Name

In the twelfth century, Olomuc and Olmuc were the first handed down name forms. In the fifteenth century an alleged first form Juliomontium (Julius hill) was assumed, according to Julius Caesar as the alleged founder. The original meaning is unclear. In the Czech, Olomouc means 'bare mountain' (Old Czech holy, 'bald' and mauc 'mountain'). The name of the city is in the Moravian-Haná dialect, a subgroup of the Middle-Moravian dialects of the Czech, Olomóc or Holomóc, in German language Ölmütz, in Polish Ołomuniec and in Latin Eburum or Olomucium.

History

Beginnings

At the end of the second century there was a Roman army camp, the northernmost known in Central Europe. Up to the fifth century there was a Germanic settlement.

In the late 7th century a first Slavic settlement arose in today's Povel district. Around 830 this was destroyed. A new castle was built on the Peter's hill (Předhrad), which was probably one of the important castles of the Moravian empire. In the ninth century three churches were built.

Přemyslidenstaat (Přemyslid dynasty)

Olomouc was first mentioned in writing in 1017 when Moravia became part of the Bohemian state of Přemysliden. In 1055 it was the seat of a separate part of the Principality. In 1063 the bishopric of Olomouc was founded by Vratislav II. Around 1070 a new castle was built. In 1077 the monastery Hradisko was founded. In 1126 Heinrich Zdik became a bishop.

At the beginning of the 13th century, the last prince of Olomouz died, Moravia was united and placed under the jurisdiction of a Margrave of the Přemyslids. In 1248, Olomouc was first mentioned as a royal town. In 1306, King Wenceslas III resided during a campaign to Poland in Olomouc, and was murdered here, which resulted in the extinction of the Přemyslids dynasty in the male family tree. The city developed economically very quickly and became the capital of Moravia.

In the Hussite wars, Olomouc was an integral part of the Catholic side. In the succession of the Charterhouse Dolein, which had been lost in the Hussite wars, the Charterhouse Olomouc was founded in 1443, which existed until the abolition in 1782. In the 16th century numerous palaces were built in the Renaissance style. In 1566 the Jesuits came to Olomouc. They founded a school which was raised to a university in 1573. In 1588, the bishop became an imperial prince.

17th and 18th centuries

In the Thirty Years' War the town was taken by the Swedes in 1642 and occupied for eight years. After the Thirty Years' War, the largely destroyed and depopulated city lost the status of the Moravian capital and abandoned it to Brno. Since a great deal of damage had been caused by fires, a detailed "fire extinguishing order" was issued in 1711, in which a number of preventive measures were also discussed.

On 26 December 1741, the city was occupied by the Prussians during the First Silesian War. After this event the fortifications were extensively expanded. A second siege by the Prussians in 1758 withstood the new fortification. In 1777, the diocese became an archbishopric.

In 1794-1797 the prominent French-American soldier and politician Marquis Lafayette was interned in Olomouc as a political prisoner of the Donaumonarchy, after being captured in Flanders by the French coalition in 1792, and then, for the time being, imprisoned by Prussia.

19th century

In 1841, the city received a railway connection. In the middle of 1845, the railway from Olomouc to Prague ("Northern State Railway") was put into operation (Olomouc-Moravská Třebová, Moravská Třebová-Prague). In 1848, the Archbishop's Palace housed the Imperial Court, which had fled here because of the revolution in Vienna. Emperor Ferdinand I handed over the government to the eighteen-year-old Francis Joseph I on December 2, 1848. On 29 November 1850, the German Confederation under Austrian leadership was restored in Olomouc by the Agreement of Olomouc (also known as the Olomouc Treaty) between Prussia, Austria and Russia. In the years 1850 to 1866 the fortification systems were extended again. In 1886, the fortress status was abolished. 1899 drove in the city the first tram.

20th century

After the collapse of the Austrian Empire in 1918 and the founding of Czechoslovakia, the Czech citizens became majority, which included, among other things, the integration of the two towns of Hodolina and Nová ulice, as well as eleven other municipalities (Bělidla, Černovír, Hejčín, Chválkovice, Lazce, Nové Sady, Nový Svět, Neředín, Pavlovičky, Povel and Řepčín) in 1919. In 1921 lived in Olomouc 57,206 inhabitants.

On March 15, 1939, the city, as well as the other areas of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, erected on the same day by the German Reich, was occupied by the Wehrmacht. As early as 1939, the Olomouc University was closed by the German occupying forces. It was not until 1946 that it was restored under the name Palacký University of Olomouc.

The German-speaking population was expelled from Olomouc in 1945/1946. Their assets were confiscated by the Beneš decree 108, the assets of the Protestant church were liquidated by the Beneš decree 131, and the Catholic churches were expropriated.

In the 1970s and 1980s, a number of prefabricated housing estates were built in the peripheral areas.

Since 1971, the entire old town has been protected as a historic preservation reserve. Floods in 1997 made the city very vulnerable, about a third of the city area was flooded. In the year 2000, the Trinity Column was included in the UNESCO World Heritage list. According to the administrative reform of 2000 the former district town with the establishment of the Olomouc region became its administrative seat.

Jews in Olomouc

The synagogue in Olomouc

The first Jews settled in Olomouc as early as 906. From the year 1060 they had to live in a ghetto and bear a yellow identification mark. In 1454 all Jews from Olomouc were expelled. This law was valid until 1848.

The Olomouc Synagogue was built between 1895 and 1897. On the night of March 15, 1939, after the occupation by the Wehrmacht, the synagogue was lit and burnt down. At the same time about 800 Jews were arrested and later deported to the Dachau concentration camp. Some of the synagogue 's benches were removed, serving as church benches in a village church near Prostějov and were finally put up in the renovated synagogue in Krnov in 2004. Some of them are now in the Synagogue of Loštice and are reminiscent of the Jewish citizens murdered in concentration camps. The seat of honor is dedicated to Berthold Oppenheim, the Rabbi of Olomouc and Loštice.

During the period of National Socialism, 3,489 people were deported to the Theresienstadt Ghetto in five transports, on 26 and 30 June 1942, on July 4, 1942, and on March 7. Only 285 Jews of the city population survived. This was the end of the Jewish life in Olomouc for a long time. Since 2011, by artist Gunter Demnig Stolpersteine (stumbling blocks) have been and still are being laid to the memory of murdered Jews in Olomouc. Olomouc is one of the cities with the most stumbling blocks in the Czech Republic (as of 2016) with Prague and Brno.

Only since 1989 there has been a revival of the Jewish cultic life in the city. In 1991, an independent Jewish community was established with a field of activity for the districts of Olomouc, Šumperk, Jeseník, Bruntál and Přerov.

 

Name

Im 12. Jahrhundert waren Olomuc und Olmuc die ersten überlieferten Namensformen. Im 15. Jahrhundert wurde eine angebliche erste Form Juliomontium (Juliusberg) vermutet, nach Julius Caesar als angeblichem Gründer. Die ursprüngliche Bedeutung ist unklar. Im Tschechischen bedeutet Olomouc ‚kahler Berg‘ (alttschech. holy ‚kahl‘ und mauc ‚Berg‘). Der Name der Stadt lautet im mährisch-hannakischen Dialekt, einer Untergruppe der mittelmährischen Dialekte des Tschechischen, Olomóc oder Holomóc, auf Deutsch Olmütz, auf Polnisch Ołomuniec und auf Lateinisch Eburum oder Olomucium.

Geschichte

Anfänge

Ende des 2. Jahrhunderts befand sich hier ein römisches Heerlager, das nördlichste bekannte in Mitteleuropa. Bis ins 5. Jahrhundert gab es eine germanische Besiedelung.

Im späten 7. Jahrhundert entstand eine erste slawische Siedlung im heutigen Ortsteil Povel. Um 830 wurde diese zerstört. Es entstand eine neue Burg auf dem Petersberg (Předhrad), die nach ihrer Größe vermutlich zu den wichtigen Burgen des Mährerreiches zählte. Im 9. Jahrhundert wurden drei Kirchen gebaut.

Přemyslidenstaat

Olomouc wurde im Jahr 1017 erstmals schriftlich erwähnt, als Mähren Teil des böhmischen Staates der Přemysliden wurde. 1055 war es Sitz eines eigenen Teilfürstentums. 1063 wurde das Bistum Olmütz durch Vratislav II. gegründet. Um 1070 entstand eine neue Burg. 1077 wurde das Kloster Hradisko gegründet. 1126 wurde Heinrich Zdik zum Bischof.

Anfang des 13. Jahrhunderts starb der letzte Olmützer Fürst, Mähren wurde vereint und einem Markgrafen aus dem Geschlecht der Přemysliden unterstellt. Zum Jahr 1248 wird Olomouc erstmals als Königsstadt erwähnt. 1306 hielt sich König Wenzel III. während eines Feldzuges nach Polen in Olmütz auf und wurde hier ermordet, wodurch die Dynastie der Přemysliden im Mannesstamm erlosch. Die Stadt entwickelte sich wirtschaftlich sehr schnell und wurde zur Hauptstadt Mährens.

In den Hussitenkriegen war Olmütz fester Bestandteil der katholischen Seite. In der Nachfolge der Kartause Dolein, die in den Hussitenkriegen untergegangen war, wurde 1443 die Kartause Olmütz gegründet, die bis zur Aufhebung 1782 bestand. Im 16. Jahrhundert entstanden zahlreiche Paläste im Renaissancestil. 1566 kamen die Jesuiten nach Olmütz. Diese gründeten eine Schule, welche 1573 zur Universität erhoben wurde. 1588 wurde der Bischof zum Reichsfürsten erhoben.

17. und 18. Jahrhundert

Im Dreißigjährigen Krieg wurde die Stadt 1642 von den Schweden eingenommen und acht Jahre okkupiert. Nach dem Dreißigjährigen Krieg verlor die großteils zerstörte und entvölkerte Stadt den Status der mährischen Hauptstadt und trat diesen an Brünn ab. Da durch Brände viel Schaden entstanden war, wurde 1711 eine detaillierte „Feuerlösch-Ordnung“ erlassen, in der auch eine Reihe vorbeugender Maßnahmen zur Sprache kam.

Am 26. Dezember 1741 wurde die Stadt von den Preußen im Ersten Schlesischen Krieg eingenommen. Nach diesem Ereignis wurden die Festungsanlagen umfangreich ausgebaut. Einer zweiten Belagerung durch die Preußen im Jahre 1758 hielt die neue Festungsanlage stand. 1777 wurde das Bistum zum Erzbistum erhoben.

1794–1797 wurde der prominente französisch-amerikanische Soldat und Politiker Marquis Lafayette in Olmütz als politischer Häftling der Donaumonarchie interniert, nachdem er von der antifranzösischen Koalition 1792 in Flandern gefangengenommen und dann vorerst von Preußen eingekerkert worden war.

19. Jahrhundert

1841 erhielt die Stadt einen Eisenbahnanschluss. Mitte 1845 wurde die Eisenbahn von Olmütz nach Prag („k.k. Nördliche Staatsbahn“) in Betrieb genommen (Olmütz–Trübau, Trübau–Prag). Im Jahr 1848 beherbergte das Schloss des Erzbischofs den wegen der Revolution in Wien hierher geflohenen kaiserlichen Hof. Kaiser Ferdinand I. übertrug hier am 2. Dezember 1848 dem achtzehnjährigen Franz Joseph I. die Regierung. Am 29. November 1850 wurde in Olmütz durch die Olmützer Punktation (auch „Olmützer Vertrag“ genannt) zwischen Preußen, Österreich und Russland der Deutsche Bund unter österreichischer Führung wieder hergestellt. In den Jahren 1850 bis 1866 wurden erneut die Befestigungsanlagen erweitert. 1886 wurde dann der Festungsstatus aufgehoben. 1899 fuhr in der Stadt die erste Straßenbahn.

20. Jahrhundert

Nach dem Zerfall des Kaiserreichs Österreich 1918 und der Gründung der Tschechoslowakei kamen die tschechischen Stadtbürger in die Mehrzahl, was unter anderem auf die Eingemeindung der zwei Städte Hodolein (Hodolany) und Neugasse (Nová ulice) sowie elf weiterer Gemeinden (Bělidla, Černovír, Hejčín, Chválkovice, Lazce, Nové Sady, Nový Svět, Neředín, Pavlovičky, Povel und Řepčín) im Jahr 1919 zurückzuführen ist. Im Jahr 1921 lebten in Olomouc 57.206 Einwohner.

Am 15. März 1939 wurde die Stadt, wie auch die übrigen Gebiete des am selben Tag vom Deutschen Reich errichteten Protektorats Böhmen und Mähren, von der Wehrmacht besetzt. Noch im Jahr 1939 wurde die Olmützer Universität von der deutschen Besatzungsmacht geschlossen. Erst im Jahr 1946 konnte sie unter dem Namen Palacký-Universität Olmütz wiederhergestellt werden.

Die deutschsprachige Bevölkerung wurde 1945/1946 aus Olmütz vertrieben. Ihr Vermögen wurde durch das Beneš-Dekret 108 konfisziert, das Vermögen der evangelischen Kirche durch das Beneš-Dekret 131 liquidiert und die katholischen Kirchen enteignet.

In den 1970er und 1980er Jahren entstanden in den Randgebieten mehrere Plattenbausiedlungen.

Seit 1971 ist die ganze Altstadt als Denkmalschutzreservat geschützt. Das Hochwasser im Jahr 1997 zog die Stadt schwer in Mitleidenschaft, etwa ein Drittel des Stadtgebiets wurde überschwemmt. Im Jahr 2000 wurde die Dreifaltigkeitssäule in die Liste des UNESCO-Welterbes aufgenommen. Nach der Verwaltungsreform von 2000 wurde die bisherige Kreisstadt mit der Errichtung der Olmützer Region dessen Verwaltungssitz.

Juden in Olmütz

Die Synagoge in Olmütz

Die ersten Juden siedelten in Olmütz bereits 906. Ab dem Jahre 1060 hatten sie in einem Ghetto zu wohnen und ein gelbes Erkennungszeichen zu tragen. Im Jahr 1454 wurden sämtliche Juden aus Olmütz ausgewiesen. Dieses Gesetz war bis 1848 gültig.

Die Olmützer Synagoge wurde von 1895 bis 1897 erbaut. In der Nacht vom 15. auf den 16. März 1939, nach der Besetzung durch die Wehrmacht, wurde die Synagoge angezündet und brannte ab. Gleichzeitig wurden etwa 800 Juden festgenommen und später in das Konzentrationslager Dachau deportiert. Einige Sitzbänke der Synagoge wurden ausgebaut, dienten lange als Kirchenbänke in einer Dorfkirche bei Prostějov und wurden schließlich 2004 in der renovierten Synagoge in Krnov aufgestellt. Einige davon stehen heute in der Synagoge von Loštice und erinnern an die in den Konzentrationslagern ermordeten jüdischen Bürger. Der Ehrensitz ist Berthold Oppenheim gewidmet, dem Rabbi von Olmütz und Loštice.

Während der Zeit des Nationalsozialismus wurden 3.489 Menschen in fünf Transporten, am 26. und 30. Juni 1942, am 4. Juli 1942 und am 7. März 1945 in das Ghetto Theresienstadt deportiert. Nur 285 Juden der Stadtbevölkerung überlebten. Damit erlosch das jüdische Leben in Olmütz für lange Zeit. Seit 2011 wurden und werden in Olmütz von Gunter Demnig Stolpersteine zur Erinnerung an ermordete Juden verlegt. Olmütz gehört mit Prag und Brünn zu den Städten mit den meisten Stolpersteinen in Tschechien (Stand 2016).

Erst seit 1989 gibt es eine Belebung des jüdischen Kultuslebens in der Stadt. 1991 wurde eine selbständige jüdische Gemeinde mit einem Wirkungskreis für die Bezirke Olmütz, Šumperk, Jeseník, Bruntál und Přerov wiederbegründet.

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olm%C3%BCtz

In May village live Waga Dia and Machhukanah Rabari people.

 

The region of Gujarat has played host to many a tribal culture and nourished them from the very earliest periods of history. One such tribe here, the Rabaris, still pursue a pastoral lifestyle—much in the same way as they did ages ago.

The Rabaris are a semi-nomadic tribe—pursuing a pre-agrarian, pastoral lifestyle—found mainly in the Kutch and Saurashtra regions of Gujarat. Though living today in permanent settlements, they are believed to have originally migrated from Baluchistan more than a millennium ago.

But over these thousand and more years, the Rabaris have undergone many changes and have been widely influenced by the local cultures with which they came in contact. Not only are they divided into distinct clans, they also prefer to trace their origin to Hindu Gods and even the Rajputs.

Without delving into the garbled clues provided by folk lore about their origin, a closer look at the Rabari today leads one into his quaint, colourful and rugged lifestyle.

By no means are the Rabaris an isolated people. The men are on the move—almost 10 out of the 12 months—in search of grazing pastures for their livestock; while the women and children remain in their villages. These villages are normally small, devoid of more than superficial amenities and, almost always, set in bleak, barren suroundings.

In a typical village, their rectangular houses, called vandhas, are built in rows. The white-washed mud walls and tiled roofs may have an appearance of starkness when viewed from outside. But within each house, the Rabari’s fondness for patterns is easily visible from the many geometric patterns that adorn its interiors. The tiny mirrors embedded into these mud-plaster patterns only enhance their beauty as they catch the faint glimmer of light streaming in from a small window or a low doorway. A home usually consists of two rooms, and an extended enclosure in the verandah which forms the kitchen.

The room at the back is normally used as a storehouse—a virtual treasure house of embroidered clothes and quilts kept in carved wooden pataras (chests); and the kothis and kothlas (granaries) made of mud and cowdung. The other room is mainly a living room decorated with embroidered torans or decorated doorways, while the doors are covered with brass foil etched in a myriad patterns. Often, the only piece of furniture that one might find is a carved, wooden cradle.

The community’s main stay is milk and milk produce from their livestock in order to purchase commodities that they trade in various forms at the local village or town markets.

Much of the handiwork seen in their decorated homes is that of their women. In fact, Rabari women are famous for their embroidery work, called bharat kaam, from which they make numerous traditional garments and furnishings. The kediyun, a gathered jacket with an embroidered smock, worn by young Rabari men and children, skirts and blouses for the women and girls—are al dexterously embroidered. Interestingly, the Rabari girl, completes over the years, her entire dowry which includes clothes as well as beautiful quilts or derkee.

Kokulashtami, after the rains, is marriage time. The men are back from their wanderings for this al important occasion. All marriages take place on this one day. Since child marriage is still very much in vogue within this tribe, outsiders are distrusted. Again, the Rabari marries only within the tribe and often into families which are closely located. Marrying outside the fold leads to social castigation and is very rare. While Rabari couples are probably the most exotically dressed, the marriage is a simple ritual performed by a Brahmin priest.

Rabaris, by and large, and ardent followers and worshippers of the Mother Goddess. Each clan has its own tribal goddess as the patron deity, though their homes often have pictures of other gods and goddesses as well. Strong tendencies of deifying and invoking the dead are still prevalent—a pointer to the community’s old world origin.

Another old world custom that has persisted is the custom of tattooing and there is a marked similarity In the motifs used in their embroideries and tattoos.

As an outsider it is difficult to communicate with these people since they speak a dialect which is a mixture of Marwari and Gujarati. But once they understand the visitor’s innocent curiosity, they exude the warmth and friendship that has always been a part of their make-up.

 

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Amish generally speak a German dialect called Pennsylvania Dutch (Deutsch), use High German during worship and learn English at school. The schools are one-room buildings run by the Amish through the Eighth Grade. Formal education beyond Grade 8 is discouraged, although many youth are given further instruction in their homes after graduation.

 

Men follow the laws of the Hebrew Scriptures with regards to beards and do not grow mustaches because of the long association of mustaches and the military. Men wear plain, dark colored suits and women usually wear a plain colored dress with long sleeves, bonnet and apron. Women usually wear a white prayer covering if married; black if single.

  

Quai Jean Jaurès 08/06/2017 15h40

Another busy day in Port de Saint-Tropez.

 

Saint-Tropez

Saint-Tropez, (Sant-Troupès in Provençal dialect) is a town, 100 kilometres west of Nice, in the Var department of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. It is also the principal town in the canton of Saint-Tropez.

Saint-Tropez is located on the French Riviera. It was a military stronghold and an unassuming fishing village until the beginning of the 20th century. It was the first town on this coast to be liberated during World War II (as part of Operation Dragoon). After the war, it became an internationally known seaside resort, renowned principally because of the influx of artists of the French New Wave in cinema and the Yé-yé movement in music. It later became a resort for the European and American jet set and a goal for tourists in search of a little Provençal authenticity and an occasional celebrity sighting.

 

The main economic resource of Saint-Tropez is tourism. The city is well known for the Hôtel Byblos and for Les Caves du Roy, a member of the Leading Hotels of the World, whose inauguration with Brigitte Bardot and Gunter Sachs in 1967 was an international event.

Many of the beaches offer windsurfing, sailing and canoeing equipment for rent, while others offer motorized water sports, such as power boats, jet bikes, water skiing and scuba diving. Some of the private beaches are naturist beaches.

The port was widely used during the 18th century; in 1789 it was visited by 80 ships. Saint-Tropez's shipyards built tartanes and three-masted ships that could carry 1,000 to 12,200 barrels. The town was the site of various associated trades, including fishing, cork, wine, and wood. The town had a school of hydrography. In 1860 the floret of the merchant marine, named "The Queen of the Angels" (a three-masted ship of 740 barrels capacity), visited the port.

Its role as a commercial port declined, and it is now (2013) primarily a tourist spot and a base for many well known sail regattas. There is fast boat transportation with Les Bateaux Verts to Sainte-Maxime on the other side of the bay and to Port Grimaud, Marines de Cogolin, Les Issambres and St-Aygulf.

 

Population: 5.600

Area: 15.18 km2

Density: 370/km2

Elevation: 0–113 m

 

[ Source and much more Info: Wikipedia - Saint-Tropez ]

 

Picture taken 1983 - digitally captured from paper print

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The Dayak or Dyak or Dayuh /ˈdaɪ.ək/ are the native people of Borneo. It is a loose term for over 200 riverine and hill-dwelling ethnic subgroups, located principally in the interior of Borneo, each with its own dialect, customs, laws, territory and culture, although common distinguishing traits are readily identifiable. Dayak languages are categorised as part of the Austronesian languages in Asia. The Dayak were animist in belief; however many converted to Islam and since the 19th century, mass conversion to Christianity.

 

HISTORY

The Dayak people of Borneo possess an indigenous account of their history, mostly in oral literature, partly in writing in papan turai (wooden records), and partly in common cultural customary practices. Among prominent accounts of the origin of the Dayak people includes the mythical oral epic of "Tetek Tahtum" by the Ngaju Dayak of Central Kalimantan, it narrates the ancestors of the all Dayak people descended from the heavens before dispensing from the inland to the downstream shores of Borneo.

 

In the southern Kalimantan flourished the independent state of Nansarunai established by the Ma'anyan Dayaks prior to the 12th century. The kingdom suffered two major attacks from the Majapahit forces that caused the decline and fall of the kingdom by the year 1389, the attacks are known as Nansarunai Usak Jawa (meaning the destruction of the Nansarunai by the Javanese) by the oral accounts of the Ma'anyan people. This contributed to the migration of the Ma'anyans to the Central and South Borneo region.

 

The colonial accounts and reports of Dayak activity in Borneo detail carefully cultivated economic and political relationships with other communities as well as an ample body of research and study considering historical Dayak migrations. In particular, the Iban or the Sea Dayak exploits in the South China Seas are documented, owing to their ferocity and aggressive culture of war against sea dwelling groups and emerging Western trade interests in the 18th and 19th centuries.

 

In 1824, as a result of the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824 to settle their commercial regional disputes by switching Java from British to Dutch in return for Malacca, the Malay Archipelago was permanently divided into formerly Dutch-colonized Indonesia and British-colonized Malaysia to this day.

 

In 1838, British adventurer James Brooke arrived to find the Sultan of Brunei fending off rebellion from warlike inland tribes. Sarawak was in chaos. Brooke put down the rebellion, and was made Governor of Sarawak in 1841, with the title of Rajah. Brooke pacified the natives, including the Dayaks, who became some of his most loyal followers. He suppressed headhunting and piracy. Brooke's most famous Iban enemy was Libau "Rentap"; Brooke led three expeditions against him and finally defeated him at Sadok Hill. Brooke had many Dayaks in his forces at this battle, and famously said "Only Dayaks can kill Dayaks.So he deployed Dayaks to kill Dayaks." Sharif Mashor, a Melanau from Mukah, was another enemy of Brooke.

 

During World War II, Japanese forces occupied Borneo and treated all of the indigenous peoples poorly - massacres of the Malay and Dayak peoples were common, especially among the Dayaks of the Kapit Division. In response, the Dayaks formed a special force to assist the Allied forces. Eleven US airmen and a few dozen Australian special operatives trained a thousand Dayaks from the Kapit Division in guerrilla warfare. This army of tribesmen killed or captured some 1,500 Japanese soldiers and provided the Allies with vital intelligence about Japanese-held oil fields.

 

Coastal populations in Borneo are largely Muslim in belief, however these groups (Tidung, Banjarese, Bulungan, Paser, Melanau, Kutainese, Kedayan, Bakumpai, Bisayah) are generally considered to be Malayised and Islamised Dayaks, native to Borneo, and heavily amalgated by the Malay people, culture and sultanate system.

 

Other groups in coastal areas of Sabah and northeastern Kalimantan; namely the Illanun, Tausūg, Sama and Bajau, although inhabiting and (in the case of the Tausug group) ruling the northern tip of Borneo for centuries, have their origins from the southern Philippines. These groups though may be indigenous to Borneo, they are nonetheless not Dayak, but instead are grouped under the separate umbrella term of Moro.

 

ETHNICITY

The Indigenous people of the Heart of Borneo are commonly known as Dayak. The term was coined by Europeans referring to the non-Malay inhabitants of Borneo. There are seven main ethnic divisions of Dayaks according to their respective native languages which are:

 

1. the Ngaju,

2. Apau Kayan,

3. Iban (Sea Dayak),

4. Klemantan (Land Dayak),

5. Murut,

6. Punan and

7. Ot Danum groups.

 

Under the main classifications, there are dozens of ethnics and hundreds of sub-ethnics dwelling in the Borneo island. There are over 50 ethnic Dayak groups speaking different languages. This cultural and linguistic diversity parallels the high biodiversity and related traditional knowledge of Borneo.

 

LANGUAGES

Dayaks do not speak just one language, even if just those on the island of Borneo (Kalimantan) are considered. Their indigenous languages belong in the general classification of Malayo-Polynesian languages and to diverse groups of Bornean and Sabahan languages (including Land Dayak), and the Ibanic languages of the Malayic branch. The Dayak are very adaptable and also speak the lingua franca of the place such as those of Malay, Chinese and European origin.

 

Many of Borneo’s languages are endemic (which means they are spoken nowhere else). It is estimated that around 170 languages and dialects are spoken on the island and some by just a few hundred people, thus posing a serious risk to the future of those languages and related heritage.

Headhunting and peacemaking

 

In the past, the Dayak were feared for their ancient tradition of headhunting practices (the ritual is also known as Ngayau by the Dayaks). Among the Iban Dayaks, the origin of headhunting was believed to be meeting one of the mourning rules given by a spirit which is as follows:

 

The sacred jar is not to be opened except by a warrior who has managed to obtain a head, or by a man who can present a human head, which he obtained in a fight; or by a man who has returned from a sojourn in enemy country.

 

Often, a war leader had at least three lieutenants (called manuk sabong) who in turn had some followers. The war (ngayau) rules among the Iban Dayaks are listed below:

 

If a warleader leads a party on an expedition, he must not allow his warriors to fight a guiltless tribe that has no quarrel with them.

If the enemy surrenders, he may not take their lives, lest his army be unsuccessful in future warfare and risk fighting empty-handed war raids (balang kayau).

The first time that a warrior takes a head or captures a prisoner, he must present the head or captive to the warleader in acknowledgement of the latter's leadership.

If a warrior takes two heads or captives, or more, one of each must be given to the warleader; the remainder belongs to the killer or captor.

The warleader must be honest with his followers in order that in future wars he may not be defeated (alah bunoh).

 

THERE WERE VARIOUS REASONS FOR HEADHUNTING

For soil fertility so Dayaks hunted fresh heads before paddy harvesting seasons after which head festival would be held in honour of the new heads.

To add supernatural strength which Dayaks believed to be centred in the soul and head of humans. Fresh heads can give magical powers for communinal protection, bountiful paddy harvesting and disease curing.

To avenge revenge for murders based on "blood credit" principle unless "adat pati nyawa" (customary compensation token) is paid.

To pay dowry for marriages e.g. "derian palit mata" (eye blocking dowry) for Ibans once blood has been splashed prior to agreeing to marriage and of course, new fresh heads show prowess, bravery, ability and capability to protect his family, community and land

For foundation of new buildings to be stronger and meaningful than the normal practice of not putting in human heads.

For protection against enemy attacks according to the principle of "attack first before being attacked".

As a symbol of power and social status ranking where the more heads someone has, the respect and glory due to him. The warleader is called tuai serang (warleader) or raja berani (king of the brave) while kayau anak (small raid) leader is only called tuai kayau (raid leader) whereby adat tebalu (widower rule) after their death would be paid according to their ranking status in the community.

For territorial expansion where some brave Dayaks intentionally migrated into new areas such as Mujah "Buah Raya" migrated from Skrang to Paku to Kanowit while infighting among Ibans themselves in Batang Ai caused the Ulu Ai Ibans to migrate to Batang Kanyau River in Kapuas, Kalimantan and then proceeded to Katibas and later on Ulu Rajang in Sarawak. The earlier migrations from Kapuas to Batang Ai, Batang Lupar, Batang Saribas and Batang Krian rivers were also made possible by fighting the local tribes like Bukitan.

 

REASONS FOR ABANDONING HEADHUNTING

Peacemaking agreements at Tumbang Anoi, Kalimantan in 1874 and Kapit, Sarawak in 1924.

Coming of Christianity, with education where Dayaks are taught that headhunting is murder and against the Christian Bible's teachings.

Dayaks' own realisation that headhunting was more to lose than to gain.

Among the most prominent legacy during the colonial rule in the Dutch Borneo (present-day Kalimantan) is the Tumbang Anoi Agreement held in 1874 in Damang Batu, Central Kalimantan (the seat of the Kahayan Dayaks). It is a formal meeting that gathered all the Dayak tribes in Kalimantan for a peace resolution. In the meeting that is reputed taken several months, the Dayak people throughout the Kalimantan agreed to end the headhunting tradition as it believed the tradition caused conflict and tension between various Dayak groups. The meeting ended with a peace resolution by the Dayak people.

 

After mass conversions to Christianity, and anti-headhunting legislation by the colonial powers was passed, the practice was banned and appeared to have disappeared. However, it should be noted that the Brooke-led Sarawak government, although banning unauthorized headhunting, actually allowed "ngayau" headhunting practices by the Brooke-supporting natives during state-sanctioned punitive expeditions against their own fellow people's rebellions throughout the state, thereby never really extinguished the spirit of headhunting especially among the Iban natives. The state-sanctioned troop was allowed to take heads, properties like jars and brassware, burn houses and farms, exempted from paying door taxes and in some cases, granted new territories to migrate into. This Brooke's practice was in remarkable contrast to the practice by the Dutch in the neighbouring West Kalimantan who prohibited any native participation in its punitive expeditions. Initially, James Brooke (the first Rajah of Sarawak) did engage the British Navy troop in the Battle of Beting Maru against the Iban and Malay of the Saribas region and the Iban of Skrang under Rentap's charge but this resulted in the Public Inquiry by the British government in Singapore. Thereafter, the Brooke government gathered a local troop who were its allies.

 

Subsequently, the headhunting began to surface again in the mid-1940s, when the Allied Powers encouraged the practice against the Japanese Occupation of Borneo. It also slightly surged in the late 1960s when the Indonesian government encouraged Dayaks to purge Chinese from interior Kalimantan who were suspected of supporting communism in mainland China and also in the late 1990s when the Dayak started to attack Madurese emigrants in an explosion of ethnic violence. After formation of Malaysia, some Iban became trackers during the Malayan Emergency against the Communist Insurgency and thereafter they continue to be soldiers in the armed forces.

 

Headhunting resurfaced in 1963 among Dayak soldiers during the Confrontation Campaign by President Sukarno of Indonesia against the newly created formation of Malaysia between the pre-existing Federation of Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak on 16 September 1963. Subsequently, Dayak trackers recruited during the Malayan Emergency against the Communists' Insurgency wanted to behead enemies killed during their military operations but disallowed by their superiors.

 

It should be noted headhunting or human sacrifice was also practised by other tribes such as follows:

Toraja community in Sulawesi used adat Ma’ Barata (human sacrifice) in Rambu Solo’ ritual which is still held until the arrival of the Hindi Dutch which is a custom to honour someone with a symbol of a great warrior and bravery in a war.

In Gomo, Sumatra, there ware megalithic artefacts where one of them is "batu pancung" (beheading stone) on which to tie any captive or convicted criminals for beheading.

One distinction was their ritual practice of head hunting, once prevalent among tribal warriors in Nagaland and among the Naga tribes in Myanmar. They used to take the heads of enemies to take on their power.

 

AGRICULTURE, LAND TENURE AND ECONOMY

Traditionally, Dayak agriculture was based on actually Integrated Indigenous Farming System. Iban Dayaks tend to plant paddy on hill slopes while Maloh Dayaks prefer flat lands as discussed by King. Agricultural Land in this sense was used and defined primarily in terms of hill rice farming, ladang (garden), and hutan (forest). According to Prof Derek Freeman in his Report on Iban Agriculture, Iban Dayaks used to practice twenty seven stages of hill rice farming once a year and their shifting cultivation practices allow the forest to regenerate itself rather than to damage the forest, thereby to ensure the continuity and sustainability of forest use and/or survival of the Iban community itself. The Iban Dayaks love virgin forests for their dependency on forests but that is for migration, territorial expansion and/or fleeing enemies.

 

Dayaks organised their labour in terms of traditionally based land holding groups which determined who owned rights to land and how it was to be used. The Iban Dayaks practice a rotational and reciprocal labour exchange called "bedurok" to complete works on their farms own by all families within each longhouse. The "green revolution" in the 1950s, spurred on the planting of new varieties of wetland rice amongst Dayak tribes.

 

To get cash, Dayaks collect jungle produce for sales at markets. With the coming of cash crops, Dayaks start to plant rubber, pepper, cocoa, etc. Nowadays, some Dayaks plant oil palm on their lands while others seek employment or involve in trade.

 

The main dependence on subsistence and mid-scale agriculture by the Dayak has made this group active in this industry. The modern day rise in large-scale monocrop plantations such as palm oil and bananas, proposed for vast swathes of Dayak land held under customary rights, titles and claims in Indonesia, threaten the local political landscape in various regions in Borneo.

 

Further problems continue to arise in part due to the shaping of the modern Malaysian and Indonesian nation-states on post-colonial political systems and laws on land tenure. The conflict between the state and the Dayak natives on land laws and native customary rights will continue as long as the colonial model on land tenure is used against local customary law. The main precept of land use, in local customary law, is that cultivated land is owned and held in right by the native owners, and the concept of land ownership flows out of this central belief. This understanding of adat is based on the idea that land is used and held under native domain. Invariably, when colonial rule was first felt in the Kalimantan Kingdoms, conflict over the subjugation of territory erupted several times between the Dayaks and the respective authorities.

 

RELIGION AND FESTIVALS

The Dayak indigenous religion has been given the name Kaharingan, and may be said to be a form of animism. The name was coined by Tjilik Riwut in 1944 during his tenure as a Dutch colonial Resident in Sampit, Dutch East Indies. In 1945, during the Japanese Occupation, the Japanese referred Kaharingan as the religion of the Dayak people. During the New Order in the Suharto regime in 1980, the Kaharingan is registered as a form of Hinduism in Indonesia, as the Indonesian state only recognises 6 forms of religion i.e. Islam, Protestantism, Roman Catholicism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism respectively. The integration of Kaharingan with Hinduism is not due to the similarities in the theological system, but due to the fact that Kaharingan is the oldest belief in Kalimantan. Unlike the development in Indonesian Kalimantan, the Kaharingan is not recognised as a religion both in Malaysian Borneo and Brunei, thus the traditional Dayak belief system is known as a form of folk animism or pagan belief on the other side of the Indonesian border.

 

Underlying the world-view is an account of the creation and re-creation of this middle-earth where the Dayak dwell, arising out of a cosmic battle in the beginning of time between a primal couple, a male and female bird/dragon (serpent). Representations of this primal couple are amongst the most pervasive motifs of Dayak art. The primal mythic conflict ended in a mutual, procreative murder, from the body parts of which the present universe arose stage by stage. This primal sacrificial creation of the universe in all its levels is the paradigm for, and is re-experienced and ultimately harmoniously brought together (according to Dayak beliefs) in the seasons of the year, the interdependence of river (up-stream and down-stream) and land, the tilling of the earth and fall of the rain, the union of male and female, the distinctions between and co-operation of social classes, the wars and trade with foreigners, indeed in all aspects of life, even including tattoos on the body, the lay-out of dwellings and the annual cycle of renewal ceremonies, funeral rites, etc.

 

The best and still unsurpassed study of a traditional Dayak religion in Kalimantan is that of Hans Scharer, Ngaju Religion: The Conception of God among a South Borneo People; translated by Rodney Needham (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1963). The practice of Kaharingan differs from group to group, but shamans, specialists in ecstatic flight to other spheres, are central to Dayak religion, and serve to bring together the various realms of Heaven (Upper-world) and earth, and even Under-world, for example healing the sick by retrieving their souls which are journeying on their way to the Upper-world land of the dead, accompanying and protecting the soul of a dead person on the way to their proper place in the Upper-world, presiding over annual renewal and agricultural regeneration festivals, etc. Death rituals are most elaborate when a noble (kamang) dies. On particular religious occasions, the spirit is believed to descend to partake in celebration, a mark of honour and respect to past ancestors and blessings for a prosperous future.

 

Among Iban Dayaks, their belief and way of life can be simply called the Iban religion as per Jenson's book with the same title and has been written by Benedict Sandin and others extensively. It is characterised by a supreme being in the name of Bunsu (Kree) Petara who has no parents and creates everything in this world and other worlds. Under Bunsu Petara are the seven gods whose names are: Sengalang Burong as the god of war and healing, Biku Bunsu Petara as the high priest and second in command, Menjaya as the first shaman (manang) and god of medicine, Selampandai as the god of creation, Sempulang Gana as the god of agriculture and land along with Semarugah, Ini Inda/Inee/Andan as the naturally born doctor and god of justice and Anda Mara as the god of wealth.

 

The life actions and decision-making processes of Iban Dayaks depend on divination, augury and omens. They have several methods to receive omens where omens can be obtained by deliberate seeking or chance encounters. The first method is via dream to receive charms, amulets (pengaroh, empelias, engkerabun) or medicine (obat) and curse (sumpah) from any gods, people of Panggau Libau and Gelong and any spirits or ghosts. The second method is via animal omens (burong laba) which have long-lasting effects such as from deer barking which is quite random in nature. The third method is via bird omens (burong bisa) which have short term effects that are commonly limited to a certain farming year or a certain activity at hands. The forth method is via pig liver divination after festival celebration At the end of critical festivals, the divination of the pig liver will be interpreted to forecast the outcome of the future or the luck of the individual who holds the festival. The fifth but not the least method is via nampok or betapa (self-imposed isolation) to receive amulet, curse, medicine or healing.

 

There are seven omen birds under the charge of their chief Sengalang Burong at their longhouse named Tansang Kenyalang (Hornbill Abode), which are Ketupong (Jaloh or Kikeh or Entis) (Rufous Piculet) as the first in command, Beragai (Scarlet-rumped trogon), Pangkas (Maroon Woodpecker) on the righthand side of Sengalang Burong's family room while Bejampong (Crested Jay) as the second in command, Embuas (Banded Kingfisher), Kelabu Papau (Senabong) (Diard's Trogon) and Nendak (White-rumped shama) on the lefthand side. The calls and flights of the omen birds along with the circumstances and social status of the listeners are considered during the omen interpretations.

 

The praying and propitiation to certain gods to obtain good omens which indicate God's favour and blessings are held in a series of three-tiered classes of minor ceremonies (bedara), intermediate rites (gawa or nimang) and major festivals (gawai) in ascending order and complexity. Any Iban Dayak will undergo some forms of simple rituals and several elaborate festivals as necessary in their lifetime from a baby, adolescent to adulthood until death. The longhouse where the Iban Dayaks stay is constructed in a unique way to function as for both living or accommodation purposes and ritual or religious practices. Nearby the longhouse, there is normally a small and simple hut called langkau ampun/sukor (forgiveness/thanksgiving hut) built to place offerings to deities. Sometimes, when potentially bad omens are encountered, a small hut is quickly built and a fire is started before saying prayers to seek good outcomes.

 

Common among all these propitiations are that prayers to gods and/or other spirits are made by giving offerings ("piring"), certain poetic leka main and animal sacrifices ("genselan") either chickens or pigs. The number (leka or turun) of each piring offering item is based on ascending odd numbers which have meanings and purposes as below:

 

- piring 3 for piring ampun (mercy) or seluwak (wastefulness spirit)

- piring 5 for piring minta (request) or bejalai (journey)

- piring 7 for piring gawai (festival) or bujang berani (brave warrior)

- piring 9 for sangkong (including others) or turu (leftover included)

 

Piring contains offering of various traditional foods and drinks while genselan is made by sacrificing chickens for bird omens or pigs for animal omens.

 

Bedara is commonly held for any general purposes before holding any rites or festivals during which a simple "miring" ceremony is done to prepare and divide piring offerings into certain portions followed by a "sampi ngau bebiau" (prayer and cleansing) poetic speeches. This most simple ceremonies have categories such as bedara matak held at the longhouse family bilek room, bedara mansau performed at the family ruai gallery, berunsur (cleansing) carried out at the tanju and river, minta ujan tauka panas (request for rain or sunniness).

 

The intermediate and medium-sized propitiatory rites are known as "gawa" (ritually working) with its main highlight called "nimang" (poetic incantation) that is recited by lemambang bards besides miring ceremonies. This category is smaller than or sometimes relegated from the full-scaled and thus costly festivals for cost savings but still maintaining the effectiveness to achieve the same purpose. Included in this category are "sandau ari" (mid-day ritual) held at the tanju verandah, gawai matak (unripe feast), gawa nimang tuah (Luck feast), enchaboh arong (head feast) and gawa timang beintu-intu (life caring feasts.

 

The major festivals comprise at least seventh categories which are related to major aspects of Iban's traditional way of life i.e. agriculture, headhunting, fortune, health, death, procreation and weaving.

 

With paddy being the major sustenance of life among Dayaks, so the first major category comprises the agricultural-related festivals which are dedicated to paddy farming to honour Sempulang Gana who is the deity of agriculture. It is a series of festivals that include Gawai Batu (Whetstone Festival), Gawai Ngalihka Tanah (Soil Ploughing Festival), Gawai Benih (Seed Festival), Gawai Ngemali Umai (Farm Healing Festival), Gawai Matah (Harvest Initiation Festival) and Gawai Basimpan (Paddy Storing Festival). According to Derek Freeman, there are 27 steps of hill paddy farming. One common ritual activity is called "mudas" (making good) any omens found during any farming stages especially the early bush clearing stage.

 

The second category includes the headhunting-related festivals to honour the most powerful deity of war, Sengalang Burong that comprises Gawai Burong (Bird Festival) and Gawai Amat/Asal (Real/Original Festival) with their successive ascending stages with most famous one being Gawai Kenyalang (Hornbill Festivla). This is perhaps the most elaborate and complex festivals which can last into seven successive days of ritual inchantation by lemambang bards. It is held normally after instructed by spirits in dreams. It is performed by tuai kayau (raid leader) called bujang berani (leading warriors) and war leader (tuai serang) who are known as "raja berani" (bravery king). In the past, this festival is vital to seek divine intervention to defeat enemies such as Baketan, Ukit and Kayan during migrations into new territories.

 

With the suppression of headhunting, the next important and third category relates to the death-related rituals among which the biggest celebration is the Soul Festival (Gawai Antu) to honour the souls of the deads especially the famous and brave ones who are invited to visit the living for the Sebayan (Haedes) to feast and to bestow all sorts of helpful charms to the living relatives. The raja berani (brave king) can be honoured by his descendants up to three times via Gawai Antu. Other mortuary ceremonies are "beserara bungai" (flower separation) held 3 days after burial, ngetas ulit (mourning termination), berantu (Gawai Antu) or Gawai Ngelumbong (Entombing Festival).

 

The fourth category in term of complexity and importance is the fortune-related festivals which consist of Gawai Pangkong Tiang (Post Banging Festival) after transferring to a new longhouse, Gawai Tuah (Luck Festival) with three ascending stages to seek and to welcome lucks, and Gawai Tajau (Jar Festival) to welcome newly acquired jars.

 

The fifth category consists of the health-related festivals to request for curing from sickness by Menjaya or Ini Andan such as in Gawai Sakit (Sickness Festival) which is held after other smaller attempts have failed to cure the sicked persons such as begama (touching), belian (various manang rituals), Besugi Sakit (to ask Keling for curing via magical power) and Berenong Sakit (to ask for curing by Sengalang Burong) in the ascending order. Manang is consecrated via an official ceremony called "Gawai Babangun" (Manang Consecration Festival). The shaman (manang) of the Iban Dayaks have various types of pelian (ritual healing ceremony) to be held in accordance with the types of sickness determined by him through his glassy stone to see the whereabouts of the soul of the sick person. Besides, Gawai Burung can also be used for healing certain difficult-to-cure sickness via magical power by Sengalang Burong especially nowadays after headhunting has been stopped. Other self-caring ritual ceremonies that are related to wellness and longevity are Nimang Bulu (Hair Adding Ceremony), Nimang Sukat (Destiny Ceremony) and Nimang Buloh Ayu (Life-Bamboo Ceremony).

 

The sixth category of festivals pertains to procreation. Gawai Lelabi (River Turtle Festival) is held to pray to the deity of creation called Selampadani, toannounce the readiness of daughters for marriage and to solicit a suitable suitor. This is where those men with trophy head skulls become leading contenders. The wedding ceremony is called Melah Pinang (Areca nut Splitting). The god of creation Selampandai is invoked here for fertility of the daughters to bear many children. There is a series of ritual rites from birth to adolescence of children.

 

The last and seventh category is Gawai Ngar (Cotton-Dyeing Festival) which is held by women who are involved in weaving pua kumbu for conventional use and ritual purposes. Ritual textiles woven by Iban women are used in the Bird Festival and in the past used to receive trophy heads. The ritual textiles have specific "enkeramba" (anthropomorphic) motifs that represent igi balang (trophy head), tiang ranyai (shrine pole), cultural heroes of Panggau and Gelong, deities and antu gerasi (demon figure).

 

Over the last two centuries, some Dayaks converted to Christianity, abandoned certain cultural rites and practices. Christianity was introduced by European missionaries in Borneo. Religious differences between Muslim and Christian natives of Borneo has led, at various times, to communal tensions. Relations, however between all religious groups are generally good.

 

Muslim Dayaks have however retained their original identity and kept various customary practices consistent with their religion.[citation needed]However many Christian Dayak has changed their name to European name but some minority still maintain their ancestors traditional name.Since Iban has been converted to Christian , some of them abandoned their ancestors belief such as 'Miring' or celebrate 'Gawai Antu' and many celebrate only Christian festivals.

 

An example of common identity, over and above religious belief, is the Melanau group. Despite the small population, to the casual observer, the coastal dwelling Melanau of Sarawak, generally do not identify with one religion, as a number of them have Islamised and Christianised over a period of time. A few practise a distinct Dayak form of Kaharingan, known as Liko. Liko is the earliest surviving form of religious belief for the Melanau, predating the arrival of Islam and Christianity to Sarawak. The somewhat patchy religious divisions remain, however the common identity of the Melanau is held politically and socially. Social cohesion amongst the Melanau, despite religious differences, is markedly tight within their small community.[citation needed]

 

Despite the destruction of pagan religions in Europe by Christians, most of the people who try to conserve the Dayaks' religion are missionaries. For example, Reverend William Howell contributed numerous articles on the Iban language, lore and culture between 1909 and 1910 to the Sarawak Gazette. The articles were later compiled in a book in 1963 entitled, The Sea Dayaks and Other Races of Sarawak.

 

SOCIETY AND CUSTOMS

Kinship in Dayak society is traced in both lines of genealogy (tusut). Although, in Dayak Iban society, men and women possess equal rights in status and property ownership, political office has strictly been the occupation of the traditional Iban patriarch. There is a council of elders in each longhouse.

 

Overall, Dayak leadership in any given region, is marked by titles, a Penghulu for instance would have invested authority on behalf of a network of Tuai Rumah's and so on to a Pemancha, Pengarah to Temenggung in the ascending order while Panglima or Orang Kaya (Rekaya) are titles given by Malays to some Dayaks.

 

Individual Dayak groups have their social and hierarchy systems defined internally, and these differ widely from Ibans to Ngajus and Benuaqs to Kayans.

 

In Sarawak, Temenggong Koh Anak Jubang was the first paramount chief of Dayaks in Sarawak and followed by Tun Temenggong Jugah Anak Barieng who was one of the main signatories for the formation of Federation of Malaysia between Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak with Singapore expelled later on. He was said to be the "bridge between Malaya and East Malaysia". The latter was fondly called "Apai" by others, which means father. Unfortunately, he had no western or formal education at all.

 

The most salient feature of Dayak social organisation is the practice of Longhouse domicile. This is a structure supported by hardwood posts that can be hundreds of metres long, usually located along a terraced river bank. At one side is a long communal platform, from which the individual households can be reached.

 

The Iban of the Kapuas and Sarawak have organised their Longhouse settlements in response to their migratory patterns. Iban longhouses vary in size, from those slightly over 100 metres in length to large settlements over 500 metres in length. Longhouses have a door and apartment for every family living in the longhouse. For example, a longhouse of 200 doors is equivalent to a settlement of 200 families.

 

The tuai rumah (long house chief) can be aided by a tuai burong (bird leader), tuai umai (farming leader) and a manang (shaman). Nowadays, each long house will have a Security and Development Committee and ad hoc committee will be formed as and when necessary for example during festivals such as Gawai Dayak.

 

The Dayaks are peace-loving people who live based on customary rules or adat asal which govern each of their main activities. The adat is administered by the tuai rumah aided by the Council of Elders in the longhouse so that any dispute can be settled amicably among the dwellers themselves via berandau (discussion). If no settlement can be reached at the longhouse chief level, then the dispute will escalate to a pengulu level and so on.

 

Among the main sections of customary adat of the Iban Dayaks are as follows:

Adat berumah (House building rule)

Adat melah pinang, butang ngau sarak (Marriage, adultery and divorce rule)

Adat beranak (Child bearing and raising rule)

Adat bumai and beguna tanah (Agricultural and land use rule)

Adat ngayau (Headhunting rule)

Adat ngasu, berikan, ngembuah and napang (Hunting, fishing, fruit and honey collection rule)

Adat tebalu, ngetas ulit ngau beserarak bungai (Widow/widower, mourning and soul separation rule)

Adat begawai (festival rule)

Adat idup di rumah panjai (Order of life in the longhouse rule)

Adat betenun, main lama, kajat ngau taboh (Weaving, past times, dance and music rule)

Adat beburong, bemimpi ngau becenaga ati babi (Bird and animal omen, dream and pig liver rule)

Adat belelang (Journey rule)

 

The Dayak life centres on the paddy planting activity every year. The Iban Dayak has their own year-long calendar with 12 consecutive months which are one month later than the Roman calendar. The months are named in accordance to the paddy farming activities and the activities in between. Other than paddy, also planted in the farm are vegetables like ensabi, pumpkin, round brinjal, cucumber, corn, lingkau and other food sources lik tapioca, sugarcane, sweet potatoes and finally after the paddy has been harvested, cotton is planted which takes about two months to complete its cycle. The cotton is used for weaving before commercial cotton is traded. Fresh lands cleared by each Dayak family will belong to that family and the longhouse community can also use the land with permission from the owning family. Usually, in one riverine system, a special tract of land is reserved for the use by the community itself to get natural supplies of wood, rattan and other wild plants which are necessary for building houses, boats, coffins and other living purposes, and also to leave living space for wild animals which is a source of meat. Beside farming, Dayaks plant fruit trees like rambutan, langsat, durian, isu and mangosteen near their longhouse or on their land plots to amrk their ownership of the land. They also grow plants which produce dyes for colouring their cotton treads if not taken from the wild forest. Major fishing using the tuba root is normally done by the whole longhouse as the river may take some time to recover. Any wild meat obtained will distribute according to a certain customary law.

 

Headhunting was an important part of Dayak culture, in particular to the Iban and Kenyah. The origin of headhunting in Iban Dayaks can be traced to the story of a chief name Serapoh who was asked by a spirit to obtain a fresh head to open a mourning jar but unfortunately he killed a Kantu boy which he got by exchanging with a jar for this purpose for which the Kantu retaliated and thus starting the headhunting practice. There used to be a tradition of retaliation for old headhunts, which kept the practice alive. External interference by the reign of the Brooke Rajahs in Sarawak via "bebanchak babi" (peacemaking) in Kapit and the Dutch in Kalimantan Borneo via peacemaking at Tumbang Anoi curtailed and limited this tradition.

 

Apart from massed raids, the practice of headhunting was then limited to individual retaliation attacks or the result of chance encounters. Early Brooke Government reports describe Dayak Iban and Kenyah War parties with captured enemy heads. At various times, there have been massive coordinated raids in the interior and throughout coastal Borneo before and after the arrival of the Raj during Brooke's reign in Sarawak.

 

The Ibans' journey along the coastal regions using a large boat called "bandong" with sail made of leaves or cloths may have given rise to the term, Sea Dayak, although, throughout the 19th Century, Sarawak Government raids and independent expeditions appeared to have been carried out as far as Brunei, Mindanao, East coast Malaya, Jawa and Celebes.

 

Tandem diplomatic relations between the Sarawak Government (Brooke Rajah) and Britain (East India Company and the Royal Navy) acted as a pivot and a deterrence to the former's territorial ambitions, against the Dutch administration in the Kalimantan regions and client sultanates.

