Sealing It Shut Again
On the third day of Ma'nene, coffins go back into freshly cleaned chambers and the tomb doors close again. After two days that felt closer to celebration, this one is quieter, because it's the day the reunion actually ends.
Ma'nene, Day Two: The Toraja Ritual Where Families Bring Their Ancestors Back Into the Light
With the tomb doors already open from the day before, Day Two of Ma'nene is the one people picture when they hear the word: coffins carried out into daylight, opened, and families speaking to relatives they haven't seen since the last ceremony.
Ma'nene, Day One: The Toraja Ritual That Opens a Tomb Before Anyone Touches What's Inside
On the first of five days in Toraja's Ma'nene ceremony, nobody brings an ancestor out yet. The entire day is spent on something quieter: building ladders, praying, and carefully opening tomb doors that have stayed shut since the last time this happened.
Festival Kebudayaan Antarabangsa Tawau: Where a Corner of Borneo Meets the World
Sabah's flagship multicultural festival packs a street in Tawau with ethnic booths — Kadazan Dusun liquor, Toraja buffalo horns, a Visayan welcome, a Tidung dragon boat — and, unexpectedly, a Kaili stall from the very corner of Sulawesi the author had just come from.
Festival Marawai: A Village Above Ambon Tries Its First Festival
A mountainside village outside Ambon just held a cultural festival for the very first time, governor-backed and built around a war dance, a bamboo-pole dance, and a night of the region's own music, with nobody yet sure what a second edition will even look like.