 

In the Indonesian region, toplessness was the norm among the Dayak people, Javanese, and the Balinese people of Indonesia before the introduction of Islam and contact with Western cultures. In Javanese and Balinese societies, women worked or rested comfortably topless. Among the Dayak, only big breasted women or married women with sagging breasts cover their breasts because they interfered with their work. Once marik empang (top cover over the shoulders) and later shirts are available, toplessness has been abandoned.

 

Metal-working is elaborately developed in making mandaus (machetes - parang in Malay and Indonesian). The blade is made of a softer iron, to prevent breakage, with a narrow strip of a harder iron wedged into a slot in the cutting edge for sharpness in a process called ngamboh (iron-smithing).

 

In headhunting it was necessary to able to draw the parang quickly. For this purpose, the mandau is fairly short, which also better serves the purpose of trailcutting in dense forest. It is holstered with the cutting edge facing upwards and at that side there is an upward protrusion on the handle, so it can be drawn very quickly with the side of the hand without having to reach over and grasp the handle first. The hand can then grasp the handle while it is being drawn. The combination of these three factors (short, cutting edge up and protrusion) makes for an extremely fast drawing-action.

 

The ceremonial mandaus used for dances are as beautifully adorned with feathers, as are the costumes. There are various terms to describe different types of Dayak blades. The Nyabor is the traditional Iban Scimitar, Parang Ilang is common to Kayan and Kenyah Swordsmiths, pedang is a sword with a metallic handle and Duku is a multipurpose farm tool and machete of sorts.

 

Normally, the sword is accompanied by a wooden shield called terabai which is decorated with a demon face to scare off the enemy. Another weapons are sangkoh (spear) and sumpit (blowpipe) with lethal poison at the tip of its laja.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

A junk is a type of Chinese sailing ship with fully battened sails. There are two types of junk in China: Northern junk which is developed from Chinese river boats, and southern junk which is developed from Austronesian ship designs, examples of which have been trading with the Eastern Han dynasty since the 2nd century AD. They continued to evolve in the later dynasties, and were predominantly used by Chinese traders throughout Southeast Asia. They were found, and in lesser numbers are still found, throughout Southeast Asia and India, but primarily in China. Found more broadly today is a growing number of modern recreational junk-rigged sailboats. Chinese junks referred to many types of coastal or river ships. They were usually cargo ships, pleasure boats, or houseboats. They vary greatly in size and there are significant regional variations in the type of rig, however they all employ fully battened sails.

 

The term "junk" (Portuguese junco; Dutch jonk; and Spanish junco) was also used in the colonial period to refer to any large to medium-sized ships of the Austronesian cultures in Island Southeast Asia, with or without the junk rig. Examples include the Indonesian and Malaysian jong, the Philippine lanong, and the Maluku kora kora.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Views diverge on whether the origin of the word is from a dialect of Chinese or from a Javanese word. The term may stem from the Chinese chuán (船, "boat; ship") — also based on and pronounced as [dzuːŋ] (Pe̍h-ōe-jī: chûn) in Minnan Chinese — or zhōu (舟), the old word for a sailing vessel.[citation needed] The modern Mandarin Chinese word for an ocean-going wooden cargo vessel is cáo (艚).

 

Pierre-Yves Manguin and Zoetmulder, amongst others, point to an Old Javanese origin, in the form of jong. The word can be traced from an Old Javanese inscription in the 9th century. It entered the Malay and Chinese languages by the 15th century, when a Chinese word list identifies it as a Malay word for "ship." The Malay Maritime Code, first drawn up in the late 15th century, uses jong frequently as the word for freight ships. European writings from 1345 through 1601 use a variety of related terms, including jonque (French), ioncque (Italian), joanga or juanga (Spanish), junco (Portuguese), and jonk (Dutch). These terms were applied to all large ships in Southeast Asia, not only to Chinese ships.

 

The origin of the word "junk" in the English language can be traced to the Portuguese word junco, which is rendered from the Arabic word j-n-k (جنك). This word comes from the fact that the Arabic script cannot represent the digraph "ng". The word was used to denote both the Javanese/Malay ship (jong or djong) and the Chinese ship (chuán), even though the two were markedly different vessels. After the disappearance of jongs in the 17th century, the meaning of "junk" (and other similar words in European languages), which until then was used as a transcription of the word "jong" in Malay and Javanese, changed its meaning to exclusively refer to the Chinese ship (chuán).

 

CONSTRUCTION

The historian Herbert Warington Smyth considered the junk as one of the most efficient ship designs, stating that "As an engine for carrying man and his commerce upon the high and stormy seas as well as on the vast inland waterways, it is doubtful if any class of vessel… is more suited or better adapted to its purpose than the Chinese or Indian junk, and it is certain that for flatness of sail and handiness, the Chinese rig is unsurpassed."

 

SAILS

The sail of Chinese junks is an adoption of the Malay junk sail, which used vegetable matting attached to bamboo battens, a practice originated from South East Asia. The full-length battens keep the sail flatter than ideal in all wind conditions. Consequently, their ability to sail close to the wind is poorer than other fore-and-aft rigs.

 

HULL

Classic junks were built of softwoods (although after the 17th century teak was used in Guangdong) with the outside shape built first. Then multiple internal compartment/bulkheads accessed by separate hatches and ladders, reminiscent of the interior structure of bamboo, were built in. Traditionally, the hull has a horseshoe-shaped stern supporting a high poop deck. The bottom is flat in a river junk with no keel (similar to a sampan), so that the boat relies on a daggerboard, leeboard or very large rudder to prevent the boat from slipping sideways in the water. Ocean-going junks have a curved hull in section with a large amount of tumblehome in the topsides. The planking is edge nailed on a diagonal. Iron nails or spikes have been recovered from a Canton dig dated to circa 221 BC. For caulking the Chinese used a mix of ground lime with Tung oil together with chopped hemp from old fishing nets which set hard in 18 hours, but usefully remained flexible. Junks have narrow waterlines which accounts for their potential speed in moderate conditions, although such voyage data as we have indicates that average speeds on voyage for junks were little different from average voyage speeds of almost all traditional sail, i.e. around 4–6 knots. The largest junks, the treasure ships commanded by Ming dynasty Admiral Zheng He, were built for world exploration in the 15th century, and according to some interpretations may have been over 120 metres in length. This conjecture was based on the size of a rudder post that was found and misinterpreted, using formulae applicable to modern engine powered ships. More careful analysis shows that the rudder post that was found is actually smaller than the rudder post shown for a 70' long Pechili Trader in Worcester's "Junks and Sampans of the Yangtze".

 

Another characteristic of junks, interior compartments or bulkheads, strengthened the ship and slowed flooding in case of holing. Ships built in this manner were written of in Zhu Yu's book Pingzhou Table Talks, published by 1119 during the Song dynasty. Again, this type of construction for Chinese ship hulls was attested to by the Moroccan Muslim Berber traveler Ibn Battuta (1304–1377 AD), who described it in great detail (refer to Technology of the Song dynasty). Although some historians have questioned whether the compartments were watertight, most believe that watertight compartments did exist in Chinese junks because although most of the time there were small passageways (known as limber holes) between compartments, these could be blocked with stoppers and such stoppers have been identified in wrecks. All wrecks discovered so far have limber holes; these are different from the free flooding holes that are located only in the foremost and aftermost compartments, but are at the base of the transverse bulkheads allowing water in each compartment to drain to the lowest compartment, thus facilitating pumping. It is believed from evidence in wrecks that the limber holes could be stopped either to allow the carriage of liquid cargoes or to isolate a compartment that had sprung a leak.

Benjamin Franklin wrote in a 1787 letter on the project of mail packets between the United States and France:

 

As these vessels are not to be laden with goods, their holds may without inconvenience be divided into separate apartments, after the Chinese manner, and each of these apartments caulked tight so as to keep out water.

— Benjamin Franklin, 1787

 

In 1795, Sir Samuel Bentham, inspector of dockyards of the Royal Navy, and designer of six new sailing ships, argued for the adoption of "partitions contributing to strength, and securing the ship against foundering, as practiced by the Chinese of the present day". His idea was not adopted. Bentham had been in China in 1782, and he acknowledged that he had got the idea of watertight compartments by looking at Chinese junks there. Bentham was a friend of Isambard Brunel, so it is possible that he had some influence on Brunel's adoption of longitudinal, strengthening bulkheads in the lower deck of the SS Great Britain. Bentham had already by this time designed and had built a segmented barge for use on the Volga River, so the idea of transverse hull separation was evidently in his mind. Perhaps more to the point, there is a very large difference between the transverse bulkheads in Chinese construction, which offer no longitudinal strengthening, and the longitudinal members which Brunel adopted, almost certainly inspired by the iron bridge and boiler engineering in which he and his contemporaries in iron shipbuilding innovation were most versed.

 

Due to the numerous foreign primary sources that hint to the existence of true watertight compartments in junks, historians such as Joseph Needham proposed that the limber holes were stopped up as noted above in case of leakage. He addresses the quite separate issue of free-flooding compartments on pg 422 of Science and Civilisation in Ancient China:

 

Less well known is the interesting fact that in some types of Chinese craft the foremost (and less frequently also the aftermost) compartment is made free-flooding. Holes are purposely contrived in the planking. This is the case with the salt-boats which shoot the rapids down from Tzuliuching in Szechuan, the gondola-shaped boats of the Poyang Lake, and many sea going junks. The Szechuanese boatmen say that this reduces resistance to the water to a minimum, though such a claim makes absolutely no hydrodynamic sense, and the device is thought to cushion the shocks of pounding when the boat pitches heavily in the rapids, as it acquires and discharges water ballast rapidly supposedly just at the time when it is most desirable to counteract buffeting at stem and stern. As with too many such claims, there has been no empirical testing of them and it seems unlikely that the claims would stand up to such testing since the diameter or number of holes needed for such rapid flooding and discharging would be so great as to significantly weaken the vulnerable fore and aft parts of the vessel. The sailors say, as sailors all over the world are inclined to do when conjuring up answers to landlubbers' questions, that it stops junks flying up into the wind. It may be the reality at the bottom of the following story, related by Liu Ching-Shu of the +5th century, in his book I Yuan (Garden of Strange Things)

 

In Fu-Nan (Cambodia) gold is always used in transactions. Once there were (some people who) having hired a boat to go from east to west near and far, had not reached their destination when the time came for the payment of the pound (of gold) which had been agreed upon. They therefore wished to reduce the quantity (to be paid). The master of the ship then played a trick upon them. He made (as it were) a way for the water to enter the bottom of the boat, which seemed to be about to sink, and remained stationary, moving neither forward nor backward. All the passengers were very frightened and came to make offerings. The boat (afterwards) returned to its original state.

 

This, however, would seem to have involved openings which could be controlled, and the water pumped out afterwards. This was easily effected in China (still seen in Kuangtung and Hong Kong), but the practice was also known in England, where the compartment was called the 'wet-well', and the boat in which it was built, a 'well-smack'. If the tradition is right that such boats date in Europe from +1712 then it may well be that the Chinese bulkhead principle was introduced twice, first for small coastal fishing boats at the end of the seventeenth century, and then for large ships a century later. However, the wet well is probably a case of parallel invention since its manner of construction is quite different from that of Chinese junks, the wet well quite often not running the full width of the boat, but only occupying the central part of the hull either side of the keel.

 

More to the point[24] wet wells were apparent in Roman small craft of the 5th century CE.

 

LEEBOARDS AND CENTERBOARDS

Leeboards and centerboards, used to stabilize the junk and to improve its capability to sail upwind, are documented from a 759 AD book by Li Chuan. The innovation was adopted by Portuguese and Dutch ships around 1570. Junks often employ a daggerboard that is forward on the hull which allows the center section of the hull to be free of the daggerboard trunk allowing larger cargo compartments. Because the daggerboard is located so far forward, the junk must use a balanced rudder to counteract the imbalance of lateral resistance.

 

Other innovations included the square-pallet bilge pump, which was adopted by the West during the 16th century for work ashore, the western chain pump, which was adopted for shipboard use, being of a different derivation. Junks also relied on the compass for navigational purposes. However, as with almost all vessels of any culture before the late 19th century, the accuracy of magnetic compasses aboard ship, whether from a failure to understand deviation (the magnetism of the ship's iron fastenings) or poor design of the compass card (the standard drypoint compasses were extremely unstable), meant that they did little to contribute to the accuracy of navigation by dead reckoning. Indeed, a review of the evidence shows that the Chinese embarked magnetic pointer was probably little used for navigation. The reasoning is simple. Chinese mariners were as able as any and, had they needed a compass to navigate, they would have been aware of the almost random directional qualities when used at sea of the water bowl compass they used. Yet that design remained unchanged for some half a millennium. Western sailors, coming upon a similar water bowl design (no evidence as to how has yet emerged) very rapidly adapted it in a series of significant changes such that within roughly a century the water bowl had given way to the dry pivot, a rotating compass card a century later, a lubberline a generation later and gimbals seventy or eighty years after that. These were necessary because in the more adverse climatic context of north western Europe, the compass was needed for navigation. Had similar needs been felt in China, Chinese mariners would also have come up with fixes. They didn't.

 

STEERING

Junks employed stern-mounted rudders centuries before their adoption in the West for the simple reason that Western hull forms, with their pointed sterns, obviated a centreline steering system until technical developments in Scandinavia created the first, iron mounted, pintle and gudgeon 'barn door' western examples in the early 12th century CE. A second reason for this slow development was that the side rudders in use were, contrary to a lot of very ill-informed opinion, extremely efficient. Thus the junk rudder's origin, form and construction was completely different in that it was the development of a centrally mounted stern steering oar, examples of which can also be seen in Middle Kingdom (c.2050–1800 BCE) Egyptian river vessels. It was an innovation which permitted the steering of large ships and due to its design allowed height adjustment according to the depth of the water and to avoid serious damage should the junk ground. A sizable junk can have a rudder that needed up to twenty members of the crew to control in strong weather. In addition to using the sail plan to balance the junk and take the strain off the hard to operate and mechanically weakly attached rudder, some junks were also equipped with leeboards or dagger boards. The world's oldest known depiction of a stern-mounted rudder can be seen on a pottery model of a junk dating from before the 1st century AD, though some scholars think this may be a steering oar; a possible interpretation given is that the model is of a river boat that was probably towed or poled.

 

From sometime in the 13th to 15th centuries, many junks began incorporating "fenestrated" rudders (rudders with large diamond-shaped holes in them), probably adopted to lessen the force needed to direct the steering of the rudder.

 

The rudder is reported to be the strongest part of the junk. In the Tiangong Kaiwu "Exploitation of the Works of Nature" (1637), Song Yingxing wrote, "The rudder-post is made of elm, or else of langmu or of zhumu." The Ming author also applauds the strength of the langmu wood as "if one could use a single silk thread to hoist a thousand jun or sustain the weight of a mountain landslide."

 

HISTORY

2nd CENTURY (HAN DYNASTY)

Chinese ships were essentially fluvial before the Song dynasty.[1] However, large Austronesian trading ships docking in Chinese seaports with as many as four sails were recorded by scholars as early as the Han Dynasty (206 BCE – 220 CE). They called them the kunlun bo or kunlun po (崑崙舶, lit. "ship of the [dark-skinned] Kunlun people"). They were booked by Chinese Buddhist pilgrims for passage to Southern India and Sri Lanka.

 

The 3rd century book "Strange Things of the South" (南州異物志) by Wan Chen (萬震) describes one of these Austronesian ships as being capable of 600-700 people together with more than 10,000 hu (斛) of cargo (250-1000 tons according to various interpretations - 600 tons deadweight according to Manguin).[8]:262 The ships could be more than 50 meters in length and had a freeboard of 5.2–7.8 meters. When seen from above they resemble covered galleries. He explains the ships' sail design as follows:

 

The people beyond the barriers, according the size of their ships, sometimes rig (as many as) four sails which they carry in row from bow to stern. (...) The four sails do not face directly forward, but are set obliquely, and so arranged that they can all be fixed in the same direction, to receive the wind and to spill it. Those sails which are behind the most windward one receiving the pressure of the wind, throw it from one to the other, so that they all profit from its force. If it is violent, (the sailors) diminish or augment the surface of the sails according to the conditions. This oblique rig, which permits the sails to receive from one another the breath of the wind, obviates the anxiety attendant upon having high masts. Thus these ships sail without avoiding strong winds and dashing waves, by the aid of which they can make great speed.

— Wan Chen,

 

A 260 CE book by K'ang T'ai (康泰) described ships with seven sails called po for transporting horses that could travel as far as Syria. He also made reference to monsoon trade between the islands (or archipelago), which took a month and a few days in a large po. Southern Chinese junks were based on keeled and multi-planked Austronesian jong (known as po by the Chinese, from Javanese or Malay perahu - large ship). Southern Chinese junks showed characteristics of Austronesian jong: V-shaped, double-ended hull with a keel, and using timbers of tropical origin. This is different from northern Chinese junks, which are developed from flat bottomed riverine boats. The northern Chinese junks had flat bottoms, no keel, no frames (only water-tight bulkheads), transom stern and stem, would have been built out of pine or fir wood, and would have its planks fastened with iron nails or clamps.

 

10–13th CENTURY (SONG DYNASTY)

The trading dynasty of the Song developed the first junks based on Southeast Asian ships. By this era they also have adopted the Malay junk sail. The ships of the Song, both mercantile and military, became the backbone of the navy of the following Yuan dynasty. In particular the Mongol invasions of Japan (1274–84), as well as the Mongol invasion of Java (both failed), essentially relied on recently acquired Song naval capabilities. Worcester estimates that Yuan junks were 11 m in beam and over 30 m long. In general they had no keel, stempost, or sternpost. They did have centreboards, and watertight bulkhead to strengthen the hull, which added great weight. Further excavations showed that this type of vessel was common in the 13th century. By using the ratio between number of soldiers and ships in both invasions, it can be concluded that each ship may carry 20-70 men.[

 

14th CENTURY (YUAN DYNASTY)

The enormous dimensions of the Chinese ships of the Medieval period are described in Chinese sources, and are confirmed by Western travelers to the East, such as Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta and Niccolò da Conti. According to Ibn Battuta, who visited China in 1347:

 

. . . We stopped in the port of Calicut, in which there were at the time thirteen Chinese vessels, and disembarked. On the China Sea traveling is done in Chinese ships only, so we shall describe their arrangements. The Chinese vessels are of three kinds; large ships called chunks (junks), middle sized ones called zaws (dhows) and the small ones kakams. The large ships have anything from twelve down to three sails, which are made of bamboo rods plaited into mats. They are never lowered, but turned according to the direction of the wind; at anchor they are left floating in the wind. A ship carries a complement of a thousand men, six hundred of whom are sailors and four hundred men-at-arms, including archers, men with shields and crossbows, who throw naphtha. Three smaller ones, the "half", the "third" and the "quarter", accompany each large vessel. These vessels are built in the towns of Zaytun (a.k.a. Zaitun; today's Quanzhou; 刺桐) and Sin-Kalan. The vessel has four decks and contains rooms, cabins, and saloons for merchants; a cabin has chambers and a lavatory, and can be locked by its occupants. This is the manner after which they are made; two (parallel) walls of very thick wooden (planking) are raised and across the space between them are placed very thick planks (the bulkheads) secured longitudinally and transversely by means of large nails, each three ells in length. When these walls have thus been built the lower deck is fitted in and the ship is launched before the upper works are finished. - Ibn Battuta

 

15–17th CENTURY (MING DYNASTY)

From the mid-15th to early 16th century, all Chinese maritime trading was banned under the Ming Dynasty. The shipping and shipbuilding knowledge acquired during the Song and Yuan dynasties gradually declined during this period.

 

EXPEDITION OF ZHENG HE

The largest junks ever built were possibly those of Admiral Zheng He, for his expeditions in the Indian Ocean (1405 to 1433), although this is disputed as no contemporary records of the sizes of Zheng He's ships are known. Instead the dimensions are based on Sanbao Taijian Xia Xiyang Ji Tongsu Yanyi (1597), a romanticized version of the voyages written by Luo Maodeng [zh] nearly two centuries later. Maodeng's novel describes Zheng He's ships as follows:

 

Treasure ships, used by the commander of the fleet and his deputies (Nine-masted junks, claimed by the Ming Shi to be about 420 feet long and 180 feet wide).

Horse ships, carrying tribute goods and repair material for the fleet (Eight-masted junks, about 340 feet long and 140 feet wide)

Supply ships, containing food-staple for the crew (Seven-masted junks, about 260 feet long and 115 feet wide).

Troop transports (Six-masted junks, about 220 feet long and 83 feet wide).

Fuchuan warships (Five-masted junks, about 165 feet long).

Patrol boats (Eight-oared, about 120 feet long).

Water tankers, with 1 month's supply of fresh water.

 

Some recent research suggests that the actual length of the biggest treasure ships may have been between 119–124 m long and 49–51 m wide, while others estimate them to be 61–76 m in length.

 

CAPTURE OF TAIWAN

In 1661, a naval fleet of 400 junks and 25,000 men led by the Ming loyalist Zheng Chenggong (Cheng Ch'eng-kung in Wade–Giles, known in the West as Koxinga), arrived in Taiwan to oust the Dutch from Zeelandia. Following a nine-month siege, Cheng captured the Dutch fortress Fort Zeelandia. A peace treaty between Koxinga and the Dutch Government was signed at Castle Zeelandia on February 1, 1662, and Taiwan became Koxinga's base for the Kingdom of Tungning.

 

JAVANESE

The physical description of Javanese junk differed from Chinese junk. It was made of very thick wood, and as the ship got old, it was fixed with new boards, with four closing boards, stacked together. The rope and the sail was made with woven rattan. The jong was made using jaty/jati wood (teak) at the time of this report (1512), at that time Chinese junks are using softwood as the main material. The jong's hull is formed by joining planks to the keel and then to each other by wooden dowels, without using either a frame (except for subsequent reinforcement), nor any iron bolts or nails. The planks are perforated by an auger and inserted with dowels, which remains inside the fastened planks, not seen from the outside. On some of the smaller vessels parts may be lashed together with vegetable fibers. The vessel was similarly pointed at both ends, and carried two oar-like rudders and lateen-rigged sails (actually tanja sail),[note 1] but it may also use junk sail, a sail of Malay origin. It differed markedly from the Chinese vessel, which had its hull fastened by strakes and iron nails to a frame and to structurally essential bulkheads which divided the cargo space. The Chinese vessel had a single rudder on a transom stern, and (except in Fujian and Guangdong) they had flat bottoms without keels.

 

Encounters with giant jongs were recorded by Western travelers. Giovanni da Empoli said that the junks of Java were no different in their strength than a castle, because the three and four boards, layered one above the other, could not be harmed with artillery. They sailed with their women, children, and families, with everyone mainly keeping to their respective rooms. Portuguese recorded at least two encounters with large Djongs, one was encountered off the coast of Pacem (Samudera Pasai Sultanate) and the other was owned by Pati Unus, who went on to attack Malacca in 1513. Characteristics of the 2 ships were similar, both were larger than Portuguese ship, built with multiple plankings, resistant to cannon fire, and had two oar-like rudders on the side of the ship. At least Pati Unus' jong was equipped with three layers of sheathing which the Portuguese said over one cruzado in thickness each. The Chinese banned foreign ships from entering Guangzhou, fearing the Javanese or Malay junks would attack and capture the city, because it is said that one of these junk would rout twenty Chinese junks.

 

Main production location of Djong was mainly constructed in two major shipbuilding centres around Java: north coastal Java, especially around Rembang-Demak (along the Muria strait) and Cirebon; and the south coast of Borneo (Banjarmasin) and adjacent islands. A common feature of these places was their accessibility to forests of teak, this wood was highly valued because of its resistance to shipworm, whereas Borneo itself would supply ironwood. Pegu, which is a large shipbuilding port at the 16th century, also produced jong, built by Javanese who resided there.

 

ACCOUNTS OF MEDIEVAL TRAVELLERS

Niccolò da Conti in relating his travels in Asia between 1419 and 1444, describes huge junks of about 2,000 tons in weight: They build some ships much larger than ours, capable of containing 2,000 tons in size, with five sails and as many masts. The lower part is constructed with of three planks, in order to withstand the force of the tempest to which they are much exposed. But some ships are built in compartments, that should one part is shattered, the other portion remaining intact to accomplish the voyage.Other translations of the passage give the size as a 2000 butts, which would be around a 1000 tons, a butt being half a ton.Also, in 1456, the Fra Mauro map described the presence of junks in the Indian Ocean as well as their construction:

 

The ships called junks (lit. "Zonchi") that navigate these seas carry four masts or more, some of which can be raised or lowered, and have 40 to 60 cabins for the merchants and only one tiller. They can navigate without a compass, because they have an astrologer, who stands on the side and, with an astrolabe in hand, gives orders to the navigator.

— Text from the Fra Mauro map, 09-P25,

 

Fra Mauro further explains that one of these junks rounded the Cape of Good Hope and travelled far into the Atlantic Ocean, in 1420:

 

About the year of Our Lord 1420 a ship, what is called an Indian Zoncho, on a crossing of the Sea of India towards the "Isle of Men and Women", was diverted beyond the "Cape of Diab" (Shown as the Cape of Good Hope on the map), through the "Green Isles" (lit. "isole uerde", Cabo Verde Islands), out into the "Sea of Darkness" (Atlantic Ocean) on a way west and southwest. Nothing but air and water was seen for 40 days and by their reckoning they ran 2,000 miles and fortune deserted them. When the stress of the weather had subsided they made the return to the said "Cape of Diab" in 70 days and drawing near to the shore to supply their wants the sailors saw the egg of a bird called roc, which egg is as big as an amphora.

— Text from Fra Mauro map, 10-A13,

 

ASIAN TRADE

Chinese junks were used extensively in Asian trade during the 16th and 17th century, especially to Southeast Asia and to Japan, where they competed with Japanese Red Seal Ships, Portuguese carracks and Dutch galleons. Richard Cocks, the head of the English trading factory in Hirado, Japan, recorded that 50 to 60 Chinese junks visited Nagasaki in 1612 alone.

 

These junks were usually three masted, and averaging between 200 and 800 tons in size, the largest ones having around 130 sailors, 130 traders and sometimes hundreds of passengers.

 

19th CENTURY (QING DYNASTY)

Large, ocean-going junks played a key role in Asian trade until the 19th century. One of these junks, Keying, sailed from China around the Cape of Good Hope to the United States and England between 1846 and 1848. Many junks were fitted out with carronades and other weapons for naval or piratical uses. These vessels were typically called "war junks" or "armed junks" by Western navies which began entering the region more frequently in the 18th century. The British, Americans and French fought several naval battles with war junks in the 19th century, during the First Opium War, Second Opium War and in between.

 

At sea, junk sailors co-operated with their Western counterparts. For example, in 1870 survivors of the English barque Humberstone shipwrecked off Formosa, were rescued by a junk and landed safely in Macao.

 

20th CENTURY

In 1938, E. Allen Petersen escaped the advancing Japanese armies by sailing a 11 m junk, Hummel Hummel, from Shanghai to California with his wife Tani and two White Russians (Tsar loyalists). In 1939, Richard Halliburton was lost at sea with his crew while sailing a specially constructed junk, Sea Dragon, from Hong Kong to the World Exposition in San Francisco.

 

In 1955, six young men sailed a Ming dynasty-style junk from Taiwan to San Francisco. The four-month journey aboard the Free China was captured on film and their arrival into San Francisco made international front-page news. The five Chinese-born friends saw an advertisement for an international trans-Atlantic yacht race, and jumped at the opportunity for adventure. They were joined by the then US Vice-Consul to China, who was tasked with capturing the journey on film. Enduring typhoons and mishaps, the crew, having never sailed a century-old junk before, learned along the way. The crew included Reno Chen, Paul Chow, Loo-chi Hu, Benny Hsu, Calvin Mehlert and were led by skipper Marco Chung. After a journey of 9,700 km, the Free China and her crew arrived in San Francisco Bay in fog on August 8, 1955. Shortly afterward the footage was featured on ABC television's Bold Journey travelogue. Hosted by John Stephenson and narrated by ship's navigator Paul Chow, the program highlighted the adventures and challenges of the junk's sailing across the Pacific, as well as some humorous moments aboard ship.

 

In 1959 a group of Catalan men, led by Jose Maria Tey, sailed from Hong Kong to Barcelona on a junk named Rubia. After their successful journey this junk was anchored as a tourist attraction at one end of Barcelona harbor, close to where La Rambla meets the sea. Permanently moored along with it was a reproduction of Columbus' caravel Santa Maria during the 1960s and part of the 1970s.

 

In 1981, Christoph Swoboda had a 65 feet (LoA) Bedar built by the boatyard of Che Ali bin Ngah on Duyong island in the estuary of the Terengganu river on the East coast of Malaysia. The Bedar is one of the two types of Malay junk schooners traditionally built there. He sailed this junk with his family and one friend to the Mediterranean and then continued with changing crew to finally finish a circumnavigation in 1998. He sold this vessel in 2000 and in 2004 he started to build a new junk in Duyong with the same craftsmen: the Pinas (or Pinis) Naga Pelangi, in order to help keep this ancient boat building tradition alive. This boat finished to be fitted out in 2010 and is working as a charter boat in the Andaman and the South China Sea.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Picture taken 1983 - digitally captured from paper print

__________________________________________

 

The Dayak or Dyak or Dayuh /ˈdaɪ.ək/ are the native people of Borneo. It is a loose term for over 200 riverine and hill-dwelling ethnic subgroups, located principally in the interior of Borneo, each with its own dialect, customs, laws, territory and culture, although common distinguishing traits are readily identifiable. Dayak languages are categorised as part of the Austronesian languages in Asia. The Dayak were animist in belief; however many converted to Islam and since the 19th century, mass conversion to Christianity.

 

HISTORY

The Dayak people of Borneo possess an indigenous account of their history, mostly in oral literature, partly in writing in papan turai (wooden records), and partly in common cultural customary practices. Among prominent accounts of the origin of the Dayak people includes the mythical oral epic of "Tetek Tahtum" by the Ngaju Dayak of Central Kalimantan, it narrates the ancestors of the all Dayak people descended from the heavens before dispensing from the inland to the downstream shores of Borneo.

 

In the southern Kalimantan flourished the independent state of Nansarunai established by the Ma'anyan Dayaks prior to the 12th century. The kingdom suffered two major attacks from the Majapahit forces that caused the decline and fall of the kingdom by the year 1389, the attacks are known as Nansarunai Usak Jawa (meaning the destruction of the Nansarunai by the Javanese) by the oral accounts of the Ma'anyan people. This contributed to the migration of the Ma'anyans to the Central and South Borneo region.

 

The colonial accounts and reports of Dayak activity in Borneo detail carefully cultivated economic and political relationships with other communities as well as an ample body of research and study considering historical Dayak migrations. In particular, the Iban or the Sea Dayak exploits in the South China Seas are documented, owing to their ferocity and aggressive culture of war against sea dwelling groups and emerging Western trade interests in the 18th and 19th centuries.

 

In 1824, as a result of the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824 to settle their commercial regional disputes by switching Java from British to Dutch in return for Malacca, the Malay Archipelago was permanently divided into formerly Dutch-colonized Indonesia and British-colonized Malaysia to this day.

 

In 1838, British adventurer James Brooke arrived to find the Sultan of Brunei fending off rebellion from warlike inland tribes. Sarawak was in chaos. Brooke put down the rebellion, and was made Governor of Sarawak in 1841, with the title of Rajah. Brooke pacified the natives, including the Dayaks, who became some of his most loyal followers. He suppressed headhunting and piracy. Brooke's most famous Iban enemy was Libau "Rentap"; Brooke led three expeditions against him and finally defeated him at Sadok Hill. Brooke had many Dayaks in his forces at this battle, and famously said "Only Dayaks can kill Dayaks.So he deployed Dayaks to kill Dayaks." Sharif Mashor, a Melanau from Mukah, was another enemy of Brooke.

 

During World War II, Japanese forces occupied Borneo and treated all of the indigenous peoples poorly - massacres of the Malay and Dayak peoples were common, especially among the Dayaks of the Kapit Division. In response, the Dayaks formed a special force to assist the Allied forces. Eleven US airmen and a few dozen Australian special operatives trained a thousand Dayaks from the Kapit Division in guerrilla warfare. This army of tribesmen killed or captured some 1,500 Japanese soldiers and provided the Allies with vital intelligence about Japanese-held oil fields.

 

Coastal populations in Borneo are largely Muslim in belief, however these groups (Tidung, Banjarese, Bulungan, Paser, Melanau, Kutainese, Kedayan, Bakumpai, Bisayah) are generally considered to be Malayised and Islamised Dayaks, native to Borneo, and heavily amalgated by the Malay people, culture and sultanate system.

 

Other groups in coastal areas of Sabah and northeastern Kalimantan; namely the Illanun, Tausūg, Sama and Bajau, although inhabiting and (in the case of the Tausug group) ruling the northern tip of Borneo for centuries, have their origins from the southern Philippines. These groups though may be indigenous to Borneo, they are nonetheless not Dayak, but instead are grouped under the separate umbrella term of Moro.

 

ETHNICITY

The Indigenous people of the Heart of Borneo are commonly known as Dayak. The term was coined by Europeans referring to the non-Malay inhabitants of Borneo. There are seven main ethnic divisions of Dayaks according to their respective native languages which are:

 

1. the Ngaju,

2. Apau Kayan,

3. Iban (Sea Dayak),

4. Klemantan (Land Dayak),

5. Murut,

6. Punan and

7. Ot Danum groups.

 

Under the main classifications, there are dozens of ethnics and hundreds of sub-ethnics dwelling in the Borneo island. There are over 50 ethnic Dayak groups speaking different languages. This cultural and linguistic diversity parallels the high biodiversity and related traditional knowledge of Borneo.

 

LANGUAGES

Dayaks do not speak just one language, even if just those on the island of Borneo (Kalimantan) are considered. Their indigenous languages belong in the general classification of Malayo-Polynesian languages and to diverse groups of Bornean and Sabahan languages (including Land Dayak), and the Ibanic languages of the Malayic branch. The Dayak are very adaptable and also speak the lingua franca of the place such as those of Malay, Chinese and European origin.

 

Many of Borneo’s languages are endemic (which means they are spoken nowhere else). It is estimated that around 170 languages and dialects are spoken on the island and some by just a few hundred people, thus posing a serious risk to the future of those languages and related heritage.

Headhunting and peacemaking

 

In the past, the Dayak were feared for their ancient tradition of headhunting practices (the ritual is also known as Ngayau by the Dayaks). Among the Iban Dayaks, the origin of headhunting was believed to be meeting one of the mourning rules given by a spirit which is as follows:

 

The sacred jar is not to be opened except by a warrior who has managed to obtain a head, or by a man who can present a human head, which he obtained in a fight; or by a man who has returned from a sojourn in enemy country.

 

Often, a war leader had at least three lieutenants (called manuk sabong) who in turn had some followers. The war (ngayau) rules among the Iban Dayaks are listed below:

 

If a warleader leads a party on an expedition, he must not allow his warriors to fight a guiltless tribe that has no quarrel with them.

If the enemy surrenders, he may not take their lives, lest his army be unsuccessful in future warfare and risk fighting empty-handed war raids (balang kayau).

The first time that a warrior takes a head or captures a prisoner, he must present the head or captive to the warleader in acknowledgement of the latter's leadership.

If a warrior takes two heads or captives, or more, one of each must be given to the warleader; the remainder belongs to the killer or captor.

The warleader must be honest with his followers in order that in future wars he may not be defeated (alah bunoh).

 

THERE WERE VARIOUS REASONS FOR HEADHUNTING

For soil fertility so Dayaks hunted fresh heads before paddy harvesting seasons after which head festival would be held in honour of the new heads.

To add supernatural strength which Dayaks believed to be centred in the soul and head of humans. Fresh heads can give magical powers for communinal protection, bountiful paddy harvesting and disease curing.

To avenge revenge for murders based on "blood credit" principle unless "adat pati nyawa" (customary compensation token) is paid.

To pay dowry for marriages e.g. "derian palit mata" (eye blocking dowry) for Ibans once blood has been splashed prior to agreeing to marriage and of course, new fresh heads show prowess, bravery, ability and capability to protect his family, community and land

For foundation of new buildings to be stronger and meaningful than the normal practice of not putting in human heads.

For protection against enemy attacks according to the principle of "attack first before being attacked".

As a symbol of power and social status ranking where the more heads someone has, the respect and glory due to him. The warleader is called tuai serang (warleader) or raja berani (king of the brave) while kayau anak (small raid) leader is only called tuai kayau (raid leader) whereby adat tebalu (widower rule) after their death would be paid according to their ranking status in the community.

For territorial expansion where some brave Dayaks intentionally migrated into new areas such as Mujah "Buah Raya" migrated from Skrang to Paku to Kanowit while infighting among Ibans themselves in Batang Ai caused the Ulu Ai Ibans to migrate to Batang Kanyau River in Kapuas, Kalimantan and then proceeded to Katibas and later on Ulu Rajang in Sarawak. The earlier migrations from Kapuas to Batang Ai, Batang Lupar, Batang Saribas and Batang Krian rivers were also made possible by fighting the local tribes like Bukitan.

 

REASONS FOR ABANDONING HEADHUNTING

Peacemaking agreements at Tumbang Anoi, Kalimantan in 1874 and Kapit, Sarawak in 1924.

Coming of Christianity, with education where Dayaks are taught that headhunting is murder and against the Christian Bible's teachings.

Dayaks' own realisation that headhunting was more to lose than to gain.

Among the most prominent legacy during the colonial rule in the Dutch Borneo (present-day Kalimantan) is the Tumbang Anoi Agreement held in 1874 in Damang Batu, Central Kalimantan (the seat of the Kahayan Dayaks). It is a formal meeting that gathered all the Dayak tribes in Kalimantan for a peace resolution. In the meeting that is reputed taken several months, the Dayak people throughout the Kalimantan agreed to end the headhunting tradition as it believed the tradition caused conflict and tension between various Dayak groups. The meeting ended with a peace resolution by the Dayak people.

 

After mass conversions to Christianity, and anti-headhunting legislation by the colonial powers was passed, the practice was banned and appeared to have disappeared. However, it should be noted that the Brooke-led Sarawak government, although banning unauthorized headhunting, actually allowed "ngayau" headhunting practices by the Brooke-supporting natives during state-sanctioned punitive expeditions against their own fellow people's rebellions throughout the state, thereby never really extinguished the spirit of headhunting especially among the Iban natives. The state-sanctioned troop was allowed to take heads, properties like jars and brassware, burn houses and farms, exempted from paying door taxes and in some cases, granted new territories to migrate into. This Brooke's practice was in remarkable contrast to the practice by the Dutch in the neighbouring West Kalimantan who prohibited any native participation in its punitive expeditions. Initially, James Brooke (the first Rajah of Sarawak) did engage the British Navy troop in the Battle of Beting Maru against the Iban and Malay of the Saribas region and the Iban of Skrang under Rentap's charge but this resulted in the Public Inquiry by the British government in Singapore. Thereafter, the Brooke government gathered a local troop who were its allies.

 

Subsequently, the headhunting began to surface again in the mid-1940s, when the Allied Powers encouraged the practice against the Japanese Occupation of Borneo. It also slightly surged in the late 1960s when the Indonesian government encouraged Dayaks to purge Chinese from interior Kalimantan who were suspected of supporting communism in mainland China and also in the late 1990s when the Dayak started to attack Madurese emigrants in an explosion of ethnic violence. After formation of Malaysia, some Iban became trackers during the Malayan Emergency against the Communist Insurgency and thereafter they continue to be soldiers in the armed forces.

 

Headhunting resurfaced in 1963 among Dayak soldiers during the Confrontation Campaign by President Sukarno of Indonesia against the newly created formation of Malaysia between the pre-existing Federation of Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak on 16 September 1963. Subsequently, Dayak trackers recruited during the Malayan Emergency against the Communists' Insurgency wanted to behead enemies killed during their military operations but disallowed by their superiors.

 

It should be noted headhunting or human sacrifice was also practised by other tribes such as follows:

Toraja community in Sulawesi used adat Ma’ Barata (human sacrifice) in Rambu Solo’ ritual which is still held until the arrival of the Hindi Dutch which is a custom to honour someone with a symbol of a great warrior and bravery in a war.

In Gomo, Sumatra, there ware megalithic artefacts where one of them is "batu pancung" (beheading stone) on which to tie any captive or convicted criminals for beheading.

One distinction was their ritual practice of head hunting, once prevalent among tribal warriors in Nagaland and among the Naga tribes in Myanmar. They used to take the heads of enemies to take on their power.

 

AGRICULTURE, LAND TENURE AND ECONOMY

Traditionally, Dayak agriculture was based on actually Integrated Indigenous Farming System. Iban Dayaks tend to plant paddy on hill slopes while Maloh Dayaks prefer flat lands as discussed by King. Agricultural Land in this sense was used and defined primarily in terms of hill rice farming, ladang (garden), and hutan (forest). According to Prof Derek Freeman in his Report on Iban Agriculture, Iban Dayaks used to practice twenty seven stages of hill rice farming once a year and their shifting cultivation practices allow the forest to regenerate itself rather than to damage the forest, thereby to ensure the continuity and sustainability of forest use and/or survival of the Iban community itself. The Iban Dayaks love virgin forests for their dependency on forests but that is for migration, territorial expansion and/or fleeing enemies.

 

Dayaks organised their labour in terms of traditionally based land holding groups which determined who owned rights to land and how it was to be used. The Iban Dayaks practice a rotational and reciprocal labour exchange called "bedurok" to complete works on their farms own by all families within each longhouse. The "green revolution" in the 1950s, spurred on the planting of new varieties of wetland rice amongst Dayak tribes.

 

To get cash, Dayaks collect jungle produce for sales at markets. With the coming of cash crops, Dayaks start to plant rubber, pepper, cocoa, etc. Nowadays, some Dayaks plant oil palm on their lands while others seek employment or involve in trade.

 

The main dependence on subsistence and mid-scale agriculture by the Dayak has made this group active in this industry. The modern day rise in large-scale monocrop plantations such as palm oil and bananas, proposed for vast swathes of Dayak land held under customary rights, titles and claims in Indonesia, threaten the local political landscape in various regions in Borneo.

 

Further problems continue to arise in part due to the shaping of the modern Malaysian and Indonesian nation-states on post-colonial political systems and laws on land tenure. The conflict between the state and the Dayak natives on land laws and native customary rights will continue as long as the colonial model on land tenure is used against local customary law. The main precept of land use, in local customary law, is that cultivated land is owned and held in right by the native owners, and the concept of land ownership flows out of this central belief. This understanding of adat is based on the idea that land is used and held under native domain. Invariably, when colonial rule was first felt in the Kalimantan Kingdoms, conflict over the subjugation of territory erupted several times between the Dayaks and the respective authorities.

 

RELIGION AND FESTIVALS

The Dayak indigenous religion has been given the name Kaharingan, and may be said to be a form of animism. The name was coined by Tjilik Riwut in 1944 during his tenure as a Dutch colonial Resident in Sampit, Dutch East Indies. In 1945, during the Japanese Occupation, the Japanese referred Kaharingan as the religion of the Dayak people. During the New Order in the Suharto regime in 1980, the Kaharingan is registered as a form of Hinduism in Indonesia, as the Indonesian state only recognises 6 forms of religion i.e. Islam, Protestantism, Roman Catholicism, Hinduism, Buddhism and Confucianism respectively. The integration of Kaharingan with Hinduism is not due to the similarities in the theological system, but due to the fact that Kaharingan is the oldest belief in Kalimantan. Unlike the development in Indonesian Kalimantan, the Kaharingan is not recognised as a religion both in Malaysian Borneo and Brunei, thus the traditional Dayak belief system is known as a form of folk animism or pagan belief on the other side of the Indonesian border.

 

Underlying the world-view is an account of the creation and re-creation of this middle-earth where the Dayak dwell, arising out of a cosmic battle in the beginning of time between a primal couple, a male and female bird/dragon (serpent). Representations of this primal couple are amongst the most pervasive motifs of Dayak art. The primal mythic conflict ended in a mutual, procreative murder, from the body parts of which the present universe arose stage by stage. This primal sacrificial creation of the universe in all its levels is the paradigm for, and is re-experienced and ultimately harmoniously brought together (according to Dayak beliefs) in the seasons of the year, the interdependence of river (up-stream and down-stream) and land, the tilling of the earth and fall of the rain, the union of male and female, the distinctions between and co-operation of social classes, the wars and trade with foreigners, indeed in all aspects of life, even including tattoos on the body, the lay-out of dwellings and the annual cycle of renewal ceremonies, funeral rites, etc.

 

The best and still unsurpassed study of a traditional Dayak religion in Kalimantan is that of Hans Scharer, Ngaju Religion: The Conception of God among a South Borneo People; translated by Rodney Needham (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1963). The practice of Kaharingan differs from group to group, but shamans, specialists in ecstatic flight to other spheres, are central to Dayak religion, and serve to bring together the various realms of Heaven (Upper-world) and earth, and even Under-world, for example healing the sick by retrieving their souls which are journeying on their way to the Upper-world land of the dead, accompanying and protecting the soul of a dead person on the way to their proper place in the Upper-world, presiding over annual renewal and agricultural regeneration festivals, etc. Death rituals are most elaborate when a noble (kamang) dies. On particular religious occasions, the spirit is believed to descend to partake in celebration, a mark of honour and respect to past ancestors and blessings for a prosperous future.

 

Among Iban Dayaks, their belief and way of life can be simply called the Iban religion as per Jenson's book with the same title and has been written by Benedict Sandin and others extensively. It is characterised by a supreme being in the name of Bunsu (Kree) Petara who has no parents and creates everything in this world and other worlds. Under Bunsu Petara are the seven gods whose names are: Sengalang Burong as the god of war and healing, Biku Bunsu Petara as the high priest and second in command, Menjaya as the first shaman (manang) and god of medicine, Selampandai as the god of creation, Sempulang Gana as the god of agriculture and land along with Semarugah, Ini Inda/Inee/Andan as the naturally born doctor and god of justice and Anda Mara as the god of wealth.

 

The life actions and decision-making processes of Iban Dayaks depend on divination, augury and omens. They have several methods to receive omens where omens can be obtained by deliberate seeking or chance encounters. The first method is via dream to receive charms, amulets (pengaroh, empelias, engkerabun) or medicine (obat) and curse (sumpah) from any gods, people of Panggau Libau and Gelong and any spirits or ghosts. The second method is via animal omens (burong laba) which have long-lasting effects such as from deer barking which is quite random in nature. The third method is via bird omens (burong bisa) which have short term effects that are commonly limited to a certain farming year or a certain activity at hands. The forth method is via pig liver divination after festival celebration At the end of critical festivals, the divination of the pig liver will be interpreted to forecast the outcome of the future or the luck of the individual who holds the festival. The fifth but not the least method is via nampok or betapa (self-imposed isolation) to receive amulet, curse, medicine or healing.

 

There are seven omen birds under the charge of their chief Sengalang Burong at their longhouse named Tansang Kenyalang (Hornbill Abode), which are Ketupong (Jaloh or Kikeh or Entis) (Rufous Piculet) as the first in command, Beragai (Scarlet-rumped trogon), Pangkas (Maroon Woodpecker) on the righthand side of Sengalang Burong's family room while Bejampong (Crested Jay) as the second in command, Embuas (Banded Kingfisher), Kelabu Papau (Senabong) (Diard's Trogon) and Nendak (White-rumped shama) on the lefthand side. The calls and flights of the omen birds along with the circumstances and social status of the listeners are considered during the omen interpretations.

 

The praying and propitiation to certain gods to obtain good omens which indicate God's favour and blessings are held in a series of three-tiered classes of minor ceremonies (bedara), intermediate rites (gawa or nimang) and major festivals (gawai) in ascending order and complexity. Any Iban Dayak will undergo some forms of simple rituals and several elaborate festivals as necessary in their lifetime from a baby, adolescent to adulthood until death. The longhouse where the Iban Dayaks stay is constructed in a unique way to function as for both living or accommodation purposes and ritual or religious practices. Nearby the longhouse, there is normally a small and simple hut called langkau ampun/sukor (forgiveness/thanksgiving hut) built to place offerings to deities. Sometimes, when potentially bad omens are encountered, a small hut is quickly built and a fire is started before saying prayers to seek good outcomes.

 

Common among all these propitiations are that prayers to gods and/or other spirits are made by giving offerings ("piring"), certain poetic leka main and animal sacrifices ("genselan") either chickens or pigs. The number (leka or turun) of each piring offering item is based on ascending odd numbers which have meanings and purposes as below:

 

- piring 3 for piring ampun (mercy) or seluwak (wastefulness spirit)

- piring 5 for piring minta (request) or bejalai (journey)

- piring 7 for piring gawai (festival) or bujang berani (brave warrior)

- piring 9 for sangkong (including others) or turu (leftover included)

 

Piring contains offering of various traditional foods and drinks while genselan is made by sacrificing chickens for bird omens or pigs for animal omens.

 

Bedara is commonly held for any general purposes before holding any rites or festivals during which a simple "miring" ceremony is done to prepare and divide piring offerings into certain portions followed by a "sampi ngau bebiau" (prayer and cleansing) poetic speeches. This most simple ceremonies have categories such as bedara matak held at the longhouse family bilek room, bedara mansau performed at the family ruai gallery, berunsur (cleansing) carried out at the tanju and river, minta ujan tauka panas (request for rain or sunniness).

 

The intermediate and medium-sized propitiatory rites are known as "gawa" (ritually working) with its main highlight called "nimang" (poetic incantation) that is recited by lemambang bards besides miring ceremonies. This category is smaller than or sometimes relegated from the full-scaled and thus costly festivals for cost savings but still maintaining the effectiveness to achieve the same purpose. Included in this category are "sandau ari" (mid-day ritual) held at the tanju verandah, gawai matak (unripe feast), gawa nimang tuah (Luck feast), enchaboh arong (head feast) and gawa timang beintu-intu (life caring feasts.

 

The major festivals comprise at least seventh categories which are related to major aspects of Iban's traditional way of life i.e. agriculture, headhunting, fortune, health, death, procreation and weaving.

 

With paddy being the major sustenance of life among Dayaks, so the first major category comprises the agricultural-related festivals which are dedicated to paddy farming to honour Sempulang Gana who is the deity of agriculture. It is a series of festivals that include Gawai Batu (Whetstone Festival), Gawai Ngalihka Tanah (Soil Ploughing Festival), Gawai Benih (Seed Festival), Gawai Ngemali Umai (Farm Healing Festival), Gawai Matah (Harvest Initiation Festival) and Gawai Basimpan (Paddy Storing Festival). According to Derek Freeman, there are 27 steps of hill paddy farming. One common ritual activity is called "mudas" (making good) any omens found during any farming stages especially the early bush clearing stage.

 

The second category includes the headhunting-related festivals to honour the most powerful deity of war, Sengalang Burong that comprises Gawai Burong (Bird Festival) and Gawai Amat/Asal (Real/Original Festival) with their successive ascending stages with most famous one being Gawai Kenyalang (Hornbill Festivla). This is perhaps the most elaborate and complex festivals which can last into seven successive days of ritual inchantation by lemambang bards. It is held normally after instructed by spirits in dreams. It is performed by tuai kayau (raid leader) called bujang berani (leading warriors) and war leader (tuai serang) who are known as "raja berani" (bravery king). In the past, this festival is vital to seek divine intervention to defeat enemies such as Baketan, Ukit and Kayan during migrations into new territories.

 

With the suppression of headhunting, the next important and third category relates to the death-related rituals among which the biggest celebration is the Soul Festival (Gawai Antu) to honour the souls of the deads especially the famous and brave ones who are invited to visit the living for the Sebayan (Haedes) to feast and to bestow all sorts of helpful charms to the living relatives. The raja berani (brave king) can be honoured by his descendants up to three times via Gawai Antu. Other mortuary ceremonies are "beserara bungai" (flower separation) held 3 days after burial, ngetas ulit (mourning termination), berantu (Gawai Antu) or Gawai Ngelumbong (Entombing Festival).

 

The fourth category in term of complexity and importance is the fortune-related festivals which consist of Gawai Pangkong Tiang (Post Banging Festival) after transferring to a new longhouse, Gawai Tuah (Luck Festival) with three ascending stages to seek and to welcome lucks, and Gawai Tajau (Jar Festival) to welcome newly acquired jars.

 

The fifth category consists of the health-related festivals to request for curing from sickness by Menjaya or Ini Andan such as in Gawai Sakit (Sickness Festival) which is held after other smaller attempts have failed to cure the sicked persons such as begama (touching), belian (various manang rituals), Besugi Sakit (to ask Keling for curing via magical power) and Berenong Sakit (to ask for curing by Sengalang Burong) in the ascending order. Manang is consecrated via an official ceremony called "Gawai Babangun" (Manang Consecration Festival). The shaman (manang) of the Iban Dayaks have various types of pelian (ritual healing ceremony) to be held in accordance with the types of sickness determined by him through his glassy stone to see the whereabouts of the soul of the sick person. Besides, Gawai Burung can also be used for healing certain difficult-to-cure sickness via magical power by Sengalang Burong especially nowadays after headhunting has been stopped. Other self-caring ritual ceremonies that are related to wellness and longevity are Nimang Bulu (Hair Adding Ceremony), Nimang Sukat (Destiny Ceremony) and Nimang Buloh Ayu (Life-Bamboo Ceremony).

 

The sixth category of festivals pertains to procreation. Gawai Lelabi (River Turtle Festival) is held to pray to the deity of creation called Selampadani, toannounce the readiness of daughters for marriage and to solicit a suitable suitor. This is where those men with trophy head skulls become leading contenders. The wedding ceremony is called Melah Pinang (Areca nut Splitting). The god of creation Selampandai is invoked here for fertility of the daughters to bear many children. There is a series of ritual rites from birth to adolescence of children.

 

The last and seventh category is Gawai Ngar (Cotton-Dyeing Festival) which is held by women who are involved in weaving pua kumbu for conventional use and ritual purposes. Ritual textiles woven by Iban women are used in the Bird Festival and in the past used to receive trophy heads. The ritual textiles have specific "enkeramba" (anthropomorphic) motifs that represent igi balang (trophy head), tiang ranyai (shrine pole), cultural heroes of Panggau and Gelong, deities and antu gerasi (demon figure).

 

Over the last two centuries, some Dayaks converted to Christianity, abandoned certain cultural rites and practices. Christianity was introduced by European missionaries in Borneo. Religious differences between Muslim and Christian natives of Borneo has led, at various times, to communal tensions. Relations, however between all religious groups are generally good.

 

Muslim Dayaks have however retained their original identity and kept various customary practices consistent with their religion.[citation needed]However many Christian Dayak has changed their name to European name but some minority still maintain their ancestors traditional name.Since Iban has been converted to Christian , some of them abandoned their ancestors belief such as 'Miring' or celebrate 'Gawai Antu' and many celebrate only Christian festivals.

 

An example of common identity, over and above religious belief, is the Melanau group. Despite the small population, to the casual observer, the coastal dwelling Melanau of Sarawak, generally do not identify with one religion, as a number of them have Islamised and Christianised over a period of time. A few practise a distinct Dayak form of Kaharingan, known as Liko. Liko is the earliest surviving form of religious belief for the Melanau, predating the arrival of Islam and Christianity to Sarawak. The somewhat patchy religious divisions remain, however the common identity of the Melanau is held politically and socially. Social cohesion amongst the Melanau, despite religious differences, is markedly tight within their small community.[citation needed]

 

Despite the destruction of pagan religions in Europe by Christians, most of the people who try to conserve the Dayaks' religion are missionaries. For example, Reverend William Howell contributed numerous articles on the Iban language, lore and culture between 1909 and 1910 to the Sarawak Gazette. The articles were later compiled in a book in 1963 entitled, The Sea Dayaks and Other Races of Sarawak.

 

SOCIETY AND CUSTOMS

Kinship in Dayak society is traced in both lines of genealogy (tusut). Although, in Dayak Iban society, men and women possess equal rights in status and property ownership, political office has strictly been the occupation of the traditional Iban patriarch. There is a council of elders in each longhouse.

 

Overall, Dayak leadership in any given region, is marked by titles, a Penghulu for instance would have invested authority on behalf of a network of Tuai Rumah's and so on to a Pemancha, Pengarah to Temenggung in the ascending order while Panglima or Orang Kaya (Rekaya) are titles given by Malays to some Dayaks.

 

Individual Dayak groups have their social and hierarchy systems defined internally, and these differ widely from Ibans to Ngajus and Benuaqs to Kayans.

 

In Sarawak, Temenggong Koh Anak Jubang was the first paramount chief of Dayaks in Sarawak and followed by Tun Temenggong Jugah Anak Barieng who was one of the main signatories for the formation of Federation of Malaysia between Malaya, Singapore, Sabah and Sarawak with Singapore expelled later on. He was said to be the "bridge between Malaya and East Malaysia". The latter was fondly called "Apai" by others, which means father. Unfortunately, he had no western or formal education at all.

 

The most salient feature of Dayak social organisation is the practice of Longhouse domicile. This is a structure supported by hardwood posts that can be hundreds of metres long, usually located along a terraced river bank. At one side is a long communal platform, from which the individual households can be reached.

 

The Iban of the Kapuas and Sarawak have organised their Longhouse settlements in response to their migratory patterns. Iban longhouses vary in size, from those slightly over 100 metres in length to large settlements over 500 metres in length. Longhouses have a door and apartment for every family living in the longhouse. For example, a longhouse of 200 doors is equivalent to a settlement of 200 families.

 

The tuai rumah (long house chief) can be aided by a tuai burong (bird leader), tuai umai (farming leader) and a manang (shaman). Nowadays, each long house will have a Security and Development Committee and ad hoc committee will be formed as and when necessary for example during festivals such as Gawai Dayak.

 

The Dayaks are peace-loving people who live based on customary rules or adat asal which govern each of their main activities. The adat is administered by the tuai rumah aided by the Council of Elders in the longhouse so that any dispute can be settled amicably among the dwellers themselves via berandau (discussion). If no settlement can be reached at the longhouse chief level, then the dispute will escalate to a pengulu level and so on.

 

Among the main sections of customary adat of the Iban Dayaks are as follows:

Adat berumah (House building rule)

Adat melah pinang, butang ngau sarak (Marriage, adultery and divorce rule)

Adat beranak (Child bearing and raising rule)

Adat bumai and beguna tanah (Agricultural and land use rule)

Adat ngayau (Headhunting rule)

Adat ngasu, berikan, ngembuah and napang (Hunting, fishing, fruit and honey collection rule)

Adat tebalu, ngetas ulit ngau beserarak bungai (Widow/widower, mourning and soul separation rule)

Adat begawai (festival rule)

Adat idup di rumah panjai (Order of life in the longhouse rule)

Adat betenun, main lama, kajat ngau taboh (Weaving, past times, dance and music rule)

Adat beburong, bemimpi ngau becenaga ati babi (Bird and animal omen, dream and pig liver rule)

Adat belelang (Journey rule)

 

The Dayak life centres on the paddy planting activity every year. The Iban Dayak has their own year-long calendar with 12 consecutive months which are one month later than the Roman calendar. The months are named in accordance to the paddy farming activities and the activities in between. Other than paddy, also planted in the farm are vegetables like ensabi, pumpkin, round brinjal, cucumber, corn, lingkau and other food sources lik tapioca, sugarcane, sweet potatoes and finally after the paddy has been harvested, cotton is planted which takes about two months to complete its cycle. The cotton is used for weaving before commercial cotton is traded. Fresh lands cleared by each Dayak family will belong to that family and the longhouse community can also use the land with permission from the owning family. Usually, in one riverine system, a special tract of land is reserved for the use by the community itself to get natural supplies of wood, rattan and other wild plants which are necessary for building houses, boats, coffins and other living purposes, and also to leave living space for wild animals which is a source of meat. Beside farming, Dayaks plant fruit trees like rambutan, langsat, durian, isu and mangosteen near their longhouse or on their land plots to amrk their ownership of the land. They also grow plants which produce dyes for colouring their cotton treads if not taken from the wild forest. Major fishing using the tuba root is normally done by the whole longhouse as the river may take some time to recover. Any wild meat obtained will distribute according to a certain customary law.

 

Headhunting was an important part of Dayak culture, in particular to the Iban and Kenyah. The origin of headhunting in Iban Dayaks can be traced to the story of a chief name Serapoh who was asked by a spirit to obtain a fresh head to open a mourning jar but unfortunately he killed a Kantu boy which he got by exchanging with a jar for this purpose for which the Kantu retaliated and thus starting the headhunting practice. There used to be a tradition of retaliation for old headhunts, which kept the practice alive. External interference by the reign of the Brooke Rajahs in Sarawak via "bebanchak babi" (peacemaking) in Kapit and the Dutch in Kalimantan Borneo via peacemaking at Tumbang Anoi curtailed and limited this tradition.

 

Apart from massed raids, the practice of headhunting was then limited to individual retaliation attacks or the result of chance encounters. Early Brooke Government reports describe Dayak Iban and Kenyah War parties with captured enemy heads. At various times, there have been massive coordinated raids in the interior and throughout coastal Borneo before and after the arrival of the Raj during Brooke's reign in Sarawak.

 

The Ibans' journey along the coastal regions using a large boat called "bandong" with sail made of leaves or cloths may have given rise to the term, Sea Dayak, although, throughout the 19th Century, Sarawak Government raids and independent expeditions appeared to have been carried out as far as Brunei, Mindanao, East coast Malaya, Jawa and Celebes.

 

Tandem diplomatic relations between the Sarawak Government (Brooke Rajah) and Britain (East India Company and the Royal Navy) acted as a pivot and a deterrence to the former's territorial ambitions, against the Dutch administration in the Kalimantan regions and client sultanates.

 

In the Indonesian region, toplessness was the norm among the Dayak people, Javanese, and the Balinese people of Indonesia before the introduction of Islam and contact with Western cultures. In Javanese and Balinese societies, women worked or rested comfortably topless. Among the Dayak, only big breasted women or married women with sagging breasts cover their breasts because they interfered with their work. Once marik empang (top cover over the shoulders) and later shirts are available, toplessness has been abandoned.

 

Metal-working is elaborately developed in making mandaus (machetes - parang in Malay and Indonesian). The blade is made of a softer iron, to prevent breakage, with a narrow strip of a harder iron wedged into a slot in the cutting edge for sharpness in a process called ngamboh (iron-smithing).

 

In headhunting it was necessary to able to draw the parang quickly. For this purpose, the mandau is fairly short, which also better serves the purpose of trailcutting in dense forest. It is holstered with the cutting edge facing upwards and at that side there is an upward protrusion on the handle, so it can be drawn very quickly with the side of the hand without having to reach over and grasp the handle first. The hand can then grasp the handle while it is being drawn. The combination of these three factors (short, cutting edge up and protrusion) makes for an extremely fast drawing-action.

 

The ceremonial mandaus used for dances are as beautifully adorned with feathers, as are the costumes. There are various terms to describe different types of Dayak blades. The Nyabor is the traditional Iban Scimitar, Parang Ilang is common to Kayan and Kenyah Swordsmiths, pedang is a sword with a metallic handle and Duku is a multipurpose farm tool and machete of sorts.

 

Normally, the sword is accompanied by a wooden shield called terabai which is decorated with a demon face to scare off the enemy. Another weapons are sangkoh (spear) and sumpit (blowpipe) with lethal poison at the tip of its laja.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

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From 19 to 21 August 2016 in the Sicilian town of Ali, there was the so-called "Great Feast" ("Festa Ranni" in Sicilian dialect) in honor of their patron Saint Agatha.

 

The feast, which lasts three days, it is called "Feast Ranni" (Great Feast) to emphasize the exceptional nature of the event, since it falls only once every ten years. Preparations officially begin early as a month before and are involved both the "ciliary" (ie families entrusted from time to time, which shall prepare at their own expense at the solemn celebration for Her Patron Saint), both the "Deputation of St. Agatha" collaborating with the parish priest, plays a role during the organizational phase.

 

The passage of the Holy Relics of the Martyr Agatha in the village of Ali (Messina) in their return to Catania, on the morning of August 17 of the year 1126, it was for this Sicilian center an extraordinary and grandiose event, that led to the building of the great Mother Church , which took place in the sixteenth century; then the celebration of the annual festival but especially the so-called "Great Feast", which recalls the three-day feasts taking place in the city of Catania.

  

We don't known the origins of this ancient feast, whose complex ritual was entrusted, almost to the present day only to the oral tradition; Father Seraphim of Ali (junior) speaks in 1754, in his book "Of story of Ali and his territory".

Long and laborious preparations are assigned to two groups each formed by twelve families belonging to two different districts of the country, they receive instructions to draw up each other's "Ciliium of Bread" and the other the "Cilium of Girls". These families are appointed by the Deputation of St. Agatha (Advisory body that exercises within the Church Mother, economic and organizational functions) and by the parish priest.

The names of the families of "ciliary", as they are called, are made known by the parish priest, after the morning Mass of the 5 February of the current year.

  

Traditionally the families of "Ciliium of Girls" traveling in neighboring countries (Fiumedinisi, Itala and Ali Terme) with the sound of the accordion and tambourine, to communicate the imminent date of the festivities and take offerings and gold jewelry in part borrowed, in part donated, to adorn the "Cilium of Girls".

Liturgical events are intertwined with the traditional folk feast. The Feast attracts many faithful and many emigrants who, for the occasion, return to their native village of Ali. The last day of celebration the two Ciliums and the float of St. Agatha are carried in procession through the city.

 

Postscript: This report is dedicated to the German family of Jewish origin, consisting of father, mother and two children, on a boat they decided to take his own life to escape their Nazi persecutors, by binding them all together, and weighted with stones, they threw themselves off the waters of Mazzaro (Taormina); they were later fished out by now without life, by local fishermen: in the "graveyard of foreigners" of Taormina, now for ever and ever close together, they rest in peace.

  

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Dal 19 al 21 Agosto 2016 nel paese Siciliano di Alì (Messina) si è svolta una caratteristica festa, della quale propongo un report fotografico.

 

La Festa , durata infatti tre giorni, è denominata "Festa Ranni" (Festa Grande) per porre in risalto l'eccezionalità del fenomeno e la grandiosità dell’evento, poiché essa ricade una sola volta ogni dieci anni. I preparativi iniziano ufficialmente già un mese prima e vedono coinvolti sia i “ciliari” (cioè le famiglie incaricate di volta in volta e scelte a rotazione, che provvedono a preparare a proprie spese la festa solenne per la Santa Patrona, con l’allestimento dei due “cilii” ovvero le due “vare” anche intese come “cerei”), sia la “Deputazione di S. Agata” che collaborando con il Parroco, svolge un ruolo durante la fase organizzativa.

 

Il passaggio delle Sacre Reliquie della Martire catanese dal paese di Ali (Messina) nel rientro loro verso Catania, la mattina del 17 agosto dell’anno 1126 , fu per questo centro Siciliano un evento straordinario e grandioso, che portarono alla edificazione della grande Chiesa Madre, avvenuta nel XVI secolo, quindi alla celebrazione della festa annuale ma soprattutto della così detta “Festa Ranni”, che ricorda i tre giorni di festa che avvengono nella città di Catania.

  

Oscure sono le origini e le antiche modalità di svolgimento di questa festa, il cui complesso rituale è stato affidato, fin quasi ai nostri giorni esclusivamente alla tradizione orale, Padre Serafino d’Alì (junior) ne parla nel 1754, nel suo libro “Della storia di Alì e suo territoro”.

Lunghi e laboriosi sono i preparativi affidati a due gruppi formati ciascuno da dodici famiglie appartenenti a due diversi quartieri del paese, che ricevono l’incarico di allestire l'uno il "Cilio del Pane" e l'altro il "Cilio delle Ragazze". Queste famiglie vengono nominate dalla Deputazione di S. Agata (Organo consultivo che esercita all’interno della Chiesa Madre, funzioni economico-organizzative) e dal Parroco, e la loro scelta segue una rotazione tale che nel corso degli anni nessun nucleo familiare, e di conseguenza nessun quartiere, ne rimane escluso.

 

I nomi dei "Ciliari", così vengono denominati, vengono resi noti dal Parroco, al termine della messa mattutina del 5 Febbraio dell’anno prestabilito per la Festa.

 

Come già detto sopra, ogni gruppo provvede autonomamente ad allestire l'uno il "Cilio del Pane" l'altro il "Cilio delle Ragazze".

  

Per tradizione le 12 famiglie di “ciliari delle ragazze”, anche loro sempre accompagnate da un nutrito gruppo (soprattutto giovani), si recano nei paesi vicini (Fiumedinisi, Itala e Alì Terme) a suon di fisarmonica e tamburello, per comunicare l’imminente data dei festeggiamenti e per raccogliere offerte e monili d’oro in parte in prestito, in parte ceduti, per adornare il “cilio delle ragazze”.

Le manifestazioni liturgiche si intrecciano con quelle folkloristiche; la festa richiama numerosi fedeli e parecchi emigrati che, per l’occasione, fanno ritorno al paese natio di Alì. L’ultimo giorno di festa i due cilii ed il fercolo di S. Agata vengono portati in processione lungo le vie cittadine.

Post scriptum: questo report lo dedico alla famiglia tedesca di origine ebrea, composta da padre, madre e da due bambini, che su di una barca decise di togliersi la vita per sfuggire ai loro persecutori nazisti, essi legandosi tutti tra di loro, ed appesantiti con pietre, si gettarono al largo delle acque di Mazzarò (Taormina); essi vennero poi ripescati, oramai senza vita, dai pescatori locali: nel “cimitero degli stranieri” di Taormina riposano le loro spoglie mortali.

  

Madia Gonds or Madia or Maria are one of the endogamous Gond tribes living in Chandrapur District and Gadchiroli District of Maharashtra State, and Bastar division of Chhattisgad State India. They have been granted the status of a Primitive tribal group by the Government of India under its affirmative action or reservation programme. The Madia Gonds are strongly affected by Naxal activities. The Madia Gond use the self designation Madia, and call the area where they live Madia Desh. They speak the Madia dialect of Gondi. A study mentions living megalithic practices amongst the Madia Gonds. One of the findings of The Bench Mark Survey done in 1997–1998: 91.08 percent of Madia Gond families lived Below Poverty Line.

 

TRADITION AND CULTURE

Madias today are doctors, teachers, government employees and naxalites. Performance of school going Madia children is on par with other children of Maharashtra state, a Madia girl student has figured in the merit list of candidates at the state level. The following are the descriptions of the Madia Gond as recorded by the British Rulers in the District Gazettes, which has been carried in the Gazettes of independent India.

 

DESCRIPTION OF THE CHANDA DISTRICT GAZETTE

The Chandrapur district gazette description of the Madia is as follows: "The Marias inhabit the wilder tracts, and are in their unsophisticated state a very attractive people. The villages are usually built deep in the jungle near some wide shallow stream, which offers facilities for the gata cultivation, and the surrounding jungles supplement the fruits of their agricultural efforts. Few villages lack the customary grove of toddy – Palm wine trees, the juice of which, fermented or unfermented, is ever acceptable to the Gond. The Marias are a lithe, active looking, well-built set of men, open, hearty manner, and the cheerful smile of good fellowship. Their dress is scanty, consisting of a compromise between a langoti (a loincloth) and a dhoti, a strip of cloth wound tightly round the waist in rope-like folds and passed between the legs with the spare end hanging down in front below the knees. Often this garment diminishes to the scantiest rag. They adorn their necks with handsome strings of beads and their arms occasionally with metal and glass bangles. Their ears are pulled out of shape by the weight of numerous brass rings with which they are usually garnished and occasionally they wear pagris. A curved knife with a brass mounted handle is stuck into the waist cloth and, from the shoulder dangles the ever handy axe without which a Gond seldom moves. Maria women wear a lugada of strong cloth usually white with a coloured strip in the border. They wear no choli (blouse), no Gond woman ever does, and their necks, like their husbands are garnished with beads. They frequently tattoo their faces and limbs in intricate patterns."

 

DANCE

All Gonds and especially Madias, are very fond of dancing. It is the great amusement of the people. Night after night in the eastern tracts in the cool, moon-lit nights of the hot weather ,the rhythmic lilt of a Gondi chorus fills the air, as the villagers dance round a fire in some open space near the hamlet. The favourite dance is a peculiar rippling step forward with the foot dragged, not very graceful when done by a single individual, but looking quite different when done in unison by a great circle of dancers singing a 're-la', 're-la', chorus to which the step keeps time. In some villages, where the headman is an enthusiast for the pastime, a trained band performs weird and wonderful step dances to the sound of the drum. At a big dance, the trained band occupies the inner ring round the fire, while the common folk, men and maids, in separate rings move round in great circles in opposite ways. All are dressed for the occasion in their best, bearing in their hands weird ornaments of wicker work, with garlands of flowers on their necks and in their hair, feather ornaments humorously or coquettishly placed. Seen in the glow of a huge log fire, glinting on the shining beads and barbaric ornaments of the dancers, with the throb of the drums and the beat of many feet moving in unison to the wild music of the voices in chorus, a Madia dance is a spectacle not easily forgotten, but lingers as a characteristic scene when other details have faded out of the memory. Men and women ordinarily dance in separate circles but in the dances where the young men choose their brides, they dance in couples.

 

GHOTUL

The youth dormitory system or Ghotul is deeply rooted in Madia Gond culture. Traditionally the Madia have a Ghotul in every village where unmarried boys and girls assemble in the evening and play, mix, dance and sing till late night but return to their houses for sleeping, which marks the difference between Bastar Ghotuls and the Ghotuls of Madia Gonds. There is a taboo against married women entering a Ghotul.

 

GOVERNMENT´S LIQUOR POLICY

The Government has granted concession to Adivasis to manufacture and possess toddy for domestic consumption on obtaining toddy licences for a period of one year (i.e. July to June every year). This privilege is given to the people of this community as they are used to toddy drinking as a part of their food for ages. According to the excise arrangements now in force in that area, each individual applicant is granted Toddy licence for tapping trees ranging from 1 to 5 for domestic consumption. The permit fee and tree tax per toddy tree is 75 paise per annum respectively.

 

MUNDHA

Mundha is one-piece decorative wooden pillar carved by a bridegroom after he is engaged. It is kept in front of Ghotul during his marriage ceremony perhaps the best example of skill in wood carving. These are reminiscent of the totem poles of the Americas.

 

MYTHS

About menstruation, the Maria Gond believe that the vagina once contained teeth and that when these teeth were removed, the wound never healed completely.

 

CONTEMPORARY LIFE STYLE

NAXAL ACTIVITIES

A Frontline Cover Story calls the Bhamragad Taluka where the Madia Gond Adivasis live, the heart of the naxalite-affected region in Maharashtra. In the jungles and 120-odd naxalite-affected villages of eastern Gadchiroli, it is the Adivasis who pay the price for extremist violence. "Whether a policeman or a naxalite, it is the Adivasis who is caught in the crossfire. The bosses are never Adivasis. They are safe in their offices or hideouts," a resident of Bhamragad is mentioned saying in the article.The police are quoted as saying that The Communist Part of India (Maoist) has around 250 full-time members and 3,000-odd local supporters. Many tribals accused of being informers are killed by naxalites or harassed by the police. Despite the constant fear, Adivasis do agree that naxalites have forced contractors to give them higher wages for tendu leaves collected and bamboo cut. The possibility of justice and action against their exploiters – the forest Department, the police, the government, the contractors, makes the Madia Gonds sympathise with the naxals. Harassment by the police pushes many naxalite sympathisers underground.

 

EKA NAKSHALWADYA CHA JANMA

Eka Nakshalwadya Cha Janma, (Marathi: एका नक्षलवाद्याचा जन्म – The birth of a Naxal), a novel written by Vilas Balkrishna Manohar, a volunteer with the Lok Biradari Prakalp, is a fictional account of a Madia Gond Juru's unwilling journey of life his metamorphosis from an exploited nameless tribal to a Naxal, a fugitive from the law.

 

COLLECTION OF TENDU LEAVES

Tendu patta, or the leaves of the Diospyros melanoxylon (an ebony tree with date-like fruit) in which tobacco is rolled to make beedis; is for the poor in this impoverished eastern Maharashtra district a crucial source of livelihood. Summer when temperatures touch 45 degrees Celsius, is peak earning time for the Madia. Tens of thousands of tribal women and children are engaged in collecting tendu leaves every summer. Women and children get up at 4.30 in the morning and walk towards the forests near their village. In no time the forests are transformed into a beehive of activity, with small armies of women and children plucking tendu leaves with assembly-line precision. The plucking session ends around 11 am and the women and children walk back balancing the weight of the leaves on their heads. Back in their villages, the women sort out the leaves and tie them up in bundles, squatting for hours inside their huts. They do the bulk of the work; it is they who bear the brunt of the hot sun and the drudgery. The day's collection of tendu patta is taken to the market or phad at around 4.30 pm and laid out in long, neat rows that stretch for acres in sun-baked fields or dry riverbeds. Men appointed by private contractors count the bundles and record them in their registers for future payments. Interestingly, the names in the register are those of the men. It is the husbands and fathers of the toiling women and children who claim the money. Although the tendu patta season doesn’t last more than two weeks, each healthy family unit can make a significant earning in this time. Tendu patta thus helps the poor earn enough money to survive the two months before the onset of the monsoons.

 

STATUS OF WOMEN

A Madia Gond girl has the freedom to have premarital sex and choose husband. As a married woman she has a freedom to take divorce if the husband gives ill treatment to her or if she cannot beget a child from him. She has a right to spend her earnings. A husband does not interfere in her affairs. However, even these women are taboo during menstruation and are not allowed attending the festivals.

 

ORGANISATIONS ASSOCIATED

- Lok Biradari Prakalp is an NGO working in the fields of health and education in the Bhamragad taluka of Gadchiroli, where many Madia Gond live. It was established in 1973[19] Dr. Prakash Amte and Dr. Mandakini Amte working for the Lok Biradari Prakalp received the 2008 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership. In the citation the board of trustees stated: the board of trustees recognizes their enhancing the capacity of the Madia Gonds to adapt positively in today's India, through healing and teaching and other compassionate interventions.

- The Tribal Cultural Heritage of India Foundation: Established in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in 2008.

- SEARCH Society For Education, Action and Research In Community Health.

 

HEALTH ISSUES

Historically the Madia Gond were victims of the ravages of small-pox and skin-diseases and a mild form of leprosy called Gondi rog. Prevalence of sickle cell anemia is very high amongst the Madia Gond.

 

RESEARCH STUDIES

The primitive tribe status of the Madia Gond make them the subject of various studies, such as the following:

 

GENETIC DIVERSITY

A Microsatellite diversity was analysed in Gondi language speaking Madia Gonds of Maharashtra and three other Marathi speaking Proto – Australoid tribal groups, to understand their genetic structure and to identify the congruence between language and gene pool. Allele frequency data at 15 Short tandem repeat (STR) loci in studied tribes was compared with data of 22 Indo-European- and Dravidian-speaking caste and tribal populations using heterozygosity, allele size variance, analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA), GST (Glutathione S-transferase) estimate, PC plot, and Mantel correlation test. Results demonstrate that Gondi tribes comprising the Madia-Gond, a hunter-gatherer population, harbour lower diversity than Marathi tribal groups, which are culturally and genetically distinct. The Proto-Australoid tribal populations were genetically differentiated from castes of similar morphology, suggesting different evolutionary mechanisms operating upon the populations. The populations showed genetic and linguistic similarity, barring a few groups with varied migratory histories. The microsatellite variation clearly demonstrates the interplay of sociocultural factors including linguistic, geographical contiguity, and microevolutionary processes in shaping the genetic diversity of populations in contemporary India.

 

EMANCIPATION OF WOMEN

The study is a record and analysis of the following events. The coming together of Madia women to form a Self Help Group, in Bagul village of Gadchiroli District, to assert their independence, the breaking of Madia customs which triggered a group member to be brutalised and paraded naked by her husband, her committing suicide, the subsequent coming together of the other members in protest, further breaking of tribal taboos, the decision taken to wear blouses and to the breaking of isolation and pollution norms during menstruation, the initiative taken in execution of government development schemes. The Naxal fear of loss of influence in the face of development and inclusion in the mainstream of the Madia. Their opposition to the activities of the Self Help Group. The murder of an engineer by the Naxals. The ongoing struggle engaged by the Madia women against poverty, prejudice, male domination and vested interests in the form of the Naxals, the politicians and the bureaucracy.

 

BENCH MARK SURVEY 1997–98

The results of the Bench Mark Survey was organised in the tribal area of the Maharashtra State pertinent to the Madia Gond are tabulated hereunder.

 

POPULATION

female 38749 - male 38156 - total 76905

 

LITERACY

female 30.19 - male 16.09 - total 23.19

 

OCCUPATION FAMILY WISE

Agriculture 10444

Agriculture labour 2260

Forest labour 365

Other 282

Total 13351

Migration 34%

BPL 91.08%

____________________________________________

 

SHILPGRAM

Shilpgram is a rural arts and crafts complex, situated 3 km west of the city of Udaipur. The center is spread over an undulating terrain of about 70 Acres of land, surrounded by the Aravali mountains. The complex is conceived as a living ethnographic museum to depict the lifestyles of the folk and tribal people of the region. With an objective of increasing awareness and knowledge about the rural arts and crafts, the Shilpgram provides opportunity to rural and urban artists to come together and interact through the process of camps and workshops.

 

DESCRIPTION

The Complex has an open air Amphitheatre with a seating capacity of approximately 8000, used for the major theatre festivals held here and the traditional folk performing arts. Each member state of the West Zone has traditional huts built within the Shilpgram, derivative of certain basic occupations fundamental to the way of life of the people of the area and also central to the culture of the country. In these traditional huts, household articles of everyday use, like terracotta, textile, wooden and metal items, decorative objects and implements are featured with appropriate signages and explanatory details with the objective to give a realistic glimpse of the people and their belongings.

 

The huts are constructed around an interlocking occupational theme. In this integrated pattern are five huts from Rajasthan, representing the weavers' community from Marwar, pottery from the hilly areas of Mewar and the tribal farmer communities of the Bhil and the Sehariyas.Apart from the state's own representation, there are seven representative huts from the state of Gujarat, five from the state of Maharashtra and five featuring the arts and crafts of Goa.

 

SHILPGRAM FESTIVAL

The Shilpgram Festival is organised every year from 21 December to December 31. The Shilpgram Fair (Shilpgram Mela), a part of the festive celebrations, serves as a destination for hand woven clothes, embroideries, mirror works and handicrafts. The 'Mela' aids in encouraging the urban potters, visual artists and designers and the cottage industry of Rajasthan. The Festival provides opportunities for learning the craft skills through various workshops. Cultural programmes during the evening and the local food stalls attract many visitors and locals.

 

SHILPDARSHAN

Shilpdarshan is a continuing activity at Shilpgram in which traditional performing artists and craftsmen are used to draw from the interior villages of the member states. They are regularly invited to exhibit their skill and to demonstrate their crafts, and sell their works in order to have direct access to the buyers. This programme has been initiated with an aim to encourage the rural craftsmen and performers.

 

WIKIPEDIA

In my dialect "LupSup" OR ''Sure get to see birds'' these days in Panti Bird Sanctuary, Kota Tinggi, Malaysia. All you need to know is the exact location. xlolx

Place Alphonse Celli 08/06/2017 16h30

 

SPIRALE [2007]

by Jean-Yves LECHEVALLIER

location (just click)

 

Saint-Tropez

Saint-Tropez, (Sant-Troupès in Provençal dialect) is a town, 100 kilometres west of Nice, in the Var department of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. It is also the principal town in the canton of Saint-Tropez.

Saint-Tropez is located on the French Riviera. It was a military stronghold and an unassuming fishing village until the beginning of the 20th century. It was the first town on this coast to be liberated during World War II (as part of Operation Dragoon). After the war, it became an internationally known seaside resort, renowned principally because of the influx of artists of the French New Wave in cinema and the Yé-yé movement in music. It later became a resort for the European and American jet set and a goal for tourists in search of a little Provençal authenticity and an occasional celebrity sighting.

 

The main economic resource of Saint-Tropez is tourism. The city is well known for the Hôtel Byblos and for Les Caves du Roy, a member of the Leading Hotels of the World, whose inauguration with Brigitte Bardot and Gunter Sachs in 1967 was an international event.

Many of the beaches offer windsurfing, sailing and canoeing equipment for rent, while others offer motorized water sports, such as power boats, jet bikes, water skiing and scuba diving. Some of the private beaches are naturist beaches.

The port was widely used during the 18th century; in 1789 it was visited by 80 ships. Saint-Tropez's shipyards built tartanes and three-masted ships that could carry 1,000 to 12,200 barrels. The town was the site of various associated trades, including fishing, cork, wine, and wood. The town had a school of hydrography. In 1860 the floret of the merchant marine, named "The Queen of the Angels" (a three-masted ship of 740 barrels capacity), visited the port.

Its role as a commercial port declined, and it is now (2013) primarily a tourist spot and a base for many well known sail regattas. There is fast boat transportation with Les Bateaux Verts to Sainte-Maxime on the other side of the bay and to Port Grimaud, Marines de Cogolin, Les Issambres and St-Aygulf.

 

Population: 5.600

Area: 15.18 km2

Density: 370/km2

Elevation: 0–113 m

 

[ Source and much more Info: Wikipedia - Saint-Tropez ]

 

Manneken Pis (literally little man pee in Marols, a dialect spoken in Brussels, also known in French as le Petit Julien), is a famous Brussels landmark. It is a small bronze fountain sculpture depicting a naked little boy urinating into the fountain's basin. It was designed by Jerome Duquesnoy and put in place in 1618 or 1619. It bears a similar cultural significance as Copenhagen's Little Mermaid.

 

Manneken-Pis [plan] was at first a fountain that played an essential role in the former distribution of drinking water since the 15th century. The system was well-known in all of Europe.

 

Towards the end of the 17th Century, the statue became more and more important in the city life. It was also a survivor of the bombardment of Brussels in 1695. Manneken-Pis became a precious good and enjoys a ceaselessly growing glory.

 

The famous little boy is everywhere in Brussels for the joy of tourists, even in the form of colourful chocolates.

is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean.

 

Peruvian territory was home to the Norte Chico civilization, one of the oldest in the world, and to the Inca Empire, the largest state in Pre-Columbian America. The Spanish Empire conquered the region in the 16th century and established a Viceroyalty, which included most of its South American colonies. After achieving independence in 1821, Peru has undergone periods of political unrest and fiscal crisis as well as periods of stability and economic upswing.

 

Peru is a representative democratic republic divided into 25 regions. Its geography varies from the arid plains of the Pacific coast to the peaks of the Andes mountains and the tropical forests of the Amazon Basin. It is a country with a high Human Development Index score and a poverty level around 36%. Its main economic activities include agriculture, fishing, mining, and manufacturing of products such as textiles.

 

The Peruvian population, estimated at 29 million, is multiethnic, including Amerindians, Europeans, Africans and Asians. The main spoken language is Spanish, although a significant number of Peruvians speak Quechua or other native languages. This mixture of cultural traditions has resulted in a wide diversity of expressions in fields such as art, cuisine, literature, and music.

 

History

Please go to

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Peru

 

Geography

Please go to

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Peru

 

Other info

Oficial name:

República del Perú

+ aym: Piruw Suyu

que: Piruw Mama Llaqta

 

Independence:

28 July 1821

 

Area:

1.285.216 km2

 

Inhabitants:

28.600.000

 

Languages:

SpanisAchuar-Shiwiar [acu] 3,000 in Peru. Population total all countries: 5,000. Morona, Macusari, Tigre, Huasaga, and Corrientes rivers. Also spoken in Ecuador. Alternate names: Achuar, Achual, Achuara, Achuale, Jivaro, Maina. Dialects: Different from Shuar (Jivaro) of Ecuador. Classification: Jivaroan

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Aguaruna [agr] 38,290 (2000 WCD). Almost no monolinguals. Western upper Marañon River area, Potro, Mayo, and Cahuapanas rivers. Alternate names: Aguajun, Ahuajun. Dialects: Close to Huambisa, Achuar-Shiwiar. Classification: Jivaroan

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Ajyíninka Apurucayali [cpc] 4,000 (2000 SIL). Apurucayali tributary of the Pachitea River. Alternate names: Ashaninca, Ashéninca Apurucayali, "Apurucayali Campa", Ajyéninka, "Campa", "Axininka Campa". Dialects: Not intelligible with other varieties of Ashéninka. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Amahuaca [amc] 90 to 130 in Peru (2000 SIL). 20 monolinguals. Population total all countries: 310. Ethnic population: 500 (300 in Peru and 200 in Brazil). Perhaps 50 in the border areas have not been contacted. Widely scattered in the southeastern Amazon Basin in Ucayali and Madre de Dios states on the following rivers: Sepahua, Curiuja, Curanja, Upper Ucayali, Inuya, Mapuya, Purus, Aguaytía, Yuruá, and Las Piedras. Also spoken in Brazil. Alternate names: Amawaka, Amaguaco, Ameuhaque, Ipitineri, Sayaco. Dialects: Closest to Cashinahua and Shipibo. Classification: Panoan, South-Central, Amahuaca

More information.

 

Amarakaeri [amr] 500 (1987 SIL). Madre de Dios and Colorado rivers. Alternate names: Amarakaire, Amaracaire, "Mashco". Dialects: Kisambaeri. The Harakmbet languages are not Arawakan. Classification: Harakmbet

More information.

 

Arabela [arl] 50 (2002 SIL). Ethnic population: 500 (2002 SIL). Arabela River, tributary of Napo, two villages. Alternate names: Chiripuno, Chiripunu. Classification: Zaparoan

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Asháninka [cni] 23,750 to 28,500 (2000 SIL). Ethnic population: 25,000 to 30,000 (2000 SIL). Apurimac, Ene, Perene, Tambo rivers and tributaries. Alternate names: Asháninca, "Campa". Dialects: Close to Ashéninka, Caquinte, Machiguenga. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Ashéninka Pajonal [cjo] 12,000 (2002 SIL). Ethnic population: 12,000 (2002 SIL). Central Gran Pajonal area. Alternate names: Ashéninca, Atsiri, Pajonal, "Campa". Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

More information.

 

Ashéninka Perené [prq] 5,500 (2001 SIL). Upper Perené River (tributary of the Pachitea River). Alternate names: "Perené Campa", Ashéninca Perené. Dialects: Somewhat intelligible with other varieties of Ashéninka. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Ashéninka, Pichis [cpu] 12,000 (2001 SIL). Pichis and its tributaries except Apurucayali. Alternate names: Pichis Ashéninca, "Pichis Campa". Dialects: Somewhat intelligible with other varieties of Ashéninka. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Ashéninka, South Ucayali [cpy] 13,000 (2002 SIL). Ethnic population: 14,000 (2002 SIL). Upper Ucayali River and tributaries (Southernmost part of Ucayali Department). Dialects: Most closely related to Pajanol Ashéninka. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Ashéninka, Ucayali-Yurúa [cpb] 7,000 in Peru (2001 SIL). Population total all countries: 7,212. Tributaries of the Ucayali River (Pachitea, Arruya, Shahuaya, Sheshea, Cohengua, Inuya) and Yurúa River. Also spoken in Brazil. Alternate names: Ucayali Ashéninca. Dialects: Somewhat intelligible with other varieties of Ashéninka. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

More information.

 

Aymara, Central [ayr] 441,743 in Peru (2000 WCD). Lake Titicaca area, Puno. Classification: Aymaran

More information.

 

Aymara, Southern [ayc] From Lake Titicaca toward ocean. Dialects: Some important verb forms and vocabulary differences from Central Aymara. Dialect intelligibility needs investigation in Tacna and Moquegua (Landerman 1984). Classification: Aymaran

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Bora [boa] 2,328 in Peru (2000 WCD). Population total all countries: 2,828. Northeast Yaguasyacu, Putumayo, Ampiyacu River area, five villages in Peru. Also spoken in Brazil, Colombia. Dialects: Miraña. A distinct language from Bora Muinane but related. 94% intelligibility of Miraña. Classification: Witotoan, Boran

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Cahuarano [cah] 5 (1976 SIL). Nanay River. Classification: Zaparoan Nearly extinct.

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Candoshi-Shapra [cbu] 3,000 (1981 SIL). Morona, Pastaza, Huitoyacu, and Chapuli rivers. Alternate names: Kandoshi, Candoshi, Candoxi, Murato. Dialects: Chapara (Shapra), Kandoashi. May be distantly related to Arawakan; probably not Jivaroan. Classification: Language Isolate

More information.

 

Capanahua [kaq] 387 (2000 WCD). No monolinguals. Ethnic population: 400 (2000 W. Adelaar). Tapiche-Buncuya rivers area. Alternate names: Kapanawa. Dialects: Pahenbaquebo. Closest language is Shipibo. Lexical similarity 50% to 60% with Shipibo. Classification: Panoan, North-Central

More information.

 

Caquinte [cot] 300 (2000 SIL). Ethnic population: 300. Poyeni, Mayapo, and Picha rivers. Along the upper Poyeni River, which flows into the Tambo; along the Yori and Agueni rivers which become the Mipaya River flowing into the Urubamba. A few speakers also live on the Sensa and Vitiricaya rivers, affluents of the Urubamba. Alternate names: Caquinte Campa, Poyenisati, "Cachomashiri". Dialects: Closest to Asháninka. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

More information.

 

Cashibo-Cacataibo [cbr] 5,000 (1999). Some women over 50 are monolingual. Aguaytía, San Alejandro, and Súngaro rivers. Alternate names: Caxibo, Cacibo, Cachibo, Cahivo, Managua, Hagueti. Dialects: Cacataibo de Mariscal, Cacataibo de Sinchi Roca, Cashibo. Classification: Panoan, Western

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Cashinahua [cbs] 1,600 in Peru (2003). Population total all countries: 2,000. Ethnic population: 5,000. Curanja and Purus rivers. Also spoken in Brazil. Alternate names: Kaxinawá, Kaxynawa, Caxinawa, Caxinawá. Dialects: It may be closest to Sharanahua. Classification: Panoan, Southeastern

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Chamicuro [ccc] 2 (2000 Adelaar). Ethnic population: 10 to 20 (2000 Adelaar). Pampa Hermosa on a tributary of Huallaga. Alternate names: Chamicura, Chamicolo. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Western Maipuran Nearly extinct.

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Chayahuita [cbt] 11,384 (2000 WCD). Paranapura, Cahuapanas, Sillay, and Shanusi rivers. Alternate names: Chayawita, Chawi, Tshaahui, Chayhuita, Chayabita, Shayabit, Balsapuertino, Paranapura, Cahuapa. Dialects: Chayahuita, Cahuapana. Not intelligible with Jebero. Classification: Cahuapanan

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Cocama-Cocamilla [cod] 2,000 in Peru (2000 W. Adelaar). Few monolinguals. Population total all countries: 2,050. Ethnic population: 15,000 in Peru (2000 W. Adelaar). Northeastern lower Ucayali, lower Marañon, and Huallaga rivers area. Also spoken in Brazil, Colombia. Alternate names: Cocama, Kokama, Ucayali, Xibitaoan, Huallaga, Pampadeque, Pandequebo. Dialects: Cocamilla, Cocama. Closest to Omagua. Classification: Tupi, Tupi-Guarani, Subgroup III

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Culina [cul] 400 in Peru (2002 Boyer). Primarily monolingual. Ethnic population: 400. Southeast, near Brazilian border, upper Purus and Santa Rosa rivers. Alternate names: Kulina, Kulino, Kulyna, Kurina, Kollina, Madija, Madihá. Classification: Arauan

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Ese Ejja [ese] 472 in Peru (2000 WCD). Ethnic population: 400 to 500 in Peru (2000 SIL). Tambopata and Heath rivers around Maldonado. Alternate names: Ese Exa, Ese Eja, Ese'ejja, Tiatinagua, Tambopata-Guarayo, Huarayo, "Chama". Classification: Tacanan, Tiatinagua

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Huachipaeri [hug] 311 (2000 WCD). Population includes 12 Sapiteri, 10 Toyeri, 20 Arasairi, 50 Manuquiari, 36 to 50 Pukirieri (Puncuri). Upper Madre de Dios and Keros rivers. Alternate names: Huachipaire, Wacipaire, "Mashco". Dialects: Huachipaire, Sapiteri, Toyeri (Toyoeri, Tuyuneri), Arasairi. Close to Amarakaeri but they probably cannot use the same literature. The Sapiteri are integrating with the Amarakaeri. Toyeri is similar to Sapiteri. Some Kisambaeri (Amarakaeri dialect) have integrated with the Toyeri and others with the Sapiteri. Manuquiari may be a subgroup of Toyeri or Huachipaeri. Pukirieri may be a subgroup of Toyeri or Arasairi. Arasairi is distinct from Amarakaeri or Huachipaeri; similar to Sapiteri. Classification: Harakmbet

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Huambisa [hub] 9,333 (2000 WCD). Morona and Santiago rivers. Alternate names: Huambiza, Wambisa. Dialects: Close to Aguaruna and Achuar-Shiwiar. Classification: Jivaroan

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Huitoto, Minica [hto] 5 in Peru (1995 SIL). Alternate names: Minica Huitoto. Classification: Witotoan, Witoto, Witoto Proper, Minica-Murui

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Huitoto, Murui [huu] 1,000 in Peru (1995 SIL). Very few monolinguals. Population total all countries: 2,900. Ampiyacu, Putumayo, and Napo rivers. None left in Brazil. Northeastern Peru, southwestern Colombia. Generally north of Amazon River between Iquitos, Peru and Leticia, Colombia on the south, to the Caquetá River on the north. Also spoken in Colombia. Alternate names: Bue, Witoto. Dialects: Mica. Classification: Witotoan, Witoto, Witoto Proper, Minica-Murui

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Huitoto, Nüpode [hux] 100 (1991 SIL). Alternate names: Nipode Witoto, Muinane Huitoto. Classification: Witotoan, Witoto, Witoto Proper, Nipode

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Iñapari [inp] 4 (1999 SIL). Piedras River, at the mouth of Sabaluyo, near Puerto Maldonado. Extinct in Bolivia. Alternate names: Inamari. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Purus Nearly extinct.

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Iquito [iqu] 35 (2002 SIL). 1 monolingual. Ethnic population: 500. Loreto Province, Pintoyacu, Nanay, and Chambira rivers, villages of San Antonia and Atalaya. Alternate names: Iquita, Ikito, Amacacore, Hamacore, Quiturran, Puca-Uma. Dialects: Pintuyacu. Was close to Cahuarano. Classification: Zaparoan Nearly extinct.

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Isconahua [isc] 82 (2000 WCD). Callaria River. Alternate names: Iscobaquebu. Dialects: Most closely related to Shipibo. Classification: Panoan, North-Central Nearly extinct.

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Jaqaru [jqr] 736 (2000 W. Adelaar). Population includes 725 Jaqaru, 11 Kawki. Ethnic population: 2,000 (2000 W. Adelaar). Lima Department, Yauyos Province, Tupe village (Jaqaru) and Cachuy village (Cauqui). Alternate names: Haqearu, Haqaru, Haq'aru, Aru. Dialects: Cauqui (Kawki, Cachuy). Lexical similarity 73% with Aymara, 79% between Kawki and Aymara. Classification: Aymaran

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Jebero [jeb] Ethnic population: 2,000 to 3,000 (2000 W. Adelaar). District of Jebero. Alternate names: Xebero, Chebero, Xihuila. Classification: Cahuapanan Nearly extinct.

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Machiguenga [mcb] 10,149 (2000 WCD). Urubamba, Camisea, Picha, Manu, Timpia, Tigompinia, Kompiroshiato, and Mishagua rivers. Alternate names: Matsiganga, Matsigenka, Mañaries. Dialects: Closest to Nomatsiguenga. There are minor dialects. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Mashco Piro [cuj] 20 to 100 (1976 SIL). All are completely monolingual. Manu Park, Dept. of Madre de Dios. Cujar, Purus, Tahuamanu, Mishagua, and Piedras rivers. Extinct in Bolivia. Alternate names: Cujareno, Cujareño, "Mashco". Dialects: About 60% inherent intelligibility of Yine. "Mashco" is a derogatory name. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Purus Nearly extinct.

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Matsés [mcf] 2,000 in Peru (2003 SIL). Population total all countries: 3,000 to 3,500. Yaquerana. Also spoken in Brazil. Alternate names: Mayoruna, Maxuruna, Majuruna, Mayiruna, Maxirona, Magirona, Mayuzuna. Dialects: Different from Mayo, or Maya and Marubo of Brazil. Classification: Panoan, Northern

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Muniche [myr] 3 (1988 SIL). Town of Muniches on the Paranapura River. Alternate names: Otanave, Otanabe, Munichino, Munichi. Classification: Language Isolate Nearly extinct.

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Nanti [cox] 350 to 600 (2002 Michael). Headwaters of the Camisea and Timpia rivers. Alternate names: "Cogapacori", "Kogapakori". Dialects: Language is most closely related to Machiguenga, but they have remained separate. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Nomatsiguenga [not] 6,500 (2003 SIL). 5,500 to 6,000 monolinguals. Departamento de Junín, between the rivers Ene and Perene, and Anapati River system in the foothills. Alternate names: "Nomatsiguenga Campa", Atiri. Dialects: Closest to Machiguenga. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Pre-Andine

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Ocaina [oca] 54 in Peru (2000). Population total all countries: 66. Ethnic population: 150 in Peru (2000 W. Adelaar). Yaguasyacu, Ampuyacu, and Putumayo rivers, northeastern Peru. Also spoken in Colombia. Alternate names: Okaina. Dialects: Dukaiya, Ibo'tsa. Classification: Witotoan, Witoto, Ocaina

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Omagua [omg] 10 to 100 in Peru (1976 SIL). Population total all countries: 10 to 100. Ethnic population: 627 (1976). Omaguas near Iquitos. There may be none left in Brazil (1995). Also spoken in Brazil. Alternate names: Omagua-Yete, Ariana, Pariana, Anapia, Macanipa, Kambeba, Yhuata, Umaua, Cambeba, Campeba, Cambela, Cambeeba, Compeva, Canga-Peba, Agua. Dialects: Closest to Cocama. Classification: Tupi, Tupi-Guarani, Subgroup III Nearly extinct.

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Orejón [ore] 190 (1976 SIL). Ethnic population: 405 (2000 WCD). Yanayacu, Sucusari, Algodon, and Putumayo rivers. Alternate names: Coto, Koto, Payagua, Mai Ja, Oregon, Orechon, Tutapi. Dialects: Nebaji. Classification: Tucanoan, Western Tucanoan, Southern

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Peruvian Sign Language [prl] Classification: Deaf sign language

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Pisabo [pig] 513 (2000 WCD). Between the Tapíche and Blanco rivers. Alternate names: Pisagua, Pisahua. Classification: Panoan, Northern

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Quechua, Ambo-Pasco [qva] 90,000 (1998 SIL). 20% monolinguals. Ethnic population: 90,000. In province of Ambo (department of Huánuco), districts of Huacar, San Francisco de Mosca, and San Rafael. In province of Pasco (department of Pasco), districts of Chaupimarca, Huachón, Huariaca, Ninacaca, Pallanchacra, San Francisco de Asís de Yarusyacán, Simón Bolívar, Ticlacayán, Tinyahuarca, Vicco, and Yanacancha. Alternate names: San Rafael-Huariaca Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Arequipa-La Unión [qxu] 18,628 (2000 WCD). 10,000 monolinguals. Ethnic population: 32,000. Arequipa Department, La Unión Province, Cotahuasi District; Apurímac Department, Antabamba Province. Alternate names: Arequipa Quechua, Cotahuasi Quechua. Dialects: Cotahuasi, Northern Arequipa, Highland Arequipa, Antabamba (Apurimac). Closer linguistically to Cuzco than to Ayacucho. Very close to eastern Apurímac. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, C

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Quechua, Ayacucho [quy] 900,000 (2000 SIL). 300,000 monolinguals. Southwestern Ayacucho Region and Lima. Alternate names: Runasimi, Chanka. Dialects: Andahuaylas, Huancavelica. Lexical similarity 96% with Surcubamba, Puquio, and Cuzco. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, C

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Quechua, Cajamarca [qvc] 30,000 (2000 D. Coombs). Cajamarca, Chetilla, and Los Baños districts. The western dialect in the district of Chetilla. The eastern variety in Porcon and in several areas around the valley of Cajamarca. Dialects: Western Cajamarca, Eastern Cajamarca. Dialect differences are relatively minor. Lexical similarity 94% with Lambayeque (closest), 92% with Pacaraos. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, A

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Quechua, Cajatambo North Lima [qvl] 7,000 (2000 SIL). 2,800 monolinguals. Northeast Lima Department: districts of Copa, Cajatambo, Huancapón, northern Manas, and northeastern Gogor and Southeast Ancash Department: districts of Pacllón, La Primavera, and Mangas (south of the Llamac River and east of the Pativilca River). Dialects: 74% intelligibility of Huamalíes Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Chachapoyas [quk] 7,000 (2003 SIL). 100 to 300 monolinguals (2003). Ethnic population: 7,000. Chachapoyas and Luya provinces, Amazonas Department. Alternate names: Amazonas. Dialects: Lamud (West Chachapoyas), Grenada-Mendoza (East Chachapoyas), La Jalca (South Chachapoyas), Llakwash Chachapoyas. Closest to San Martín Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, B

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Quechua, Chincha [qxc] 6,000 (2000 SIL). Northeastern Chincha Province, Ica; northwestern Castrovirreyna Province, Huancavelica; southeastern Yauyos Province, Lima. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, A

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Quechua, Chiquián Ancash [qxa] 10,000 (2000 SIL). 4,000 monolinguals. Southeast Ancash Department, Bolognesi Province, Chiquián District, Western Bolognesi west of the Pativilca River and north of the Llamac River, and eastern Ocros, those areas that border the Corpanqui Valley. Western Ocros may be included, but the dialect is somewhat different. Dialects: Possibly intelligible with Cajatambo Quechua. Some contact with Cajatambo and very little with Huamalíes. 73% intelligibility of Huamalíes. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Corongo Ancash [qwa] 4,000 (2000 SIL). 1,700 monolinguals (2000 SIL). Northern Ancash Department, Corongo Province, Aco, Corongo, Cusca, La Pampa, and Yanac districts. Most prevalent in Aco and Cusca. Dialects: Most closely related to Huaylas and Sihuas Quechua. Some contact with Sihuas, Northern Conchucos, and Huaylas by road. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Cusco [quz] 1,500,000 (1989 UBS). 300,000 to 500,000 monolinguals. Total Quechua speakers in Peru 3,500,000 to 4,400,000 including Quechua I 750,000, Quechua II 2,675,000 (2000 Adelaar). Ethnic population: 1,500,000. Departments of Cusco, half of Puno, and northeast Arequipa. Alternate names: Cuzco Quechua, Quechua Qosqo-Qollaw, Runasimi Qusqu Qullaw, Quechua de Cusco-Collao, Qheswa, Quechua Cusco, Quechua de Cuzco. Dialects: Caylloma Quechua, Eastern Apurímac Quechua, Puno Quechua. Some dialect differences, but not as distinct as elsewhere. Substantial phonological and morphological differences with Ayacucho Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, C

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Quechua, Eastern Apurímac [qve] 200,000 (2002 SIL). 80,000 monolinguals (30% in towns, 60% to 70% in remote areas, especially at high altitudes). Ethnic population: 200,000. Abancay, Grau, Cotabambas, Aymaraes and Antabamba Ayamaraes, Chuquibambilla, and Anda provinces of the department of Apurímac. The province of La Unión, Arequipa. Alternate names: Quechua del Este de Apurímac, Apurímac Quechua. Dialects: Abancay, Antabamba, Cotabambas. La Unión Quechua (Arequipa) is very similar to Antabamba. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, C

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Quechua, Huallaga Huánuco [qub] 40,000 (1993 SIL). 66% monolingual. Northeast Huánuco Department, including the city of Huánuco. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Huamalíes-Dos de Mayo Huánuco [qvh] 72,440 (2000 WCD). 20,000 to 30,000 monolinguals. Ethnic population: 80,000 to 110,000. Northwest Huánuco Department. Dialects: Monzón, Huamalíes, Northern Dos de Mayo. Lexical similarity 96% with Margos-Yarowilca-Lauricocha Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Huaylas Ancash [qwh] 336,332 (2000 WCD). Less than 20,000 monolinguals. Ethnic population: 300,000. Central Ancash Department, provinces of Huaraz, Carhuaz, Caraz; in the Callejón de Huaylas. Alternate names: Huaraz Quechua. Dialects: Huaraz, Yungay, Huailas (Huaylas). Parker says it is not intelligible with Cuzco, Ayacucho, Southern Junín (Huanca), Cajamarca, Amazonas (Chachapoyas), or San Martín Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Huaylla Wanca [qvw] 250,000 (2002 SIL). Southern Junín Department, Huancayo and Concepción provinces. Alternate names: Southern Huancayo Quechua, Huanca Huaylla Quechua. Dialects: Waycha (Huaycha, Central Huancayo), East Waylla, West Waylla. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Jauja Wanca [qxw] 14,550 to 31,500 (1962 census). Ethnic population: 77,727 (2000 WCD). Central Junín Department, Jauja Province. Alternate names: Shausha Wanka Quechua, Huanca Jauja Quechua. Dialects: Considerable phonological differences with Tarma. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Lambayeque [quf] 20,000 (1998 SIL). Lambayeque Region, Inkawasi, Kañaris, and Miracosta districts, and the communities of Penachí and Santa Lucía, and in adjacent areas of other departments (Cajamarca, Piura). Alternate names: Ferreñafe. Dialects: Incahuasi, Cañaris. Lexical similarity 94% with Cajamarca Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, A

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Quechua, Margos-Yarowilca-Lauricocha [qvm] 83,395 (1993 census). 14,000 monolinguals. Ethnic population: 114,000 (1993 census). Southwest and south central Huánuco Department, districts of Obas, Aparicio Pomares, Cahuac, Chavinillo, Chacabamba, Jacas Chico, Rondos, San Francisco de Asis, Jivia, Baños, Queropalca, Jesús, San Miguel de Cauri, Yarumayo, Margos, and Chaulán. Dialects: Literature can be adapted from Huamalíes-Dos de Mayo. Lexical similarity 90% with Panao, 85% with Corongo (Ancash), Sihuas, Monzón, Tarma, Ulcumayo Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Napo Lowland [qvo] 8,000 in Peru. Population total all countries: 12,000. Napo River Region. Also communities on the Putumayo. Some were moved to Madre de Dios. Also spoken in Colombia, Ecuador. Alternate names: Runa Shimi, Santa Rosa Quechua, Santarrosino, Quixo, Kicho, Quijo, Napo, Yumbo, Lowland Napo Quichua, Napo Kichua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, B

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Quechua, North Junín [qvn] 60,000 (1998). 7,000 monolinguals (1972 census). Northern Junín Department, districts of Junín, Carhuamayo, Ondores, San Pedro de Cajas, southeast of Pasco. Alternate names: Tarma-Junín Quechua, Junín Quechua. Dialects: There are two dialects in Tarma Province which differ from the town of Junín. Lexical similarity 97% with Cajatambo, 96% with La Unión Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Northern Conchucos Ancash [qxn] 250,000 (2002 SIL). 65,000 monolinguals (1994 census). East Ancash Department, Pomabamba to San Luis, and Huacrachuco in northwest Huánuco Department. May include a small part of the northern Marañon area. Alternate names: Conchucos Quechua, Northern Conchucos Quechua. Dialects: Related to Southern Conchucos, Huamalíes, Sihuas. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Pacaraos [qvp] 250 (1984 W. Adelaar). Ethnic population: 900. East central Lima Department, Pacaraos village. Dialects: Divergent lexically, morphologically, and phonologically from other Quechua. By its archaic features it occupies an important position relative to the reconstruction of Proto-Quechua. Lexical similarity 94% with Huarí, Cajatambo, Tarma, and Carás Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, A

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Quechua, Panao Huánuco [qxh] 50,000 (2002 SIL). 10,000 monolinguals. East central Huánuco Department. Alternate names: Pachitea Quechua. Dialects: Lexical similarity 98% with La Unión, 96% with Cajatambo Quechua. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Puno [qxp] 500,000. 100,000 monolinguals (2002). Puno Department and adjacent areas: northeast Arequipa, highland area of Moquegua. Alternate names: Quechua Qollaw, Quechua Collao. Dialects: North Bolivian Quechua, Cailloma Quechua. Mutually intelligible with Cusco Quechua and North Bolivian Quechua: possibly sufficient to understand complex and abstract discourse. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, C

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Quechua, San Martín [qvs] 15,000 (2000 SIL). 2,000 monolinguals. Ethnic population: 43,982 (2000 WCD). Loreto Department, San Martín Region, Sisa, Lamas, and other districts, and along parts of the Ucayali River. Lamas town is "the cradle of the culture" and 22 km from Tarapota. Alternate names: Ucayali, Lamista, Lamisto, Lama, Lamano, Motilón. Dialects: Several minor dialects. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, B

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Quechua, Santa Ana de Tusi Pasco [qxt] 10,000 (1993 SIL). Pasco Department, southeastern part of District Daniel Carrion. Dialects: Probably a dialect of Chaupihuaranga Quecha. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Sihuas Ancash [qws] 6,500 (2002 SIL). 3,000 monolinguals. Ancash Department, Sihuas Province, districts west of Sihuas River and north of Rupac River: southern Quiches, Alfonso Ugarte, Huayllabamba, Sihuas, and western Ragash. Dialects: Most closely related to Northern Conchucos and Corongo Quechuas. Intelligibility testing has been conducted with these two language groups and initial results show intelligibility of Corongo Quechua to be on the high end of marginal. Intelligibility of Northern Conchucos appears to be lower. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Southern Conchucos Ancash [qxo] 250,000 (1994 census). 80,000 monolinguals. East Ancash Department, Chavín to San Luis to Llamellín in East Ancash Department, and Huacaybamba, Huacrachuco, San Buenaventura, and Pinra in northwest Huánuco Department. Includes much of southern Marañon. Alternate names: Conchucos Quechua, Southern Conchucos Quechua. Dialects: Related to Northern Conchucos, Huamalíes, Huaylas. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Southern Pastaza [qup] 1,553 (2000 WCD). 20% monolinguals. Northern jungle, Anatico Lake, Pastaza and Huasaga rivers, along the Ñucuray River and Manchari. Alternate names: Inga. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, B

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Quechua, Yanahuanca Pasco [qur] 20,500 (1972 census). 8,200 monolinguals. Western Pasco Department, sparsely populated high country, and more densely populated valleys, districts of Yanahuanca, Villcabamba, Tapoc, Chacayan, Paucar, San Pedro de Pillao, Goyllarisquizqa, Chinche. Alternate names: Daniel Carrion. Dialects: Many related Quechua dialects intersect here: Junín, Ambo-Pasco, Santa Ana de Tusi, Cajatambo, Dos de Mayo. Further intelligibility studies may be needed. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua I

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Quechua, Yauyos [qux] 6,500 (2003 SIL). Lima Department, Yauyos Province; Ica Department, northern section of Chincha Province; Huancavelica Department, northeastern corner of Castrovirreyna Province. Dialects: San Pedro de Huacarpana, Apurí, Madean-Viñac (Madeán), Azángaro-Huangáscar-Chocos (Huangáscar), Cacra-Hongos, Tana-Lincha (Lincha), Tomás-Alis (Alis), Huancaya-Vitis, Laraos. Not a single language, but a cover term for a highly differentiated linguistic area with many one-village varieties. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, A

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Quichua, Northern Pastaza [qvz] 2,000 in Peru. Alamos, Tigre River. Alternate names: Tigre Quechua, Alama, Bobonaza. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, B

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Resígaro [rgr] 14 (1976 SIL). Northeastern Peru, Loreto Department, in Bora and Ocaina villages. Alternate names: Resígero. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Northern Maipuran, Inland Nearly extinct.

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Secoya [sey] 144 in Peru. Northern Peru, Boca de Angusilla and Santa Marta, a small river off the Napo River near the Ecuador border. Alternate names: Angotero, Encabellao. Dialects: Angotero, Piojé. Classification: Tucanoan, Western Tucanoan, Northern, Siona-Secoya

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Sharanahua [mcd] 450 in Peru (2000 SIL). 70% monolinguals. Population includes 200 to 300 Mastanahua. Population total all countries: 950. Upper Purus River area. Also spoken in Brazil. Dialects: Marinahua (Marinawa), Chandinahua, Mastanahua. Close to Yaminahua, Chitonahua, Yora. Classification: Panoan, South-Central, Yaminahua-Sharanahua

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Shipibo-Conibo [shp] 26,000 (2003 SIL). Northeastern middle Ucayali River area, Painaco, Requena, Sur Bolognesi, Pisqui (on the other side of Contamana). Dialects: Shipibo (Alto Ucayali), Conibo (Coniba), Pisquibo, Shetebo (Setebo, Setibo, Xitibo, Manoita), Shipibo del Madre de Dios. Classification: Panoan, North-Central

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Spanish [spa] 20,000,000 in Peru (1995). Alternate names: Español, Castellano. Classification: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western, Western, Gallo-Iberian, Ibero-Romance, West Iberian, Castilian

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Spanish, Loreto-Ucayali [spq] Loreto and Ucayali river areas. Alternate names: Jungle Spanish. Dialects: Some other speakers have limited comprehension of colloquial standard Spanish. Classification: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western, Western, Gallo-Iberian, Ibero-Romance, West Iberian, Castilian

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Taushiro [trr] 1 (2002 SIL). Ethnic population: 20. Off the Tigre River, Aucayacu River, tributary of the Ahuaruna River. Alternate names: Pinchi, Pinche. Dialects: Possibly Zaparoan. Ruhlen says it is related to Candoshi. Classification: Language Isolate Nearly extinct.

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Ticuna [tca] 8,000 in Peru (2000 SIL). Northeastern Amazon River Region, from Chimbote in Peru to San Antonio do Iça in Brazil. Alternate names: Tikuna, Tukuna. Classification: Language Isolate

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Urarina [ura] 3,000 (2002 SIL). Urarinas District, Pucayacu, Chambira, and Urituyacu rivers. Alternate names: Shimacu, Simacu, Itucali. Dialects: There are several dialects with minor differences. Ruhlen and others classify it as Andean. Classification: Language Isolate

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Yagua [yad] 5,692 in Peru (2000 WCD). 2,000 monolinguals. Ethnic population: 6,000. Loreto, northeastern Amazon River Region, from Iquitos to the Brazil border. Some go to urban centers like Iquitos for economic reasons. Some occasionally go into Brazil. Also spoken in Colombia. Alternate names: Nijyamïï Nikyejaada, Yahua, Llagua, Yava, Yegua. Dialects: 2 dialects. Classification: Peba-Yaguan

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Yaminahua [yaa] 750 in Peru (2003 SIL). Population includes 400 Yaminahua (1998 SIL), 200 Mastanahua (1981 SIL), 150 Chitonahua. Population total all countries: 1,244. Huacapishtea and Mapuya. Chitonahua at the headwaters of the Embira River. Also spoken in Bolivia, Brazil. Alternate names: Yaminawa, Jaminawá, Yuminahua, Yamanawa. Dialects: Yaminahua, Chitonahua (Morunahua, Moronahua, Foredafa, Horudahua, Horunahua). Closest to Sharanahua. Classification: Panoan, South-Central, Yaminahua-Sharanahua

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Yanesha' [ame] 9,831 (2000 WCD). Ethnic population: 10,000 (2000 W. Adelaar). Central and eastern Pasco Region and Junín, western jungle, headwaters of the Pachitea and Perene rivers. Alternate names: Amuesha, Amuese, Amueixa, Amoishe, Amagues, Amage, Omage, Amajo, Lorenzo, Amuetamo, Amaje. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Western Maipuran

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Yine [pib] 4,000 (2000 SIL). Ethnic population: 4,000 to 5,000. Departments of Ucayali and Cusco, east central Urubamba River area; Department of Ucayali and Loreto, along the Ucayali River (Conatmana and Pucallpa); Department of Madre de Dios, Madre de Dios River. Alternate names: "Piro", Pirro, Pira, "Simirinche", Simiranch, Contaquiro. Dialects: Machinere in Brazil is different enough to need separate literature. Classification: Arawakan, Maipuran, Southern Maipuran, Purus

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Yora [mts] 350 to 400 (1998 SIL). Manu Park, Panagua River. Some are outside of the Park on the Mishagua River. There may be more in Brazil. Alternate names: Yura, Yoranahua, Manu Park Panoan, Parquenahua, Nahua. Dialects: Close to Yaminahua and Sharanahua. Classification: Panoan, South-Central, Yora

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Extinct languages

Abishira [ash] Extinct. Puerto Elvira on Lake Vacacocha on the Napo River. Alternate names: Abiquira, Auishiri, Agouisiri, Avirxiri, Abigira, Ixignor, Vacacocha, Tequraca. Classification: Unclassified

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Aguano [aga] Extinct. Ethnic population: 40 families in Santa Cruz de Huallaga who did not use Aguano but were members of the ethnic group (1959). Lower Huallaga and upper Samiria rivers, the right bank tributary of the Marañon River. Alternate names: Uguano, Aguanu, Awano, Santa Crucino. Classification: Unclassified

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Andoa [anb] Extinct. Pastaza River. None in Ecuador. Alternate names: Shimigae, Semigae, Gae, Gaye. Dialects: A distinct language from Záparo (Kayapwe) of Ecuador, which is now extinct in Peru. Classification: Zaparoan

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Atsahuaca [atc] Extinct. Carama River, tributary of Tambopata, and Chaspa River, tributary of Inambari. Alternate names: Yamiaca. Classification: Panoan, North-Central

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Aushiri [avs] Extinct. Tributaries of the right bank of the Napo River, Escuelacocha. Alternate names: Auxira. Classification: Zaparoan

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Cholón [cht] Extinct. Valley of the Huallaga River from Tingo María to Valle. Alternate names: Tinganeses, Seeptsa. Dialects: Ruhlen says it is Andean. Adelaar says it is in the Hibito-Cholon family. Classification: Hibito-Cholon

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Hibito [hib] Extinct. Bobonaje River, tributary of Jelache, tributary of Huayabamba, coming into Huallaga on the west side. Alternate names: Jibito, Chibito, Zibito, Ibito, Xibita. Classification: Hibito-Cholon

More information.

 

Nocamán [nom] Extinct. Headwaters of the Inuya River, Amueya River, Tamaya River. Alternate names: Nocomán. Dialects: May have been a dialect of Cashibo. Classification: Panoan, Western

More information.

 

Omurano [omu] Extinct. Alternate names: Humurana, Roamaina, Numurana, Umurano, Mayna. Classification: Zaparoan

More information.

 

Panobo [pno] Extinct. Along the Ucayali River and mixed with the Shetebo. Alternate names: Manoa, Pano, Pana, Pelado, Wariapano, Huariapano. Classification: Panoan, Unclassified

More information.

 

Puquina [puq] Extinct. South shore of Lake Titicaca, town of Puquina. Classification: Unclassified

More information.

 

Quechua, Classical [qwc] Extinct. Central Peru. Classification: Quechuan, Quechua II, C

More information.

 

Remo [rem] Extinct. Between the Tapiche and Calleria rivers. If they exist, they are in Brazil at the headwaters of the Moa River; but there is no evidence of their existence in Brazil. Alternate names: Rheno. Classification: Panoan, North-Central

More information.

 

Sensi [sni] Extinct. Right bank of the Ucayali River. Alternate names: Senti, Tenti, Mananahua. Classification: Panoan, North-Central

More information.

 

Yameo [yme] Extinct. Marañon and Amazon rivers from the mouth of the Tigre to the Nanay River. Classification: Peba-Yagu

 

Capital city:

Lima

 

Meaning country name:

The exact meaning behind the word "Peru" remains obscure: the most popular theory derives it from the native word biru meaning "river" (compare with the River Biru in modern Ecuador). Another explanation claims that it comes from the name of the Indian chieftain Beru. Spanish explorers asked him the name of the land, but not understanding their language, he assumed they wanted his own name, which he gave them. Another possibility explanation traces the name to pelu, presumptively an old native name of the region.

 

Description Flag:

The flag of Peru was created by José de San Martín and adopted by the government of Peru in 1825. It is a vertical triband with red outer bands and a single white middle band. Depending on its use, it may be defaced with different emblems, and has different names.

 

Coat of arms:

The Coat of Arms of Peru is a national symbolic emblem of Peru. Four variants are used: the Coat of Arms per se (Escudo de Armas), the National Coat of Arms or National Shield (Escudo Nacional), the Great Seal of the State (Gran Sello del Estado) and the Naval Coat of Arms (Escudo de la Marina de Guerra).

All four share the same escutcheon or shield, consisting of three elements: the top left section shows the vicuña, the national animal, on a light-blue field, representing the fauna of Peru; the tree in the top right section is the cinchona tree (the source of quinine, a powerful anti-malarial drug and the key flavorant in "tonic water," used in making gin-and-tonics), on a white background, representing the national flora; and the bottom cornucopia with coins spilling from it, on a red field, represents the mineral resources of the country.

 

Motto:

"Happy and strong for the union"

 

National Anthem: National Anthem from peru

 

Somos libres, seámoslo siempre,

y antes niegue sus luces el sol

que faltemos al voto solemne

que la patria al Eterno elevó.

I

Largo tiempo el peruano oprimido

la ominosa cadena arrastró;

condenado a cruel servidumbre

largo tiempo en silencio gimió.

Mas apenas el grito sagrado

¡Libertad! en sus costas se oyó,

la indolencia de esclavo sacude,

la humillada cerviz levantó.

II

Ya el estruendo de broncas cadenas

que escuchamos tres siglos de horror,

de los libres al grito sagrado

que oyó atónito el mundo, cesó.

Por doquier San Martín inflamado,

libertad, libertad, pronunció,

y meciendo su base los Andes

la anunciaron, también, a una voz.

III

Con su influjo los pueblos despiertan

y cual rayo corrió la opinión;

desde el istmo a las tierras del fuego,

desde el fuego a la helada región.

Todos juran romper el enlace

que Natura a ambos mundos negó,

y quebrar ese cetro que España

reclinaba orgullosa en los dos.

IV

Lima, cumple ese voto solemne,

y, severa, su enojo mostró,

al tirano impotente lanzando,

que intentaba alargar su opresión.

A su esfuerzo saltaron los grillos

y los surcos que en sí reparó,

le atizaron el odio y venganza

que heredara de su Inca y Señor.

V

Compatriotas, no más verla esclava

si humillada tres siglos gimió,

para siempre jurémosla libre

manteniendo su propio esplendor.

Nuestros brazos, hasta hoy desarmados

estén siempre cebando el cañón,

que algún día las playas de Iberia

sentirán de su estruendo el terror.

VI

Excitemos los celos de España

pues presiente con mengua y furor

que en concurso de grandes naciones

nuestra patria entrará en parangón.

En la lista que de éstas se forme

llenaremos primero el reglón

que el tirano ambicioso Iberino,

que la América toda asoló.

VII

En su cima los Andes sostengan

la bandera o pendón bicolor,

que a los siglos anuncie el esfuerzo

que ser libres, por siempre nos dio.

A su sombra vivamos tranquilos,

y al nacer por sus cumbres el sol,

renovemos el gran juramento

que rendimos al Dios de Jacob.

 

English

 

We are free, may we always be so,

and let the sun rather deny its light

Than that we should fail the solemn vow

that the motherland to the Eternal elevated.

I

For a long time the oppressed Peruvian

the ominous chain dragged;

sentenced to cruel servitude

for a long time in silence he moaned.

But as soon as the sacred yell

Liberty! on its coasts was heard,

the indolence of a slave he shakes off,

the humiliated neck he raised.

II

Now the roar of rough chains

that we heard for three centuries of horror,

from the freed to the sacred yell,

that astonished the world heard, stopped.

Everywhere San Martín inflamed,

liberty, liberty, pronounced,

and rocking their base the Andes

they announced it, as well, in unison.

III

With its influx the peoples wake up

and like lighting ran the opinion;

from the isthmus to the lands of fire,

from fire to the icy region.

Everyone swears to break the link

that Nature denied to both worlds,

and break that sceptre that Spain

reclined proud on both.

IV

Lima, fulfill this solemn vow,

and, severe, its anger showed,

to the impotent tyrant throwing,

who tried to extend his oppression.

At his effort the grasshoppers jumped

and the furrows that he repaired,

stirred up his hate and vengeance

inherited from his Inca and Lord.

V

Countrymen, may we no more see her a slave

if humiliated for three centuries she moaned,

forever may we swear it free

maintaining her own splendor.

Our arms, until today unarmed

be always feeding the cannon,

that some day the beaches of Iberia

will feel horror from its roar.

VI

May we excite the jealously of Spain

since it has a feeling with shortage and furor

that in contest of great nations

our country will enter in comparison.

On the list formed by these

we shall fill first the line

than the ambitious Iberian tyrant,

who all of America knocked down.

VII

On its summit may the Andes sustain

the two-color flag or banner,

may it to the centuries announce the effort

that being free, forever gave us.

Under its shadow may we live calm,

and at the sun's birth by its summits,

may we renew the great oath

we rendered to the God of Jacob.

 

Internet Page: www.peru.gob.pe

www.peru.info

www.peru.com

 

Peru in diferent languages

 

eng | afr | bam | ces | dan | dsb | eus | fin | hau | hrv | hsb | hun | ibo | jav | kin | lav | lin | lit | mlt | nld | nor | pol | por | roh | ron | run | rup | slk | slv | sme | smo | sqi | swa | swe | szl | tgl | tur | wol | zza: Peru

arg | ast | cat | fao | glg | isl | scn | spa | tet: Perú

aze | bos | crh | kaa | mol | slo | tuk | uzb: Peru / Перу

cos | fur | ita | lld | srd: Perù

bre | cor | wln: Perou

deu | ltz | nds: Peru / Peru

aym | que: Piruw

est | vor: Peruu

fra | jnf: Pérou

ind | msa: Peru / ڤيرو

cym: Periw

epo: Peruo

frp: Pèrou

fry: Perû

gla: Pearu; Peru; Perù

gle: Peiriú / Peiriú

glv: Yn Pheroo

hat: Pewou

ina: Peru; Peruvia

kmr: Pêrû / Перу / پێروو

kur: Perû / پەروو

lat: Peruvia

mlg: Peroa

nrm: Pérouo

oci: Peró

rmy: Peru / पेरु

smg: Perū

vie: Pê-ru

vol: Peruvän

abq | alt | bul | che | chm | chv | kbd | kir | kjh | kom | krc | kum | mkd | mon | oss | rus | tyv | udm | ukr: Перу (Peru)

bak | srp | tat: Перу / Peru

bel: Перу / Pieru; Пэру / Peru

kaz: Перу / Perw / پەرۋ

tgk: Перу / پرو / Peru

ara: البيرو (al-Bīrū); بيرو (Bīrū)

fas: پرو / Peru

prs: پیرو (Pērū)

pus: پېرو (Perū)

uig: پېرۇ / Péru / Перу

urd: پیرو (Perū)

div: ޕެރޫ (Perū)

heb: פרו (Perû)

lad: פירו / Peru

yid: פּערו (Peru)

amh: ፔሩ (Peru)

ell-dhi: Περού (Peroý)

ell-kat: Περοῦ (Peroỹ); Περουβία (Peroyvía)

hye: Պերու (Perou)

kat: პერუ (Peru)

hin: पेरू (Perū); पीरू (Pīrū)

ben: পেরু (Peru); পিরু (Piru)

pan: ਪੇਰੂ (Perū)

kan: ಪೆರು (Peru)

mal: പെറു (Peṟu)

tam: பெரு (Peru)

tel: పెరూ (Perū)

zho: 祕魯/秘鲁 (Bìlǔ)

yue: 祕魯/秘鲁 (Beilóuh)

jpn: ペルー (Perū); ペル (Peru)

kor: 페루 (Peru)

mya: ပီရူး (Piẏù)

tha: เปรู (Pērū)

lao: ເປຣູ (Pēlū)

khm: ប៉េរ៉ូ (Berū); ប៉េរូ (Berū)

 

Haverfordwest a market town in Pembrokeshire, Wales.

 

The name of the town means "ford used by heifers" or "ford used by goats" from Old English hæfer. In local dialect, it is pronounced "Harford". "West" was added in the 15th century, to distinguish the town from Hereford. The Welsh name is said by B. G. Charles to be "merely a corruption of the English name".

 

The town has been English-speaking for centuries (South Pembrokeshire being known as 'Little England Beyond Wales'), but because the town markets traded the goods of Welsh farmers to the north and east, there has always been a significant Welsh-speaking influence. The suburb of Prendergast seems to have originated as an extramural Welsh dormitory, dating from the times when all agricultural trade had to pass through the borough, and the fearful Normans before the destruction of Anglo-Norman power in 1136 tried to prevent Welshmen bearing arms from entering within the castle walls after nightfall.

 

The scores of Iron Age and Roman coinage and artefact discoveries, and excavations by the Dyfed Archaeological Trust point to significant Roman penetration to this westernmost part of Wales.

 

The strategic position of Haverfordwest with its defensive bluff overlooking the lowest fordable point on the western Cleddau and accessible to sea traffic would have required a Roman presence, probably modest in scale, from the 1st century AD to protect supplies to and from the coast, e.g. the Roman legionary headquarters at Caerleon were roofed with slates from the lower slopes of the Preseli Hills.

 

In 1992 aerial photography identified a Roman road running west of Carmarthen past Wiston to Poyston Cross, raising the possibility of Roman fortlets at strategic river crossings at Whitland and Haverfordwest.

 

James Phillips, in The History of Pembrokeshire (published 1909), records a find of Roman silver coins in Haverfordwest, the earliest dated coin a Valerian and the latest a Claudius Gothicus. The museum in which the coins were deposited has been "scattered to the winds" and the whereabouts of the coins is unknown.

 

Phillips claimed that the pre-Norman name of Haverfordwest was Caer Alun, so named by the Emperor Maximus. His sources are not given but the Cambro-Briton in 1822 also recorded that Maximus, the last Roman Emperor of Britain on withdrawing Roman legions from Britain granted civic status and Celtic names to a number of pacified Romano-British settlements, including Southampton, Chichester, Old Sarum near Salisbury, Carmarthen and Haverfordwest.

 

Information Source:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haverfordwest

 

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The feast of St.Alphio (the festivities are in honor of the three holy martyrs brothers Alfio, Filadelfo and Cirino) are the most important religious festival in the city of Lentini (Sicily - Italy)

Historically, the three brothers were arrested and later executed for professing the Christian religion using their noble influence, as their parents had previously done, Vitale and Beatrice; after having undergone several trials throughout the central-southern territory of Italy, since nobody wanted to condemn them with a final sentence as belonging to one of the most important families of the empire, the three Saints, disembarked in Messina, suffered a further trial in Taormina, they stopped at Trecastagni and only at the end, on 3 September, they arrived in Lentini under the jurisdiction of King Tartullo, and in Lentini they were slaughtered.

The celebrations for the three Holy Martyrs are held in that of Lentini every year, on 9-10 and 11 May (and on 2 September, the date of the return of the sacred relics of the three brothers in the city, in 1517). St.Alphio is the Patron Saint of Lentini, and is considered the Holy Protector of the deaf-mutes.

The festivities begin on the evening of May 9, when the relic is carried in procession through the streets of the city. At one o'clock in the night we see the race by "nuri" ("nuri" is the dialectal voice of the so-called "nudes"), they are barefoot and half-naked devotees, dressed only in a short white shorts, also covered with a red band that surrounds the chest, holding with your right hand a bouquet of flowers (or on the shoulders a candle), while the left hand is carried behind the back, to evoke the chains that bound the three brothers (it is not to discard the hypothesis that this position of the left hand may be linked to the belief of medieval origin, that this hand was considered "impure" as it was considered at the time "the hand of the devil"); the "nuri" go during the night, along an ancient path called "saint route"; the younger men proceed with a fast race (sometimes they retrace the holy route several times), raising loudly in the middle of the night praises towards the three Holy Martyrs. The evening and night of the 9th, therefore, is dedicated to the passion that recalls martyrdom; the next day is that of the triumph: at 10 am, the silver float (the so-called "vara") leaves the Mother Church to be carried in procession through the streets of the city. St.Alphio, seated on his silver armchair, donated in the last century by Senator Luigi Beneventano, is taken out of the churchyard, escorted by the knights of the Holy Sepulcher, all the deputation, the pious devotees and canons. The festivities conclude at dawn on 11 morning, when St.Alphio returns to the Church and the last firecrackers burst.

  

La festa di sant'Alfio (i festeggiamenti sono in onore dei tre fratelli santi martiri Alfio, Filadelfo e Cirino) sono la più importante festa religiosa della città di Lentini (Sicilia).

Storicamente, i tre fratelli vennero arrestati ed in seguito giustiziati per aver professato la religione cristiana utilizzando la loro influenza nobile, come avevano fatto in precedenza i loro genitori, Vitale e Beatrice; dopo aver subito parecchi processi per tutto il territorio centro-meridionale d'Italia,, visto che nessuno voleva condannarli con una sentenza definitiva in quanto appartenenti ad una delle famiglie più importanti dell’impero, i tre Santi, sbarcarono a Messina, subirono un ulteriore processo a Taormina, si fermarono a Trecastagni e solo alla fine, il 3 settembre, arrivarono a Lentini sotto la giurisdizione di Re Tartullo, enel paese di Lentini furono trucidati.

Le celebrazioni per i tre Santi Martiri si svolgono in quel di Lentini tutti gli anni, il 9-10 ed 11 maggio (e il 2 settembre, data che ricorre il rientro delle sacre reliquie dei tre fratelli in città, nel 1517). Sant'Alfio è il Santo Patrono di Lentini, ed è considerato il Santo Protettore dei sordo-muti.

I festeggiamenti cominciano la sera del 9 maggio, quando la reliquia viene portata in processione per le vie della città. All'una di notte si assiste alla corsa dei "nuri" (voce dialettale dei cosiddetti "nudi"), sono devoti scalzi e seminudi, vestiti solo di un pantaloncino corto di colore bianco, ricoperti anche di una fascia rossa che cinge il torace, impugnando con la mano destra un mazzo di fiori (o sulle spalle un cero), mentre la mano sinistra è portata dietro la schiena, per rievocare le catene che legavano i tre fratelli (non è da scartare l'ipotesi che tale posizione della mano sinistra possa essere legata alla credenza di origine medioevale, che tale mano era considerata "impura" in quanto considerata all'epoca "la mano del diavolo"); i "nuri" percorrono, nella stessa notte tra il 9 e il 10, un antichissimo percorso chiamato "giro santo"; gli uomini più giovani procedono con una corsa veloce (a volte ripercorrono più volte il giro santo), elevando ad alta voce nel cuore della notte lodi verso i tre Santi Martiri. La serata e la notte del 9, perciò, è dedicata alla passione che ricorda il martirio; il giorno successivo è quello del trionfo: alle ore 10 del mattino, il fercolo d'argento (la cosiddetta vara) esce dalla Chiesa Madre per essere portato in processione per le vie della città, osannato dalla folla al grido di "prima Diu e poi li Santi, e viva i Mattri Santi". Sant'Alfio, seduto sulla sua poltrona d'argento, donata nel secolo scorso dal senatore Luigi Beneventano, viene portato fuori dal sagrato, scortato dai cavalieri del Santo Sepolcro con il mantello bianco crociato di rosso, tutta la deputazione, i devoti spingitori ed i canonici . I festeggiamenti si concludono all'alba dell'11 mattina, quando Sant'Alfio rientra in Chiesa e scoppiano gli ultimi mortaretti.

  

www.bap.de/start/musik/songtexte/titel/verdamp-lang-her --- www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghi2xReyFYA&feature=related --- www.worldvision.de/unsere-arbeit-wie-wir-arbeiten-entwick... ---

Bap Colognian (Kölsch) pronunciation: [/bap/] is a German rock group. With ten albums reaching the number one in the German record charts, Bap is one of the most successful rock acts in their home country.

 

Nearly all of Bap's lyrics are written in Kölsch, the dialect of Cologne, or more precisely in a Kölsch-influenced derivation of Eifelplatt, a regional variant of the Ripuarian language spoken in the nearby rural Eifel. Niedecken's most prominent musical influences, especially early in his career, were Bob Dylan, the Kinks, Bruce Springsteen, the Rolling Stones, and Wolfgang Ambros.

The group was founded in 1976 under the name Wolfgang Niedecken's Bap in Cologne, Germany by Wolfgang Niedecken and Hans Heres. In 1981 they released their most famous song "Verdamp lang her" (English: Damn long time ago), in which Niedecken describes regrets he has about his relationship with his then recently deceased father. The band's name "BAP" derived from "BAPP", both, a play-on-words on the Kölsch word "Papp" (related to the German word Papa for dad), but pronounced differently, and Niedecken's then-times nickname. BAP ist eine Kölschrockband um den Frontmann Wolfgang Niedecken und gilt als eine der erfolgreichsten Rockbands deutscher Sprache. Von den 23 BAP-Alben erreichten 19 die Top 10, zehn wurden sogar Nummer 1 der Charts.Die Gruppe um Sänger und Songschreiber Wolfgang Niedecken besteht seit 1976. Die Band traf sich zu Beginn in wechselnder Besetzung, um „einen Kasten Bier leerzuproben“.[1] Der erste Auftritt erfolgte 1977 im Mariensaal in Köln-Nippes mit zwei akustischen Gitarren (Wolfgang Niedecken, Hans Heres) und Perkussion (Afro Bauermann). Das erste Album, Wolfgang Niedecken's BAP rockt andere kölsche Leeder. erschien 1979, die Band bestand zu dieser Zeit aus Wolfgang Niedecken, Hans „Honçe“ Heres, Wolfgang „Gröön“ Klever, Manfred „Schmal“ Boecker, Wolfgang „Wolli“ Boecker und Bernd Odenthal. Die zweite LP Affjetaut folgte 1980, wie die Debüt-Platte noch unter der Bezeichnung „Wolfgang Niedeckens BAP“, da Niedecken sich bereits als Solo-Künstler mit Gitarre und Mundharmonika als „Bob Dylan der Südstadt“ einen Namen gemacht hatte; beide Platten wurden noch beim Kölner Independent-Label Eigelstein Musikproduktion veröffentlicht.

 

Der Bandname BAP entstand aus Niedeckens Spitzname, der seinen Vater so nannte. Diese Aussprache entstammt der Herkunft der Familie aus Rheinland-Pfalz, und weil sie vom kölschen „Pap“ abwich, entstand so Niedeckens Spitzname.[2] Als ein erster Auftritt geplant wurde, für den mit einem Plakat geworben werden sollte, musste ein Bandname erdacht werden. Hans Heres schlug dem Veranstalter vor, „BAPP“ zu nehmen.[3] Da sich die Bandmitglieder aber einig waren, dass „BAPP“ – mit zwei „P“ geschrieben – auf der Bassdrum nicht gut aussah, wurde einfach ein „P“ gestrichen.[4]

Der musikalische und inhaltliche Stil der BAP-Songs wird wesentlich von Bob Dylan, den Kinks und den Rolling Stones geprägt. Auch Bruce Springsteen, mit dem Sänger Wolfgang Niedecken eine persönliche Freundschaft verbindet, gilt als wichtiger Orientierungspunkt für BAP. Verschiedene BAP-Lieder, vor allem melancholische (z. B. Helfe kann dir keiner, Paar Daach fröher) zeigen in den Arrangements und der Stimmung deutliche Ähnlichkeiten mit Stücken von Wolfgang Ambros, etwa von dessen Album 19 Class A Numbers. Die Texte beschäftigen sich oft mit gesellschaftlichen oder persönlichen Problemen.1979 fanden unter dem Bandnamen "Wolfgang Niedeckens BAP" erste Auftritte außerhalb von Köln und der näheren Umgebung statt; so zum Beispiel auch anlässlich der Bundesgartenschau 1979 in der Bonner Rheinaue.[5] Im Mai 1982 machte BAP ihre erste professionell organisierte Deutschlandtournee. Im Mittelpunkt standen Songs des aktuellen Albums Für Usszeschnigge, das 1981 als erstes beim Major-Label EMI-Electrola erschienen war. Für den Wechsel von Eigelstein zur EMI mussten BAP in der lokalen Kultur-Szene viel Kritik einstecken, wurden jedoch mit Platz 1 in den deutschen Album-Charts prompt belohnt.

 

Im Sommer 1982 folgten verschiedene Auftritte im Rahmen von Großveranstaltungen und Fernsehproduktionen: Rockpop In Concert für das ZDF in der Dortmunder Westfalenhalle 1, Demonstration gegen die Nachrüstung der NATO am 10. Juni 1982 (Zehnter Juni) auf den Bonner Rheinwiesen, Vorprogramm der Rolling Stones am 4. und 5. Juli 1982 im Müngersdorfer Stadion in Köln und als erste deutsche Band bei einem Festival des WDR-Rockpalast am 28. August 1982 auf der Loreley-Freilichtbühne.

 

Nach Erscheinen des vierten Albums Vun drinne noh drusse war die Band zwischen Oktober 1982 und Oktober 1983 sieben Monate lang unterwegs. Neben Deutschland standen auch Konzerte in Österreich, der Schweiz und den Benelux-Ländern auf dem Programm. Insgesamt wurden etwa 130 Auftritte gespielt. Die Tournee endete mit einem Konzert im Kölner „Stollwerck“. Das vom Abriss bedrohte Bürgerhaus Stollwerck erhielt die Einnahmen dieses Konzerts zur Finanzierung seiner weiteren Arbeit. Am 28. Mai 1983 spielte BAP auf einem Festival im niedersächsischen Schüttorf im Vorprogramm von Rod Stewart und am 22. Oktober 1983 auf einer weiteren Großdemonstration gegen die NATO-Nachrüstung im Bonner Hofgarten.

 

Für den Januar 1984 war – nach langen Verhandlungen mit der staatlichen Künstleragentur – eine Tournee mit 14 Konzerten in 13 Städten der DDR geplant. Im Vorfeld der Tour zeichnete das DDR-Fernsehen ein Interview mit Wolfgang Niedecken inklusive zweier Unplugged-Versionen von BAP-Liedern auf. Dieses wurde später jedoch sinnentstellend verkürzt gesendet. So entschloss sich Niedecken, einige politische Statements, die der Band wichtig waren, in einem eigenen Lied darzustellen. Es wurde als Deshalv spill’ mer he betitelt und erstmals auf dem letzten „West-Konzert“ vor der Tour in Wolfsburg gespielt. Als die Band bereits in Ost-Berlin im Hotel Unter den Linden war, gab es am Vorabend des ersten Konzerts heftige Auseinandersetzungen über dieses Lied mit der DDR-Seite. Als die Band sich weigerte, es von der Setlist zu nehmen, kam es zum Eklat. Die Tournee wurde abgebrochen, bevor das erste Konzert auf dem Boden der DDR gespielt werden konnte. In einer Sendung des DDR-Fernsehens war die Ansage eines Moderators während eines Konzerts im Berliner Palast der Republik zu sehen, zu dem BAP geladen war. Er nannte als Begründung ihrer Absage, die Band wolle „nicht unter dem Symbol der weißen Taube auf blauem Grund auftreten“.[6]

 

Die Tournee zum Album Zwesche Salzjebäck un Bier begann am 15. und 16. Juni 1984 mit zwei Konzerten im Archäologischen Park in Xanten. Sie wurden vom ZDF aufgezeichnet und später in einer Zusammenfassung gesendet. Die Tour dauerte bis zum Februar 1985 und übertraf von der Zuschauerresonanz her noch die von 1982/83.

 

Am 2. März 1986 begann in Lohmar bei Köln die Tournee Ahl Männer, aalglatt. BAP spielte zunächst einige Konzerte im ländlichen Raum, bevor die Band am 15. März 1986 in der Essener Grugahalle bei der 17. und letzten Rocknacht des WDR-Rockpalast auftrat. Die Rocknacht, bei der auch Jackson Browne und Big Country auftraten, wurde wie schon das Festival auf der Loreley 1982 via Eurovision von vielen europäischen Radio- und Fernsehstationen ausgestrahlt.

 

Von April bis Juli folgten zahlreiche weitere Konzerte. Wegen der anhaltenden Popularität wurden teilweise auch größere Hallen ausgewählt. So fanden die „Heimspiele“ der Kölner Band erstmals in der bis zu 8000 Zuschauer fassenden Kölner Sporthalle, der damals größten Veranstaltungshalle der Domstadt, statt. Bei dieser Tournee gab es mit Christian Schneider erstmals auf einer Tournee einen Gastmusiker, weil die zum Teil sehr komplexen Keyboard-Arrangements des neuen Albums live mit nur einem Keyboarder nicht zu realisieren gewesen wären. Schneider spielte neben Keyboards bei einigen Stücken auch Saxophon. Den letzten Auftritt der Tour absolvierte die Band am 26. Juli 1986; genau drei Monate nach der Atomreaktor-Katastrophe von Tschernobyl auf dem legendären Anti-WAAhnsinns-Festival gegen die Wiederaufbereitungsanlage von Wackersdorf in Burglengenfeld.

 

Nach Ende der Tournee 1986 legte BAP eine kreative Pause ein (u. a. bedingt durch bandinterne, künstlerische Meinungsverschiedenheiten), die Wolfgang Niedecken zur Veröffentlichung seines Albums Schlagzeiten und zu einigen Solo-Konzerten nutzte. BAP stand erst im September 1987 bei zwei Festivals wieder auf der Bühne, um sich auf eine Tournee durch China vorzubereiten. Diese Tournee ist im Buch BAP övver China dokumentiert.

 

Das Album Da Capo wurde von Oktober bis Dezember 1988 zunächst bei einer ausgedehnten Hallentournee präsentiert. Bei dieser Tournee legte BAP die Scheu vor den ganz großen Konzertarenen endgültig ab. So standen auch die Frankfurter Festhalle und die Münchener Olympiahalle auf dem Programm. Im Sommer 1989 folgten weitere Konzerte, teilweise auch im Rahmen von Festivals gemeinsam mit Joe Cocker. Eines dieser Events fand in der Berliner Waldbühne statt.

 

Auch die Tournee 1991 wurde in mehreren Teilen durchgeführt. Kurz nach der Vollendung der deutschen Einheit standen im Januar 1991 zunächst die ersten Konzerte der Band auf dem Gebiet der ehemaligen DDR auf dem Programm. Anschließend ging BAP in Westdeutschland auf Club-Tour und absolvierte eine Reihe von Auftritten in beschaulichem Rahmen, zumeist in kleinen Hallen. Das Konzert im Kölner E-Werk wurde aufgezeichnet und später auf dem Album Live – Affrocke veröffentlicht.

 

Im Mai und Juni 1991 folgte eine Tournee ausschließlich durch die größten deutschen Konzerthallen und bei verschiedenen Open-Air-Festivals. Als Gast bei den Konzerten trat Julian Dawson auf. Am 26. Januar 1994 startete die Tournee zum im August 1993 erschienenen Album Pik Sibbe. Nach wie vor war die Nachfrage in der BAP-Hochburg Köln groß, in einigen anderen Städten blieben die Zuschauerzahlen etwas hinter den Erwartungen zurück. Die folgende Tournee zum Album Amerika begann im November 1996. Der Tourneestart in Koblenz wurde für den WDR-Rockpalast mitgeschnitten und später im Fernsehen ausgestrahlt.

 

Mit dem Ausstieg von Bassist Steve Borg und von Gründungsmitglied Manfred „Schmal“ Boecker verließen zwei Musiker die Band, die BAP über viele Jahre mitgeprägt haben. 1999 stieg auch Gitarrist Klaus „Major“ Heuser aus, der während 19 Jahren Bandmitgliedschaft die überwiegende Zahl der Lieder komponierte. Außerdem verließ Keyboarder Alexander „Effendi“ Büchel die Firma BAP. Diese Abgänge und die darauf folgenden Neubesetzungen veränderten den musikalischen Ausdruck von BAP nachhaltig.

 

Zu den Gründen für den Ausstieg von Major sagt Wolfgang Niedecken rückblickend im März 2011:

  

„Der Major ist ein toller Gitarrist. Aber er wollte, dass BAP international ausgerichteten Radio-Pop spielt. Ich wollte beim Kölsch-Rock bleiben. Beide Positionen waren nicht vereinbar. Ich bin ihm dankbar, dass er selbst gegangen ist. Ich hätte ihn nämlich nie rausgeschmissen.[7]“

 

Als Neuzugang an den Keyboards stieg Michael Nass bei BAP ein, der zuvor in den 1980er Jahren in der DDR-Musikszene musikalisch sehr aktiv war, u. a. bei P 16 und später in Liselotte Rezniceks Frauenband Mona Lise. Gitarrist wurde Helmut Krumminga. Im Sommer 2001 gab BAP vor der eigentlichen Aff un zo-Tour ab Herbst 2001 zwei Vorabkonzerte, darunter das „Konzert an der toten Brücke“ (Soda-Brücke) in Euskirchen, das auch vom WDR aufgezeichnet und wenige Tage später in der Sendung Rockpalast gesendet wurde. Das Album selbst stieg wie der Vorgänger Tonfilm auf Platz 1 in die deutschen Charts ein.

 

Im Januar 2006 war die Kölnarena zwar anlässlich des Starts der Jubiläumskonzerte zum 30-jährigen Bestehen der Band mit 25.000 Zuschauern an zwei aufeinander folgenden Tagen fast ausverkauft. Bei anderen Auftritten hatte man sich von vorneherein durch die Wahl kleinerer Konzertorte angepasst.

 

Auch das im Mai 2008 erschienene Album Radio Pandora stieg auf Platz 1 in die deutschen Charts ein. Im Winter 2008 startete die Tournee dazu, am 2. Weihnachtstag gab es das Heimspiel in der Köln-Arena (Lanxess-Arena); sie dauerte (mit Unterbrechungen) bis zum Sommer 2009, wobei die Band von Anne de Wolff (Violine, Bratsche, Gesang) und teilweise von Rhani Krija (Percussion) begleitet wurde.

 

Für November 2011 war der Start der aktuellsten Tournee geplant. Aufgrund einer schweren Erkrankung Wolfgang Niedeckens wurde der Start der Tour auf Anfang Mai 2012 verschoben.[8][9][10]

 

Auslandsauftritte [Bearbeiten]

 

BAP ist im Laufe der bisher 35-jährigen Bandgeschichte in vielen Ländern der Welt aufgetreten. Nachdem sich die Bandmitglieder anfangs kaum vorstellen konnten, dass ihre kölschen Texte außerhalb des Rheinlandes verstanden würden, durften sie erleben, dass ihre Platten weit darüber hinaus gekauft wurden. Tourneen waren dadurch auch im Ausland möglich.

 

Die ersten Auftritte außerhalb Deutschlands waren im Dezember 1982 in der Schweiz (Basel und St.Gallen)[11] und bis Mitte der 1980er Jahre in Österreich, Luxemburg, Belgien und Dänemark (Roskilde-Festival). Seitdem gehören Auftritte in diesen Nachbarländern zum Bestandteil jeder Tournee.

 

Spätere Fernreisen wurden zumeist als Begleitung zu künstlerischen oder politischen Themen organisiert; häufig war nicht die komplette Gruppe unterwegs; manchmal auch nur Wolfgang Niedecken alleine oder in Begleitung von Musikern seiner Solo-Projekte:

Mit einigen Gästen tourte BAP im Oktober 1987 vier Wochen durch China. Acht Auftritte wurden in Peking, Shanghai und Kanton absolviert.[12]

Wolfgang Niedecken spielte 1987 auf Einladung der Kulturstiftung Casa de los tres Mundos (ein Projekt des Schauspielers Dietmar Schönherr, des Produzenten Peter Reichelt und des Kulturministers Ernesto Cardenal) mit seiner Complizen-Band in Nicaragua.

In ähnlicher Zusammensetzung spielten Wolfgang Niedecken & Complizen 1988 in Mosambik eine kleine Tour.

Die politischen Veränderungen in der Sowjetunion unter Gorbatschow machten es möglich, dass BAP im Mai 1989 je drei Konzerte in Moskau und Wolgograd gab.[13] Dort kamen die Musiker auch mit Fans aus der DDR ins Gespräch. Nachdem die BAP-Tour durch Ostdeutschland 1984 abgesagt wurde, war der Umweg über die UdSSR die einzige Möglichkeit, als DDR-Bürger mit der Band zu sprechen.

 

More info and other languages available at:

 

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAP

A junk is a type of Chinese sailing ship with fully battened sails. There are two types of junk in China: Northern junk which is developed from Chinese river boats, and southern junk which is developed from Austronesian ship designs, examples of which have been trading with the Eastern Han dynasty since the 2nd century AD. They continued to evolve in the later dynasties, and were predominantly used by Chinese traders throughout Southeast Asia. They were found, and in lesser numbers are still found, throughout Southeast Asia and India, but primarily in China. Found more broadly today is a growing number of modern recreational junk-rigged sailboats. Chinese junks referred to many types of coastal or river ships. They were usually cargo ships, pleasure boats, or houseboats. They vary greatly in size and there are significant regional variations in the type of rig, however they all employ fully battened sails.

 

The term "junk" (Portuguese junco; Dutch jonk; and Spanish junco) was also used in the colonial period to refer to any large to medium-sized ships of the Austronesian cultures in Island Southeast Asia, with or without the junk rig. Examples include the Indonesian and Malaysian jong, the Philippine lanong, and the Maluku kora kora.

 

ETYMOLOGY

Views diverge on whether the origin of the word is from a dialect of Chinese or from a Javanese word. The term may stem from the Chinese chuán (船, "boat; ship") — also based on and pronounced as [dzuːŋ] (Pe̍h-ōe-jī: chûn) in Minnan Chinese — or zhōu (舟), the old word for a sailing vessel.[citation needed] The modern Mandarin Chinese word for an ocean-going wooden cargo vessel is cáo (艚).

 

Pierre-Yves Manguin and Zoetmulder, amongst others, point to an Old Javanese origin, in the form of jong. The word can be traced from an Old Javanese inscription in the 9th century. It entered the Malay and Chinese languages by the 15th century, when a Chinese word list identifies it as a Malay word for "ship." The Malay Maritime Code, first drawn up in the late 15th century, uses jong frequently as the word for freight ships. European writings from 1345 through 1601 use a variety of related terms, including jonque (French), ioncque (Italian), joanga or juanga (Spanish), junco (Portuguese), and jonk (Dutch). These terms were applied to all large ships in Southeast Asia, not only to Chinese ships.

 

The origin of the word "junk" in the English language can be traced to the Portuguese word junco, which is rendered from the Arabic word j-n-k (جنك). This word comes from the fact that the Arabic script cannot represent the digraph "ng". The word was used to denote both the Javanese/Malay ship (jong or djong) and the Chinese ship (chuán), even though the two were markedly different vessels. After the disappearance of jongs in the 17th century, the meaning of "junk" (and other similar words in European languages), which until then was used as a transcription of the word "jong" in Malay and Javanese, changed its meaning to exclusively refer to the Chinese ship (chuán).

 

CONSTRUCTION

The historian Herbert Warington Smyth considered the junk as one of the most efficient ship designs, stating that "As an engine for carrying man and his commerce upon the high and stormy seas as well as on the vast inland waterways, it is doubtful if any class of vessel… is more suited or better adapted to its purpose than the Chinese or Indian junk, and it is certain that for flatness of sail and handiness, the Chinese rig is unsurpassed."

 

SAILS

The sail of Chinese junks is an adoption of the Malay junk sail, which used vegetable matting attached to bamboo battens, a practice originated from South East Asia. The full-length battens keep the sail flatter than ideal in all wind conditions. Consequently, their ability to sail close to the wind is poorer than other fore-and-aft rigs.

 

HULL

Classic junks were built of softwoods (although after the 17th century teak was used in Guangdong) with the outside shape built first. Then multiple internal compartment/bulkheads accessed by separate hatches and ladders, reminiscent of the interior structure of bamboo, were built in. Traditionally, the hull has a horseshoe-shaped stern supporting a high poop deck. The bottom is flat in a river junk with no keel (similar to a sampan), so that the boat relies on a daggerboard, leeboard or very large rudder to prevent the boat from slipping sideways in the water. Ocean-going junks have a curved hull in section with a large amount of tumblehome in the topsides. The planking is edge nailed on a diagonal. Iron nails or spikes have been recovered from a Canton dig dated to circa 221 BC. For caulking the Chinese used a mix of ground lime with Tung oil together with chopped hemp from old fishing nets which set hard in 18 hours, but usefully remained flexible. Junks have narrow waterlines which accounts for their potential speed in moderate conditions, although such voyage data as we have indicates that average speeds on voyage for junks were little different from average voyage speeds of almost all traditional sail, i.e. around 4–6 knots. The largest junks, the treasure ships commanded by Ming dynasty Admiral Zheng He, were built for world exploration in the 15th century, and according to some interpretations may have been over 120 metres in length. This conjecture was based on the size of a rudder post that was found and misinterpreted, using formulae applicable to modern engine powered ships. More careful analysis shows that the rudder post that was found is actually smaller than the rudder post shown for a 70' long Pechili Trader in Worcester's "Junks and Sampans of the Yangtze".

 

Another characteristic of junks, interior compartments or bulkheads, strengthened the ship and slowed flooding in case of holing. Ships built in this manner were written of in Zhu Yu's book Pingzhou Table Talks, published by 1119 during the Song dynasty. Again, this type of construction for Chinese ship hulls was attested to by the Moroccan Muslim Berber traveler Ibn Battuta (1304–1377 AD), who described it in great detail (refer to Technology of the Song dynasty). Although some historians have questioned whether the compartments were watertight, most believe that watertight compartments did exist in Chinese junks because although most of the time there were small passageways (known as limber holes) between compartments, these could be blocked with stoppers and such stoppers have been identified in wrecks. All wrecks discovered so far have limber holes; these are different from the free flooding holes that are located only in the foremost and aftermost compartments, but are at the base of the transverse bulkheads allowing water in each compartment to drain to the lowest compartment, thus facilitating pumping. It is believed from evidence in wrecks that the limber holes could be stopped either to allow the carriage of liquid cargoes or to isolate a compartment that had sprung a leak.

Benjamin Franklin wrote in a 1787 letter on the project of mail packets between the United States and France:

 

As these vessels are not to be laden with goods, their holds may without inconvenience be divided into separate apartments, after the Chinese manner, and each of these apartments caulked tight so as to keep out water.

— Benjamin Franklin, 1787

 

In 1795, Sir Samuel Bentham, inspector of dockyards of the Royal Navy, and designer of six new sailing ships, argued for the adoption of "partitions contributing to strength, and securing the ship against foundering, as practiced by the Chinese of the present day". His idea was not adopted. Bentham had been in China in 1782, and he acknowledged that he had got the idea of watertight compartments by looking at Chinese junks there. Bentham was a friend of Isambard Brunel, so it is possible that he had some influence on Brunel's adoption of longitudinal, strengthening bulkheads in the lower deck of the SS Great Britain. Bentham had already by this time designed and had built a segmented barge for use on the Volga River, so the idea of transverse hull separation was evidently in his mind. Perhaps more to the point, there is a very large difference between the transverse bulkheads in Chinese construction, which offer no longitudinal strengthening, and the longitudinal members which Brunel adopted, almost certainly inspired by the iron bridge and boiler engineering in which he and his contemporaries in iron shipbuilding innovation were most versed.

 

Due to the numerous foreign primary sources that hint to the existence of true watertight compartments in junks, historians such as Joseph Needham proposed that the limber holes were stopped up as noted above in case of leakage. He addresses the quite separate issue of free-flooding compartments on pg 422 of Science and Civilisation in Ancient China:

 

Less well known is the interesting fact that in some types of Chinese craft the foremost (and less frequently also the aftermost) compartment is made free-flooding. Holes are purposely contrived in the planking. This is the case with the salt-boats which shoot the rapids down from Tzuliuching in Szechuan, the gondola-shaped boats of the Poyang Lake, and many sea going junks. The Szechuanese boatmen say that this reduces resistance to the water to a minimum, though such a claim makes absolutely no hydrodynamic sense, and the device is thought to cushion the shocks of pounding when the boat pitches heavily in the rapids, as it acquires and discharges water ballast rapidly supposedly just at the time when it is most desirable to counteract buffeting at stem and stern. As with too many such claims, there has been no empirical testing of them and it seems unlikely that the claims would stand up to such testing since the diameter or number of holes needed for such rapid flooding and discharging would be so great as to significantly weaken the vulnerable fore and aft parts of the vessel. The sailors say, as sailors all over the world are inclined to do when conjuring up answers to landlubbers' questions, that it stops junks flying up into the wind. It may be the reality at the bottom of the following story, related by Liu Ching-Shu of the +5th century, in his book I Yuan (Garden of Strange Things)

 

In Fu-Nan (Cambodia) gold is always used in transactions. Once there were (some people who) having hired a boat to go from east to west near and far, had not reached their destination when the time came for the payment of the pound (of gold) which had been agreed upon. They therefore wished to reduce the quantity (to be paid). The master of the ship then played a trick upon them. He made (as it were) a way for the water to enter the bottom of the boat, which seemed to be about to sink, and remained stationary, moving neither forward nor backward. All the passengers were very frightened and came to make offerings. The boat (afterwards) returned to its original state.

 

This, however, would seem to have involved openings which could be controlled, and the water pumped out afterwards. This was easily effected in China (still seen in Kuangtung and Hong Kong), but the practice was also known in England, where the compartment was called the 'wet-well', and the boat in which it was built, a 'well-smack'. If the tradition is right that such boats date in Europe from +1712 then it may well be that the Chinese bulkhead principle was introduced twice, first for small coastal fishing boats at the end of the seventeenth century, and then for large ships a century later. However, the wet well is probably a case of parallel invention since its manner of construction is quite different from that of Chinese junks, the wet well quite often not running the full width of the boat, but only occupying the central part of the hull either side of the keel.

 

More to the point[24] wet wells were apparent in Roman small craft of the 5th century CE.

 

LEEBOARDS AND CENTERBOARDS

Leeboards and centerboards, used to stabilize the junk and to improve its capability to sail upwind, are documented from a 759 AD book by Li Chuan. The innovation was adopted by Portuguese and Dutch ships around 1570. Junks often employ a daggerboard that is forward on the hull which allows the center section of the hull to be free of the daggerboard trunk allowing larger cargo compartments. Because the daggerboard is located so far forward, the junk must use a balanced rudder to counteract the imbalance of lateral resistance.

 

Other innovations included the square-pallet bilge pump, which was adopted by the West during the 16th century for work ashore, the western chain pump, which was adopted for shipboard use, being of a different derivation. Junks also relied on the compass for navigational purposes. However, as with almost all vessels of any culture before the late 19th century, the accuracy of magnetic compasses aboard ship, whether from a failure to understand deviation (the magnetism of the ship's iron fastenings) or poor design of the compass card (the standard drypoint compasses were extremely unstable), meant that they did little to contribute to the accuracy of navigation by dead reckoning. Indeed, a review of the evidence shows that the Chinese embarked magnetic pointer was probably little used for navigation. The reasoning is simple. Chinese mariners were as able as any and, had they needed a compass to navigate, they would have been aware of the almost random directional qualities when used at sea of the water bowl compass they used. Yet that design remained unchanged for some half a millennium. Western sailors, coming upon a similar water bowl design (no evidence as to how has yet emerged) very rapidly adapted it in a series of significant changes such that within roughly a century the water bowl had given way to the dry pivot, a rotating compass card a century later, a lubberline a generation later and gimbals seventy or eighty years after that. These were necessary because in the more adverse climatic context of north western Europe, the compass was needed for navigation. Had similar needs been felt in China, Chinese mariners would also have come up with fixes. They didn't.

 

STEERING

Junks employed stern-mounted rudders centuries before their adoption in the West for the simple reason that Western hull forms, with their pointed sterns, obviated a centreline steering system until technical developments in Scandinavia created the first, iron mounted, pintle and gudgeon 'barn door' western examples in the early 12th century CE. A second reason for this slow development was that the side rudders in use were, contrary to a lot of very ill-informed opinion, extremely efficient. Thus the junk rudder's origin, form and construction was completely different in that it was the development of a centrally mounted stern steering oar, examples of which can also be seen in Middle Kingdom (c.2050–1800 BCE) Egyptian river vessels. It was an innovation which permitted the steering of large ships and due to its design allowed height adjustment according to the depth of the water and to avoid serious damage should the junk ground. A sizable junk can have a rudder that needed up to twenty members of the crew to control in strong weather. In addition to using the sail plan to balance the junk and take the strain off the hard to operate and mechanically weakly attached rudder, some junks were also equipped with leeboards or dagger boards. The world's oldest known depiction of a stern-mounted rudder can be seen on a pottery model of a junk dating from before the 1st century AD, though some scholars think this may be a steering oar; a possible interpretation given is that the model is of a river boat that was probably towed or poled.

 

From sometime in the 13th to 15th centuries, many junks began incorporating "fenestrated" rudders (rudders with large diamond-shaped holes in them), probably adopted to lessen the force needed to direct the steering of the rudder.

 

The rudder is reported to be the strongest part of the junk. In the Tiangong Kaiwu "Exploitation of the Works of Nature" (1637), Song Yingxing wrote, "The rudder-post is made of elm, or else of langmu or of zhumu." The Ming author also applauds the strength of the langmu wood as "if one could use a single silk thread to hoist a thousand jun or sustain the weight of a mountain landslide."

 

HISTORY

2nd CENTURY (HAN DYNASTY)

Chinese ships were essentially fluvial before the Song dynasty.[1] However, large Austronesian trading ships docking in Chinese seaports with as many as four sails were recorded by scholars as early as the Han Dynasty (206 BCE – 220 CE). They called them the kunlun bo or kunlun po (崑崙舶, lit. "ship of the [dark-skinned] Kunlun people"). They were booked by Chinese Buddhist pilgrims for passage to Southern India and Sri Lanka.

 

The 3rd century book "Strange Things of the South" (南州異物志) by Wan Chen (萬震) describes one of these Austronesian ships as being capable of 600-700 people together with more than 10,000 hu (斛) of cargo (250-1000 tons according to various interpretations - 600 tons deadweight according to Manguin).[8]:262 The ships could be more than 50 meters in length and had a freeboard of 5.2–7.8 meters. When seen from above they resemble covered galleries. He explains the ships' sail design as follows:

 

The people beyond the barriers, according the size of their ships, sometimes rig (as many as) four sails which they carry in row from bow to stern. (...) The four sails do not face directly forward, but are set obliquely, and so arranged that they can all be fixed in the same direction, to receive the wind and to spill it. Those sails which are behind the most windward one receiving the pressure of the wind, throw it from one to the other, so that they all profit from its force. If it is violent, (the sailors) diminish or augment the surface of the sails according to the conditions. This oblique rig, which permits the sails to receive from one another the breath of the wind, obviates the anxiety attendant upon having high masts. Thus these ships sail without avoiding strong winds and dashing waves, by the aid of which they can make great speed.

— Wan Chen,

 

A 260 CE book by K'ang T'ai (康泰) described ships with seven sails called po for transporting horses that could travel as far as Syria. He also made reference to monsoon trade between the islands (or archipelago), which took a month and a few days in a large po. Southern Chinese junks were based on keeled and multi-planked Austronesian jong (known as po by the Chinese, from Javanese or Malay perahu - large ship). Southern Chinese junks showed characteristics of Austronesian jong: V-shaped, double-ended hull with a keel, and using timbers of tropical origin. This is different from northern Chinese junks, which are developed from flat bottomed riverine boats. The northern Chinese junks had flat bottoms, no keel, no frames (only water-tight bulkheads), transom stern and stem, would have been built out of pine or fir wood, and would have its planks fastened with iron nails or clamps.

 

10–13th CENTURY (SONG DYNASTY)

The trading dynasty of the Song developed the first junks based on Southeast Asian ships. By this era they also have adopted the Malay junk sail. The ships of the Song, both mercantile and military, became the backbone of the navy of the following Yuan dynasty. In particular the Mongol invasions of Japan (1274–84), as well as the Mongol invasion of Java (both failed), essentially relied on recently acquired Song naval capabilities. Worcester estimates that Yuan junks were 11 m in beam and over 30 m long. In general they had no keel, stempost, or sternpost. They did have centreboards, and watertight bulkhead to strengthen the hull, which added great weight. Further excavations showed that this type of vessel was common in the 13th century. By using the ratio between number of soldiers and ships in both invasions, it can be concluded that each ship may carry 20-70 men.[

 

14th CENTURY (YUAN DYNASTY)

The enormous dimensions of the Chinese ships of the Medieval period are described in Chinese sources, and are confirmed by Western travelers to the East, such as Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta and Niccolò da Conti. According to Ibn Battuta, who visited China in 1347:

 

. . . We stopped in the port of Calicut, in which there were at the time thirteen Chinese vessels, and disembarked. On the China Sea traveling is done in Chinese ships only, so we shall describe their arrangements. The Chinese vessels are of three kinds; large ships called chunks (junks), middle sized ones called zaws (dhows) and the small ones kakams. The large ships have anything from twelve down to three sails, which are made of bamboo rods plaited into mats. They are never lowered, but turned according to the direction of the wind; at anchor they are left floating in the wind. A ship carries a complement of a thousand men, six hundred of whom are sailors and four hundred men-at-arms, including archers, men with shields and crossbows, who throw naphtha. Three smaller ones, the "half", the "third" and the "quarter", accompany each large vessel. These vessels are built in the towns of Zaytun (a.k.a. Zaitun; today's Quanzhou; 刺桐) and Sin-Kalan. The vessel has four decks and contains rooms, cabins, and saloons for merchants; a cabin has chambers and a lavatory, and can be locked by its occupants. This is the manner after which they are made; two (parallel) walls of very thick wooden (planking) are raised and across the space between them are placed very thick planks (the bulkheads) secured longitudinally and transversely by means of large nails, each three ells in length. When these walls have thus been built the lower deck is fitted in and the ship is launched before the upper works are finished. - Ibn Battuta

 

15–17th CENTURY (MING DYNASTY)

From the mid-15th to early 16th century, all Chinese maritime trading was banned under the Ming Dynasty. The shipping and shipbuilding knowledge acquired during the Song and Yuan dynasties gradually declined during this period.

 

EXPEDITION OF ZHENG HE

The largest junks ever built were possibly those of Admiral Zheng He, for his expeditions in the Indian Ocean (1405 to 1433), although this is disputed as no contemporary records of the sizes of Zheng He's ships are known. Instead the dimensions are based on Sanbao Taijian Xia Xiyang Ji Tongsu Yanyi (1597), a romanticized version of the voyages written by Luo Maodeng [zh] nearly two centuries later. Maodeng's novel describes Zheng He's ships as follows:

 

Treasure ships, used by the commander of the fleet and his deputies (Nine-masted junks, claimed by the Ming Shi to be about 420 feet long and 180 feet wide).

Horse ships, carrying tribute goods and repair material for the fleet (Eight-masted junks, about 340 feet long and 140 feet wide)

Supply ships, containing food-staple for the crew (Seven-masted junks, about 260 feet long and 115 feet wide).

Troop transports (Six-masted junks, about 220 feet long and 83 feet wide).

Fuchuan warships (Five-masted junks, about 165 feet long).

Patrol boats (Eight-oared, about 120 feet long).

Water tankers, with 1 month's supply of fresh water.

 

Some recent research suggests that the actual length of the biggest treasure ships may have been between 119–124 m long and 49–51 m wide, while others estimate them to be 61–76 m in length.

 

CAPTURE OF TAIWAN

In 1661, a naval fleet of 400 junks and 25,000 men led by the Ming loyalist Zheng Chenggong (Cheng Ch'eng-kung in Wade–Giles, known in the West as Koxinga), arrived in Taiwan to oust the Dutch from Zeelandia. Following a nine-month siege, Cheng captured the Dutch fortress Fort Zeelandia. A peace treaty between Koxinga and the Dutch Government was signed at Castle Zeelandia on February 1, 1662, and Taiwan became Koxinga's base for the Kingdom of Tungning.

 

JAVANESE

The physical description of Javanese junk differed from Chinese junk. It was made of very thick wood, and as the ship got old, it was fixed with new boards, with four closing boards, stacked together. The rope and the sail was made with woven rattan. The jong was made using jaty/jati wood (teak) at the time of this report (1512), at that time Chinese junks are using softwood as the main material. The jong's hull is formed by joining planks to the keel and then to each other by wooden dowels, without using either a frame (except for subsequent reinforcement), nor any iron bolts or nails. The planks are perforated by an auger and inserted with dowels, which remains inside the fastened planks, not seen from the outside. On some of the smaller vessels parts may be lashed together with vegetable fibers. The vessel was similarly pointed at both ends, and carried two oar-like rudders and lateen-rigged sails (actually tanja sail),[note 1] but it may also use junk sail, a sail of Malay origin. It differed markedly from the Chinese vessel, which had its hull fastened by strakes and iron nails to a frame and to structurally essential bulkheads which divided the cargo space. The Chinese vessel had a single rudder on a transom stern, and (except in Fujian and Guangdong) they had flat bottoms without keels.

 

Encounters with giant jongs were recorded by Western travelers. Giovanni da Empoli said that the junks of Java were no different in their strength than a castle, because the three and four boards, layered one above the other, could not be harmed with artillery. They sailed with their women, children, and families, with everyone mainly keeping to their respective rooms. Portuguese recorded at least two encounters with large Djongs, one was encountered off the coast of Pacem (Samudera Pasai Sultanate) and the other was owned by Pati Unus, who went on to attack Malacca in 1513. Characteristics of the 2 ships were similar, both were larger than Portuguese ship, built with multiple plankings, resistant to cannon fire, and had two oar-like rudders on the side of the ship. At least Pati Unus' jong was equipped with three layers of sheathing which the Portuguese said over one cruzado in thickness each. The Chinese banned foreign ships from entering Guangzhou, fearing the Javanese or Malay junks would attack and capture the city, because it is said that one of these junk would rout twenty Chinese junks.

 

Main production location of Djong was mainly constructed in two major shipbuilding centres around Java: north coastal Java, especially around Rembang-Demak (along the Muria strait) and Cirebon; and the south coast of Borneo (Banjarmasin) and adjacent islands. A common feature of these places was their accessibility to forests of teak, this wood was highly valued because of its resistance to shipworm, whereas Borneo itself would supply ironwood. Pegu, which is a large shipbuilding port at the 16th century, also produced jong, built by Javanese who resided there.

 

ACCOUNTS OF MEDIEVAL TRAVELLERS

Niccolò da Conti in relating his travels in Asia between 1419 and 1444, describes huge junks of about 2,000 tons in weight: They build some ships much larger than ours, capable of containing 2,000 tons in size, with five sails and as many masts. The lower part is constructed with of three planks, in order to withstand the force of the tempest to which they are much exposed. But some ships are built in compartments, that should one part is shattered, the other portion remaining intact to accomplish the voyage.Other translations of the passage give the size as a 2000 butts, which would be around a 1000 tons, a butt being half a ton.Also, in 1456, the Fra Mauro map described the presence of junks in the Indian Ocean as well as their construction:

 

The ships called junks (lit. "Zonchi") that navigate these seas carry four masts or more, some of which can be raised or lowered, and have 40 to 60 cabins for the merchants and only one tiller. They can navigate without a compass, because they have an astrologer, who stands on the side and, with an astrolabe in hand, gives orders to the navigator.

— Text from the Fra Mauro map, 09-P25,

 

Fra Mauro further explains that one of these junks rounded the Cape of Good Hope and travelled far into the Atlantic Ocean, in 1420:

 

About the year of Our Lord 1420 a ship, what is called an Indian Zoncho, on a crossing of the Sea of India towards the "Isle of Men and Women", was diverted beyond the "Cape of Diab" (Shown as the Cape of Good Hope on the map), through the "Green Isles" (lit. "isole uerde", Cabo Verde Islands), out into the "Sea of Darkness" (Atlantic Ocean) on a way west and southwest. Nothing but air and water was seen for 40 days and by their reckoning they ran 2,000 miles and fortune deserted them. When the stress of the weather had subsided they made the return to the said "Cape of Diab" in 70 days and drawing near to the shore to supply their wants the sailors saw the egg of a bird called roc, which egg is as big as an amphora.

— Text from Fra Mauro map, 10-A13,

 

ASIAN TRADE

Chinese junks were used extensively in Asian trade during the 16th and 17th century, especially to Southeast Asia and to Japan, where they competed with Japanese Red Seal Ships, Portuguese carracks and Dutch galleons. Richard Cocks, the head of the English trading factory in Hirado, Japan, recorded that 50 to 60 Chinese junks visited Nagasaki in 1612 alone.

 

These junks were usually three masted, and averaging between 200 and 800 tons in size, the largest ones having around 130 sailors, 130 traders and sometimes hundreds of passengers.

 

19th CENTURY (QING DYNASTY)

Large, ocean-going junks played a key role in Asian trade until the 19th century. One of these junks, Keying, sailed from China around the Cape of Good Hope to the United States and England between 1846 and 1848. Many junks were fitted out with carronades and other weapons for naval or piratical uses. These vessels were typically called "war junks" or "armed junks" by Western navies which began entering the region more frequently in the 18th century. The British, Americans and French fought several naval battles with war junks in the 19th century, during the First Opium War, Second Opium War and in between.

 

At sea, junk sailors co-operated with their Western counterparts. For example, in 1870 survivors of the English barque Humberstone shipwrecked off Formosa, were rescued by a junk and landed safely in Macao.

 

20th CENTURY

In 1938, E. Allen Petersen escaped the advancing Japanese armies by sailing a 11 m junk, Hummel Hummel, from Shanghai to California with his wife Tani and two White Russians (Tsar loyalists). In 1939, Richard Halliburton was lost at sea with his crew while sailing a specially constructed junk, Sea Dragon, from Hong Kong to the World Exposition in San Francisco.

 

In 1955, six young men sailed a Ming dynasty-style junk from Taiwan to San Francisco. The four-month journey aboard the Free China was captured on film and their arrival into San Francisco made international front-page news. The five Chinese-born friends saw an advertisement for an international trans-Atlantic yacht race, and jumped at the opportunity for adventure. They were joined by the then US Vice-Consul to China, who was tasked with capturing the journey on film. Enduring typhoons and mishaps, the crew, having never sailed a century-old junk before, learned along the way. The crew included Reno Chen, Paul Chow, Loo-chi Hu, Benny Hsu, Calvin Mehlert and were led by skipper Marco Chung. After a journey of 9,700 km, the Free China and her crew arrived in San Francisco Bay in fog on August 8, 1955. Shortly afterward the footage was featured on ABC television's Bold Journey travelogue. Hosted by John Stephenson and narrated by ship's navigator Paul Chow, the program highlighted the adventures and challenges of the junk's sailing across the Pacific, as well as some humorous moments aboard ship.

 

In 1959 a group of Catalan men, led by Jose Maria Tey, sailed from Hong Kong to Barcelona on a junk named Rubia. After their successful journey this junk was anchored as a tourist attraction at one end of Barcelona harbor, close to where La Rambla meets the sea. Permanently moored along with it was a reproduction of Columbus' caravel Santa Maria during the 1960s and part of the 1970s.

 

In 1981, Christoph Swoboda had a 65 feet (LoA) Bedar built by the boatyard of Che Ali bin Ngah on Duyong island in the estuary of the Terengganu river on the East coast of Malaysia. The Bedar is one of the two types of Malay junk schooners traditionally built there. He sailed this junk with his family and one friend to the Mediterranean and then continued with changing crew to finally finish a circumnavigation in 1998. He sold this vessel in 2000 and in 2004 he started to build a new junk in Duyong with the same craftsmen: the Pinas (or Pinis) Naga Pelangi, in order to help keep this ancient boat building tradition alive. This boat finished to be fitted out in 2010 and is working as a charter boat in the Andaman and the South China Sea.

 

WIKIPEDIA

1920s electric tram operating in Darmstadt, Germany. Now used for tourism, parties etc..

 

In fact, it can also be used to free the power lines from ice after a heavy ice storm. This was found out after one such event a few winters ago. All the modern trams were stuck because their electronics shut them down automatically to protect their delicate pantographs from damage as these skipped over the pieces of ice, leading to impressive showers of sparks. But the old pre-war trams just went on undeterred, their much more rugged pantographs scraping the ice off the power lines so their modern brethren were again clear to go.

 

This tram is called "Datterich Express" after a character invented by playwright Ernst Elias Niebergall in the early 1800s. "Datterich" in the local dialect means someone who's got the shakes, in this case because of decades of alcohol abuse. I don't know why they chose just this guy as a city mascot, but they did.

 

Look at the dude who's driving. Is he cool, or is he?

 

Seiko Epson R-D1x with Leitz Summicron-C 40 mm. Obviously shot in B&W. What else?

Manarola (La Spezia) al tramonto /

 

Manarola (Manaea in the local dialect) is a small town, a frazione of the comune (municipality) of Riomaggiore, in the province of La Spezia, Liguria, northern Italy. It is the second smallest of the famous "Cinque Terre" towns frequented by tourists.

Manarola may be the oldest of the towns in the Cinque Terre, with the cornerstone of the church, San Lorenzo, dating from 1338. The local dialect is Manarolese, which is marginally different from the dialects in the nearby area. The name "Manarola" is probably dialectical evolution of the Latin, "magna rota". In the Manarolese dialect this was changed to "magna roea" which means "large wheel", in reference to the mill wheel in the town [1].

 

Manarola's primary industries have traditionally been fishing and wine-making. The local wine, called Sciacchetrà, is especially renowned; references from Roman writings mention the high quality of the wine produced in the region. In recent years, Manarola and its neighboring towns have become popular tourist destinations, particularly in the summer months. Tourist attractions in the region include a famous walking trail between Manarola and Riomaggiore (called Via dell'Amore, "Love's Trail") and hiking trails in the hills and vineyards above the town. Manarola is one of the five villages. Mostly all of the houses are bright and colourful. (Wikipedia)

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Mozambique, officially the Republic of Mozambique is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest.

The area was explored by Vasco da Gama in 1498 and colonized by Portugal in 1505. Mozambique became independent in 1975, to which it became the People's Republic of Mozambique shortly after, and was the scene of an intense civil war lasting from 1977 to 1992. The country was named Moçambique by the Portuguese after the Island of Mozambique, derived from Musa Al Big or Mossa Al Bique or Mussa Ben Mbiki, an Arab trader who first visited the island and later lived there.

Mozambique is a member of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries and the Commonwealth of Nations and an observer of the Francophonie. Mozambique's life expectancy and infant mortality rates are both among the worst ranked in the world due to the excessive malaria carrying mosquitoes. Its Human Development Index is one of the lowest on earth.

 

History

 

Early migrations

Between the first and fifth centuries AD, waves of Bantu-speaking people migrated from the west and north through the Zambezi River valley and then gradually into the plateau and coastal areas. They established agricultural communities or societies based on herding cattle. They brought with them the technology for iron making, a metal which they used to make weapons for the conquest of their neighbors. Cities in Mozambique during the Middle Ages (5th to the 16th century) were not sturdily built, so there is little left of many medieval cities such as the trading port Sofala. Nevertheless several Swahili trade ports dotted the coast of the country before the arrival of Arabs and the Portuguese which had been trading with Madagascar and the Far East.

Swahili, Arab and Portuguese rule

When Portuguese explorers reached East Africa in 1498, Swahili and Arabic commercial settlements had existed along the coast and outlying islands for several centuries. From about 1500, Portuguese trading posts and forts displaced the Arabic commercial and military hegemony becaming regular ports of call on the new European sea route to the east.

The voyage of Vasco da Gama around the Cape of Good Hope into the Indian Ocean in 1498 marked the Portuguese entry into trade, politics, and society in the Indian Ocean world. The Portuguese gained control of the Island of Mozambique and the port city of Sofala in the early 16th century, and by the 1530s small groups of Portuguese traders and prospectors penetrated the interior regions seeking gold, where they set up garrisons and trading posts at Sena and Tete on the Zambezi River and tried to gain exclusive control over the gold trade. The Portuguese attempted to legitimize and consolidate their trade and settlement positions through the creation of prazos (land grants) tied to Portuguese settlement and administration. While prazos were originally developed to be held by Portuguese, through intermarriage they became African Portuguese or African Indian centres defended by large African slave armies known as Chikunda. Historically within Mozambique there was slavery. Human beings were bought and sold by African tribal chiefs, Arab traders, and the Portuguese. Many Mozambican slaves were supplied by tribal chiefs who raided warring tribes and sold their captives to the prazeiros.

Although Portuguese influence gradually expanded, its power was limited and exercised through individual settlers and officials who were granted extensive autonomy. The Portuguese were able to wrest much of the coastal trade from Arabs between 1500 and 1700, but, with the Arab seizure of Portugal's key foothold at Fort Jesus on Mombasa Island (now in Kenya) in 1698, the pendulum began to swing in the other direction. As a result, investment lagged while Lisbon devoted itself to the more lucrative trade with India and the Far East and to the colonisation of Brazil. During the 18th and 19th centuries the Mazrui and Omani Arabs reclaimed much of the Indian Ocean trade, forcing the Portuguese to retreat south. Many prazos had declined by the mid-19th century, but several of them survived. During the 19th century other European powers, particularly the British (British South Africa Company) and the French (Madagascar), became increasingly involved in the trade and politics of the region around the Portuguese East African territories.

By the early 20th century the Portuguese had shifted the administration of much of Mozambique to large private companies, like the Mozambique Company, the Zambezia Company and the Niassa Company, controlled and financed mostly by the British, which established railroad lines to neighbouring countries. Although slavery had been legally abolished in Mozambique, at the end of the 19th century the Chartered companies enacted a forced labor policy and supplied cheap – often forced – African labor to the mines and plantations of the nearby British colonies and South Africa. The Zambezia Company, the most profitable chartered company, took over a number of smaller prazeiro holdings, and established military outposts to protect its property. The chartered companies built roads and ports to bring their goods to market including a railroad linking present day Zimbabwe with the Mozambican port of Beira.

Because of their unsatisfactory performance and because of the shift, under the Estado Novo regime of Oliveira Salazar, towards a stronger Portuguese control of Portuguese empire's economy, the companies' concessions were not renewed when they ran out. This was what happened in 1942 with the Mozambique Company, which however continued to operate in the agricultural and commercial sectors as a corporation, and had already happened in 1929 with the termination of the Niassa Company's concession. In 1951, the Portuguese overseas colonies in Africa were rebranded as Overseas Provinces of Portugal.

 

Independence movement

 

As communist and anti-colonial ideologies spread out across Africa, many clandestine political movements were established in support of Mozambican independence. These movements claimed that since policies and development plans were primarily designed by the ruling authorities for the benefit of Mozambique's Portuguese population, little attention was paid to Mozambique's tribal integration and the development of its native communities. According to the official guerrilla statements, this affected a majority of the indigenous population who suffered both state-sponsored discrimination and enormous social pressure. Many felt they had received too little opportunity or resources to upgrade their skills and improve their economic and social situation to a degree comparable to that of the Europeans. Statistically, Mozambique's Portuguese whites were indeed wealthier and more skilled than the black indigenous majority. As a response to the guerrilla movement, the Portuguese government from the 1960s and principally the early 1970s, initiated gradual changes with new socioeconomic developments and equalitarian policies for all.

The Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO), initiated a guerrilla campaign against Portuguese rule in September 1964. This conflict, along with the two others already initiated in the other Portuguese colonies of Angola and Portuguese Guinea, became part of the so-called Portuguese Colonial War (1961–1974). From a military standpoint, the Portuguese regular army maintained control of the population centres while the guerrilla forces sought to undermine their influence in rural and tribal areas in the north and west. As part of their response to FRELIMO the Portuguese government began to pay more attention to creating favourable conditions for social development and economic growth.

After 10 years of sporadic warfare and Portugal's return to democracy through a leftist military coup in Lisbon which replaced Portugal's Estado Novo regime for a military junta (the Carnation Revolution of April 1974), FRELIMO took control of the territory. Within a year, most of the 250,000 Portuguese in Mozambique had left – some expelled by the government of the nearly independent territory, some fleeing in fear – and Mozambique became independent from Portugal on June 25, 1975. Within a few years, almost the entire ethnic Portuguese population which had remained at independence had also departed.

 

Geography and climate

 

At 309,475 square miles (801,590 km²), Mozambique is the world's 35th-largest country (after Pakistan). It is comparable in size to Turkey.

 

Mozambique is located on the southeast coast of Africa. It is bound by Swaziland to the south, South Africa to the southwest, Zimbabwe to the west, Zambia and Malawi to the northwest, Tanzania to the north and the Indian Ocean to the east. The country is divided into two topographical regions by the Zambezi River. To the north of the Zambezi River, the narrow coastline moves inland to hills and low plateaus, and further west to rugged highlands, which include the Niassa highlands, Namuli or Shire highlands, Angonia highlands, Tete highlands and the Makonde plateau, covered with miombo woodlands. To the south of the Zambezi River, the lowlands are broader with the Mashonaland plateau and Lebomo mountains located in the deep south.

The country is drained by five principal rivers and several smaller ones with the largest and most important the Zambezi. The country has three lakes, Lake Niassa (or Malawi), Lake Chiuta and Lake Shirwa, all in the north. The major cities are Maputo, Beira, Nampula, Tete, Quelimane, Chimoio, Pemba, Inhambane, Xai-Xai and Lichinga.

 

Mozambique has a tropical climate with two seasons, a wet season from October to March and a dry season from April to September. Climatic conditions, however, vary depending on altitude. Rainfall is heavy along the coast and decreases in the north and south. Annual precipitation varies from 500 to 900 mm (20 to 35 inches) depending on the region with an average of 590 mm (23 inches). Cyclones are also common during the wet season. Average temperature ranges in Maputo are from 13 to 24 degrees Celsius (55 to 75 degrees Fahrenheit) in July to 22 to 31 degrees Celsius (72 to 88 degrees Fahrenheit) in February.

 

Other Infos

 

Oficial Name:

Republica de Mocambique

 

Independence:

June 25, 1975

 

Area:

801.590 km2

 

Inhabitants:

20.071.000

 

Languages:

Barwe [bwg] 15,000 (1999). Tete Province. Alternate names: Balke, Cibalke. Dialects: Speakers probably have good comprehension of Nyungwe or Sena. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Senga-Sena (N.40), Sena

More information.

 

Chopi [cce] 800,000 (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Southern coast, north of Limpopo River. Center is Quissico, southern part of Zavala District, approximately 100 km coastal strip between Inharrime and Chidunguela. Alternate names: Shichopi, Copi, Cicopi, Shicopi, Tschopi, Txopi, Txitxopi. Dialects: Copi, Ndonge, Lengue (Lenge, Kilenge), Tonga, Lambwe, Khambani. Many dialects; all inherently intelligible with each other. Lexical similarity 44% with Gitonga. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Chopi (S.60)

More information.

 

Chuwabu [chw] 786,715 (1997 census). Central coast between Quelimane and the Mlanje Mountains. Alternate names: Chuwabo, Chwabo, Cuwabo, Cuabo, Chuabo, Chichwabo, Cicuabo, Txuwabo, Echuwabo, Echuabo. Dialects: Central Chuwabo, Nyaringa, Marale, Karungu, Maindo. Lexical similarity 78% between Chuwabo of Makusi District and Marrare. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Dema [dmx] 5,000 (2000 Bister). Population displaced during Cabora Bassa Dam construction. Far western Mozambique, just north of Zimbabwe. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Shona (S.10)

More information.

 

Kokola [kzn] Western Zambezia Province. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Koti [eko] 64,200 (1997 Mucanheia). Nampula Province, Angoche District, coastal around Angoche Island; also a community in Nampula City. Alternate names: Coti, Ekoti, Angoche, Angoxe. Dialects: Ekoti, Enatthembo (Sangaje, Esangaje, Esakaji, Esangaji, "Edheidhei", "Etteittei"). A separate language within the Makhuwa group. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Kunda [kdn] 4,929 in Mozambique (2000 WCD). Around confluence of the Luangwe and Zambezi rivers. Alternate names: Chikunda, Cikunda, Chicunda. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Senga-Sena (N.40), Sena

More information.

 

Lolo [llb] 150,000 (2002 SIL). Western Zambezia Province. Alternate names: Ilolo. Dialects: May be a dialect of Lomwe or Makhuwa. Close to Takwane. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Lomwe [ngl] 1,300,000 (1991). Northeast and central, most of Zambezia Province, southern Nampula Province. The prestige center is Alto Molocue, Zambezia. Alternate names: Ngulu, Ingulu, Nguru, Mihavane, Mihavani, Mihawani, Western Makua, Lomue, Ilomwe, Elomwe, Alomwe, Walomwe, Chilowe, Cilowe, Acilowe. Dialects: Closest to Makhuwa, Chwabo. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Maindo [cwb] 20,000 (2003). Micaune, just northeast of Chinde, at the mouth of the Zambezi River. Alternate names: Chwambo. Dialects: Mitange, Badoni. Lexical similarity 84% with Chuabo. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makhuwa [vmw] 2,500,000 (1996). Nampula, south of Meeto area. Alternate names: Central Makhuwa, Makhuwa-Makhuwana, Macua, Emakua, Makua, Makoane, Maquoua, Makhuwwa of Nampula, Emakhuwa. Dialects: Emwaja, Enaharra (Maharra, Nahara, Emathipane), Enyara, Central Makua (Makhuwana, Makuana, Emakhuwana), Empamela (Nampamela), Enlai (Mulai). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makhuwa-Marrevone [xmc] 420,101 (2000 WCD). Coast of central Delgado Province from Moma to Angoche. Alternate names: Maca, Maka, Coastal Makhuwa, South Maca, Emaka, Marevone, Marrevone. Dialects: Makhuwana (Emakhuwana), Naharra (Enaharra), Enlai, Nampamela (Empamela). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makhuwa-Meetto [mgh] 800,000 in Mozambique (1997 census). Population total all countries: 1,160,000. Cabo Delgado and Niassa provinces. Also spoken in Tanzania. Alternate names: Meetto, Mêto, Meto, Metto, Emeto, Imeetto, Medo. Dialects: Imeetto has 81% to 88% lexical similarity with Saka, 78% to 82% with Nahara, 78% to 80% with Makua, 66% to 68% with Lomwe. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makhuwa-Moniga [mhm] 200,000 (2003 Kröger). Delgado Province. Alternate names: Emoniga, Moniga, Emakhuwa-Emoniga. Dialects: Lexical similarity 56% with Lomwe. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makhuwa-Saka [xsq] 200,000 (2003 Kröger). Delgado Province. Alternate names: Saaka, Esaaka, Saka, Saanga, Isaanga, Ishanga, Sanga. Dialects: Saka (Esaaka), Rati (Erati). Lexical similarity 81% to 88% with Makhuwa-Meetto, 78% to 80% with Makhuwa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makhuwa-Shirima [vmk] 500,000 (1996). South of Niassa Province. Alternate names: West Makua, Xirima, Eshirima, Chirima, Shirima, Makhuwa-Niassa, Makhuwa-Xirima, Makhuwa-Exirima. Dialects: Probably not intelligible with the Metto, Makhuwa, or Lomwe. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Makonde [kde] 233,358 in Mozambique (1997 census). Population includes 12,000 Ndonde (1980). Northeast Mozambique. Maviha is in Mueda, Mozambique. Alternate names: Chimakonde, Chinimakonde, Cimakonde, Konde, Makonda, Maconde, Shimakonde, Matambwe. Dialects: Vadonde (Donde, Ndonde), Vamwalu (Mwalu), Vamwambe (Mwambe), Vamakonde (Makonde), Maviha (Chimaviha, Kimawiha, Mavia, Mabiha, Mawia). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Yao (P.20)

More information.

 

Makwe [ymk] 22,000 in Mozambique (2003). Population total all countries: 32,000. Cabo Delgado Province, on the coast from the Tanzania border south to Quionga, Palma, until just south of Olumbe; and in the interior along the Rovuma River until Pundanhar. Also spoken in Tanzania. Alternate names: Kimakwe, Palma, Macue. Dialects: Coastal Makwe (Palma), Interior Makwe. Not inherently intelligible with Swahili. Lexical similarity 60% with Swahili, 57% with Mwani, 48% with Yao. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, G, Swahili (G.40)

More information.

 

Manyawa [mny] 150,000 (1999). 85% are monolingual in Lugela District. Western Zambezia Province, including Lugela District. Dialects: Close to Takwane. Lexical similarity 69% with Takwane. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Manyika [mxc] 145,331 in Mozambique (2000 WCD). 759,923 Shona in Mozambique (1980 census) probably included Manyika, Ndau, Tewe, and Tawala. Northern half of Manica Province, north of Ndau, west of Tewe. Alternate names: Chimanyika, Manika. Dialects: Bocha (Boka), Bunji, Bvumba, Domba, Guta, Here, Hungwe, Jindwi, Karombe, Nyamuka, Nyatwe, Unyama. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Shona (S.10)

More information.

 

Marenje [vmr] 75,000 (1997 census). Western Zambezia. Alternate names: Emarendje, Marendje. Dialects: Related to Lolo and Kokola. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Mozambican Sign Language [mzy] In at least the 3 largest cities: Maputo, Beira, and Nampula. Dialects: Some dialectal variation. Standardization efforts are in progress (1999). Not related to or based on Portuguese nor Portuguese Sign Language. Classification: Deaf sign language

More information.

 

Mwani [wmw] 80,000 (2000). Cabo Delgado Province, on the coast north of Pemba from Arimba to Palma, including Ibo and Mocimboa da Praia, and the offshore Querimba Archipelago. Alternate names: Kimwani, Mwane, Muane, Quimuane, Ibo. Dialects: Wibo (Kiwibo), Kisanga (Kikisanga, Quissanga), Nkojo (Kinkojo), Nsimbwa (Kinsimbwa). Not intelligible with Swahili. Kiwibo is the prestige dialect. Kinsimbwa, the northernmost Mocimboa da Praia dialect is inherently intelligible with others, even though it is the most distinct. Lexical similarity 60% with Swahili, 48% with Yao. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, G, Swahili (G.40)

More information.

 

Nathembo [nte] 18,000 (1993 Johnstone). Southeastern Nampula Province, just north of Angohe, on the Sangange Peninsula, at Zubairi, Charamatane, Amisse, Mutembua, Namaeca, Namaponda, and up to Mogincual and Khibulani. Alternate names: Sakaji, Esakaji, Sankaji, Sanagage, Sangaji, Theithei. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Ndau [ndc] 1,900,000 in Mozambique (2000 Chebanne). Population total all countries: 2,700,000. South central region, south of Beira in Sofala and Manica Province. Also spoken in Zimbabwe. Alternate names: Chindau, Njao, Ndzawu, Southeast Shona, Sofala. Dialects: Ndau (Cindau), Shanga (Cimashanga, Mashanga, Chichanga, Chixanga, Xanga, Changa, Senji, Chisenji), Danda (Cidanda, Ndanda, Cindanda, Vadanda, Watande), Dondo (Cidondo, Wadondo, Chibabava), Gova (Cigova). Closer to Manyika, and much more divergent from Union Shona. Danda and Ndanda may be the same. Gova in Mozambique is closer to Ndau, but in Zambia and Zimbabwe it is closer to Korekore dialect of Shona. Lexical similarity 92% between Danda and Dondo dialects, 85% between Dondo and Shanga; 74% to 81% between Ndau dialects and Manyika. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Shona (S.10)

More information.

 

Ngoni [ngo] 35,000 in Mozambique (1989). Central Cabo Delgado Province, around Macuaida in Niassa Province, in northeast Tete Province. Alternate names: Chingoni, Kingoni, Angoni, Kisutu, Sutu. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Manda (N.10)

More information.

 

Nsenga [nse] 141,000 in Mozambique (1993 Johnstone). Alternate names: Chinsenga, Senga. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Senga-Sena (N.40), Senga

More information.

 

Nyanja [nya] 497,671 in Mozambique (1997 census). Niassa, Zambezia, and Tete provinces. Chewa is in Macanga District, Tete; Ngoni is in Sanga and Lago in Niassa, Angonia in Tete; Nsenga is in Zumbo in Tete; Nyanja is along Lake Niassa in Niassa and Tete. Alternate names: Chinyanja. Dialects: Chewa (Cewa, Chichewa, Cicewa), Ngoni (Cingoni), Nyanja (Cinyanja). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Nyanja (N.30)

More information.

 

Nyungwe [nyu] 262,455 (1980 census). Central, banks of Zambezi River above the Sena. Alternate names: Chinyungwi, Cinyungwe, Nyongwe, Teta, Tete, Yungwe. Dialects: Close to Sena. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Senga-Sena (N.40), Sena

More information.

 

Phimbi [phm] 6,000. Central, banks of Zambezi River above the Sena. Alternate names: Pimbi. Dialects: Close to Sena. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Senga-Sena (N.40), Sena

More information.

 

Portuguese [por] 30,000 in Mozambique (1998 SIL). Classification: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western, Western, Gallo-Iberian, Ibero-Romance, West Iberian, Portuguese-Galician

More information.

 

Ronga [rng] 640,947 in Mozambique (2000 WCD). Population total all countries: 727,565. South of Maputo Province, coastal areas. Also spoken in South Africa. Alternate names: Shironga, Xironga, Gironga. Dialects: Konde, Putru, Kalanga. Partially intelligible with Tsonga and Tswa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Tswa-Ronga (S.50)

More information.

 

Sena [seh] 876,570 (1997 census). 86,000 Podzo in Mozambique (1993 Johnstone). Northwest, Sofala, Manica, Tete, and Zambezia provinces, lower Zambezi River Region. Alternate names: Cisena, Chisena. Dialects: Caia (Care, Sare, North Sena), Bangwe (South Sena), Rue (Chirue), Gombe, Sangwe, Podzo (Phodzo, Chipodzo, Cipodzo, Puthsu, Shiputhsu), Gorongosa. Different literature needed for Malawi. Close to Nyungwe, Nyanja, Kunda. Lexical similarity 92% between Podzo and Sena-Sare. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, N, Senga-Sena (N.40), Sena

More information.

 

Swahili [swh] 9,232 in Mozambique (2000 WCD). Northern. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, G, Swahili (G.40)

More information.

 

Swati [ssw] 731 in Mozambique (1980 census). Alternate names: Swazi, Siswazi, Siswati, Tekela, Tekeza. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Nguni (S.40)

More information.

 

Takwane [tke] 150,000 (1997 census). Western Zambezia Province. Alternate names: Thakwani. Dialects: Related to Manyawa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Makua (P.30)

More information.

 

Tawara [twl] 50,000 (1997). South of Tete Province, just north of Zimbabwe. Alternate names: Tawala. Dialects: Tawara-Chioco, Tawara-Daque. The northernmost variety related to Korekore. It appears to have been influenced by Nyungwe. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Shona (S.10)

More information.

 

Tewe [twx] 250,000 (2000 Nelimo). Manica Province, Chimoio City and District. Alternate names: Ciute, Chiute, Teve, Vateve, Wateve. Dialects: Considered by many to be a Manyika dialect. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Shona (S.10)

More information.

 

Tonga [toh] 223,971 (1980 census). South, Inhambane area up to Morrumbane. Alternate names: Inhambane, Shengwe, Bitonga, Tonga-Inhambane. Dialects: Gitonga Gy Khogani, Nyambe (Cinyambe), Sewi (Gisewi). Lexical similarity 44% with Chopi. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Chopi (S.60)

More information.

 

Tsonga [tso] 1,500,000 in Mozambique (1989 UBS). South of Maputo, most of Maputo and Gaza provinces. Alternate names: Shitsonga, Xitsonga, Thonga, Tonga, Gwamba. Dialects: Bila (Vila), Changana (Xichangana, Changa, Shangaan, Hlanganu, Hanganu, Langanu, Shilanganu, Shangana), Jonga (Djonga, Dzonga), Ngwalungu (Shingwalungu). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Tswa-Ronga (S.50)

More information.

 

Tswa [tsc] 695,212 in Mozambique (1980 census). Southern Region, most of Inhambane Province. Also spoken in South Africa, Zimbabwe. Alternate names: Shitshwa, Kitshwa, Sheetshwa, Xitshwa, Tshwa. Dialects: Hlengwe (Lengwe, Shilengwe, Lhengwe, Makwakwe-Khambana, Khambana-Makwakwe, Khambani), Tshwa (Dzibi-Dzonga, Dzonga-Dzibi, Dzivi, Xidzivi), Mandla, Ndxhonge, Nhayi. Partially intelligible of Ronga and Tsonga. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Tswa-Ronga (S.50)

More information.

 

Yao [yao] 450,000 in Mozambique (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Niassa Province, south and west of Lake Malawi. Also possibly Zimbabwe. Alternate names: Chiyao, Ciyao, Achawa, Adsawa, Adsoa, Ajawa, Ayawa, Ayo, Djao, Haiao, Hiao, Hyao, Jao, Veiao, Wajao. Dialects: Makale (Cimakale), Massaninga (Cimassaninga), Machinga, Mangochi, Tunduru Yao, Chikonono (Cikonono). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, P, Yao (P.20)

More information.

 

Zulu [zul] 1,798 in Mozambique (1980 census). Alternate names: Isizulu, Zunda. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, S, Nguni (S.40)

 

Capital city:

Maputo

 

Meaning country name:

From the name of the Island of Mozambique, which in turn probably comes from the name of a previous Arab ruler, the sheik Mussa Ben Mbiki.

 

Description Flag:

The flag of Mozambique was adopted on May 1, 1983. It includes the image of an AK-47 and is the only national flag in the world to feature such a modern rifle.

The flag is based on the flag of the Mozambican Liberation Front (FRELIMO). The FRELIMO flag, used for a brief period after the country gained its independence from Portugal, looks like the current flag but lacking the emblem.

In 2005, a competition was held to design a new flag for Mozambique. 119 entries were received and a winning flag was selected, but to this day the flag remains the same. This came in the context of a drive to create a new crest and anthem for the country. Mozambique's parliamentary opposition would specifically like to see removed from the flag the image of the Kalashnikov assault rifle, which symbolizes the nation's struggle for independence, according to press reports.

This drive to change these national symbols has met great resistance from public opinion.

Flag Symbolism

Green: The riches of the soil

Black: The African continent

Yellow: The mineral riches

White: The peace

Red: The country’s struggle for independence

The Emblem:

Yellow star: The solidarity of the people and the socialistic beliefs of the country

Book: Education

Hoe: Peasants and agriculture

AK-47: The nation’s determination to protect its freedom

 

Coat of arms:

The coat of arms of Mozambique, which was adopted in 1990, clearly recalls the former socialist government of the country. It shows a gear wheel, bordered by corn stalks and sugarcane. In the middle there is a red sun over a mountain and blue waves, an AK-47 crossed with a hoe, and a book. The wreath is tied with a ribbon bearing the name of the country.

The corn stalk and the sugar cane stand for the agriculture, or rather nature, the cog wheel for the working class, the book for the intelligentsia, the hoe for the peasants, the AK-47 for the struggle for independence of the country, and the red star for socialism. The red sun symbolizes South of Africa and the hope for a better life.

 

National anthem: Pátria Amada

 

PÁTRIA AMADA

I

Na memória de África e do Mundo

Pátria bela dos que ousaram lutar

Moçambique, o teu nome é liberdade

O Sol de Junho para sempre brilhará

 

CORO(2x)

Moçambique nossa terra gloriosa

Pedra a pedra construindo um novo dia

Milhões de braços, uma só força

Oh pátria amada, vamos vencer

II

Povo unido do Rovuma ao Maputo

Colhe os frutos do combate pela paz

Cresce o sonho ondulando na bandeira

E vai lavrando na certeza do amanhã

 

CORO(2x)

III

Flores brotando do chão do teu suor

Pelos montes, pelos rios, pelo mar

Nós juramos por ti, oh Moçambique

Nenhum tirano nos irá escravizar

 

CORO(2x)

 

English Translation

I

In the memory of Africa and the World

Beautiful fatherland of that they had dared to fight

Mozambique, your name is Freedom

The Sun of June forever will shine

 

Chorus (2x)

Mozambique, our Glorious Land

Rock by rock constructing the new day

Millions of arms in one only force

O Loved fatherland we go to be successful

II

Joined people from Rovuma to Maputo

It harvests the fruits of the combat for the Peace

The dream grows waving in the flag

E goes cultivating in the certainty of tomorrow

 

Chorus (2x)

III

Flowers sprouting of the soil of your sweat

For mounts, the rivers, the sea

We swear for you, O Mozambique

No tyrant in will go them to enslave

 

Chorus (2x)

 

Internet Page: www.govnet.gov.mz

www.mozambique.mz

www.clubofmozambique.com

 

Mozambique in diferent languages

 

eng | arg | ast | fra | frp | glg | hau | ina | jnf | nld | que | spa: Mozambique

bre | hrv | hun | ibo | jav | pol | slk | slv | szl | tur | zza: Mozambik

ces | cor | dsb | fao | fin | hsb | nor | sme | tgl | wol: Mosambik

aze | bos | crh | kaa | slo | tuk | uzb: Mozambik / Мозамбик

eus | kin | run | wln: Mozambike

dan | por | swe: Moçambique

deu | ltz | nds: Mosambik / Moſambik

cat | oci: Moçambic

cym | roh: Mosambic

est | vor: Mosambiik

ron | rup: Mozambic

afr: Mosambiek

bam: Mɔzambiki

epo: Mozambiko

fry: Mozambyk

fur: Mozambîc

gla: Mòsaimbic

gle: Mósaimbíc / Mósaimbíc

glv: Yn Vosambeeck

hat: Mozanbik

ind: Mozambik / موزامبيك

isl: Mósambík

ita: Mozambico

kmr: Mozambîk / Мозамбик / مۆزامبیک

kur: Mozambîk / مۆزامبیک

lat: Mozambicum; Mosambica

lav: Mozambika

lin: Mozambíki

lit: Mozambikas

lld: Mozambich

mlg: Mozambika

mlt: Możambik

mol: Mozambic / Мозамбик

msa: Mozambique / موزامبيق

nrm: Mozaumbique

rmy: Mozambiko / मोज़ाम्बिको

scn: Mozambicu

smg: Mozambiks

smo: Mosamepika

som: Musambiig

sot: Mozambiki

sqi: Mozambiku

srd: Mozambighe

ssw: iMozambiki

swa: Msumbiji

tet: Mosambike

vie: Mô-dăm-bích

vol: Mosambikän

zul: iMozambike

abq | alt | bul | che | chm | chv | kbd | kir | kjh | kom | krc | kum | mkd | mon | oss | rus | tyv | udm: Мозамбик (Mozambik)

bak | srp | tat: Мозамбик / Mozambik

bel: Мазамбік / Mazambik

kaz: Мозамбик / Mozambïk / موزامبيك

tgk: Мозамбик / مازمبیک / Mozambik

ukr: Мозамбік (Mozambik)

ara: موزامبيق (Mūzāmbīq); موزمبيق (Mūzambīq); الموزامبيق (al-Mūzāmbīq); الموزمبيق (al-Mūzambīq)

fas: موزامبیک / Mozâmbik

prs: موزمبیک (Mōzambīk)

pus: موزمبيک (Mozambīk); موزامبيک (Mozāmbīk)

uig: موزامبىك / Mozambik / Мозамбик

urd: موزمبیق (Mozambīq)

div: މޮޒަންބީގް (Możanbīg)

heb: מוזמביק (Môzambîq); מוזאמביק (Môzâmbîq)

lad: מוזאמביקי / Mozambike

yid: מאָזאַמביק (Mozambik)

amh: ሞዛምቢክ (Mozambik)

ell: Μοζαμβίκη (Mozamvíkī)

hye: Մոզամբիկ (Mozambik)

kat: მოზამბიკი (Mozambiki)

hin: मोज़ाम्बिक (Mozāmbik)

ben: মোজাম্বিক (Mojāmbik)

pan: ਮੋਜ਼ਾਮਬੀਕ (Mozāmbīk)

kan: ಮೊಜಾಮ್ಬಿಕ್ (Mojāmbik)

mal: മൊസാംബിക് (Mosāṁbik); മൊസാംബിക്ക് (Mosāṁbikk)

tam: மொஸாம்பிக் (Mosāmpik); மொசாம்பிக் (Močāmpik)

tel: మొజాంబిక్ (Mojāṁbik)

zho: 莫桑比克 (Mòsāngbǐkè)

jpn: モザンビーク (Mozanbīku)

kor: 모잠비크 (Mojambikeu)

mya: မုိဇမ္ဘစ္ (Mozãbʰiʿ)

tha: โมซัมบิค (Mōsâmbik); โมซัมบิก (Mōsâmbik)

khm: ម៉ូហ្សាំប៊ិក (Mūhsāṁbik); ម៉ូហ្សំប៉ិក (Mūhsaṁbik)

 

Palazzo ducale di Modena

 

Módena (Mòdna en dialecto modenés; Modena en italiano) es una ciudad italiana, capital de la provincia de Módena, en la región Emilia-Romaña. Cuenta con una población de 184 973 habitantes. La catedral, la Torre Cívica («Ghirlandina») y la Piazza Grande de la ciudad están declaradas Patrimonio de la Humanidad por la Unesco.

Módena queda en la llanura padana, y está rodeada por dos ríos, el Secchia y el Panaro, ambos afluentes del Po. Su presencia está simbolizada por la fuente de los dos ríos, en el centro de la ciudad, obra de Giuseppe Graziosi. La ciudad está conectada con el Panaro a través del canal Naviglio.

La cordillera de los Apeninos comienzan a unos 10 kilómetros al sur de la ciudad.

 

Módena es un importante centro industrial. La ciudad se ubica en el corazón de la «Motor Valley» que forma un conjunto de grupos industriales prestigios así como numerosos circuitos y museos. Las empresas Lamborghini, Pagani, Ferrari y Maserati tienen su sede dentro de un radio de 20 km alrededor de Módena.

 

Ubicado en la llanura Padana, el territorio modenés dispone de importantes riquezas gustativas. Su producto líder es el vinagre balsámico producido en los dominios agrícolas en el entorno de Módena. La base de su elaboración son las uvas cosechadas en los viñedos de la provincia. El lambrusco, vino rosado burbujeante, tiene como origen las viñas cercanas de Módena y Reggio Emilia. Además, Módena es la tierra del queso parmigiano reggiano y del jamón de Módena. Junto con Bolonia, Módena comparte el lugar de origen de la pasta tortellini.

 

El Duomo de Módena, la Torre Ghirlandina y la Piazza Grande están incluidos desde 1997 dentro del Patrimonio mundial de la UNESCO. El arquitecto Lanfranco y el escultor Wiligelmo erigieron el Duomo en el siglo XII por San Geminiano, obispo de Módena y Santo Patrón de la ciudad. Entre 1179 y 1319 se construyó la torre Ghirlandina asociada con el Duomo. Su nombre de Ghirlandina -guirnalda- resulta de su forma y recuerda la torre Giralda de Sevilla.

Durante más de dos siglos, la familia Este tenía como sede el Palazzo Ducale (palacio ducal). Hoy en día, este palacio recibe la Academia militar.

El Palazzo Comunale –ayuntamiento– cuya la fachada está en la Piazza Grande abarca un conjunto de edificios más antiguos. Dentro del edificio se encuentra la Secchia rapita –el cubo raptado- uno de los símbolos de la ciudad. La estatua de la Bonissima, símbolo de bondad, está posada en la esquina exterior del Palazzo Comunale.

Iglesias. Módena es una ciudad rica en iglesias, se cuentan más de quince en el casco histórico. También es importante nombrar a la iglesia de Santa María Pomposa, la iglesia del Voto o la iglesia de San Vicenzo. Existe también una sinagoga ubicada cerca del Palazzo Comunale.

En el mercado Albinelli se reúnen cada día productores locales de vinagre balsámico, jamón curdo o queso, entre otros.

es.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%B3dena

 

Modena is a city and comune (municipality) on the south side of the Po Valley, in the Province of Modena, in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy.

A town, and seat of an archbishop, it is known for its car industry since the factories of the famous Italian upper-class sports car makers Ferrari, De Tomaso, Lamborghini, Pagani and Maserati are, or were, located there and all, except Lamborghini, have headquarters in the city or nearby. One of Ferrari's cars, the 360 Modena, was named after the town itself. Ferrari's production plant and Formula One team Scuderia Ferrari are based in Maranello south of the city.

The University of Modena, founded in 1175 and expanded by Francesco II d'Este in 1686, focuses on economics, medicine and law, and is the second oldest athenaeum in Italy. Italian military officers are trained at the Military Academy of Modena, and partly housed in the Baroque Ducal Palace. The Biblioteca Estense houses historical volumes and 3,000 manuscripts. The Cathedral of Modena, the Torre della Ghirlandina and Piazza Grande are a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1997.

Modena is also known in culinary circles for its production of balsamic vinegar.

Famous Modenesi include Mary of Modena, the Queen consort of England and Scotland; operatic tenor Luciano Pavarotti and soprano Mirella Freni, born in Modena itself; Enzo Ferrari, eponymous founder of the Ferrari motor company; Catholic priest Gabriele Amorth; chef Massimo Bottura; comics artist Franco Bonvicini; the band Modena City Ramblers and singer-songwriter Francesco Guccini, who lived here for several decades.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modena

 

Monarga (Greek: Μoναργά, Turkish: Boğaztepe) is a small village in the Famagusta District of Cyprus, located 7 km northeast of Trikomo. It is under the de facto control of Northern Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus, officially the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), is a de facto state that comprises the northeastern portion of the island of Cyprus. It is recognised only by Turkey, and its territory is considered by all other states to be part of the Republic of Cyprus.

 

Northern Cyprus extends from the tip of the Karpass Peninsula in the northeast to Morphou Bay, Cape Kormakitis and its westernmost point, the Kokkina exclave in the west. Its southernmost point is the village of Louroujina. A buffer zone under the control of the United Nations stretches between Northern Cyprus and the rest of the island and divides Nicosia, the island's largest city and capital of both sides.

 

A coup d'état in 1974, performed as part of an attempt to annex the island to Greece, prompted the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. This resulted in the eviction of much of the north's Greek Cypriot population, the flight of Turkish Cypriots from the south, and the partitioning of the island, leading to a unilateral declaration of independence by the north in 1983. Due to its lack of recognition, Northern Cyprus is heavily dependent on Turkey for economic, political and military support.

 

Attempts to reach a solution to the Cyprus dispute have been unsuccessful. The Turkish Army maintains a large force in Northern Cyprus with the support and approval of the TRNC government, while the Republic of Cyprus, the European Union as a whole, and the international community regard it as an occupation force. This military presence has been denounced in several United Nations Security Council resolutions.

 

Northern Cyprus is a semi-presidential, democratic republic with a cultural heritage incorporating various influences and an economy that is dominated by the services sector. The economy has seen growth through the 2000s and 2010s, with the GNP per capita more than tripling in the 2000s, but is held back by an international embargo due to the official closure of the ports in Northern Cyprus by the Republic of Cyprus. The official language is Turkish, with a distinct local dialect being spoken. The vast majority of the population consists of Sunni Muslims, while religious attitudes are mostly moderate and secular. Northern Cyprus is an observer state of ECO and OIC under the name "Turkish Cypriot State", PACE under the name "Turkish Cypriot Community", and Organization of Turkic States with its own name.

 

Several distinct periods of Cypriot intercommunal violence involving the two main ethnic communities, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, marked mid-20th century Cyprus. These included the Cyprus Emergency of 1955–59 during British rule, the post-independence Cyprus crisis of 1963–64, and the Cyprus crisis of 1967. Hostilities culminated in the 1974 de facto division of the island along the Green Line following the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. The region has been relatively peaceful since then, but the Cyprus dispute has continued, with various attempts to solve it diplomatically having been generally unsuccessful.

 

Cyprus, an island lying in the eastern Mediterranean, hosted a population of Greeks and Turks (four-fifths and one-fifth, respectively), who lived under British rule in the late nineteenth-century and the first half of the twentieth-century. Christian Orthodox Church of Cyprus played a prominent political role among the Greek Cypriot community, a privilege that it acquired during the Ottoman Empire with the employment of the millet system, which gave the archbishop an unofficial ethnarch status.

 

The repeated rejections by the British of Greek Cypriot demands for enosis, union with Greece, led to armed resistance, organised by the National Organization of Cypriot Struggle, or EOKA. EOKA, led by the Greek-Cypriot commander George Grivas, systematically targeted British colonial authorities. One of the effects of EOKA's campaign was to alter the Turkish position from demanding full reincorporation into Turkey to a demand for taksim (partition). EOKA's mission and activities caused a "Cretan syndrome" (see Turkish Resistance Organisation) within the Turkish Cypriot community, as its members feared that they would be forced to leave the island in such a case as had been the case with Cretan Turks. As such, they preferred the continuation of British colonial rule and then taksim, the division of the island. Due to the Turkish Cypriots' support for the British, EOKA's leader, Georgios Grivas, declared them to be enemies. The fact that the Turks were a minority was, according to Nihat Erim, to be addressed by the transfer of thousands of Turks from mainland Turkey so that Greek Cypriots would cease to be the majority. When Erim visited Cyprus as the Turkish representative, he was advised by Field Marshal Sir John Harding, the then Governor of Cyprus, that Turkey should send educated Turks to settle in Cyprus.

 

Turkey actively promoted the idea that on the island of Cyprus two distinctive communities existed, and sidestepped its former claim that "the people of Cyprus were all Turkish subjects". In doing so, Turkey's aim to have self-determination of two to-be equal communities in effect led to de jure partition of the island.[citation needed] This could be justified to the international community against the will of the majority Greek population of the island. Dr. Fazil Küçük in 1954 had already proposed Cyprus be divided in two at the 35° parallel.

 

Lindley Dan, from Notre Dame University, spotted the roots of intercommunal violence to different visions among the two communities of Cyprus (enosis for Greek Cypriots, taksim for Turkish Cypriots). Also, Lindlay wrote that "the merging of church, schools/education, and politics in divisive and nationalistic ways" had played a crucial role in creation of havoc in Cyprus' history. Attalides Michael also pointed to the opposing nationalisms as the cause of the Cyprus problem.

 

By the mid-1950's, the "Cyprus is Turkish" party, movement, and slogan gained force in both Cyprus and Turkey. In a 1954 editorial, Turkish Cypriot leader Dr. Fazil Kuchuk expressed the sentiment that the Turkish youth had grown up with the idea that "as soon as Great Britain leaves the island, it will be taken over by the Turks", and that "Turkey cannot tolerate otherwise". This perspective contributed to the willingness of Turkish Cypriots to align themselves with the British, who started recruiting Turkish Cypriots into the police force that patrolled Cyprus to fight EOKA, a Greek Cypriot nationalist organisation that sought to rid the island of British rule.

 

EOKA targeted colonial authorities, including police, but Georgios Grivas, the leader of EOKA, did not initially wish to open up a new front by fighting Turkish Cypriots and reassured them that EOKA would not harm their people. In 1956, some Turkish Cypriot policemen were killed by EOKA members and this provoked some intercommunal violence in the spring and summer, but these attacks on policemen were not motivated by the fact that they were Turkish Cypriots.

 

However, in January 1957, Grivas changed his policy as his forces in the mountains became increasingly pressured by the British Crown forces. In order to divert the attention of the Crown forces, EOKA members started to target Turkish Cypriot policemen intentionally in the towns, so that Turkish Cypriots would riot against the Greek Cypriots and the security forces would have to be diverted to the towns to restore order. The killing of a Turkish Cypriot policeman on 19 January, when a power station was bombed, and the injury of three others, provoked three days of intercommunal violence in Nicosia. The two communities targeted each other in reprisals, at least one Greek Cypriot was killed and the British Army was deployed in the streets. Greek Cypriot stores were burned and their neighbourhoods attacked. Following the events, the Greek Cypriot leadership spread the propaganda that the riots had merely been an act of Turkish Cypriot aggression. Such events created chaos and drove the communities apart both in Cyprus and in Turkey.

 

On 22 October 1957 Sir Hugh Mackintosh Foot replaced Sir John Harding as the British Governor of Cyprus. Foot suggested five to seven years of self-government before any final decision. His plan rejected both enosis and taksim. The Turkish Cypriot response to this plan was a series of anti-British demonstrations in Nicosia on 27 and 28 January 1958 rejecting the proposed plan because the plan did not include partition. The British then withdrew the plan.

 

In 1957, Black Gang, a Turkish Cypriot pro-taksim paramilitary organisation, was formed to patrol a Turkish Cypriot enclave, the Tahtakale district of Nicosia, against activities of EOKA. The organisation later attempted to grow into a national scale, but failed to gain public support.

 

By 1958, signs of dissatisfaction with the British increased on both sides, with a group of Turkish Cypriots forming Volkan (later renamed to the Turkish Resistance Organisation) paramilitary group to promote partition and the annexation of Cyprus to Turkey as dictated by the Menderes plan. Volkan initially consisted of roughly 100 members, with the stated aim of raising awareness in Turkey of the Cyprus issue and courting military training and support for Turkish Cypriot fighters from the Turkish government.

 

In June 1958, the British Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan, was expected to propose a plan to resolve the Cyprus issue. In light of the new development, the Turks rioted in Nicosia to promote the idea that Greek and Turkish Cypriots could not live together and therefore any plan that did not include partition would not be viable. This violence was soon followed by bombing, Greek Cypriot deaths and looting of Greek Cypriot-owned shops and houses. Greek and Turkish Cypriots started to flee mixed population villages where they were a minority in search of safety. This was effectively the beginning of the segregation of the two communities. On 7 June 1958, a bomb exploded at the entrance of the Turkish Embassy in Cyprus. Following the bombing, Turkish Cypriots looted Greek Cypriot properties. On 26 June 1984, the Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktaş, admitted on British channel ITV that the bomb was placed by the Turks themselves in order to create tension. On 9 January 1995, Rauf Denktaş repeated his claim to the famous Turkish newspaper Milliyet in Turkey.

 

The crisis reached a climax on 12 June 1958, when eight Greeks, out of an armed group of thirty five arrested by soldiers of the Royal Horse Guards on suspicion of preparing an attack on the Turkish quarter of Skylloura, were killed in a suspected attack by Turkish Cypriot locals, near the village of Geunyeli, having been ordered to walk back to their village of Kondemenos.

 

After the EOKA campaign had begun, the British government successfully began to turn the Cyprus issue from a British colonial problem into a Greek-Turkish issue. British diplomacy exerted backstage influence on the Adnan Menderes government, with the aim of making Turkey active in Cyprus. For the British, the attempt had a twofold objective. The EOKA campaign would be silenced as quickly as possible, and Turkish Cypriots would not side with Greek Cypriots against the British colonial claims over the island, which would thus remain under the British. The Turkish Cypriot leadership visited Menderes to discuss the Cyprus issue. When asked how the Turkish Cypriots should respond to the Greek Cypriot claim of enosis, Menderes replied: "You should go to the British foreign minister and request the status quo be prolonged, Cyprus to remain as a British colony". When the Turkish Cypriots visited the British Foreign Secretary and requested for Cyprus to remain a colony, he replied: "You should not be asking for colonialism at this day and age, you should be asking for Cyprus be returned to Turkey, its former owner".

 

As Turkish Cypriots began to look to Turkey for protection, Greek Cypriots soon understood that enosis was extremely unlikely. The Greek Cypriot leader, Archbishop Makarios III, now set independence for the island as his objective.

 

Britain resolved to solve the dispute by creating an independent Cyprus. In 1959, all involved parties signed the Zurich Agreements: Britain, Turkey, Greece, and the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders, Makarios and Dr. Fazil Kucuk, respectively. The new constitution drew heavily on the ethnic composition of the island. The President would be a Greek Cypriot, and the Vice-President a Turkish Cypriot with an equal veto. The contribution to the public service would be set at a ratio of 70:30, and the Supreme Court would consist of an equal number of judges from both communities as well as an independent judge who was not Greek, Turkish or British. The Zurich Agreements were supplemented by a number of treaties. The Treaty of Guarantee stated that secession or union with any state was forbidden, and that Greece, Turkey and Britain would be given guarantor status to intervene if that was violated. The Treaty of Alliance allowed for two small Greek and Turkish military contingents to be stationed on the island, and the Treaty of Establishment gave Britain sovereignty over two bases in Akrotiri and Dhekelia.

 

On 15 August 1960, the Colony of Cyprus became fully independent as the Republic of Cyprus. The new republic remained within the Commonwealth of Nations.

 

The new constitution brought dissatisfaction to Greek Cypriots, who felt it to be highly unjust for them for historical, demographic and contributional reasons. Although 80% of the island's population were Greek Cypriots and these indigenous people had lived on the island for thousands of years and paid 94% of taxes, the new constitution was giving the 17% of the population that was Turkish Cypriots, who paid 6% of taxes, around 30% of government jobs and 40% of national security jobs.

 

Within three years tensions between the two communities in administrative affairs began to show. In particular disputes over separate municipalities and taxation created a deadlock in government. A constitutional court ruled in 1963 Makarios had failed to uphold article 173 of the constitution which called for the establishment of separate municipalities for Turkish Cypriots. Makarios subsequently declared his intention to ignore the judgement, resulting in the West German judge resigning from his position. Makarios proposed thirteen amendments to the constitution, which would have had the effect of resolving most of the issues in the Greek Cypriot favour. Under the proposals, the President and Vice-President would lose their veto, the separate municipalities as sought after by the Turkish Cypriots would be abandoned, the need for separate majorities by both communities in passing legislation would be discarded and the civil service contribution would be set at actual population ratios (82:18) instead of the slightly higher figure for Turkish Cypriots.

 

The intention behind the amendments has long been called into question. The Akritas plan, written in the height of the constitutional dispute by the Greek Cypriot interior minister Polycarpos Georkadjis, called for the removal of undesirable elements of the constitution so as to allow power-sharing to work. The plan envisaged a swift retaliatory attack on Turkish Cypriot strongholds should Turkish Cypriots resort to violence to resist the measures, stating "In the event of a planned or staged Turkish attack, it is imperative to overcome it by force in the shortest possible time, because if we succeed in gaining command of the situation (in one or two days), no outside, intervention would be either justified or possible." Whether Makarios's proposals were part of the Akritas plan is unclear, however it remains that sentiment towards enosis had not completely disappeared with independence. Makarios described independence as "a step on the road to enosis".[31] Preparations for conflict were not entirely absent from Turkish Cypriots either, with right wing elements still believing taksim (partition) the best safeguard against enosis.

 

Greek Cypriots however believe the amendments were a necessity stemming from a perceived attempt by Turkish Cypriots to frustrate the working of government. Turkish Cypriots saw it as a means to reduce their status within the state from one of co-founder to that of minority, seeing it as a first step towards enosis. The security situation deteriorated rapidly.

 

Main articles: Bloody Christmas (1963) and Battle of Tillyria

An armed conflict was triggered after December 21, 1963, a period remembered by Turkish Cypriots as Bloody Christmas, when a Greek Cypriot policemen that had been called to help deal with a taxi driver refusing officers already on the scene access to check the identification documents of his customers, took out his gun upon arrival and shot and killed the taxi driver and his partner. Eric Solsten summarised the events as follows: "a Greek Cypriot police patrol, ostensibly checking identification documents, stopped a Turkish Cypriot couple on the edge of the Turkish quarter. A hostile crowd gathered, shots were fired, and two Turkish Cypriots were killed."

 

In the morning after the shooting, crowds gathered in protest in Northern Nicosia, likely encouraged by the TMT, without incident. On the evening of the 22nd, gunfire broke out, communication lines to the Turkish neighbourhoods were cut, and the Greek Cypriot police occupied the nearby airport. On the 23rd, a ceasefire was negotiated, but did not hold. Fighting, including automatic weapons fire, between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and militias increased in Nicosia and Larnaca. A force of Greek Cypriot irregulars led by Nikos Sampson entered the Nicosia suburb of Omorphita and engaged in heavy firing on armed, as well as by some accounts unarmed, Turkish Cypriots. The Omorphita clash has been described by Turkish Cypriots as a massacre, while this view has generally not been acknowledged by Greek Cypriots.

 

Further ceasefires were arranged between the two sides, but also failed. By Christmas Eve, the 24th, Britain, Greece, and Turkey had joined talks, with all sides calling for a truce. On Christmas day, Turkish fighter jets overflew Nicosia in a show of support. Finally it was agreed to allow a force of 2,700 British soldiers to help enforce a ceasefire. In the next days, a "buffer zone" was created in Nicosia, and a British officer marked a line on a map with green ink, separating the two sides of the city, which was the beginning of the "Green Line". Fighting continued across the island for the next several weeks.

 

In total 364 Turkish Cypriots and 174 Greek Cypriots were killed during the violence. 25,000 Turkish Cypriots from 103-109 villages fled and were displaced into enclaves and thousands of Turkish Cypriot houses were ransacked or completely destroyed.

 

Contemporary newspapers also reported on the forceful exodus of the Turkish Cypriots from their homes. According to The Times in 1964, threats, shootings and attempts of arson were committed against the Turkish Cypriots to force them out of their homes. The Daily Express wrote that "25,000 Turks have already been forced to leave their homes". The Guardian reported a massacre of Turks at Limassol on 16 February 1964.

 

Turkey had by now readied its fleet and its fighter jets appeared over Nicosia. Turkey was dissuaded from direct involvement by the creation of a United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) in 1964. Despite the negotiated ceasefire in Nicosia, attacks on the Turkish Cypriot persisted, particularly in Limassol. Concerned about the possibility of a Turkish invasion, Makarios undertook the creation of a Greek Cypriot conscript-based army called the "National Guard". A general from Greece took charge of the army, whilst a further 20,000 well-equipped officers and men were smuggled from Greece into Cyprus. Turkey threatened to intervene once more, but was prevented by a strongly worded letter from the American President Lyndon B. Johnson, anxious to avoid a conflict between NATO allies Greece and Turkey at the height of the Cold War.

 

Turkish Cypriots had by now established an important bridgehead at Kokkina, provided with arms, volunteers and materials from Turkey and abroad. Seeing this incursion of foreign weapons and troops as a major threat, the Cypriot government invited George Grivas to return from Greece as commander of the Greek troops on the island and launch a major attack on the bridgehead. Turkey retaliated by dispatching its fighter jets to bomb Greek positions, causing Makarios to threaten an attack on every Turkish Cypriot village on the island if the bombings did not cease. The conflict had now drawn in Greece and Turkey, with both countries amassing troops on their Thracian borders. Efforts at mediation by Dean Acheson, a former U.S. Secretary of State, and UN-appointed mediator Galo Plaza had failed, all the while the division of the two communities becoming more apparent. Greek Cypriot forces were estimated at some 30,000, including the National Guard and the large contingent from Greece. Defending the Turkish Cypriot enclaves was a force of approximately 5,000 irregulars, led by a Turkish colonel, but lacking the equipment and organisation of the Greek forces.

 

The Secretary-General of the United Nations in 1964, U Thant, reported the damage during the conflicts:

 

UNFICYP carried out a detailed survey of all damage to properties throughout the island during the disturbances; it shows that in 109 villages, most of them Turkish-Cypriot or mixed villages, 527 houses have been destroyed while 2,000 others have suffered damage from looting.

 

The situation worsened in 1967, when a military junta overthrew the democratically elected government of Greece, and began applying pressure on Makarios to achieve enosis. Makarios, not wishing to become part of a military dictatorship or trigger a Turkish invasion, began to distance himself from the goal of enosis. This caused tensions with the junta in Greece as well as George Grivas in Cyprus. Grivas's control over the National Guard and Greek contingent was seen as a threat to Makarios's position, who now feared a possible coup.[citation needed] The National Guard and Cyprus Police began patrolling the Turkish Cypriot enclaves of Ayios Theodoros and Kophinou, and on November 15 engaged in heavy fighting with the Turkish Cypriots.

 

By the time of his withdrawal 26 Turkish Cypriots had been killed. Turkey replied with an ultimatum demanding that Grivas be removed from the island, that the troops smuggled from Greece in excess of the limits of the Treaty of Alliance be removed, and that the economic blockades on the Turkish Cypriot enclaves be lifted. Grivas was recalled by the Athens Junta and the 12,000 Greek troops were withdrawn. Makarios now attempted to consolidate his position by reducing the number of National Guard troops, and by creating a paramilitary force loyal to Cypriot independence. In 1968, acknowledging that enosis was now all but impossible, Makarios stated, "A solution by necessity must be sought within the limits of what is feasible which does not always coincide with the limits of what is desirable."

 

After 1967 tensions between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots subsided. Instead, the main source of tension on the island came from factions within the Greek Cypriot community. Although Makarios had effectively abandoned enosis in favour of an 'attainable solution', many others continued to believe that the only legitimate political aspiration for Greek Cypriots was union with Greece.

 

On his arrival, Grivas began by establishing a nationalist paramilitary group known as the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston B or EOKA-B), drawing comparisons with the EOKA struggle for enosis under the British colonial administration of the 1950s.

 

The military junta in Athens saw Makarios as an obstacle. Makarios's failure to disband the National Guard, whose officer class was dominated by mainland Greeks, had meant the junta had practical control over the Cypriot military establishment, leaving Makarios isolated and a vulnerable target.

 

During the first Turkish invasion, Turkish troops invaded Cyprus territory on 20 July 1974, invoking its rights under the Treaty of Guarantee. This expansion of Turkish-occupied zone violated International Law as well as the Charter of the United Nations. Turkish troops managed to capture 3% of the island which was accompanied by the burning of the Turkish Cypriot quarter, as well as the raping and killing of women and children. A temporary cease-fire followed which was mitigated by the UN Security Council. Subsequently, the Greek military Junta collapsed on July 23, 1974, and peace talks commenced in which a democratic government was installed. The Resolution 353 was broken after Turkey attacked a second time and managed to get a hold of 37% of Cyprus territory. The Island of Cyprus was appointed a Buffer Zone by the United Nations, which divided the island into two zones through the 'Green Line' and put an end to the Turkish invasion. Although Turkey announced that the occupied areas of Cyprus to be called the Federated Turkish State in 1975, it is not legitimised on a worldwide political scale. The United Nations called for the international recognition of independence for the Republic of Cyprus in the Security Council Resolution 367.

 

In the years after the Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus one can observe a history of failed talks between the two parties. The 1983 declaration of the independent Turkish Republic of Cyprus resulted in a rise of inter-communal tensions and made it increasingly hard to find mutual understanding. With Cyprus' interest of a possible EU membership and a new UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 1997 new hopes arose for a fresh start. International involvement from sides of the US and UK, wanting a solution to the Cyprus dispute prior to the EU accession led to political pressures for new talks. The believe that an accession without a solution would threaten Greek-Turkish relations and acknowledge the partition of the island would direct the coming negotiations.

 

Over the course of two years a concrete plan, the Annan plan was formulated. In 2004 the fifth version agreed upon from both sides and with the endorsement of Turkey, US, UK and EU then was presented to the public and was given a referendum in both Cypriot communities to assure the legitimisation of the resolution. The Turkish Cypriots voted with 65% for the plan, however the Greek Cypriots voted with a 76% majority against. The Annan plan contained multiple important topics. Firstly it established a confederation of two separate states called the United Cyprus Republic. Both communities would have autonomous states combined under one unified government. The members of parliament would be chosen according to the percentage in population numbers to ensure a just involvement from both communities. The paper proposed a demilitarisation of the island over the next years. Furthermore it agreed upon a number of 45000 Turkish settlers that could remain on the island. These settlers became a very important issue concerning peace talks. Originally the Turkish government encouraged Turks to settle in Cyprus providing transfer and property, to establish a counterpart to the Greek Cypriot population due to their 1 to 5 minority. With the economic situation many Turkish-Cypriot decided to leave the island, however their departure is made up by incoming Turkish settlers leaving the population ratio between Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots stable. However all these points where criticised and as seen in the vote rejected mainly by the Greek Cypriots. These name the dissolution of the „Republic of Cyprus", economic consequences of a reunion and the remaining Turkish settlers as reason. Many claim that the plan was indeed drawing more from Turkish-Cypriot demands then Greek-Cypriot interests. Taking in consideration that the US wanted to keep Turkey as a strategic partner in future Middle Eastern conflicts.

 

A week after the failed referendum the Republic of Cyprus joined the EU. In multiple instances the EU tried to promote trade with Northern Cyprus but without internationally recognised ports this spiked a grand debate. Both side endure their intention of negotiations, however without the prospect of any new compromises or agreements the UN is unwilling to start the process again. Since 2004 negotiations took place in numbers but without any results, both sides are strongly holding on to their position without an agreeable solution in sight that would suit both parties.

officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic, is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia, bordered by Burma and People's Republic of China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the south and Thailand to the west. Laos traces its history to the Kingdom of Lan Xang or Land of a Million Elephants, which existed from the 14th to the 18th century.

After a period as a French protectorate, it gained independence in 1949. A long civil war ended officially when the Communist Pathet Lao movement came to power in 1975, but the protesting between factions continued for several years. Forty-four percent of the population lived below the international poverty line of the equivalent of US$1.25 a day according to data from 2006, though the CIA World Factbook currently places this figure at 26%.

 

History

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Laos

 

Geography

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_Laos

 

Other info

Oficial Name:

ສາທາລະນະລັດປະຊາທິປະໄຕປະຊາຊົນລາວ

Shathalanat Paxathipatai Paxaxôn Lao

Lao People's Democratic Republic

 

Independence:

19 July 1949

 

Area:

236.800km2

 

Inhabitants:

5.789.000

 

Language:

Aheu [thm] 1,770 in Laos (2000). Pak Sane Province, Khamkeut District, near Lak Sao. Alternate names: Kha Tong Luang, Thavung, Phon Soung, Phonsung, So. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Viet-Muong, Thavung

More information.

 

Akha [ahk] 58,000 in Laos (1995 Nguyen Duy Thieu). Luang Namtha, Phongsali provinces. Alternate names: Kaw, Ekaw, Ko, Aka, Ikaw, Ak'a, Ahka, Khako, Hka Ko, Khao Kha Ko, Ikor, Aini, Yani. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha, Hani, Ha-Ya

More information.

 

Alak [alk] 4,000 (2000 Bradley). Southern Laos, mainly in Saravan and Sekong provinces. Alternate names: Hrlak. Dialects: Included under Bahnaric as closest to Bahnar, Tampuan, Lamam. Also included under Katuic. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, Central Bahnaric

More information.

 

Arem [aem] 20 in Laos. Ethnic population: 500 (1995). West central, both sides of the Viet Nam-Laos border, west of Phuc Trach. Alternate names: Chomrau, Chombrau, Umo. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Viet-Muong, Chut Nearly extinct.

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Bit [bgk] 1,530 in Laos (1985 Proschan). Population total all countries: 2,030. Near the northern border with China, northeast of Namtha, Luang Namtha Province, and south of Boun Neua; Phongsali Province, Boun-Tai, Samphan, and Khoa districts, 8 villages. Also spoken in China. Alternate names: Khabit, Khbit, Phsing, Phsin. Dialects: Not Khmuic, but Palaungic (J-O Svantesson 1990). Related to Khao in Viet Nam. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Khao

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Bo [bgl] 2,950 (2000). Central Laos inland from the bend of the Mekong, Nhang River, around Nape, Kammouan Province and Lak Sao, Bolikhamxay Province, Hinboun District. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Viet-Muong, Muong

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Bru, Eastern [bru] 69,000 in Laos (1999). Population total all countries: 129,559. Eastern Savannehkhet Province, Sepone District. Also spoken in Thailand, Viet Nam. Dialects: Tri (So Tri, So Trii, Chali). It is partially intelligible with Western Bru of Thailand. Related to Khua. Mangkong in Viet Nam and eastern Laos is a dialect of Eastern Bru, different linguistically from the Mangkong that are the same as So of Thailand. Mangkong is an ethnic group. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, West Katuic, Brou-So

More information.

 

Chut [scb] 450 in Laos (1995 census). Khammouan Province, Bouarapha District, near the Viet Nam border at about the latitude of the Mu Gia Pass. Alternate names: May, Ruc, Sach, Salang. Dialects: May, Ruc. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Viet-Muong, Chut

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Con [cno] 1,000 (1981 Wurm and Hattori). Luang Namtha Province, southwest of Vieng Pou Kha. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Palaungic, Western Palaungic, Lametic

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Halang Doan [hld] 2,346 in Laos (2000). Attopeu Province, Kasseng Plateau, Sanxai District, on the left banks of the Kamane and Dak Robay rivers, near the Viet Nam border. Alternate names: Halang Duan, Duan, Doan. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, North Bahnaric, West, Duan

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Hani [hni] 1,122 in Laos (1995). Phongsali Province, along the Yunnan border. None in Thailand. Alternate names: Hanhi, Haw. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha, Hani, Ha-Ya

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Hmong Daw [mww] 169,800 in Laos (1995 census). Northern Laos. Alternate names: White Meo, White Miao, Meo Kao, White Lum, Bai Miao. Dialects: Hmong Gu Mba (Hmong Qua Mba, Striped Hmong), Mong Leng. Classification: Hmong-Mien, Hmongic, Chuanqiandian

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Hmong Njua [blu] 145,600 in Laos (1995). Northern Laos. Alternate names: Blue Meo, Blue Miao, Tak Meo, Hmong Njwa, Hmong Leng, Miao, Meo. Classification: Hmong-Mien, Hmongic, Chuanqiandian

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Hung [hnu] 2,000 in Laos (1996 Ferlus). Population total all countries: 2,700 to 3,700. Bolikhamsay, Khammouan provinces. The Toum live northeast of Nape and south of the Phong. Also spoken in Viet Nam. Dialects: Toum (Tum), Phong (Pong, Poong, Pong 1, Pong 2). Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Viet-Muong, Cuoi

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Ir [irr] 4,420 (2000). Saravan Province, east of Saravan town. Alternate names: In, Yir. Dialects: Closest to Ong. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, Central Katuic, Ta'oih

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Iu Mien [ium] 20,250 in Laos (2000). Alternate names: Mien, Man, Yao, Myen, Highland Yao. Classification: Hmong-Mien, Mienic, Mian-Jin

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Jeh [jeh] 8,013 in Laos (1995 census). Southern Laos, Xekong Province, Dakchung District; Attopeu Province, Sanxai District, basin of Poko, Kamane, and Dak Main rivers. Alternate names: Die, Yeh, Gie. Dialects: Jeh Bri La, Jeh Mang Ram. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, North Bahnaric, West, Jeh-Halang

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Jeng [jeg] 7,320 (2000). Attopeu Province, Samakkhixai and Sanamxai districts, 6 villages north of Attopeu town. Alternate names: Cheng, Chiengceng. Dialects: Related to Oy, Sapuan, Sok. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Oi-The

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Kado [kdv] 225 in Laos (2000). Phongsali Province. Alternate names: Kadu, Katu, Asak, Sak, Gadu, Thet. Dialects: Kadu, Ganaan (Ganan), Andro, Sengmai, Chakpa, Phayeng. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Jingpho-Konyak-Bodo, Jingpho-Luish, Luish

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Kaduo [ktp] 5,000 in Laos (1981 Wurm and Hattori). Population total all countries: 10,292. North central on the China border, north of Mong Ou Tay. Also spoken in China. Alternate names: Gazhuo. Dialects: No information on intelligibility of other Lolo languages. No significant dialect differences. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha, Hani, Bi-Ka

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Kang [kyp] 47,636 in Laos (1995 census). Population total all countries: 81,701. Houaphan Province, Xam-Tai District; Xiangkhoang Province, Nonghet District. Also spoken in China. Alternate names: Tai Khang. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Kam-Sui

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Kasseng [kgc] 1,200 (2000 D. Bradley). Ethnic population: 6,000 (2000). Southern Laos near Viet Nam border, Boloven Plateau area north of Attopeu, and between the Jeh, Alak, Laven, and Tareng peoples. Alternate names: Koseng, Kaseng, Kraseng. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, East Katuic, Kaseng

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Kataang [kgd] 107,350 (2000). Southern Laos near the Ta'oih and Bru people, around Muong Nong, in Saravan, Savannakhet, Sekong, and Champassak provinces, around Toumlahn District, 2 villages in Khong Chiem, Ubon Ratachatani District, Thailand. Alternate names: Katang. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, Central Katuic, Ta'oih

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Katu, Western [kuf] 14,700 (1998). Upper Xe Kong River, high basin of Song Boung River watershed along the Vietnamese border, Sekong, Saravan, and Champassak provinces. Dialects: A different language variety and orthography from Viet Nam. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, East Katuic, Katu-Pacoh

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Khlor [llo] 6,000 (1981 Wurm and Hattori). Saravan Province, Laongam District, south of Ir and Ong. Alternate names: Klor, Lor. Dialects: Closest to Ngeq. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, East Katuic, Ngeq-Nkriang

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Khmu [kjg] 389,694 in Laos (1985 F. Proschan). Population total all countries: 479,739. Scattered through northern Laos. Also spoken in China, France, Myanmar, Thailand, USA, Viet Nam. Alternate names: Kmhmu, Khmu', Khamu, Kamu, Kammu, Khamuk, Kamhmu, Khomu, Mou, Pouteng, Pu Thenh, Tenh, Theng, Lao Terng. Dialects: Yuan, Khroong (Krong), Luang Prabang, Sayabury, Lyy, Rok, U, Hat. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Mal-Khmu', Khmu'

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Khua [xhv] 2,000 in Laos (1981). Khammouan Province, Bouarapha District, northwest of Boualapha. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, West Katuic, Brou-So

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Khuen [khf] 8,000 in Laos (1995 Chazee). Population total all countries: 9,000. Luang Namtha Province, Nale, Sing, and Viangphoukha districts. Near the Lamet people. Also spoken in China, USA. Alternate names: Kween, Khween, Khouen. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Mal-Khmu', Khmu'

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Kim Mun [mji] 4,500 in Laos (1995 Chazee). Northwestern Laos, Luang Namtha Province, Long, Namtha districts; Huay Sai Province; Nam Moh District, Udom Sai Province, Nam Moh District; Bokeo Province. Alternate names: Mun, Lan Tin, Lanten, Man Lan-Tien, Lowland Yao, Jim Mun. Classification: Hmong-Mien, Mienic, Mian-Jin

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Kiorr [xko] 2,359 in Laos (1985 F. Proschan). Louang Nam Tha and Bokeo provinces, 6 villages. Also spoken in Myanmar. Alternate names: Saamtaav, Samtao, Samtao 2, Con, Col. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Palaungic, Western Palaungic, Angkuic

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Kuan [uan] 2,500 (1995 census). Bolikhamxay Province, Viangthong District, near the Mouan River. Dialects: Some classification problems, possibly because of migration. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Unclassified

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Kuy [kdt] 51,180 in Laos (2000). 80% monolingual. Savannakhet, Saravan, Sedone provinces. A large group on both sides of the Mekong in southern Laos. Alternate names: Sui, Suai, Suay, Suoi, Soai, Suei, Aouei, Kuoy, Kui, Dui, Khamen-Boran, Old Khmer, Cuoi. Dialects: Antra, Na Nhyang. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, West Katuic, Kuay-Nheu

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Lahu [lhu] 8,702 in Laos (1995 census). Bokeo Province, Peung, Tonpheung, Houayxay districts. Alternate names: Museu, Mussuh, Muhso, Musso. Dialects: Na (Black Lahu, Musser Dam, Northern Lahu, Loheirn), Nyi (Red Lahu, Southern Lahu, Musseh Daeng, Luhishi, Luhushi), Shehleh. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha, Lahu

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Lahu Shi [kds] 3,240 in Laos (2000). Population total all countries: 40,240. Bokeo Province, Kentung District. Also spoken in China, Myanmar, Thailand, USA, Viet Nam. Alternate names: Kutsung, Kucong, Yellow Lahu, Shi, Kui, Kwi. Dialects: Difficult intelligibility of Black Lahu. A distinct language from Nyi (Red Lahu). Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha, Lahu

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Lamet [lbn] 16,740 in Laos (1995 census). Population total all countries: 16,864. Northwestern Laos, Luang Namtha, Bokeo provinces. Also spoken in Thailand, USA. Alternate names: Lemet, Kha Lamet, Khamet, Khamed, Rmeet. Dialects: Upper Lamet, Lower Lamet. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Palaungic, Western Palaungic, Lametic

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Lao [lao] 3,000,000 in Laos (1991 UBS). Population total all countries: 3,188,577. Mekong River Valley from Luang Prabang south to the Cambodian border. The Lao Kao went to Thailand and are in Nan, Loei, Saraburi, and elsewhere; the Lao-Khrang are in the Nakhonsawan and Nakhon Pathom area. May also be in Viet Nam. Also spoken in Australia, Cambodia, Canada, France, Thailand, USA. Alternate names: Laotian Tai, Laotian, Phou Lao, Eastern Thai, Lum Lao, Lao Wiang, Lao Kao, Rong Kong, Tai Lao, Lao-Tai, LÃ o, Lao-Lum, Lao-Noi. Dialects: Luang Prabang, Vientiane (Wiang Jan), Savannakhet (Suwannakhet), Pakse, Lao-Kao, Lao-Khrang. Dialect cluster with Northeastern Tai of Thailand. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, Lao-Phutai

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Laos Sign Language [lso] Dialects: Related to sign languages in Viet Nam and earlier ones in Thailand. Classification: Deaf sign language

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Lave [brb] 12,750 in Laos (1984). Population total all countries: 18,444. Attopeu Province, Laos-Cambodian border. Also spoken in Cambodia, France, USA, Viet Nam. Alternate names: Brao, Braou, Brau, Proue, Brou, Love, Laveh, Rawe. Dialects: Palau. Close to Krung 2, Kravet, Sou. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Brao-Kravet

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Laven [lbo] 40,519 in Laos (1995 census). Southwestern Laos, Champassak, Attopeu provinces, Boloven Plateau, near the Alak. Also spoken in USA. Alternate names: Loven, Boloven, Boriwen, Laweenjru, Jaru, Jru', Jruq. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Laven

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Lü [khb] 134,100 in Laos (2000). Western Phongsali, Luang Namtha, Bokeo, Udomxay, Xanyabouli, Luang Prabang provinces. Alternate names: Lue, Lu, Pai-I, Shui-Pai-I. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, Northwest

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Mal [mlf] 23,193 in Laos (1995 census). Population total all countries: 26,193. Xaignabouli Province, Phiang District, west of the Mekong River. Also spoken in Thailand, USA. Alternate names: Khatin, T'in, Htin, Thin, Tin. Dialects: Not intelligible with Lua, Phai, or Pray 3. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Mal-Khmu', Mal-Phrai

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Maleng [pkt] 800 in Laos (1996 Ferlus). Population total all countries: 1,000. Khammouan Province, Nakay District, Nam Theun Valley, near the banks of the Theun River. Also spoken in Viet Nam. Alternate names: Malieng, Malang. Dialects: Maleng, Pakatan (Kha Pakatan), Malang, Hareme. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Viet-Muong, Chut

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Mlabri [mra] 24 in Laos (1985 F. Proschan). Xaignabouli Province, Phiang District, near Thailand border. Alternate names: Mla, Mla-Bri, Mabri, Mrabri, Yumbri, Ma Ku, Yellow Leaf. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Mlabri

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Ngeq [ngt] 12,189 (1995 census). 70% monolingual. Southern Laos, Sekong, Saravan, Champassak provinces, 25 villages. Alternate names: Ngeh, Nge', Ngae, Kriang, Nkriang. Dialects: Closest to Khlor. Related to Alak 2. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, East Katuic, Ngeq-Nkriang

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Nung [nut] A few in Laos. Alternate names: Nong. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Central

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Nyaheun [nev] 5,152 (1995 census). Eastern part of Boloven Plateau near Sekong and Paksong. Alternate names: Nha Heun, Nyah Heuny, Hoen, Nia Hoen, Hun, Hin, Niahon, Nyahön, Yaheun. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Nyaheun

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O'du [tyh] 194 in Laos (1996 F. Proschan). Xiang Khoang Province, Nonghet District. Alternate names: O Du, Iduh, 'Iduh, "Tay Hat", "Hat", "Haat". Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Mal-Khmu', Khmu'

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Ong [oog] 10,300 (2000). Saravan Province, north of Saravan town. Alternate names: Tong, Hantong. Dialects: Closest to Ir. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, Central Katuic, Ta'oih

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Oy [oyb] 14,947 (1995 census). 80% monolingual. Attopeu Province, at the foot of the Bolaven Plateau near Pakse. Alternate names: Huei, Oi. Dialects: Riyao, Tamal Euy, Inn Tea, Kranyeu. Related to Jeng, Sapuan, Sok, The. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Oi-The

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Pacoh [pac] 13,224 in Laos (1995 census). 70% monolingual. Saravan Province, Samouay District; Savannakhet Province, Nong District. Alternate names: Bo River Van Kieu, Pokoh. Dialects: Pahi. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, East Katuic, Katu-Pacoh

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Phai [prt] 15,000 in Laos (1995 census). Phongsali Province, Boun-Tai, Boun-Nua, Phongsali, Samphan districts; Xaignabouli Province, Hongsa, Xaignabouli, Phiang districts. Alternate names: Thung Chan Pray, Phay, Kha Pray, Pray 1, Prai. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Mal-Khmu', Mal-Phrai

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Phana' [phq] 350 (1995 census). Luang Namtha Province, Luang Namtha District, Bopiet and Namtoung villages; Bokeo Province, Houayxay District, one village. Alternate names: Pana', Bana'. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha

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Phong-Kniang [pnx] 1,000 (1981 Wurm and Hattori). Southern Houaphan Province, Viangthong and Houamuang districts, near the Neun River; northern Xieng Khouang Province. Alternate names: Pong 3, Khaniang, Kenieng, Keneng, Lao Phong. Dialects: Related to Puoc and Khang. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Xinh Mul

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Phu Thai [pht] 154,400 in Laos (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Khammouan, Savannakhet, Saravan, Champassak provinces; some found in Oudomxai and Luang Prabang provinces. Alternate names: Putai, Phutai, Puthay. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, Lao-Phutai

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Phuan [phu] 106,099 in Laos (2000 WCD). Bolikhamxai, Vientiane, Xiangkhoang, and Houaphan. Alternate names: Lao Phuan, Phu Un. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, East Central, Chiang Saeng

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Phunoi [pho] 35,635 in Laos (1995 census). North central, around Phony Saly. Also spoken in Thailand. Alternate names: Phounoy, Phu Noi, Punoi. Dialects: Black Khoany, White Khoany, Mung, Hwethom, Khaskhong. Close to Bisu, Pyen, and Mpi. Those listed as dialects may be separate languages. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Phunoi

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Pu Ko [puk] 2 villages. Alternate names: Poko. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern

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Puoc [puo] 2,164 in Laos (1985 F. Proschan). Northeast, Houaphan Province, Xiangkho District; Xieng Khouang Province, Het River, along the Viet Nam border. Alternate names: Kha Puhoc, Puhoc, Puok, Pou Hok, Xinh Mul, Xin Mul, Xing Mun, Ksing Mul, Lao Muh, Kha Niang. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Khmuic, Xinh Mul

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Rien [rie] 5,279 (2000 WCD). Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai

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Saek [skb] 14,000 in Laos (1990 Diller). Population total all countries: 25,000. Central Laos near the Viet Nam border. Upper Nam Noy and Nam Pheo areas in Khammouan Province and the village of Na Kadok in Khamkeut District, Borikhamxay Province. Also spoken in Thailand. Alternate names: Sek, Tai Sek, Set. Dialects: Na Kadok, Khammouan. Close to Tai Mène. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Sek

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Salang [hal] 4,000 in Laos. Southern Laos, Attopeu Province. Alternate names: Halang. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, North Bahnaric, West, Jeh-Halang

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Sapuan [spu] 2,400 (1981). Southern Laos, Attopeu Province, banks of the Se Kong and Se Kamane rivers. Alternate names: Sapouan. Dialects: Related to Oy, Sok, Jeng. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Oi-The

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Sila [slt] 1,772 in Laos (1995 census). Population total all countries: 2,612. North central, north of Muong Hai. Also spoken in Viet Nam. Classification: Sino-Tibetan, Tibeto-Burman, Lolo-Burmese, Loloish, Southern, Akha, Hani

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Sô [sss] 102,000 in Laos (1993). Population total all countries: 160,000. Khammouan, Thakhek, Savannakhet provinces, both sides of the Mekong River. Also spoken in Thailand. Alternate names: Mangkong, Mang-Koong, Makong, So Makon, Mankoong, Mang Cong, Bru, Kah So, Thro. Dialects: So Trong, So Slouy, So Phong. Close to Bru. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, West Katuic, Brou-So

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Sok [skk] 1,600 (1981). Attopeu Province. Alternate names: Sork, Sawk. Dialects: Related to Oy, Sapuan, Jeng. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Oi-The

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Sou [sqq] 2,360 (2000). Southern Laos, Attopeu Province, Phouvong and Sanamxai districts. Alternate names: Suq, Souk, Su, Su', Sawk. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Brao-Kravet

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Tai Daeng [tyr] 25,000 in Laos (1991). Northeastern Laos, near the Viet Nam border. Alternate names: Red Thai, Thai Do, Thai Dang, Tai Deng, Daeng. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, East Central, Chiang Saeng

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Tai Dam [blt] 50,000 in Laos (1995). Khammouan Province. Alternate names: Black Tai, Tai Noir, Thai Den. Dialects: Tai Muoi (Tai Muei, Tay Mueai, Meuay). Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, East Central, Chiang Saeng

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Tai Dón [twh] 200,000 in Laos (1995 census). Northeastern Laos. Alternate names: Tai Blanc, Thái Tráng, Tai Lai, Tai Kao, White Tai. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, East Central, Chiang Saeng

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Tai Loi [tlq] 500 in Laos (1995 census). Luang Namtha Province, Long District. Tai Loi is across the border in Myanmar. Tai Loi may also be in China. Alternate names: Loi, Tailoi, Wakut, Monglwe. Dialects: Tai Loi, Doi. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Northern Mon-Khmer, Palaungic, Western Palaungic, Angkuic

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Tai Long [thi] 4,800 (2004). Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern

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Tai Mène [tmp] 7,200 (1995 census). Borikhamxay Province, Vieng Thong District, several villages; Khamkeut District, many villages: Lak Xao, Khamkeut, Na Heuang, Nam Sak, Sop Chat, Ka'ane, Phon Thoen, Sop Pone, and Tha Veng. Alternate names: Tai Maen, Tai-Maen, Tay Mènè, Tai Mene, Tai Man, Tai Men. Dialects: Close to Saek. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Northern

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Tai Nüa [tdd] 35,000 in Laos (1995 Chazee). Northwestern Laos. Also possibly in north Viet Nam. Alternate names: Chinese Shan, Tai Neua, Tai Nuea. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, Northwest

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Tai Pao [tpo] 3,300 (1995 census). Bolikhamxay Province, Viangthong, Khamkeut, Pakkading districts. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai

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Talieng [tdf] 23,091 (1995 census). Muong Phine-Bung Sai area, Savannakhet Province. Alternate names: Taliang, Tariang. Dialects: Related to Trieng or Hre in Viet Nam; may be the same as Trieng. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, North Bahnaric, West

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Ta'oih, Lower [tto] 15,836 (2000 WCD). Saravan Province, northwest of Saravan town. Alternate names: Tong. Dialects: Tong, Hantong'. Not intelligible with Upper Ta'oih. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, Central Katuic, Ta'oih

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Ta'oih, Upper [tth] 30,876 in Laos (1995 census). 70% monolingual. Population total all countries: 49,876. Saravan Province, mainly in Ta-Oy District. Also spoken in USA, Viet Nam. Alternate names: Ta-Oy, Ta-Oi, Tau Oi, Ta Hoi, Kantua. Dialects: Pasoom, Kamuan', Palee'n, Leem, Ha'aang (Sa'ang). Not intelligible with Lower Ta'oih until speakers have had at least 2 weeks' contact. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, Central Katuic, Ta'oih

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Tareng [tgr] 5,000 (1981 Wurm and Hattori). Just west of Viet Nam border, east of Kayong, north of Chavane and Thia. Alternate names: Tariang. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Katuic, East Katuic, Katu-Pacoh

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Tay Khang [tnu] 200. Khammouan Province. Possibly also in Viet Nam. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai

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Thai, Northern [nod] 9,396 in Laos (2000 WCD). Haut Mekong and Sayaboury provinces, Laos. Alternate names: Lanna, Lan Na, Lanatai, Lannatai, "Yuan", "Youon", "Youanne", Myang, Muang. Dialects: Nan. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Southwestern, East Central, Chiang Saeng

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The [thx] 2,920 (2000). Attopeu Province. Alternate names: Thae. Classification: Austro-Asiatic, Mon-Khmer, Eastern Mon-Khmer, Bahnaric, West Bahnaric, Oi-The

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Yoy [yoy] 1,000 in Laos (1995 census). Alternate names: Yoi, Yooi, Yooy, Dioi, Jui. Classification: Tai-Kadai, Kam-Tai, Be-Tai, Tai-Sek, Tai, Northern

 

Capital city:

Vientiene

 

Meaning country name:

Name coined under French rule, derived from Lao lao meaning "a Laotian" or "Laotian", possibly originally from an ancient Indian word lava. Lava names one of the twin sons of the god Rama. Might also be from "Ai-Lao" the old Chinese name for the Tai ethnic groups of which the Lao people belong to.[9] Formerly known as "Lan Xang" or "land of a million elephants".

 

Description Flag:

The flag of Laos was adopted on December 2, 1975. The flag had previously been used by the short-lived Lao nationalist government of 1945.

The flag consists of three horizontal strips, middle blue strip is twice the height of the top and bottom red stripes. In the middle is a white disc, the diameter of the disc is 0.8 times the height of the blue stripe. The flag ratio is 2:3.

The red color in the flag represents the blood shed in the struggle for independence, the blue color symbolizes the wealth of the country. The white disc represents the moon over the river Mekong, as well as the unity of the country under the communist government.

From 1952 until the fall of the royal government in 1975 the country had a red flag, with a white three-headed elephant (the god Erawan) in the middle. On top of the elephant is a nine-folded umbrella, while the elephant itself stands on a five level pedestal. The white elephant is a common royal symbol in south-east asia, the three heads referred to the three former kingdoms Vientiane, Luangprabang, and Xiengkhoung which made up the country. The nine-folded umbrella is also a royal symbol, originating from Mt. Meru in the Buddhist cosmology. The pedestal represented the law on which the country rested.

 

Coat of arms:

The coat of arms of Laos shows the national shrine Pha That Luang. Furthermore the dam appears as a symbol of power generation at the reservoir Nam Ngun, an asphalt street appears, and a stylized watered field is represented. In the lower part a section of a gear wheel is to be seen. The two inscriptions left and right read "Peace, Independence, Democracy" (lao script: ສັນຕິພາບ ເຬàºàº°àº¥àº²àº” ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ) and announce on the right "Unity and Prosperity" (lao script: ເຬàºàº°àºžàº²àºš ວັດຖະນາຖາວຬນ.)

The coat of arms was modified in 1991. The existing Communist symbols red star as well as the hammer and sickle were replaced with the national shrine at Pha That Luang. The coat of arms is specified in the Laotian constitution:

The National Emblem of the Lao People's Democratic Republic is a circle depicting in the bottom part one-half of a cog wheel and red ribbon with inscriptions [of the words] "Lao People's Democratic Republic", and [flanked by] crescent-shaped stalks of fully-ripened rice at both sides and red ribbons bearing the inscription "Peace, Independence, Democracy, Unity, Prosperity". A picture of That Luang Pagoda is located between the tips of the stalks of rice. A road, a paddy field, a forest and a hydroelectric dam are depicted in the middle of the circle.

 

Motto:

ສັນຕິພາບ ເອກະລາດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ເອກະພາບ ວັດທະນາຖາວອນ

"Peace, Independence, Democracy, Unity and Prosperity"

 

National Anthem: "Pheng Xat Lao"

 

Lao lyrics

ຊາດລາວຕັ້ງແຕ່ໃດມາ ລາວທຸກຖ້ວນຫນ້າເຊີດຊູສຸດໃຈ

ຮ່ວມແຮງຮ່ວມຈິດຮ່ວມໃຈ ສາມັກຄີກັນເປັນກຳລັງດຽວ

ເດັດດ່ຽວພ້ອມກັນກ້າວຫນ້າ ບູຊາຊູກຽດຂອງລາວ

ສົ່ງເສີມໃຊ້ສິດເປັນເຈົ້າ ລາວທຸກຊົນເຜົ່າສະເໝີພາບກັນ

ບໍ່ໃຫ້ຝູງຈັກກະພັດ ແລະພວກຂາຍຊາດ

ເຂົ້າມາລົບກວນ ລາວທັງມວນຊູເອກະລາດ

ອິດສະລະພາບ ຂອງຊາດລາວໄວ້

ຕັດສິນໃຈສູ້ຊິງເອົາໄຊ ພາຊາດກ້າວໄປສູ່ຄວາມວັດທະນາ

 

Transliteration of Lao lyrics

 

Xatlao tangtae dayma lao thookthuan na xeutxoo sootchay,

Huamhaeng huamchit huamchay samakkhikan pen kamlang diao.

Detdiao phomkan kaona booxa xukiat khong lao,

Songseum xaysit pen chao laothook xonphao sameu pabkan.

Bo hay Fung chackkaphat lae phuak khayxat khaomalob kuan,

Lao thangmuan xoo ekkalat itsalaphab khong xatlao vai,

Tatsin chay soo xing ao xay Pa Sad kaopay soo khuam vatthana.

 

English translation

 

For all time the Lao people have glorified their Fatherland,

United in heart, spirit and vigour as one.

Resolutely moving forwards,

Respecting and increasing the dignity of the Lao people

And proclaiming the right to be their own masters.

The Lao people of all origins are equal

And will no longer allow imperialists and traitors to harm them.

The entire people will safeguard the independence

And the freedom of the Lao nation.

They are resolved to struggle for victory

In order to lead the nation to prosperity.

 

Internet Page: www.undplao.org

www.na.gov.la

www.visit-laos.com

 

Laos in diferent languages

 

eng | afr | arg | ast | bre | cat | ces | cym | dan | dsb | est | eus | fao | fin | fra | frp | fry | fur | glg | hat | hau | hrv | hsb | ina | isl | ita | jav | jnf | lim | lin | lld | mlt | nld | nor | oci | pol | roh | ron | rup | scn | slk | slv | sme | spa | srd | swa | swe | szl | tet | tgl | tur | vor | zza: Laos

aze | bos | crh | gag | kaa | mol | tuk | uzb: Laos / Лаос

deu | ltz | nds: Laos / Laos

ind | msa: Laos / لأوس

kin | run: Lawose

lav | mlg: Laosa

bam: Lawo

cor: Pow Lao

csb: Laòs

epo: Laoso

gla: Làthos; Laos

gle: Laos / Laos

glv: Yn Laos

hun: Laosz

ibo: Laus

kmr: Laos / Лаос / لائۆس

kur: Laos / لائۆس

lat: Laosium; Laotia; Laotium; Laonia; Laosia

lit: Laosas

nrm: Lâos

por: Laus; Laos

que: Laws

rmy: Laos / लाओस

slo: Laozem / Лаозем

smg: Lauosos

smo: Lao

sqi: Laosi

vie: Lào

vol: Laoän

wln: Lawosse

wol: Laawos

alt | bul | che | chm | chv | kbd | kir | kjh | kom | krc | kum | mkd | mon | oss | rus | tyv | udm | ukr: Лаос (Laos)

bak | srp | tat: Лаос / Laos

abq: Лаос (Łaos)

bel: Лаос / Łaos

kaz: Лаос / Laos / لاوس

tgk: Лаос / لئاس / Laos

ara: لاوس (Lāwus); لاووس (Lāwūs); اللاوس (al-Lāwus); اللاووس (al-Lāwūs); لاو (Lāw)

fas: لائوس / Lâos

prs: لاوس (Lāōs)

pus: لاوس (Lāos)

uig: لائوس / Laos / Лаос

urd: لیوس (Leos); لاؤس / لائوس (Lāʾos)

div: ލާއޯސް (Lā'ōs)

heb: לאוס (Laʾôs)

lad: לאוס / Laos

yid: לאַאָס (Laos)

amh: ላኦስ (La'os); ላዎስ (Lawos)

ell: Λάος (Láos)

hye: Լաոս (Laos)

kat: ლაოსი (Laosi)

hin: लाओस (Lāos)

ben: লাওস (Lāos)

pan: ਲਾਓਸ (Lāos)

kan: ಲಾಒಸ್ (Lāos)

mal: ലാവോസ് (Lāvōs)

tam: லாவோஸ் (Lāvōs)

tel: లావోస్ (Lāvōs)

zho: 寮國/寮国 (Liáoguó); 老挝 (Lǎowō)

yue: 寮國/寮国 (Louhgwok)

jpn: ラオス (Raosu)

kor: 라오스 (Laoseu)

bod: ལ་འོ་གོ་ (La.'o.go.); ལའོ་གོ་ (La'o.go.)

dzo: ལ་འོསུ་ (La.'osu.)

mya: လာအုိ (La'o)

tha: ลาว (Lāw)

lao: ລາວ (Lāw); ເມືອງລາວ (Mʉ̄aṅ Lāw); ປະເທດລາວ (Patʰēt Lāw)

khm: ឡាវ (Ḷāv); លាវ (Lāv)

 

Módena (Mòdna en dialecto modenés; Modena en italiano) es una ciudad italiana, capital de la provincia de Módena, en la región Emilia-Romaña. Cuenta con una población de 184 973 habitantes. La catedral, la Torre Cívica («Ghirlandina») y la Piazza Grande de la ciudad están declaradas Patrimonio de la Humanidad por la Unesco.

Módena queda en la llanura padana, y está rodeada por dos ríos, el Secchia y el Panaro, ambos afluentes del Po. Su presencia está simbolizada por la fuente de los dos ríos, en el centro de la ciudad, obra de Giuseppe Graziosi. La ciudad está conectada con el Panaro a través del canal Naviglio.

La cordillera de los Apeninos comienzan a unos 10 kilómetros al sur de la ciudad.

 

Módena es un importante centro industrial. La ciudad se ubica en el corazón de la «Motor Valley» que forma un conjunto de grupos industriales prestigios así como numerosos circuitos y museos. Las empresas Lamborghini, Pagani, Ferrari y Maserati tienen su sede dentro de un radio de 20 km alrededor de Módena.

 

Ubicado en la llanura Padana, el territorio modenés dispone de importantes riquezas gustativas. Su producto líder es el vinagre balsámico producido en los dominios agrícolas en el entorno de Módena. La base de su elaboración son las uvas cosechadas en los viñedos de la provincia. El lambrusco, vino rosado burbujeante, tiene como origen las viñas cercanas de Módena y Reggio Emilia. Además, Módena es la tierra del queso parmigiano reggiano y del jamón de Módena. Junto con Bolonia, Módena comparte el lugar de origen de la pasta tortellini.

 

El Duomo de Módena, la Torre Ghirlandina y la Piazza Grande están incluidos desde 1997 dentro del Patrimonio mundial de la UNESCO. El arquitecto Lanfranco y el escultor Wiligelmo erigieron el Duomo en el siglo XII por San Geminiano, obispo de Módena y Santo Patrón de la ciudad. Entre 1179 y 1319 se construyó la torre Ghirlandina asociada con el Duomo. Su nombre de Ghirlandina -guirnalda- resulta de su forma y recuerda la torre Giralda de Sevilla.

Durante más de dos siglos, la familia Este tenía como sede el Palazzo Ducale (palacio ducal). Hoy en día, este palacio recibe la Academia militar.

El Palazzo Comunale –ayuntamiento– cuya la fachada está en la Piazza Grande abarca un conjunto de edificios más antiguos. Dentro del edificio se encuentra la Secchia rapita –el cubo raptado- uno de los símbolos de la ciudad. La estatua de la Bonissima, símbolo de bondad, está posada en la esquina exterior del Palazzo Comunale.

Iglesias. Módena es una ciudad rica en iglesias, se cuentan más de quince en el casco histórico. También es importante nombrar a la iglesia de Santa María Pomposa, la iglesia del Voto o la iglesia de San Vicenzo. Existe también una sinagoga ubicada cerca del Palazzo Comunale.

En el mercado Albinelli se reúnen cada día productores locales de vinagre balsámico, jamón curdo o queso, entre otros.

es.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%B3dena

 

Modena is a city and comune (municipality) on the south side of the Po Valley, in the Province of Modena, in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy.

A town, and seat of an archbishop, it is known for its car industry since the factories of the famous Italian upper-class sports car makers Ferrari, De Tomaso, Lamborghini, Pagani and Maserati are, or were, located there and all, except Lamborghini, have headquarters in the city or nearby. One of Ferrari's cars, the 360 Modena, was named after the town itself. Ferrari's production plant and Formula One team Scuderia Ferrari are based in Maranello south of the city.

The University of Modena, founded in 1175 and expanded by Francesco II d'Este in 1686, focuses on economics, medicine and law, and is the second oldest athenaeum in Italy. Italian military officers are trained at the Military Academy of Modena, and partly housed in the Baroque Ducal Palace. The Biblioteca Estense houses historical volumes and 3,000 manuscripts. The Cathedral of Modena, the Torre della Ghirlandina and Piazza Grande are a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1997.

Modena is also known in culinary circles for its production of balsamic vinegar.

Famous Modenesi include Mary of Modena, the Queen consort of England and Scotland; operatic tenor Luciano Pavarotti and soprano Mirella Freni, born in Modena itself; Enzo Ferrari, eponymous founder of the Ferrari motor company; Catholic priest Gabriele Amorth; chef Massimo Bottura; comics artist Franco Bonvicini; the band Modena City Ramblers and singer-songwriter Francesco Guccini, who lived here for several decades.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modena

 

See also the Luozang English language webpage at www.luozang.com/en/products/ and the picture of the Tibetan-Chinese-English Learning Machine announced in October 2009 at flickr.com/photos/74568056@N00/4041347505/

The TIbetan and the Chinese language product pages are more recent -- see www.luozang.com/tb/products/ and www.luozang.com/products/ E-mail: Luozang6666@yahoo.cn

 

A Tibetan friend showed me this a few days ago. A Tibetan-Chinese-English e-book dictionary, it sells for 1300 RMB in China or about USD $180. The website describing the e-book, and home of this photo, is at www.luozang.com/

As a student who has been studying Tibetan for two years, I find the speech generation key helpful for Lhasa dialect pronunciation. It would be useful if pronunciation in Kham and Amdo dialects could be added. The Tibetan- Chinese dictionary is better than the Tibetan-English dictionary. Entering Tibetan letters with superscripts and subscripts is easy -- just start from the top with the superscript letter, hit the m button, then the letter, hit m, then the subscript.

The Luzoang Company's email address: luozang@luozang.com

The design team is at 31 Jiangsu Road in Lhasa. So far the documentation is only in Tibetan and Chinese only but not in English.

Here is my translation of the Chinese language description of the world's first Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionary:

 

Translation of www.luozang.com/index.html

 

The World’s First Tibetan-Chinese English Electronic Dictionary

 

I. Product characteristics:

 

1.Tibetan-Chinese-English dictionary function: includes 26 Tibetan-Chinese-English dictionaries, divided into general, science and technology and Buddhism categories. Implements translation between all language pairs for Tibetan, Chinese and English. The same term can be searched in multiple dictionaries and more a search may be done using more than one search term.

2.Tibetan-Chinese-English book function: collects 25 encyclopedic works including twelve Tibetan electronic books on history, famous people, language, aphorisms, grammar, Traditional Tibetan Medicine, Tibetan Buddhism, famous historic sites, customs, biographies, etc. There are also thirteen Chinese language encyclopedic works including Tang Dynasty poetry, Song Dynasty Poetry, the “Three Character Classic”, myths and legends, language and characters, ancient literature, thought and learning, culture, Chinese history, customs and civilization, Chinese art, and Chinese architecture. Users can use these electronic books to understand traditional Tibetan and Han culture, customs and history.

3. Single Chinese characters can be entered: this can be used to search on any unfamiliar Chinese character in the explanation of a term and at the same time hear the word pronounced by a human speaker.

4.Tibetan, Chinese and English titles for a MP3 format song can be displayed simultaneously.

5.Multiple language human speaker pronunciation function: plays a recording of a person pronouncing any Tibetan, Chinese or English work in the dictionary.

6.Multilingual computer text processing capability: the WordPad function implements the entry, saving and transfer of Tibetan, Chinese and English text through the　ＵＳＢ port to a personal computer for editing and printing. Tibetan language documents can be saved using Tibetan names.

7.Study function: Tibetan, Chinese and English language words and phrases can be saved: this can be used for repetitive study of difficult to memorize words and phrases. There is also a function that can used for study of Tibetan-Chinese and Chinese-Tibetan as well as Chinese-English and English-Chinese colloquial language.

8.Tibetan keyboard entry function: the special key arrangement makes possible easy entry of Tibetan language text. This Tibetan text entry method is completely compatible with the Himalaya Tibetan text entry method.

9.U disk function: has 1 GB of onboard memory and accepts an expansion card that can increase memory up to 3 GB.

10.Download function: Online Tibetan, Chinese and English language material can be downloaded to this electronic dictionary for editing, formatting and study.

11.Other functions: games, MP3 player, photo album, name card management, travel planning, calendar, calculator, scientific calculator etc.

 

II. Comparison with similar products on the Chinese and foreign markets

 

This is the world’s first Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionary : No similar product has been marketed thus far. The successful research and development of this product fills a gap: the lack of a Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionary. Compared with similar products, this electronic dictionary uses the most advanced version of ＵＮＩＣＯＤＥ to represent text. The hardware accommodates large files with its memory space of 1 GB that can be increased to 3 GB with an expansion card.

 

This product also has a USB port that enables exchange of information with computers, a headphone jack and speaker with clear audio output. It can combines in one device multiple functions including electronic dictionary, study, MP3 player and computer text processing.

 

The main differences between this and similar products are

:

1)Development of the first Tibetan electronic dictionary hardware product.

2)The first time　ＵＮＩＣＯＤＥ is used in the Tibetan language text character encoding.

3)The first time Tibetan language text editing is implemented in an electronic dictionary product.

4)The first time Tibetan LRC lyrics files and songs are simultaneously displayed.

 

------

Translation of www.luozang.com/contents.html

 

Essential Contents:

 

I. Luozang Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionary

 

General Dictionaries:

1.Donga Great Tibetan Dictionary

2.Great Tibetan - Chinese Dictionary

3.Great Chinese - Tibetan Dictionary

4.Chinese - Tibetan Dictionary

5.New Tibetan Dictionary

6.English-Tibetan Comparative Phrases Dictionary

7.English-Tibetan Dictionary

8.Tibetan-English Dictionary

9.Student Tibetan Dictionary

10.Student Character Dictionary

11.Chinese-Tibetan Proverb Dictionary

12.Tibetan-Chinese Proverb Dictionary

 

II. Science and Technology Dictionaries

13.Tibetan-Chinese-English Computer Comparative Dictionary

14.Tibetan-Chinese-English Physics Comparative Dictionary

15.Tibetan-Chinese-English Mathematics Comparative Dictionary

 

Buddhism Dictionaries

16.Chinese-Tibetan Buddhism Dictionary

17.Tibetan-Chinese Buddhism Dictionary

18.English-Tibetan Buddhism Dictionary

19.Tibetan-English Buddhism Dictionary

 

English Dictionaries

20. Practical English-Chinese Dictionary

21. Practical Chinese-English Dictionary

22. English-Chinese Dictionary of Abbreviations

 

Chinese Dictionaries

23. Dictionary of Modern Chinese

24. Student Chinese Dictionary

25. Chinese Proverb Dictionary

26. Dictionary of Symonyms, Congate Meanings and Antonyms

 

II. Tibetan-Chinese Encyclopedic Electronic Books

 

Tibetan Language Encyclopedic Works

1.History

2.Introduction to monasteries

3.Famous People

4.Mottos

5.Sayings

6.Grammar

7.Traditional Tibetan Medicine

8.Tibetan Buddhism

9.Historic sites and scenic spots

10.King Gesar

11.Customs

12.Biographies

 

Chinese Language Encyclopedic Works

13.Tang Poems

14.Song Poems

15."Three Character Classic"

16.Myths and Legends

17.Language and Characters

18.Ancient Literature

19.Thought and Learning

20.Classical Texts

21.Chinese History

22.Customs and Civilization

23.Chinese Art

24.Chinese Architecture

25.Ethnic Festivals

------

Translation of www.luozang.com/aboutus.html

 

Introducing Luozang Digital S&T Co., Ltd. [Note: a possible translation of the Chinese name; not official name]

 

Luozang Digital S&T Co., Ltd. Is a technology company with a strong team spirit. Some of us specialize in the Tibetan language; others are experts in computer technology. Some of us who hold MAs came back from study abroad while others are PhD students. Some have rich marketing experience and some are experienced accountants. Most of the members of the R&D group are part time employees who work in S&T institutions such as Tibet University.

 

Luozang Digital S&T’s Luozang brand Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionary (hardware) is the world’s first Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionary. Thus far no similar product has reached the market. Luozang has powerful features including a breakthrough in Tibetan language information technology. For example, the character text encoding uses UNICODE, the world’s most advanced character encoding technique. The Tibetan text entry method is totally compatible with Microsoft’s　Himalaya Tibetan character entry method, implements Tibetan language LRC lyric displays for playing MP3 files etc. This product was marketed in October 2008.

 

Luozang Digital S&T has also developed a computer software product. This product is easy to use and can be used for Tibetan text processing, Tibetan electronic dictionaries, Tibetan-Chinese-English electronic dictionaries, Tanghka software and geographical name and game software.

 

Luozang Digital S&T relies on S&T to develop its various businesses. Taking advantage of scientific talent at Tibet University and other research institutions, it continues to develop new products with a high S&T content.

 

---------------

ཐོན་རྫས་ཀྱི་ནུས་པའི་གསལ་བཤད།

༡.བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་གློག་རྡུལ་ཚིག་མཛོད་ཀྱི་ནུས་པ། བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་ཚིག་མཛོད་ཆ་ཚང་34ཡི་ནང་དོན་བསྡུ་རུབ་བྱས་ཡོད་པ་དང་། སྤྱིར་བཏང་གི་རིགས། ཚན་རྩལ་གྱི་རིགས། ཆོས་ལུགས་ཀྱི་རིགས་གསུམ་དུ་དབྱེ་ཡོད། བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་ཡིག་རིགས་གསུམ་ཡིག་བསྒྱུར་བྱེད་ཐུབ་པ་དང་ཚིག་མཛོད་མི་འདྲ་ བའི་ནང་ནས་ཡིག་རིགས་གཅིག་དེ་འཚོལ་ཐུབ་པ་དང་ཚིག་མཛོད་མང་པོ་འཚོལ་ཞིབ་བྱེད་ པའི་ནུས་པ་ཡོད།

༢.བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་གློག་རྡུལ་དཔེ་དེབ་ཀྱི་ནུས་པ། སྣ་མང་གློག་རྡུལ་དཔེ་དེབ་25ནང་དོན་ཚུད་པ་དང་། བོད་ཡིག་སྣ་མང་དཔེ་དེབ་12ནང་ལོ་རྒྱུས་དང་། གྲགས་ཅན་མི་སྣ། ལེགས་བཤད། གཏམ་དཔེ། ཚིག་ཕྲད། བོད་སྨན། ནང་པའི་ཆོས་ལུགས། གྲགས་ཅན་གནའ་ཤུལ། སྲོལ་རྒྱུན། གཏམ་རྒྱུད་ལ་སོགས་པའི་ནང་དོན་ཚུད་ཡོད། རྒྱ་ཡིག་སྣ་མང་གློག་རྡུལ་དཔེ་དེབ་13ནང་། ཐང་རབས་སྙན་ངག སུང་རབས་ཚིག ཡིག་གསུམ་ཆོས། ལྷ་སྒྲུང་གཏམ་རྒྱུད། སྐད་ཡིག གནའ་བོའི་ཡིག་རིགས། བསམ་བློའི་རིག་གཞུང་། རིག་གནས་ཚིག་མཛོད། ཀྲུང་གོའི་ལོ་རྒྱུས། སྲོལ་རྒྱུན་རིག་གནས། ཀྲུང་གོའི་སྒྱུ་རྩལ། ཀྲུང་གོའི་འཛུགས་སྐྲུན་ལ་སོགས་ཚུད་ཡོད། བེད་སྤྱོད་མཁན་གྱི་གློག་རྡུལ་དཔེ་དེབ་དེའི་རིགས་བརྒྱུད་ནས་རང་རྒྱལ་གྱི་རྒྱ་ བོད་སྲོལ་རྒྱུན་རིག་གནས་དང་། མི་རིགས་གོམས་སྲོལ་དང་ལོ་རྒྱུས་སོགས་ཤེས་རྟོགས་བྱེད་ཐུབ།

༣.ཡི་གེ་གཅིག་གི་འཚོལ་ཞིབ་ནུས་པ། གང་རུང་ཚིག་མཛོད་ཀྱི་འགྲེལ་པ་ལས་རྒྱུས་མེད་ཚིག་གསར་ཞིག་གིས་ཁེར་རྐྱང་འཚོལ་ ཞིབ་བྱེད་པ་དང་། ད་དུང་དངོས་མིའི་སྒྲ་གདངས་ཐོན་པའི་ནུས་པ་ལྡན།

༤.བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་MP3གཞས་ཚིག་མཉམ་དུ་ཐོན་པའི་ནུས་པ་ལྡན།

༥.སྐད་རིགས་མང་པོའི་དངོས་མིའི་སྒྲ་གདངས་ཀྱི་ནུས་པ། བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་དངོས་མིའི་སྒྲ་གདངས་ལྡན་པ།

༦.སྐད་རིགས་མང་པོའི་གློག་ཀླད་ཡིག་རིགས་ཐག་གཅོད་ཀྱི་ནུས་པ། WordPadནང་བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་ཡིག་རིགས་འབྲི་ཐུབ་པའི་ནུས་པ་ལྡན་པ་མ་ཟད། ཉར་ཚགས་བྱེད་ཐུབ་པ་དང་། USBབརྒྱུད་ནས་རང་མོས་ཀྱི་རང་ཉིད་གློག་ཀླད་ནང་བླུགས་ཏེ་ཐད་ཀར་བཟོ་བཅོས་དང་ ལྕགས་པར་རྒྱག་ཐུབ། བོད་ཡིག་གི་ཡིག་ཆའི་མིང་ལ་བོད་ཡིག་རང་གི་ཉར་ཚགས་བྱེད་ཐུབ།

༧.སློབ་སྦྱོང་བྱེད་པའི་ནུས་པ། བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་གྱི་ཚིག་དང་བརྗོད་པའི་དྲན་ཤེས་ཀྱི་ནུས་པ། རྟོགས་དཀའ་བ་དང་ཉན་དཀའ་བའི་ཚིག་ཚོགས་དེའི་རིགས་བསྐྱར་ཟློས་སློབ་སྦྱོང་བྱེད་ ཐུབ། ད་དུང་བོད་རྒྱ། རྒྱ་བོད། རྒྱ་དབྱིན། དབྱིན་རྒྱ་ཁ་སྐད་སློབ་སྦྱོང་བྱེད་ཐུབ།

༨.བོད་ཡིག་ཕབ་གཞོང་རྒྱག་པའི་ནུས་པ། དམིགས་བསལ་གྱི་ཕབ་གཞོང་འཆར་འགོད་ཀྱི་བོད་ཡིག་བདེ་བླགས་ངང་རྒྱག་ཐུབ་པ། བོད་ཡིག་རྒྱག་སྟངས་ནི་Himalayaརྒྱག་སྟངས་དང་གཅིག་མཚུངས་ཡིན།

༩.འཁྱེར་སྡེར་གྱི་ནུས་པ། 1Gགཤོངས་ཚད་དང་SDཁཱ་ཡི་རྒྱ་སྐྱེད་3Gདུ་རྒྱ་སྐྱེད་བྱེད་ཐུབ་པ་ཟད་འཁྱེར་སྡེར་དུ་ཡང་བེད་སྤྱོད་བྱེད་ཐུབ།

༡༠.ཕབ་ནུས། དྲྭ་ཐོག་གི་བོད་རྒྱ་དབྱིན་དཔྱད་ཚགས་གློག་རྡུལ་ཚིག་མཛོད་ནང་བླུགས་ནས་རྩོམ་སྒྲིག་དང་བཟོ་བཅོས། སློབ་སྦྱོང་སོགས་བྱེད་ཐུབ།

༡༡.ནུས་པ་གཞན། རྩེད་མོ་དང་། MP3 པར་དེབ། མིང་བྱང་དོ་དམ། ཉིན་རེའི་འཆར་འགོད། ལོ་ཐོ། རྩིས་རྒྱག་འཕྲུལ་ཆས། ཚན་རིག་རྩིས་རྒྱག་སོགས་ཡོད། །

formerly known as the Ellice Islands, is a Polynesian island nation located in the Pacific Ocean, midway between Hawaii and Australia. Its nearest neighbours are Kiribati, Samoa and Fiji. It comprises four reef islands and five true atolls. Its population of 12,373 makes it the third-least-populated sovereign state in the world, with only Vatican City and Nauru having fewer inhabitants. In terms of physical land size, at just 26 square kilometres (10 sq mi) Tuvalu is the fourth smallest country in the world, larger only than the Vatican City at 0.44 km2 (0.17 sq mi), Monaco at 1.95 km2 (0.75 sq mi) and Nauru at 21 km2 (8.1 sq mi).

 

The first inhabitants of Tuvalu were Polynesian people. The islands came under the UK's sphere of influence in the late 19th century. The Ellice Islands were administered by Britain as part of a protectorate from 1892 to 1916 and as part of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony from 1916 to 1974. In 1974, the Ellice Islanders voted for separate British dependency status as Tuvalu, separating from the Gilbert Islands which became Kiribati upon independence. Tuvalu became fully independent within the Commonwealth in 1978.

 

History

Tuvaluans are a Polynesian people who settled the islands around 3000 years ago coming from Tonga and Samoa. During pre-European-contact times there was frequent canoe voyaging between the nearer islands. Eight of the nine islands of Tuvalu were inhabited; thus the name, Tuvalu, means "eight standing together" in Tuvaluan. Possible evidence of fire in the Caves of Nanumanga may indicate human occupation thousands of years before that.

 

Tuvalu was first sighted by Europeans in 1568 with the arrival of Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira from Spain who also encountered the island of Nui (atoll) but was unable to land. The next Europeans to appear did not do so until the late 1700s when explorers reached the area. By the early 1800s, whalers were roving the Pacific though visiting Tuvalu only infrequently because of the difficulties of landing ships on the atolls. No settlements had been established by them

Peruvian slave raiders ("blackbirders") combed the Pacific between 1862 and 1864 and Tuvalu was one of the hardest-hit Pacific island groups with over 400 people taken from Funafuti and Nukulaelae.

In 1892 the islands became part of the British protectorate known as the Ellice Islands. The protectorate was incorporated into the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony in 1916. In 1943, during World War II, Tuvalu was selected as an operations base for Allied forces battling the Japanese in the Pacific. Thousands of marines were stationed there until December 1945.

 

In 1974 ethnic differences within the colony caused the Polynesians of the Ellice Islands to vote for separation from the Micronesians of the Gilbert Islands (to become Kiribati). The following year the Ellice Islands became the separate British colony of Tuvalu. Independence was granted in 1978.

 

Tuvalu Independence Day is celebrated on 1 October. In 1979 Tuvalu signed a treaty of friendship with the United States that recognised Tuvalu's rightful possession of four small islands formerly claimed by the United States.

As low-lying islands, lacking a surrounding shallow shelf, the island communities of Tuvalu are especially susceptible to changes in sea level and storm patterns that hit the island undissipated. It is estimated that a sea level rise of 20–40 centimetres (8–16 inches) in the next 100 years could make Tuvalu uninhabitable. The South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC) suggests that while Tuvalu is vulnerable to climate change there are additional environmental problems such as population growth and poor coastal management that are affecting sustainable development on the island. SOPAC ranks the country as extremely vulnerable using the Environmental Vulnerability Index. While some commentators have called for the relocation of the population of Tuvalu to Australia, New Zealand, or Kioa (Fiji), the former Prime Minister Maatia Toafa said his government did not regard rising sea levels as such a threat that the entire population would need to be evacuated. In spite of persistent Internet rumours that New Zealand has agreed to accept an annual quota of 75 evacuees, the annual residence quota of 75 Tuvaluans under the Pacific Access Category (and 50 places for people from Kiribati) replaced the previous Work Schemes from the two countries and are not related to environmental concerns.

 

Tuvalu's small population is distributed across nine islands, five of which are atolls. The smallest island, Niulakita, was uninhabited until it was resettled by people from Niutao in 1949.

 

Local government districts consisting of more than one islet:

 

Funafuti

Nanumea

Nui

Nukufetau

Nukulaelae

Vaitupu

Local government districts consisting of only one island:

 

Nanumanga

Niulakita

Niutao

 

Geography

Tuvalu consists of four reef islands and five true atolls. Its small, scattered group of atolls has poor soil and a total land area of only about 26 square kilometres (less than 10 sq. mi.) making it the fourth smallest country in the world. The land is very low lying with narrow coral atolls. Funafuti is the largest atoll of the nine low reef islands and atolls that form the Tuvalu volcanic island chain. It comprises numerous islets around a central lagoon that is approximately 25.1 kilometres (15.6 mi) (N–S) by 18.4 kilometres (11.4 mi) (W-E), centred on 179°7’E and 8°30’S. An annular reef rim surrounds the lagoon, with several natural reef channels.

 

The highest elevation is 4.5 metres (15 ft) above sea level, which gives Tuvalu the second-lowest maximum elevation of any country (after the Maldives). Because of this low elevation, the islands that make up this nation may be threatened by any future sea level rise. Under such circumstances, the population may evacuate to New Zealand, Niue or the Fijian island of Kioa. Additionally, Tuvalu is affected by what is known as a king tide, which can raise the sea level higher than a normal high tide. In the future, this may threaten to submerge the nation entirely. Tuvalu has very poor land and the soil is hardly usable for agriculture. Tuvalu has westerly gales and heavy rain from November to March and tropical temperatures moderated by easterly winds from March to November.

 

Climate change

At its highest, Tuvalu is only 4.5 m above sea level, and officials have been concerned about the effects of rising sea levels for some years At the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in December 2009, Tuvalu's spokesman Ian Fry was one of the strongest critics of the final document stating "It looks like we are being offered 30 pieces of silver to betray our people and our future"

 

Oficial name:

Tuvalu

 

Independence :

1 October 1978

 

Area:

25.63 km2

 

...........................Population...........Area

Funafuti island.............4.492......2,80km2

Nanumaga island............590......2,78km2

Nanumea island..............664......3,87km2

Niulatika island.................35......0,42km2

Niutao island..................663.......2,53km2

Nui island.......................548.......2,83km2

Nukufetau island.............586.......2,99km2

Nukulaelae island...........393........1,82km2

Vaitapu island.............1,591........5,60km2

 

Inhabitants:

9.500

 

Languages:

Kiribati [gil] 870 in Tuvalu (1987). Nui, a northern island. Alternate names: Gilbertese, Ikiribati. Dialects: Nui (Nuian). Classification: Austronesian, Malayo-Polynesian, Central-Eastern, Eastern Malayo-Polynesian, Oceanic, Central-Eastern Oceanic, Remote Oceanic, Micronesian, Micronesian Proper, Ikiribati

More information.

 

Tuvaluan [tvl] 10,670 in Tuvalu (1998). Population total all countries: 13,051. Tuvalu, 7 of the 9 inhabited islands. Also spoken in Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, New Zealand. Alternate names: Ellice, Ellicean, Tuvalu. Dialects: North Tuvaluan (Nanumanga, Nanumea, Niutao), South Tuvaluan (Nukufetau, Vaitupu, Funafuti, Nukulaelae). Not intelligible with Samoan, which was formerly used as a mission language. Tuvalu is intelligible with Tokelau. The southern dialect is official. Classification: Austronesian, Malayo-Polynesian, Central-Eastern, Eastern Malayo-Polynesian, Oceanic, Central-Eastern Oceanic, Remote Oceanic, Central Pacific, East Fijian-Polynesian, Polynesian, Nuclear, Samoic-Outlier, Ellicean

 

Capital city:

Funafuti

 

Meaning country name:

From the native "eight islands" or "eight standing with each other" (Tuvalu actually consists of nine isands in Tuvalu - only eight of them traditionally inhabited). An earlier name, Niulakita, the name of the first atoll settled in 1949, became suppressed.

Ellice Islands (former name): named after Edward Ellice, a British politician and merchant, by Captain Arent de Peyster, who sighted the islands in 1819 sailing on the ship Rebecca. Ellice owned the cargo of the ship. The Ellice Islands received the name Tuvalu following a vote for secession from the Gilbert Islands (now Kiribati) in 1975/1976.

 

Description Flag:

The current Flag of Tuvalu was instated when the country became independent in 1978, after the separation from the Gilberts in 1976. Like many former and current British dependencies, the Tuvaluan flag is a light blue ensign based on the Union Flag, which is shown in the upper left canton of the flag. The previous flag (with the Gilberts) was also based on the Union Flag but with the coat of arms created by Sir Arthur Grimble in 1932, the resident commissioner of the British colony.

The stars represent the 9 islands of which Tuvalu is made up; the arrangement is geographically correct when the flag is hung from the hoist down (because of the astronomical position in the sky).

In 1995 the flag was replaced with a new one which was not based on the British flag, and also represented the islands with stars. This flag, however, was not liked by the inhabitants, who felt that it was a move towards replacing the popular British monarchy with a republic. The old flag was re-instated in 1997, with some minor changes.

 

Coat of arms:

The coat of arms of Tuvalu shows a shield with a golden border, which is decorated in a pattern with eight mussels and eight banana leaves. The shield itself shows a hut beneath a blue sky on green grounds. Beneath the ground are stylized depictions in blue and gold of ocean waves.

Beneath the shield stands a banner with the Tuvaluan inscription Tuvalu mo te Atua, which translates "Tuvalu for the Almighty" and additionally serves as the title of the Tuvaluan national anthem.

 

Motto:

"Tuvalu mo te Atua"

 

National Anthem: Tuvalu mo te Atua

 

Tuvaluan

 

Tuvalu mo te Atua

Ko te Fakavae sili,

Ko te alu foki tena,

O te manuia katoa;

Loto lasi o fai,

Tou malo saoloto;

Fusi ake katoa

Ki te loto alofa;

Kae amo fakatasi

Ate atu fenua.

"Tuvalu mo te Atua"

Ki te se gata mai!

Tuku atu tau pulega

Ki te pule mai luga,

Kilo tonu ki ou mua

Me ko ia e tautai.

"Pule tasi mo ia"

Ki te se gata mai,

Ko tena mana

Ko tou malosi tena.

Pati lima kae kalaga

Ulufonu ki te tupu.

"Tuvalu ko tu saoloto"

Ki te se gata mai!

 

English lyrics

 

Tuvalu for the Almighty

Are the words we hold most dear;

For as people or as leaders

Of Tuvalu we all share

In the knowledge that God

Ever rules in heav'n above,

And that we in this land

Are united in His love.

We build on a sure foundation

When we trust in God's great law;

"Tuvalu for the Almighty"

Be our song for evermore!

Let us trust our lives henceforward

To the King to whom we pray,

With our eyes fixed firmly on Him

He is showing us the way.

"May we reign with Him in glory"

Be our song for evermore,

for His almighty power

Is our strength from shore to shore.

Shout aloud in jubilation

To the King whom we adore.

"Tuvalu free and united"

Be our song for evermore!

 

Internet Page: www.gov.tv

www.tuvaluislands.com

www.timelesstuvalu.com

 

Tuvalu in diferent languages

 

eng | afr | ast | bre | cat | ces | cor | dan | dsb | est | eus | fao | fin | fra | frp | fur | glg | glv | hrv | hsb | hun | ibo | ina | ita | jav | jnf | lav | lin | lit | lld | mlt | nld | nor | oci | pol | por | roh | ron | rup | scn | slk | slv | sme | smg | spa | sqi | srd | swa | swe | tah | tet | tkl | ton | tpi | tur | tvl | vor | wol | zza: Tuvalu

aze | bos | crh | kaa | mol | slo | uzb: Tuvalu / Тувалу

deu | ltz | nds: Tuvalu / Tuvalu

bam | que: Tuwalu

hat | wln: Touvalou

ind | msa: Tuvalu / توۏالو

arg: Tuvalu; Tubalu

cym: Twfalu

epo: Tuvalo

fry: Tûvalû

gla: Tubhalu

gle: Tuvalú / Tuvalú

isl: Túvalú

kmr: Tûvalû / Тувалу / تووڤالوو

kur: Tûvalû / تووڤالوو

lat: Tuvalum; Insulae Tuvaluae; Tuvalu

mlg: Tovalo

nrm: Tuvalou

rmy: Tuvalu / तुवालु

tuk: Tuwalu / Тувалу

vie: Tu-va-lu

vol: Tuvaluäns

alt | bul | che | chm | chv | kbd | kir | kjh | kom | krc | kum | mkd | mon | oss | rus | tyv | udm | ukr: Тувалу (Tuvalu)

bak | srp | tat: Тувалу / Tuvalu

abq: Тувалу (Tuvału)

bel: Тувалу / Tuvału

kaz: Тувалу / Twvalw / تۋۆالۋ

tgk: Тувалу / توولو / Tuvalu

ara: توفالو (Tūfālū)

fas: تووالو / Tuvâlu

prs: تووالو (Tūvālū)

pus: تووالو (Tūwālū)

uig: تۇۋالۇ / Tuwalu / Тувалу

urd: ٹووالو (Ṫūvālū); تووالو (Tūvālū)

div: ޓުވާލޫ (Ṫuvālū)

heb: טובלו (Ṭûṿalû); טובאלו (Ṭûṿâlû)

lad: טוב'אלו / Tuvalu

yid: טוּװאַלו (Tuvalu)

amh: ቱቫሉ (Tuvalu)

ell-dhi: Τουβαλού (Toyvaloý)

ell-kat: Τουβαλοῦ (Toyvaloỹ)

hye: Տուվալու (Touvalou); Թուվալու (Ṭouvalou)

kat: ტუვალუ (Tuvalu)

hin: तुवालु (Tuvālu)

ben: টুভালু (Ṭubʰālu)

pan: ਟੂਵਾਲੂ (Ṭūvālū)

kan: ತುವಾಲು (Tuvālu)

mal: ടുവാലു (Ṭuvālu); തുവാലു (Tuvālu)

tam: துவாலு (Tuvālu); துவாலூ (Tuvālū)

tel: తువాలు (Tuvālu)

zho: 圖瓦盧/图瓦卢 (Túwǎlú)

jpn: トゥヴァル (Tuvaru); ツバル (Tsubaru)

kor: 투발루 (Tuballu)

mya: တူဗလူး (Tubálù)

tha: ตูวาลู (Tūwālū)

khm: ទុយវ៉ាលុយ (Tuyvāluy); ទូវ៉ាលូ (Tūvālū)

 

Looking west from Kamenná.

 

"Cheb (German Eger, in the Sudeten German dialect of Cheb Egha; obsoletely also Heb) is a town in the district of the same name in the Karlovy Vary Region, 40 km southwest of Karlovy Vary and 5 km from the border with Germany on the Ohři River, from which it is derived from the German name of the city. The first historically preserved mention of Cheb, the central city of the entire former Chebsko, dates from 1061. Until the end of World War II, the majority of the population was German, and Cheb was an important part of the Sudetenland. After the end of the war, the German residents were displaced and the town became largely depopulated. Approximately 32 thousand inhabitants live here, which makes Cheb the second largest city in the region after Karlovy Vary. There are seven primary schools, two secondary schools, one practical school, two grammar schools and the Faculty of Economics of the University of West Bohemia in Cheb. The main industries here are engineering, textiles, metalworking, construction, woodworking and food. The neighboring municipalities of the seat are Okrouhlá, Třebeň, Pomezí nad Ohří, Nebanice, Tuřany, Odrava, Lipová, Libá, Františkovy Lázně, Waldsassen and Schirnding.

 

Bohemia (Latin Bohemia, German Böhmen, Polish Czechy) is a region in the west of the Czech Republic. Previously, as a kingdom, they were the center of the Czech Crown. The root of the word Czech probably corresponds to the meaning of man. The Latin equivalent of Bohemia, originally Boiohaemum (literally "land of Battles"), which over time also influenced the names in other languages, is derived from the Celtic tribe of the Boios, who lived in this area from the 4th to the 1st century BC Bohemia on it borders Germany in the west, Austria in the south, Moravia in the east and Poland in the north. Geographically, they are bounded from the north, west and south by a chain of mountains, the highest of which are the Krkonoše Mountains, in which the highest mountain of Bohemia, Sněžka, is also located. The most important rivers are the Elbe and the Vltava, with the fertile Polabean Plain extending around the Elbe. The capital and largest city of Bohemia is Prague, other important cities include, for example, Pilsen, Karlovy Vary, Kladno, Ústí nad Labem, Liberec, Hradec Králové, Pardubice and České Budějovice, Jihlava also lies partly on the historical territory of Bohemia." - info from Wikipedia.

 

Summer 2019 I did a solo cycling tour across Europe through 12 countries over the course of 3 months. I began my adventure in Edinburgh, Scotland and finished in Florence, Italy cycling 8,816 km. During my trip I took 47,000 photos.

 

Now on Instagram.

 

Become a patron to my photography on Patreon or donate.

The Fountain dello Sprone, or Fontana dello Sprone, also called the Fontana del Buontalenti is an early 17th-century Mannerist-style public fountain found at the corner of via dello Sprone and Borgo San Jacopo, in the quarter of Oltrarno in the city of Florence, region of Tuscany, Italy.

  

Fontana dello Sprone

The fountain, located at the acute angle (sprone) formed by the intersection of the two streets, nestled against the private building, was designed and sculpted by Bernardo Buontalenti and completed in 1608, likely for the celebration of the wedding of Cosimo II de' Medici and Maria Maddalena d'Austria. The fountain consists of a grotesque bearded face with a water spout protruding from its mouth, with a swirling marble conch basin below. It has undergone various restorations: in the 17th century by Giuseppe del Rosso, and a recent restoration in 2014.Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 360,930 inhabitants in 2023, and 984,991 in its metropolitan area.

 

Florence was a centre of medieval European trade and finance and one of the wealthiest cities of that era. It is considered by many academics to have been the birthplace of the Renaissance, becoming a major artistic, cultural, commercial, political, economic and financial center. During this time, Florence rose to a position of enormous influence in Italy, Europe, and beyond. Its turbulent political history includes periods of rule by the powerful Medici family and numerous religious and republican revolutions. From 1865 to 1871 the city served as the capital of the Kingdom of Italy. The Florentine dialect forms the base of standard Italian and it became the language of culture throughout Italy due to the prestige of the masterpieces by Dante Alighieri, Petrarch, Giovanni Boccaccio, Niccolò Machiavelli and Francesco Guicciardini.

 

The city attracts millions of tourists each year, and UNESCO declared the Historic Centre of Florence a World Heritage Site in 1982. The city is noted for its culture, Renaissance art and architecture and monuments. The city also contains numerous museums and art galleries, such as the Uffizi Gallery and the Palazzo Pitti, and still exerts an influence in the fields of art, culture and politics. Due to Florence's artistic and architectural heritage, Forbes ranked it as one of the most beautiful cities in the world in 2010.

 

Florence plays an important role in Italian fashion, and is ranked in the top 15 fashion capitals of the world by Global Language Monitor; furthermore, it is a major national economic centre, as well as a tourist and industrial hub.

 

Florence (Italian: Firenze) weathered the decline of the Western Roman Empire to emerge as a financial hub of Europe, home to several banks including that of the politically powerful Medici family. The city's wealth supported the development of art during the Italian Renaissance, and tourism attracted by its rich history continues today.

 

Prehistoric origins

For much of the Quaternary Age, the Florence-Prato-Pistoia plain was occupied by a great lake bounded by Monte Albano in the west, Monte Giovi in the north and the foothills of Chianti in the south. Even after most of the water had receded, the plain, 50 metres (160 ft) above sea level, was strewn with ponds and marshes that remained until the 18th century, when the land was reclaimed. Most of the marshland was in the region of Campi Bisenzio, Signa and Bagno a Ripoli.

 

It is thought that there was already a settlement at the confluence of the Mugnone River with the River Arno between the 10th and 8th centuries BC. Between the 7th and 6th centuries BC, Etruscans discovered and used the ford of the Arno near this confluence, closer to the hills to the north and south. A bridge or a ferry was probably constructed here, about ten metres away from the current Ponte Vecchio, but closer to the ford itself. The Etruscans, however, preferred not to build cities on the plain for reasons of defence and instead settled about six kilometres away on a hill. This settlement was a precursor of the fortified centre of Vipsul (today's Fiesole), which was later connected by road to all the major Etruscan centres of Emilia to the north and Lazio to the south.

 

Classical Florence

Some historians still assert the existence of a Pre-Roman settlement in Florence, arguing the possibility of an urban center destroyed by Sulla.

 

Written history of Florence traditionally begins in 59 BC, when the Romans founded the village for army veterans, and reportedly dedicated it to the god Mars. According to some stories, the city was founded for precise political and strategic reasons; in 62 BC, Fiesole (a region in Florence) was a cove for Catilines, and Caesar wanted an outpost nearby to monitor the roads and communications. It was originally named Fluentia, owing to the fact that it was built between two rivers, which was later changed to Florentia ("flowering").

 

The Romans built ports on the Arno and the Mugnone to create advantageous transport positions; old Florence was on the Via Cassia, forming a wedge controlling the end of the Apennine valley of the Arno and the beginning of the plain that led to the sea in the direction of Pisa. In AD 123, a bridge was constructed over the Arno. Buildings began to accumulate around the Roman military camp, including an aqueduct (from Monte Morello), a forum (in today's Piazza della Repubblica), spas, the Roman Theatre of Florence, and the Roman Amphitheatre of Florence, while the surrounding land was organized by centuriation. A nearby river port allowed trade up to Pisa. The outlines of the Roman city are still recognizable in the city's plan, notably the city walls.

 

In AD 285, Diocletian established a commander seat in Florence who was responsible for all of Tuscia. Eastern merchants (some from the quarter of Oltrarno) brought the cult of Isis, and later Christianity.

 

Because Florence rapidly developed over the next several centuries and into the Middle Ages, few monuments from the Roman period remain in Florence today. Some of the remaining structures include the thermal complex discovered in the Piazza della Signoria, the amphitheater (or at least its road structure), and artifacts remaining at the Florentine National Archaeological Museum and the Museo di Firenze com'era (English: The Museum of Florence as it Was).

 

Early Middle Ages

The seat of a bishopric from around the beginning of the 4th century CE, the city was ruled alternatively by Byzantine and Ostrogothic potentates as the two powers fought each other for control of the city. The city would be taken by siege only to be lost again later by one of the two powers. In the sixth century, at the end this unstable period, the population fell to a low point speculated to be as low as 1,000.

 

Peace returned under Lombard rule in the 6th century. Conquered by Charlemagne in 774, Florence became part of the March of Tuscany, whose capital was Lucca. The population began to grow again and commerce prospered. In 854, Florence and Fiesole were united in one county.

 

Middle Ages

Profile of Dante Alighieri, one of the most renowned Italian poets, painted by his contemporary Giotto di Bondone

Margrave Hugh "the Great" of Tuscany chose Florence as his residence instead of Lucca in about 1000 CE. This initiated a Golden Age of Florentine Art. In 1013, construction was begun on the Basilica di San Miniato al Monte. The exterior of the baptistry was reworked in Romanesque style between 1059 and 1128.

 

Florence experienced a long period of civic revival beginning in the 10th century and was governed from 1115 by an autonomous medieval commune. But the period of revival was interrupted when the city was plunged into internal strife by the 13th-century struggle between the Ghibellines, supporters of the German emperor, and the pro-Papal Guelphs after the murder of nobleman Buondelmonte del Buondelmonti for reneging on his agreement to marry one of the daughters of the Amidei family. In 1257, the city was ruled by a podestà, the Guelph Luca Grimaldi. The Guelphs had triumphed and soon split in turn into feuding "White" and "Black" factions led respectively by Vieri de' Cerchi and Corso Donati. These struggles eventually led to the exile of the White Guelphs, one of whom was the poet Dante Alighieri. This factional strife was later recorded by Dino Compagni, a White Guelph, in his Chronicles of Florence.

 

Political conflict did not, however, prevent the city's rise to become one of the most powerful and prosperous in Europe, assisted by its own strong gold currency. The "fiorino d'oro" of the Republic of Florence, or florin, was introduced in 1252, the first European gold coin struck in sufficient quantities to play a significant commercial role since the 7th century. Many Florentine banks had branches across Europe, with able bankers and merchants such as the famous chronicler Giovanni Villani of the Peruzzi Company engaging in commercial transactions as far away as Bruges. The florin quickly became the dominant trade coin of Western Europe, replacing silver bars in multiples of the mark. This period also saw the eclipse of Florence's formerly powerful rival Pisa, which was defeated by Genoa in 1284 and subjugated by Florence in 1406. Power shifted from the aristocracy to the mercantile elite and members of organized guilds after an anti-aristocratic movement, led by Giano della Bella, enacted the Ordinances of Justice in 1293.

 

While visiting the ruins of Rome during the jubilee celebration in 1300, the banker and chronicler Giovanni Villani (c. 1276–1348) noted the well-known history of the city, its monuments and achievements, and was then inspired to write a universal history of his own city of Florence. Hence he began to record the history of Florence in a year-by-year format in his Nuova Cronica, which was continued by his brother and nephew after he succumbed to the Black Death in 1348. Villani is praised by historians for preserving valuable information on statistics, biographies, and even events taking place throughout Europe, but his work has also drawn criticism by historians for its many inaccuracies, use of the supernatural and divine providence to explain the outcome of events and glorification of Florence and the papacy.

 

Renaissance

In 1338, there were about 17,000 beggars in the city. Four thousand were on public relief. There were six primary schools with 10,000 pupils, including girls. Four high schools taught 600 students, including a few girls. They studied literature and philosophy.

 

Of a population estimated at 80,000 before the Black Death of 1349, about 25,000 are estimated to have been engaged in the city's wool industry. In 1345, Florence was the scene of an attempted strike by wool carders (ciompi), who in 1378 rose up in a brief revolt against oligarchic rule known as the Revolt of the Ciompi. After their suppression, the city came under the sway of the Albizzi family, bitter rivals of the Medici family, between 1382 and 1434. Cosimo de' Medici (1389–1464) was the first Medici family member to govern the city from behind the scenes. Although the city was technically a democracy of sorts, his power came from a vast network of patronage and a political alliance to new immigrants to the city, the gente nuova. The fact that the Medici were bankers to the pope also contributed to their prominence. Cosimo was succeeded by his son Piero di Cosimo de' Medici (1416–1469), who was shortly thereafter succeeded by Cosimo's grandson, Lorenzo in 1469. Lorenzo de' Medici was a great patron of the arts who commissioned works by Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Sandro Botticelli.

 

After Lorenzo's death in 1492, his son Piero the Unfortunate took the reins of government, however his rule was short. In 1494, King Charles VIII of France invaded Italy and entered Tuscany on his way to claim the throne of the Kingdom of Naples. After Piero made a submissive treaty with Charles, the Florentines responded by forcing him into exile, and the first period of Medici rule ended with the restoration of a republican government. Anti-Medici sentiment was much influenced by the teachings of the radical Dominican prior Girolamo Savonarola. However, in due time, Savonarola lost support and was hanged in 1498. Medici rule was not restored until 1512. The Florentines drove out the Medici for a second time and re-established the Republic on May 16, 1527.

 

An individual of highly unusual insight into political conditions of this time was Niccolò Machiavelli, whose prescriptions for Florence's regeneration under strong leadership have often been seen as a legitimization of political expediency and even evil. Machiavelli was tortured and exiled from Florence by the Medici family in 1513, due to accusations of conspiracy, which was exacerbated because of his ties to the previous republican government of Florence. Commissioned by the Medici, in 1520 Machiavelli wrote the Florentine Histories, a history of the city.

 

The 10-month Siege of Florence (1529–1530) by the Spanish ended the Republic of Florence and Alessandro de' Medici became the ruler of the city. The siege brought the destruction of its suburbs, the ruin of its export business and the confiscation of its citizens' wealth. Alessandro, who ruled from 1531 to 1537, was the first Medici to use the style Duke of Florence, a title arranged for him in 1532 by Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. In 1569, Duke Cosimo I was elevated to the rank of Grand Duke of Tuscany by Pope Pius V. The Medici would continue to rule in Tuscany as grand dukes until 1737. After the Battle of Marciano in 1554, the city's historical rival Siena was conquered and the only remaining territory in Tuscany not ruled from Florence was the Republic of Lucca (later a Duchy).

 

During Renaissance Florence, mobs were both common and influential. Families were pitted against each other in a constant struggle for power. Politically, double-crossings and betrayals were not uncommon, sometimes even within families. Despite political violence, factionalism and corruption, Renaissance Florence did experiment with different forms of citizen government and power sharing arrangements. In order to reconcile the warring factions and families, a complex electoral system was developed as mechanism for sharing power. Incumbent officers and appointees carried out a secret ballot every three or four years. They committed the names of all those elected into a series of bags, one for each sesto, or sixth, of the city. One name was drawn from each bag every two months to form the highest executive authority of the city, the Signoria. The selection scheme was controlled to ensure that no two members of the same family ended up in the same batch of six names.

 

This lottery arrangement organized the political structure of Florence until 1434, when the Medici family took power. To maintain control, the Medici undermined the selection process by introducing a system of elected committees they could effectively manipulate by fear and favour. Civic lotteries still took place, but actual power rested with the Medicis. In 1465, a movement to reintroduce civic lotteries was halted by an extraordinary commission packed with Medici supporters.

 

Role in art, literature, music and science

The surge in artistic, literary, and scientific investigation that occurred in Florence in the 14th-16th centuries was facilitated by Florentines' strong economy, based on money, banking, trade, and with the display of wealth and leisure.

 

In parallel with leisure evolving from a strong economy, the crises of the Catholic church (especially the controversy over the French Avignon Papacy and the Great Schism) along with the catastrophic effects of the Black Death led to a re-evaluation of medieval values, resulting in the development of a humanist culture, stimulated by the works of Petrarch and Boccaccio. This prompted a revisitation and study of the classical antiquity, leading to the Renaissance.

 

This renaissance thrived locally from about 1434 to 1534. It halted amid social, moral, and political upheaval. By then, the inspiration it had created had set the rest of Western Europe ablaze with new ideas.

 

Florence benefited materially and culturally from this sea-change in social consciousness. In the arts, the creations of Florentine artists, architects, and musicians were influential in many parts of Europe. The culmination of certain speculations into the nature of ancient Greek drama by humanist scholars led to the birth of opera in the 1590s.

 

Modern and contemporary age

The extinction of the Medici line and the accession in 1737 of Francis Stephen, Duke of Lorraine, the husband of Maria Theresa of Austria, led to Tuscany's inclusion in the territories of the Austrian crown. Habsburg rule was to end in defeat at the hands of France and the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont in 1859, and Tuscany became a province of the united Kingdom of Italy in 1861.

 

Florence replaced Turin as Italy's capital in 1865 and, in an effort to modernise the city, the old market in the Piazza del Mercato Vecchio and many medieval houses were pulled down and replaced by a more formal street plan with newer houses. The Piazza (first renamed Piazza Vittorio Emmanuele II, then Piazza della Repubblica, the present name) was significantly widened and a large triumphal arch was constructed at the west end. This development was unpopular and was prevented from continuing by the efforts of several British and American people living in the city.[citation needed] Poet Antonio Pucci had written in the 14th century, "There was never so noble a garden as when in Mercato Vecchio the eyes and tastes of the Florentines did feast." The area had, however, decayed from its original medieval splendor. A museum recording the destruction stands nearby today. The country's second capital city was superseded by Rome six years later after the withdrawal of the French troops made its addition to the kingdom possible. A very important role is played in these years by the famous Florentine café Giubbe Rosse from its foundation until the present day.

 

20th century

In the 19th century, the population of Florence doubled to over 230,000, and in the 20th century reached over 450,000 at one point with the growth of tourism, trade, financial services and the industry. A foreign community came to represent one-quarter of the population in the second half of the 19th century and of this period and writers such as James Irving and the pre-Raphaelite artists captured a romantic vision of the city in their works. Numerous villas of mainly English barons with their eclectic collections of art were bequeathed to the city in this era. Today they are occupied by museums such as the Horne Museum, the Stibbert Museum, Villa La Pietra, etc.

 

During World War II, the city experienced a year-long German occupation (1943–1944). On September 25, 1943, Allied bombers targeted central Florence, destroying many buildings and killing 215 civilians.

 

In late July 1944, the British 8th Army closed in as they liberated Tuscany. New Zealand troops stormed the Pian dei Cerri hills overlooking the city. After several days of fighting, German forces retreated and gave way.

 

During the German retreat, Florence was declared an undefended "open city", prohibiting further shelling and bombing in accordance with the Hague Convention. On 4 August, the retreating Germans decided to detonate charges along the bridges of the Arno linking the district of Oltrarno to the rest of the city, thus making it difficult for the New Zealand, South African and British troops to cross just before liberation. The German officer in charge of the demolitions, Gerhard Wolf, ordered that the Ponte Vecchio was to be spared. At 04:00 on 4 August 1944, an armored patrol of the South African Imperial Light Horse and Kimberley Regiments found the Ponte Vecchio bridge intact, crossed the bridge under heavy German shelling and subsequently became the first Allied soldiers to enter Florence. Before the war, Wolf had been a student in the city, and his decision has been honored with a memorial plaque on the bridge. Instead, an equally historic area of streets directly to the south of the bridge, including part of the Corridoio Vasariano, was destroyed using mines. Since then, the bridges have been restored exactly to their original forms using as many of the remaining materials as possible, but the buildings surrounding the Ponte Vecchio have been rebuilt in a style combining the old with modern design. The last days of battle for Florence were very intense because the Italian Fascists resistance skirmish known as Franchi Tiratori. The Allied soldiers who died driving the Germans from Tuscany are buried in cemeteries outside the city, i.e. British and Commonwealth soldiers a few kilometers east of the center on the north bank of the Arno ), whilst Americans are about 9 kilometers (5.6 mi) south of the city .

 

On November 4, 1966, the Arno flooded parts of the city centre, killing at least 40 and damaging millions of art treasures and rare books. There was no warning from the authorities who knew the flood was coming except a phone call to the jewellers on the Ponte Vecchio. Volunteers from around the world came to help rescue the books and art, and the effort inspired multiple new methods of art conservation. Forty years later, there were still works awaiting restoration.

 

On May 28, 1993, a powerful car bomb exploded in the via de Georgofili, behind the Uffizi, killing five people, injuring numerous others and seriously damaging the Torre dei Pulci, the museum and parts of its collection. The blast has been attributed to the Mafia.

 

21st century

In 2002, Florence was the seat of the first European Social Forum. There are also several new building and cultural projects, such as that of the Parco della Musica e della Cultura, which will be a vast musical and cultural complex that is currently being built in the Parco delle Cascine (Cascine park). It will host a lyrical theatre containing 2000 places, a concert hall for 1000 spectators, a hall with 3000 seats and an open-air amphitheatre with 3000 spaces. It will host numerous ballets, concerts, lyrical operas and numerous musical festivals. The theatre was inaugurated on April 28, 2011, in honour of the 150th anniversary of the Italian unification.

is a landlocked country in Central Africa. It borders Chad in the north, Sudan in the east, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of the Congo in the south, and Cameroon in the west. The CAR covers a land area of almost 623,000 km², and has an estimated population of about 4.4 million as per 2008. Bangui is the capital city.

 

History

Please go to

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Central_African_Repu...

 

Geography

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_the_Central_African_Re...

 

Other info

Oficial Name:

Republique Centrafricaine

Ködörösêse tî Bêafrîka

 

Independence:

August 13, 1960

 

Area:

622.984km2

 

Inhabitants:

4.500.000

 

Languages:

Ali [aiy] 35,000 (1996). Boali, Bimbo, Boda, and Yaloke subprefectures. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, East

More information.

 

Banda, Mid-Southern [bjo] 100,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 102,000. Alindao, Mobaye, Mingala, Kembe, Kouango subprefectures. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan. Alternate names: Banda Central Sud. Dialects: Bongo, Dukpu, Yakpa (Yacoua, Yakpwa, Yakwa, Bayaka), Wasa (Ouassa). Closest to Gubu, but speakers have better relations with Mbanza speakers. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Mid-Southern

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Banda, South Central [lnl] 150,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population includes 55,000 Langba, 95,000 Ngbugu. Population total all countries: 153,000. Sibut, Mobaye, Alindao, Kembe, Mingala subprefectures. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Dialects: Langba (Lagba), Ngbugu (Ngbougou). May be intelligible with Langbashe. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, South Central

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Banda, Togbo-Vara [tor] 12,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Bria (Togbo) and Bambari (Vara) subprefectures. Dialects: Togbo (Tohgboh, Tagbo, Tagbwali), Vara (Vora, Vera). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Togbo-Vara

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Banda, West Central [bbp] 4,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Population includes 1,000 Wojo. Population total all countries: 7,500. Bambari, Bakala (Dakpa), Grimari (Gbi, Wojo), Kaga Bandoro (Wojo), Bamingui (Gbaga-Nord) subprefectures. Also spoken in Sudan. Dialects: Dakpa, Gbaga-Nord (Gbaga-2), Gbi, Vita, Wojo (Hodjo). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, West Central

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Banda-Bambari [liy] 183,000 (1996). Population includes 4,000 Gbende, 2,000 Joto, mainly Linda. Bambari, Ippy, Grimari, Bakala, Alindao subprefectures. Alternate names: Banda of Bambari. Dialects: Linda, Joto (Jeto), Ndokpa, Ngapo (Ngapu), Gbende. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Banda-Bambari

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Banda-Banda [bpd] 102,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Bria (Bereya), Yalinga (Vidiri), Bakouma, Sibut (Ka, Gbaga-South), Dekoa, Damara, Grimari (Mbi), Bossangoa (Gbambiya), Bozoum, Bocarangoa, Paoua (Hai) subprefectures. Also spoken in Sudan. Dialects: Banda-Banda, Bereya (Bria, Banda of Bria, Banda de Bria), Buru, Gbaga-South (Gbaga 1), Gbambiya, Hai, Ka, Mbi (Mbiyi), Ndi (Ndri), Ngalabo, Ngola, Vidiri (Mvedere, Vodere, Vidri, Vadara). May be intelligible with Banda-Bambari. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Banda-Banda

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Banda-Mbrès [bqk] 42,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Mbrès Subprefecture (Mbre, Moruba), Kaga Bandoro, Bouca (Buka), Bakala (Sabanga, Moruba). Also spoken in Sudan. Alternate names: Banda of Mbrès, Banda-Mbre. Dialects: Buka (Bouka), Mbre (Mbere, Mbele), Moruba (Morouba, Maraba), Sabanga (Sangbanga), Wada (Ouadda). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Banda-Mbres

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Banda-Ndélé [bfl] 35,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Ndili, Bamingui, Ouadda, Kaga Bandoro subprefectures. Also spoken in Sudan. Alternate names: Banda of Ndélé, Nyele. Dialects: Banda-Ndélé, Junguru (Djingburu, Nguru), Tangbago (Tambolo, Tambaggo, Tombaggo, Tangago), Ngao (Ngau, Bandangao), Ngbala. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Banda-Ndele

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Banda-Yangere [yaj] 26,500 (1996). Nola, Bambio, Berberati, and Carnot subprefectures. Alternate names: Yangere, Yanguere. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Western

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Birri [bvq] 200 (1996). Ethnic population: 5,000 in Central African Republic. Extinct in Sudan (1993). Scattered throughout southwestern corner of Central African Republic, and formerly in Deim Zubeir, Bahr el Ghazal Province, Sudan. Alternate names: Biri, Viri, Bviri. Dialects: Mboto, Munga. Only one dialect spoken in Central African Republic. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi

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Bodo [boy] 15 (1996). Haut-Mbomou Prefecture, scattered throughout the eastern tip of Central African Republic. Not more than 3 speakers in the same village. None in the original area or Sudan. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Central, D, Bira-Huku (D.30) Nearly extinct.

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Bofi [bff] 23,500 (1996). Boda and Bimbo subprefectures. Alternate names: Boffi. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, East

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Bokoto [bdt] 130,000 (1996). Baoro, Carnot, Boda subprefectures. Alternate names: Bokodo, Bogoto, Bogodo, Bokpoto. Dialects: Gbaya of Boda (Gbaya de Boda), Bokpan, Bokoto. May be intelligible with Northwest Gbaya. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, Central

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Buraka [bkg] 2,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 3,800. Mobaye Subprefecture, along the Ubangi River. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Bouraka, Boraka, Bolaka. Dialects: May not be inherently intelligible with Gbanziri. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Gbanzili

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Dagba [dgk] 40,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Batangafo, Kabo, and Bossangoa subprefectures. Also spoken in Chad. Dialects: May be intelligible with Kaba. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper

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Dendi [deq] 10,000 (1996). Ouango Subprefecture. Dialects: High intelligibility of Yakoma. Ngbandi and Mbangi may be inherently intelligible with Dendi. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Ngbandi

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French [fra] 9,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Scattered. Classification: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western, Western, Gallo-Iberian, Gallo-Romance, Gallo-Rhaetian, Oïl, French

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Fulfulde, Bagirmi [fui] 156,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Scattered. Alternate names: Baghirmi Peul, Bagirmi Fula. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Atlantic, Northern, Senegambian, Fulani-Wolof, Fula, Eastern

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Furu [fuu] 4,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Mobaye Subprefecture, 11 villages. Alternate names: Bagero, Bagiro, Baguero, Baguiro. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Kara

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Ganzi [gnz] 1,400 (1996). Scattered throughout Central African Republic. Dialects: Ganzi, Yaka. May be intelligible with Baka. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Baka-Gundi

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Gbanu [gbv] 95,000 (1996). Carnot and Bossembélé subprefectures, north of Bogangolo. Alternate names: Gbanou, Banu. Dialects: Gbanu, Gbagiri (Gbagili, Bagili, Baguili), Budigri (Bidikili). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, Central

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Gbanziri [gbg] 14,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 17,500. Kouango Subprefecture, along the Ubangi River. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Gbanzili, Banziri, Gbandere. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Gbanzili

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Gbaya, Northwest [gya] 200,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 267,000 to 282,000. Bouar, Baboua, Bocaranga, Paoua subprefectures. Also spoken in Cameroon, Congo, Nigeria. Alternate names: Gbaya Nord-Ouest, Gbaya. Dialects: Gbaya Kara (Gbaya de Bouar, Boar), Bodoe, Lai (Lay), Yaáyuwee (Yaiwe, Kalla). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, Northwest

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Gbaya, Southwest [mdo] 164,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 177,000. Berberati, Carnot, Gamboula, Nola subprefectures. Also spoken in Cameroon. Alternate names: Gbaya Sud-Ouest. Dialects: Biyanda (Bianda), Buli (Boli), Mbondomo (Mbodomo), Bokare (Bokari), Mboundja (Mbunza), Bosoko (Bossouka, Mbusuku), Toongo, Yangele, Mbakolo (Yasua), Budamono, Mbombeleng. Mbodomo has subdialects Yangamo-Garga-Sarali, Petit-Belo-Doumba. They have high inherent intelligibility with each other. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, Southwest

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Gbaya-Bossangoa [gbp] 176,000 (1996). Bossangoa, Batangafo (Gbabana) subprefectures. Alternate names: Gbaya of Bossangoa, Gbaya de Bosangoa, Gbea, Gbeya, Gbaya of Borro, Gbaya-Borro. Dialects: Gbabana, Bossangoa. May be inherently intelligible with Gbaya-Bosoum or Suma. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, Central

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Gbaya-Bozoum [gbq] 32,500 (1996). Bozoum Subprefecture. Alternate names: Gbaya de Bozoum, Bozom. Dialects: Diabe, Boyali, Bozom. May be inherently intelligible with Gbaya-Bossangoa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, Central

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Gbayi [gyg] 5,000 (1996). Northern Mingala Prefecture. Alternate names: Kpasiya. Dialects: Related to Ngbandi. Ethnically Kpatili, but not intelligible with Kpatili. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Ngbandi

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Geme [geq] 550 (1996). Ndélé Subprefecture, 2 villages north of Ndélé. Alternate names: Jeme, Ngba Geme, Gueme. Dialects: Geme Tulu, Geme Kulagbolu. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Zande, Zande-Nzakara

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Gubu [gox] Alternate names: Gobu, Ngobo, Ngobu, Gabou, Gabu. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Mid-Southern

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Gula [kcm] 13,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 13,200. Birao Subprefecture, near Sudan border at Kafia Kingi. Also spoken in Sudan. Alternate names: Kara of Sudan, Kara de Soudan, Kara, Tar Gula, Gula du Mamoun, Goula, Yamegi. Dialects: Molo, Mele, Mot-Mar (Moto-Mara), Sar (Sara), Mere, Zura (Koto). Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Kara

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Gundi [gdi] 9,000 (1988 census). Nola Subprefecture, south and east of Nola. The Sangha River is the border to the Yaka Region. Alternate names: Ngundi, Ngondi. Dialects: May be intelligible with Baka. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Baka-Gundi

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Kaba [ksp] 72,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 83,000. Paoua and Marounda subprefectures. Also spoken in Chad. Alternate names: Kabba, Sara Kaba, Sara. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper

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Kako [kkj] 10,400 in Central African Republic (1996). Gambula town at the Cameroon border near Berberati, west Central African Republic. Alternate names: Kaka, Yaka, Nkoxo. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, A, Kako (A.90)

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Kara [kah] 4,800 (1996). Birao Subprefecture. Alternate names: Fer, Dam Fer, Fertit. Classification: Unclassified

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Kare [kbn] 93,000 in Central African Republic. Population includes 57,500 Kare, 35,500 Tale (1996). Population total all countries: 97,463. Bozoum and Bocaranga subprefectures. Also spoken in Cameroon. Alternate names: Karré, Kari, Kali. Dialects: Tale (Tali), Kari. Intelligible with Mbum. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Adamawa, Mbum-Day, Mbum, Central, Karang

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Kpagua [kuw] 3,830 (2000 WCD). Not in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Kpagwa. Dialects: Closest to Ngundu. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, Central, Central Core, Mid-Southern

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Kpatili [kym] 4,500 (1996). Southern Mingala Prefecture. Alternate names: Kpatiri, Kpatere, Ngindere. Dialects: Related to Nzakara. Not intelligible with Gbayi, who are ethnically Kpatili. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Zande, Zande-Nzakara

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Laka [lap] 2,050 in Central African Republic (1996). Bocaranga Subprefecture, 9 villages at the Chad border. Alternate names: Kabba Laka. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper

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Langbashe [lna] 40,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 43,000. Kouango Subprefecture. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Langbashi, Langbase, Langbasi, Langwasi, Langbwasse. Dialects: May be intelligible with South Central Banda. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Banda, South Central

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Limassa [bme] Few speakers in Ngundi villages. Along the border with Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Bomasa, Bomassa, Bamassa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Baka-Gundi

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Lutos [ndy] 17,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 18,978. Ndélé, Kaga Andoro, and Kabo subprefectures. Also spoken in Chad. Alternate names: Ruto. Dialects: Nduka (Ndouka, Ndoukwa), Lutos (Ruto, Routo, Rito, Luto, Louto), Wada (Wad), Nduga (Ngougua), Konga. Only Lutos dialect is in Chad; Ruto and Nduka dialects are in Central African Republic. Not intelligible with Sar or Ngambai. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Vale

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Manza [mzv] 220,000 (1996). Bouca, Kaga Bandoro, Mbrès, Dekoa, Sibut, Grimari subprefectures. Possibly in Chad or Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Mandja, Manja. Dialects: Close to Ngbaka-Minangende of Democratic Republic of the Congo. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, East

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Mbangi [mgn] 2,750 (1996). Bangassou, Ouango, and Alindao subprefectures. Alternate names: Mbangui. Dialects: High intelligibility of Yakoma. May be intelligible with Ngbandi or Dendi. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Ngbandi

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Mbati [mdn] 60,000 (1996). Mbaiki Subprefecture. Alternate names: Songo, Lisongo, Isongo, Issongo, Lissongo. Dialects: Bolemba, Mbati of Mbaïki, Bwaka, Bonzio. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, C, Ngundi (C.20)

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Mbay [myb] 8,300 in Central African Republic (1996). Markounda and Batangafo subprefectures. Alternate names: Mbai. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper

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Mbum [mdd] 12,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Bocaranga Subprefecture, along the Cameroon border. Not in Chad. Alternate names: Mboum. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Adamawa, Mbum-Day, Mbum, Southern

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Monzombo [moj] 1,600 in Central African Republic (1996). Mongoumba Subprefecture. Alternate names: Monjombo, Mondjembo, Monzumbo. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Monzombo

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Mpiemo [mcx] 24,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 29,000. Nola Subprefecture. Also spoken in Cameroon, Congo. Alternate names: Mpo, Mbimu, Bimu, Mbimou, Mpyemo, Mbyemo. Dialects: Jasoa (Jasua), Bidjuki (Bidjouki), Mpyemo. The Jasua dialect is spoken by most people and is well understood by others. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, A, Makaa-Njem (A.80)

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Ngam [nmc] 17,700 in Central African Republic (1996). Kabo Subprefecture. Alternate names: Ngama. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper

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Ngando [ngd] 5,000 (1996). Mbaïki Subprefecture. Alternate names: Dingando, Bodzanga, Bangandou, Bagandou, Ngando-Kota. Dialects: Dikuta, Dikota (Kota). Close to Yaka. Kota may be a separate language. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, C, Ngando (C.10)

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Ngbaka Ma'bo [nbm] 88,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 189,553. Mbaiki, Bimbo, and Mongoumba subprefectures. Also spoken in Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Ngbaka Limba, Mbaka, Mbacca, Bwaka, Bouaka, Nbwaka, Gbaka, Ma'bo. Dialects: Close to Gilima. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Bwaka

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Ngbaka Manza [ngg] 29,000 (1996). Damara, Bogangolo, and Boali subprefectures. Dialects: May be intelligible with Manza. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka, East

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Ngombe [nmj] 1,450 (1996). Mambere Kadeï Prefecture. Alternate names: Ngombe-Kaka, Bagando-Ngombe, Bangando-Ngombe. Dialects: May be intelligible with Southwest Gbaya. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Sere-Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka-Mba, Ngbaka, Western, Baka-Gundi

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Nzakara [nzk] 50,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Bangassou, Bakouma, and Gambo subprefectures. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Ansakara, N'sakara, Sakara, Zakara. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Zande, Zande-Nzakara

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Pana [pnz] 82,000 in Central African Republic. Population includes 63,000 Pana, 10,000 Pondo, 9,000 Gonge (1996). Population total all countries: 85,975. Bocaranga Subprefecture. Also spoken in Cameroon, Chad, Nigeria. Alternate names: Pani. Dialects: Pana, Pondo, Gonge. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Adamawa, Mbum-Day, Mbum, Central, Karang

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Pande [bkj] 9,700 (1996). Nola and Berberati subprefectures. Alternate names: Ipande. Dialects: Pande (Ndjeli, Njeli, Linyeli, Linzeli, Ngili), Bogongo (Bugongo, Bukongo). Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, C, Ngundi (C.20)

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Runga [rou] 21,500 in Central African Republic (1996). Bamingui-Bangoran Prefecture, capital city of Bangui. Alternate names: Rounga, Runga de Ndele, Ayki, Aykindang. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Maban, Mabang, Runga-Kibet

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Sango [sag] 350,000 in Central African Republic (1988 census). Population includes 24,573 Sango Riverain. Population total all countries: 404,000. Scattered. Not in Cameroon. Also spoken in Chad, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Alternate names: Sangho. Dialects: A rapidly spreading creole derived from Ngbandi. Lexical similarity 51% with French, 49% from African languages. However, the African-based words are used more frequently. Classification: Creole, Ngbandi based

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Sango, Riverain [snj] 34,500 (1996). Mobaye Subprefecture, along the Ubangi River. Dialects: High intelligibility of Sango. Classification: Creole, Ngbandi based

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Sara Dunjo [koj] 4,000 (1996). Ndélé Subprefecture, close to the Chadian border. 9 villages. Alternate names: Kaba Dunjo, Sara Dinjo. Dialects: May be the same as Kaba Na of Chad. May be intelligible with Sara. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper, Sara Kaba

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Sara Kaba [sbz] 13,600 (1996). Ndélé and Birao subprefectures. Alternate names: Ta Sara. Dialects: May be intelligible with Sara Dunjo of Central African Republic or Kaba Na of Chad. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Sara Proper, Sara Kaba

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Suma [sqm] 50,000 (1996). Bossangoa, Markounda, and Paoua subprefectures. Alternate names: Souma. Dialects: May be intelligible with Gbaya-Bossangoa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Gbaya-Manza-Ngbaka

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To [toz] Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Adamawa, Mbum-Day, Mbum, Unclassified

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Ukhwejo [ukh] 2,000 (1996 SIL). Sangha Province, south of Nola. Ukhwejo dialect at Ngulo; Bikaka at Nalimo, Salo, Bayanga, and Gbaso; Piiga at Koola, Ambasila; Kamsili at Bomanzoku, Linjombo. 7 villages on both sides of the Sanga River. Alternate names: Benkonjo. Dialects: Ukhwejo, Bikaka, Piiga, Kamsili (Ngamsile). Close to Koonzime, Mpiemo, Bomwali, Makaa. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, A, Makaa-Njem (A.80)

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Vale [vae] 5,400 (1996). Batangafo, Kabo, and Kaga Bandoro subprefectures. Not in Chad. Dialects: Vale, Tana (Tane, Tele). Related to Lutos. Not intelligible with Sara or Ngambai. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Sara-Bagirmi, Sara, Vale

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Yaka [axk] 15,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 30,000. Nola, Bambio, Mbaïki, Mongoumba subprefectures, all along the Congo border in the forest. The Sangha River is the border with the Baka Region. Also spoken in Congo. Alternate names: Aka, Nyoyaka, Beká, Pygmée de Mongoumba, Pygmée de la Lobaye, Pygmées de la Sanghas, "Babinga", "Bambenga". Dialects: Beka (Gbayaka, Bayaka, Moyaka), Nzari. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, Benue-Congo, Bantoid, Southern, Narrow Bantu, Northwest, C, Ngando (C.10)

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Yakoma [yky] 100,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 110,000. Kembi and Ouango subprefectures. Mainly along the Ubangi River, and in administrative centers throughout Central African Republic. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo. Dialects: High intelligibility of Ngbandi and Sango. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Ngbandi

More information.

 

Yulu [yul] 4,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Population total all countries: 7,000. Ouadda-Djaléi and Ouadda subprefectures. Yulu are in Central African Republic and Sudan; Binga are in Sudan and Democratic Republic of the Congo. Also spoken in Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan. Alternate names: Youlou. Dialects: Binga, Yulu. Aja is not a dialect of Yulu, but of Kresh (R. Brown). Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Central Sudanic, West, Bongo-Bagirmi, Kara

More information.

 

Zande [zne] 62,000 in Central African Republic (1996). Rafaï, Zémio, and Obo subprefectures. Alternate names: Azande, Zandi, Pazande, Sande, Badjande. Classification: Niger-Congo, Atlantic-Congo, Volta-Congo, North, Adamawa-Ubangi, Ubangi, Zande, Zande-Nzakara

 

Capital city:

Bangui

 

Meaning of the country name:

Named after its geographical position in the center of the continent of Africa.

 

Description Flag:

The flag of the Central African Republic was adopted on December 1, 1958. It was designed by Barthélemy Boganda, the first president of the autonomous territory of Oubangui-Chari, who believed that "France and Africa must march together". Thus he combined the red, white, blue of the French tricolour and the Pan-African colors red, green and yellow. The red color symbolizes the blood of the people of the nation, the blood that was spilt in order to bring it independence, and the blood that they would spill to protect their nation. The blue color represents the sky and freedom. The white color represents peace, and dignity. The green color represents hope, and faith. The yellow color represents tolerance.

 

Coat of arms:

The Coat of Arms of the Central African Republic consists of a shield in the center, with two flags on its edges, and with a sun rising over the shield. Below and above the shield are banners, and there is a medal located below the shield as well.

Symbolism

The elephant and the baobab tree represent nature and the backbone of the country. The gold star on a map of Africa symbolizes the position of the Central African Republic. The hand (bottom right corner) was the symbol of the dominant party in 1963 when the arms were adopted.

 

Motto:

"Unité, Dignité, Travail"

 

National Anthem: La Renaissance

 

Sangho

 

Bêafrîka, mbeso tî âBantu

Kîri mo gbû gîgî tî mo-mvenî

Mo bâa pâsi na gbe tî âzo kûê

Me fadësô, mo ke na kürü gô

 

Mo sö benda, mo bûngbi kûê ôko

Na kusâra ngâ na nëngö-terê

Tî tö ndâ tî finî dutï tî ë sô

E mä gbegô tî_âkötarä tî ë

 

CHORUS:

E gbû kua nzönî na nëngö-terê

E kpë ndiä nzönî na mängö-terê

E kinda wasïöbê, ë tomba pâsi

E yâa bandêra tî ködrö tî ë!

 

French

 

Ô Centrafrique, ô berceau des Bantous!

Reprends ton droit au respect, à la vie!

Longtemps soumis, longtemps brimé par tous,

Mais de ce jour brisant la tyrannie.

Dans le travail, l'ordre et la dignité,

Tu reconquiers ton droit, ton unité,

Et pour franchir cette étape nouvelle,

De nos ancêtres la voix nous appelle.

 

CHORUS:

Au travail dans l'ordre et la dignité,

Dans le respect du droit dans l'unité,

Brisant la misère et la tyrannie,

Brandissant l'étendard de la Patrie.

 

English

 

Oh! Central Africa, cradle of the Bantu!

Take up again your right to respect, to life!

Long subjugated, long scorned by all,

But, from today, breaking tyranny's hold.

Through work, order and dignity

You reconquer your rights, your unity,

And to take this new step

The voice of our ancestors call us.

 

CHORUS:

To work! In order and dignity,

in the respect for rights and in unity,

Breaking poverty and tyranny,

Holding high the flag of the Fatherland.

 

Internet Page: www.rcainfo.org

www.pygmies.info

 

R.C.A. in diferent languages

 

eng: Central African Republic

ast | glg | spa: República Centroafricana

cos | roh: Republica Centrafricana

ind | msa: Republik Afrika Tengah / ريڤوبليك افريكا تڠه

kin | run: Republika ya Santrafrika

afr: Sentraal-Afrikaanse Republiek

arg: Republica Zentroafricana

aze: Mərkəzi Afrika Respublikası / Мәркәзи Африка Республикасы

bos: Srednjoafrička Republika / Средњоафричка Република; Centralna Afrička Republika / Централна Афричка Република

bre: Republik Kreizafrika

cat: República Centrafricana; República Centreafricana

ces: Středoafrická republika

cor: Repoblek Sentrafrika

crh: Merkeziy Afrika Cumhuriyeti / Меркезий Африка Джумхуриети

cym: Gweriniaeth Canolbarth Affrica

dan: Den Centralafrikanske Republik

deu: Zentralafrikanische Republik / Zentralafrikaniſche Republik

dsb: Centralnoafriska republika; Centralnoafrikańska republika

epo: Centr-Afrika Respubliko

est: Kesk-Aafrika Vabariik

eus: Afrika Erdiko Errepublika

fao: Miðafrikalýðveldið

fin: Keski-Afrikan tasavalta

fra: République centrafricaine

frp: Rèpublica centrafriquêna

fry: Sintraal Afrikaanske Republyk

fur: Republiche Centrafricane

gla: Poblachd Meadhan Afraga

gle: Poblacht na hAfraice Láir / Poblaċt na hAfraice Láir

glv: Pobblaght yn Affrick Veanagh

hat: Repiblik santafrik

hau: Jamhuriyar Afirka ta Tsakiya

hrv: Srednjoafrička Republika

hsb: Centralnoafriska republika

hun: Közép-afrikai Köztársaság

ina: Republica Centroafrican

isl: Mið-Afríkulýðveldið

ita: Repubblica Centrafricana

jav: Republik Afrika Tengah

jnf: Républyique Centrafritchaine

kmr: Cimḧurîyeta Efrîqe ya Merkezê / Щьмһ’ӧрийәта Африке йа Мәрк’әзе / جمحوریەتا ئەفریقێ مەرکەزێ; Cimḧurîyeta Efrîqe ya Ortê / Щьмһ’ӧрийәта Әфриqе йа Орт’е / جمحوریەتا ئەفریقێ ئۆرتێ; Cimḧurîyeta Efrîqe ya Merkez / Щьмһ’ӧрийәта Әфриqе йа Мәрк’әз / جمحوریەتا ئەفریقێ مەرکەز; Cimḧurîyeta Afrîke ya Merkezê / Щьмһ’ӧрийәта Африке йа Мәрк’әзе / جمحوریەتا ئافریکێ مەرکەزێ; Cimḧurîyeta Afrîke ya Ortê / Щьмһ’ӧрийәта Африке йа Орт’е / جمحوریەتا ئافریکێ ئۆرتێ; Cimḧurîyeta Afrîke ya Merkez / Щьмһ’ӧрийәта Африке йа Мәрк’әз / جمحوریەتا ئافریکێ مەرکەز

kon: Repubilika ya Afelika ya Kati

kur: Komara Afrîka Navendî / کۆمارا ئافریکا ناڤەندی; Komara Efrîqe Navendî / کۆمارا ئەفریقە ناڤەندی; Komara Efrîqya Navendî / کۆمارا ئەفریقیا ناڤەندی

lat: Res Publica Africae Mediae; Respublica Mediae Africae

lav: Centrālāfrikas Republika

lim: Centraolafrikaanse Republiek

lin: Repubiliki ya Santrafríka

lit: Centrinės Afrikos Respublika

lld: Republica Zentrafricana

ltz: Zentralafrikanesch Republik / Zentralafrikaneſch Republik

mlt: Repubblika Afrikana Ċentrali

mol: Republica Centrafricană / Република Чентрафриканэ

nds: Zentralafrikanisch Republiek / Zentralafrikaniſch Republiek

nld: Centraal-Afrikaanse Republiek

nno: Den sentralafrikanske republikken

nob: Den sentralafrikanske republikk

nrm: Républlique Chente-d’Afrique

oci: Republica Centreafricana

pol: Republika Środkowoafrykańska

por: República Centro-Africana

que: Chawpi Afrika Ripublika

rmy: Maškarafrikani Republika / माश्काराक़्रिकानी रेपुब्लिका

ron: Republica Centrafricană

rup: Republica Chendroafricanã

sag: Ködörösêse tî Bêafrîka

scn: Ripùbbrica Centrafricana

slk: Stredoafrická republika

slo: Sredafrikju Republik / Средафрикйу Републик

slv: Srednjeafriška republika

sme: Gaska-Afrihká republihkka

smg: Centrėnės Afrėkas Respoblėka

sqi: Republika e Afrikës Qendrore

srd: Repùbrica Tzentrafricana

swa: Jamhuri ya Afrika ya Kati

swe: Centralafrikanska republiken

szl: Rypublika Środkowoafrikańsko

tet: Repúblika Sentruafrikana

tgl: Republika ng Gitnang Aprika

tuk: Orta Afrika Jumhuriýäti / Орта Африка Җумхурийәти; Merkezi Afrika Jumhuriýäti / Меркези Африка Җумхурийәти

tur: Orta Afrika Cumhuriyeti; Merkez Afrika Cumhuriyeti; Merkezî Afrika Cumhuriyeti

uzb: Oʻrta Ofriqo Respublikasi / Ўрта Офриқо Республикаси; Oʻrta Afrika Respublikasi / Ўрта Африка Республикаси; Markaziy Ofriqo Respublikasi / Марказий Офриқо Республикаси; Markaziy Afrika Respublikasi / Марказий Африка Республикаси

vie: Cộng hòa Trung Phi

vol: Repüblikän Zänoda-Frikopa

vor: Kesk-Afriga Vabariik

wln: Republike Cintrafrikinne

wol: Réewum Diggu Afrik

zza: Cumhuriyetê Afrika Miyanêne

krc | kum: Орта Африка Республикасы (Orta Afrika Respublikasy)

abq: Центрально-Африканска Ареспублика (Centralno-Afrikanska Arespubłika)

alt: Тӧс Африканский Республика (Tös Afrikanskij Respublika)

bak: Үҙәк Африка Республикаһы / Üźäk Afrika Respublikahı

bel: Цэнтральна-Афрыканская Рэспубліка / Centralna-Afrykanskaja Respublika

bul: Централноафриканска република (Centralnoafrikanska republika)

che: Центрально-Африкански Республика (Central'no-Afrikanski Respublika)

chv: Центрти Африкӑ Республики (Centrti Afrikă Respubliki)

kaz: Орталық Африка Республикасы / Ortalıq Afrïka Respwblïkası / ورتالىق افريكا رەسپۋبليكاسى

kbd: Центральнэ-Африканскэ Республикэ (Central'nă-Afrikanskă Respublikă)

kir: Орто Африка Республикасы (Orto Afrika Respublikasy)

kjh: Центрально-Африканскай Республика (Central'no-Afrikanskaj Respublika)

kom: Центрально-Африканскӧй Республика (Central'no-Afrikansköj Respublika)

mkd: Централноафричка Република (Centralnoafrička Republika)

mon: Төв Африкийн Бүгд Найрамдах Улс (Töv Afrikijn Bügd Najramdaĥ Uls)

oss: Централон-Африкаг Республикӕ (Centralon-Afrikag Respublikä)

rus: Центрально-Африканская Республика (Central'no-Afrikanskaja Respublika)

srp: Централноафричка Република / Centralnoafrička Republika

tat: Үзәк Африка республикасы / Üzäk Afrika respublikası

tgk: Ҷумҳурии Африқои Марказӣ / جمهوری افریقای مرکزی / Çumhuriji Afriqoi Markazī; Ҷумҳурии Африкаи Марказӣ / جمهوری افریکۀ مرکزی / Çumhuriji Afrikai Markazī

tyv: Төп Африк Республика (Töp Afrik Respublika)

ukr: Центрально-Африканська Республіка (Central'no-Afrykans'ka Respublika)

ara: جمهورية إفريقيا الوسطى (Ǧumhūrīyâtu Ifrīqiyā l-Wusṭá)

fas: جمهوری افریقای مرکزی (Jomhūrī-ye Efrīqā-ye Markazī)

prs: جمهوری افریقای مرکزی (Jomhūrī-ye Afrīqā-ye Markazī)

pus: د منځنۍ افريقا جمهوريت (də Manźnəy Afriqā Jumhūriyat); د مرکزي افريقا جمهوريت (də Markazī Afriqā Jumhūriyat)

uig: ئوتتۇرا ئافرىقا جۇمھۇرىيىتى / Ottura Afriqa jumhuriyiti / Оттура Африқа җумһурийити

urd: وسطی افریقی جمہوریہ (Vasṭī Afrīqī Jumhūrīyâ)

div: ސެންޓްރަލް އެފްރިކަން ރިޕަބްލިކް (Senṫral Efrikan Ripablik)

heb: הרפובליקה המרכז אפריקאית (ha-Repûblîqah ha-Merkaz Afrîqaʾît)

lad: ריפובליקה סינטרואפ'ריקאנה / Republika Sentroafrikana

yid: צענטראַל-אַפֿריקאַנישע רעפּובליק (Tsentral-Afrikaniše Republik)

amh: የመካከለኛው አፍሪቃ ሪፐብሊክ (yä-Mäkakkäläññaw Ăfriḳa Ripäblik)

ell-dhi: Κεντροαφρικανική Δημοκρατία (Kentroafrikanikī́ Dīmokratía)

ell-kat: Κεντροαφρικανικὴ Δημοκρατία (Kentroafrikanikī̀ Dīmokratía); Κεντρικὴ Ἀφρικανικὴ Δημοκρατία (Kentrikī̀ Afrikanikī̀ Dīmokratía)

hye: Կենտրոնական Աֆրիկյան Հանրապետություն (Kentronakan Afrikyan Hanrapetouṭyoun)

kat: ცენტრალური აფრიკის რესპუბლიკა (C̣entraluri Aṗrikis respublika)

hin: सेंट्रल अफ़्रीकन रिपब्लिक (Seṁṭral Afrīkan Ripablik)

san: केन्द्रीय अफ्रीका गणराज्य (Kendrīya Apʰrīkā Gaṇrājya)

ben: মধ্য আফ্রিকা প্রজাতন্ত্র (Môdʰẏô Āpʰrikā Prôjātôntrô)

pan: ਕੇਦਰੀ ਅਫਰੀਕਾ ਗਣਰਾਜ (Kedrī Apʰrīkā Gaṇrāj)

kan: ಮಧ್ಯ ಆಫ್ರಿಕ ಗಣರಾಜ್ಯ (Madʰya Āpʰrika Gaṇarājya)

mal: മദ്ധ്യ ആഫ്രിക്കന് റിപ്പബ്ലിക്ക് (Maddʰya Āpʰrikkan Ṟippablikk); സെന്ട്രല് ആഫ്രിക്കന് റിപബ്ലിക് (Senṭral Āpʰrikkan Ṟipablik)

tam: மத்திய ஆப்பிரிக்கக் குடியரசு (Mattiya Āppirikkak Kuṭiyaraču); மத்திய ஆபிரிக்கக் குடியரசு (Mattiya Āpirikkak Kuṭiyaraču); மத்திய ஆப்ரிக்கக் குடியரசு (Mattiya Āprikkak Kuṭiyaraču)

tel: సెంట్రల్ ఆఫ్రికన్ రిపబ్లిక్ (Seṁṭral Āpʰrikan Ripablik)

zho: 中非共和國/中非共和国 (Zhōngfēi Gōnghéguó)

jpn: 中央アフリカ共和国 (Chūō Afurika Kyōwakoku)

kor: 중앙아프리카공화국 (Jungang Apeurika Gonghwaguk)

mya: ဗယုိအာဖရိကသမ္မတနုိင္ငံ (Báyo Apʰáẏíká Ṯãmátánaĩṅã)

tha: สาธารณรัฐแอฟริกากลาง (Sātʰāronrât Ǣfrikā Klāṅ)

khm: សាធារណរដ្ឋអាហ្វ្រិកកណ្ដាល (Sātʰāroṇrod[tʰ] Āhvrik Kaṇdāl)

 

#4975 - 2021 Day 226: A twitten is an alleyway, in old Sussex dialect. I'm not sure how widespread the term is outside of Sussex, but every place I have ever lived in the county has one or several.

On July 10th the A11s and the A24s came pretty close of Cracroft shore. It was great to see Springer again (frontground), who got bigger

 

Springer story:

Springer was a 2 years old female when she was found in January 2002 travelling by herself in the South area of Vancouver I. Thanks to the dialect she was already "speaking" very well, scientists (Helena Symonds at Orcalab) figured out to which pod she belonged to, the A4s from the Northern Residents. It turned out she had just lost her mother A45 and left her matriline (the A24s) for not very clear reasons yet. She hadn't a normal behaviour, she was looking for any kind of contact like floating logs or even boats and some aquarium started to be interested in getting her. It has finally been decided to bring her back to the North, in the western part of Johnstone strait, where the chances for her to go back with her familly ,that is often found in this area during summer ,were the best. She arrived there on July 13th and after a very intense night ( Springer exchanged calls with the A12s and the A35s that were passing by not so far from her) she was realeased on July 14th when the same groups (A12s, A35s) went beside her net, floating quietly in very shallow waters. The days following her release, many things happened. She was seen travelling with different groups (the A12s, A36s, with A51/A61), and sometimes by herself again which made people doubting about the chances of this operation to succeed.

But, on August 25th 2002, It was confirmed by Graeme Ellis that Springer was definitely travelling with the A11s which is a A4 pod's matriline led by A24's possible sister,A11. That was such a great news and a huge relief..

Since then, Springer has stayed with this group and it's with tears in our eyes that we see her evolving years after years in what is now her real life..

It was the first time such an operation was attempted, and it greatly succeeded, which proves that the release of an orca, whose we know which group it belongs to, is possible.. and there are several captive orcas that we know to which group they belong to..

A sculpture of Guido Gezelle, an fluential writer and poet and a Roman Catholic priest famous for the use of the West Flemish dialect. It was created by by Jules Lagae and is located in West-Brugge Quarter, Bruges, Flanders, Belgium.

 

He was ordained a priest in 1854, and worked as a teacher and priest in Roeselare. He was always interested in all things in English and was given the prestigious right of being the priest for the 'English Convent' in Bruges. He died there in a small room, where it is still forbidden to enter.

 

He was the son of Monica Devrieze and Pieter Jan Gezelle, a Flemish gardener in Bruges. Gezelle was the uncle of Flemish writer Stijn Streuvels (Frank Lateur). There is a museum of his works close by the English convent and also a small bar named after him.

 

He tried to develop an independent Flemish language, more or less separated from the general Dutch language, which had certain more "Hollandic" aspects. The Dutch he used in his poems was heavily influenced by the local West Flemish dialect. His works are often inspired by his mystic love towards God and Creation. Later, his poetry was associated with literary Impressionism, and he is considered a forerunner of that movement.

 

Gezelle also was a translator of poetry and prose, most famous now for his translation of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's Song of Hiawatha, published in 1886. He had already read the original at Roeselare in 1856 and was interested in it because on the one hand, the American Indians fascinated him, and, on the other, he liked its portrayal of Christian missionaries.

 

Information Source:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guido_Gezelle

 

LT Paul Friedrich Kempf, was a pilot of Jasta 2 (Boelke). He only got 4 victories so you won't find much information on him. But because he had an elaborate paint scheme his pictures are widely seen. He was also one of the few flight leaders to servive the war. he died in the 1960's

 

Kennscht mi noch? is swabian dialect for 'Kennst Du mich noch?' , in english: Do you still remember me?. What he means is: You can't get me! or, as another writing, this time on a Fok. DVII, says: Du doch nicht!

 

Kempf was a very talkative young man and when he meets an old comrade he hasn't saw for months he walked to him, touched his shoulders and said: "Hello, I'm Fritz Kempf, we know each other from..., kennscht mi noch?" (Do you still remember me?) He adds this question nearly everytime, it was a funny habit of him. His comrades made a joke of it and asked him if he would say this to the enemy too, especially when he is in a hot dogfight. So he decided to choose this sentence as his personal marking.

 

'Kennscht mi noch' is not slang! In 'high german' the correct version is 'Kennst Du mich noch'. As Aaron said: 'Kennst' is from 'Kennen'= remember. But in Baden-Wuerttemberg and the swabian part of Bavaria this 'Kennst' is pronounced 'Kennscht' and also includes the 'Du'. It's not a slang word, but dialect. German dialects are sometimes hard to understand and differs greatly from each other. For myself I am speaking the 'franconian' variant and some time ago when I was in Switzerland and talked with my wife in 'franconian', the people around us thought we are coming from Finnland.

 

Interrupted his engineering studies to fulfill his Einjahrfreiwilliger compulsory military obligation at age 19, October 1913. Joined 5. Badisches-Infanterie Regiment Nr. 113 in Freiburg. His volunteer service was extended by outbreak of the war. He was promoted Unteroffizier on August 3, 1914 as his unit prepared to go to battle. In the fighting for the Battle of the Frontiers which seesawed back and forth around Mulhausen, Upper Alsace, Kempf was seriously wounded remaining in hospital until February 1915. During the healing process applied for a transfer to the Luftstreitkraefte arriving at FEA 3 in Gotha on May 6, 1915. He was then sent back to Freiburg for complete training and then on to Darmstadt and FEA 9 at the end of November 1915. During this time he received a number of awards/promotions for his earlier infantry service and good work in training and other duties. These are: 11-12/?/15 Iron Cross 2nd Class, 1/27/16 promoted to Vizefeldwebel, 5/21/16 received Pilot's Badge, 7/22/16 Baden's Silver Merit Medal, promoted to Leutnant on 9/9/16. Jan. 4, 1916 joins Kampfstaffel 20 of Kampfgeschwader 4. Participates in Verdun and Somme battles. Unit transferred from the Western Front and goes east and is attached to Halbgeschwader I and supports the drive to capture Bucharest in the Rumanian campaign. After the fall of Bucharest the unit is transferred to Macedonia. Kempf's squadron mate is Hermann Frommherz. The unit is then transferred west in late February 1917. 3/20/17 Kempf receives Iron Cross 1st Class and is transferred to Jasta Boelcke. Frommherz is already there a week earlier. Kempf is recorded as scoring victories on these dates: 4/30/17 a BE2d, 6/5/17 Sopwith Pup, 10/20/17 Sopwith Camel. He receives another decoration, Bulgarian Military Merit Order w/ War Decoration. Assigned 10/20/17 to Jastaschule I at Valenciennes for duty at the flight school until 1/30/18. Kempf scores again on 5/8/18 another Sopwith Camel. His last victory. He is awarded another decoration, the Knight 2nd Class with Swords of the Zaehringen Lion. On 8/18/18 Kempf is detached from Jasta B and returns to Jastaschule I and finishes out the war there. His final award of the war comes two days before his return home, the Wound Badge in Black for his wounding four years earlier in the infantry.

www.bap.de/start/musik/songtexte/titel/verdamp-lang-her --- www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ghi2xReyFYA&feature=related --- www.worldvision.de/unsere-arbeit-wie-wir-arbeiten-entwick... ---

Bap Colognian (Kölsch) pronunciation: [/bap/] is a German rock group. With ten albums reaching the number one in the German record charts, Bap is one of the most successful rock acts in their home country.

 

Nearly all of Bap's lyrics are written in Kölsch, the dialect of Cologne, or more precisely in a Kölsch-influenced derivation of Eifelplatt, a regional variant of the Ripuarian language spoken in the nearby rural Eifel. Niedecken's most prominent musical influences, especially early in his career, were Bob Dylan, the Kinks, Bruce Springsteen, the Rolling Stones, and Wolfgang Ambros.

The group was founded in 1976 under the name Wolfgang Niedecken's Bap in Cologne, Germany by Wolfgang Niedecken and Hans Heres. In 1981 they released their most famous song "Verdamp lang her" (English: Damn long time ago), in which Niedecken describes regrets he has about his relationship with his then recently deceased father. The band's name "BAP" derived from "BAPP", both, a play-on-words on the Kölsch word "Papp" (related to the German word Papa for dad), but pronounced differently, and Niedecken's then-times nickname. BAP ist eine Kölschrockband um den Frontmann Wolfgang Niedecken und gilt als eine der erfolgreichsten Rockbands deutscher Sprache. Von den 23 BAP-Alben erreichten 19 die Top 10, zehn wurden sogar Nummer 1 der Charts.Die Gruppe um Sänger und Songschreiber Wolfgang Niedecken besteht seit 1976. Die Band traf sich zu Beginn in wechselnder Besetzung, um „einen Kasten Bier leerzuproben“.[1] Der erste Auftritt erfolgte 1977 im Mariensaal in Köln-Nippes mit zwei akustischen Gitarren (Wolfgang Niedecken, Hans Heres) und Perkussion (Afro Bauermann). Das erste Album, Wolfgang Niedecken's BAP rockt andere kölsche Leeder. erschien 1979, die Band bestand zu dieser Zeit aus Wolfgang Niedecken, Hans „Honçe“ Heres, Wolfgang „Gröön“ Klever, Manfred „Schmal“ Boecker, Wolfgang „Wolli“ Boecker und Bernd Odenthal. Die zweite LP Affjetaut folgte 1980, wie die Debüt-Platte noch unter der Bezeichnung „Wolfgang Niedeckens BAP“, da Niedecken sich bereits als Solo-Künstler mit Gitarre und Mundharmonika als „Bob Dylan der Südstadt“ einen Namen gemacht hatte; beide Platten wurden noch beim Kölner Independent-Label Eigelstein Musikproduktion veröffentlicht.

 

Der Bandname BAP entstand aus Niedeckens Spitzname, der seinen Vater so nannte. Diese Aussprache entstammt der Herkunft der Familie aus Rheinland-Pfalz, und weil sie vom kölschen „Pap“ abwich, entstand so Niedeckens Spitzname.[2] Als ein erster Auftritt geplant wurde, für den mit einem Plakat geworben werden sollte, musste ein Bandname erdacht werden. Hans Heres schlug dem Veranstalter vor, „BAPP“ zu nehmen.[3] Da sich die Bandmitglieder aber einig waren, dass „BAPP“ – mit zwei „P“ geschrieben – auf der Bassdrum nicht gut aussah, wurde einfach ein „P“ gestrichen.[4]

Der musikalische und inhaltliche Stil der BAP-Songs wird wesentlich von Bob Dylan, den Kinks und den Rolling Stones geprägt. Auch Bruce Springsteen, mit dem Sänger Wolfgang Niedecken eine persönliche Freundschaft verbindet, gilt als wichtiger Orientierungspunkt für BAP. Verschiedene BAP-Lieder, vor allem melancholische (z. B. Helfe kann dir keiner, Paar Daach fröher) zeigen in den Arrangements und der Stimmung deutliche Ähnlichkeiten mit Stücken von Wolfgang Ambros, etwa von dessen Album 19 Class A Numbers. Die Texte beschäftigen sich oft mit gesellschaftlichen oder persönlichen Problemen.1979 fanden unter dem Bandnamen "Wolfgang Niedeckens BAP" erste Auftritte außerhalb von Köln und der näheren Umgebung statt; so zum Beispiel auch anlässlich der Bundesgartenschau 1979 in der Bonner Rheinaue.[5] Im Mai 1982 machte BAP ihre erste professionell organisierte Deutschlandtournee. Im Mittelpunkt standen Songs des aktuellen Albums Für Usszeschnigge, das 1981 als erstes beim Major-Label EMI-Electrola erschienen war. Für den Wechsel von Eigelstein zur EMI mussten BAP in der lokalen Kultur-Szene viel Kritik einstecken, wurden jedoch mit Platz 1 in den deutschen Album-Charts prompt belohnt.

 

Im Sommer 1982 folgten verschiedene Auftritte im Rahmen von Großveranstaltungen und Fernsehproduktionen: Rockpop In Concert für das ZDF in der Dortmunder Westfalenhalle 1, Demonstration gegen die Nachrüstung der NATO am 10. Juni 1982 (Zehnter Juni) auf den Bonner Rheinwiesen, Vorprogramm der Rolling Stones am 4. und 5. Juli 1982 im Müngersdorfer Stadion in Köln und als erste deutsche Band bei einem Festival des WDR-Rockpalast am 28. August 1982 auf der Loreley-Freilichtbühne.

 

Nach Erscheinen des vierten Albums Vun drinne noh drusse war die Band zwischen Oktober 1982 und Oktober 1983 sieben Monate lang unterwegs. Neben Deutschland standen auch Konzerte in Österreich, der Schweiz und den Benelux-Ländern auf dem Programm. Insgesamt wurden etwa 130 Auftritte gespielt. Die Tournee endete mit einem Konzert im Kölner „Stollwerck“. Das vom Abriss bedrohte Bürgerhaus Stollwerck erhielt die Einnahmen dieses Konzerts zur Finanzierung seiner weiteren Arbeit. Am 28. Mai 1983 spielte BAP auf einem Festival im niedersächsischen Schüttorf im Vorprogramm von Rod Stewart und am 22. Oktober 1983 auf einer weiteren Großdemonstration gegen die NATO-Nachrüstung im Bonner Hofgarten.

 

Für den Januar 1984 war – nach langen Verhandlungen mit der staatlichen Künstleragentur – eine Tournee mit 14 Konzerten in 13 Städten der DDR geplant. Im Vorfeld der Tour zeichnete das DDR-Fernsehen ein Interview mit Wolfgang Niedecken inklusive zweier Unplugged-Versionen von BAP-Liedern auf. Dieses wurde später jedoch sinnentstellend verkürzt gesendet. So entschloss sich Niedecken, einige politische Statements, die der Band wichtig waren, in einem eigenen Lied darzustellen. Es wurde als Deshalv spill’ mer he betitelt und erstmals auf dem letzten „West-Konzert“ vor der Tour in Wolfsburg gespielt. Als die Band bereits in Ost-Berlin im Hotel Unter den Linden war, gab es am Vorabend des ersten Konzerts heftige Auseinandersetzungen über dieses Lied mit der DDR-Seite. Als die Band sich weigerte, es von der Setlist zu nehmen, kam es zum Eklat. Die Tournee wurde abgebrochen, bevor das erste Konzert auf dem Boden der DDR gespielt werden konnte. In einer Sendung des DDR-Fernsehens war die Ansage eines Moderators während eines Konzerts im Berliner Palast der Republik zu sehen, zu dem BAP geladen war. Er nannte als Begründung ihrer Absage, die Band wolle „nicht unter dem Symbol der weißen Taube auf blauem Grund auftreten“.[6]

 

Die Tournee zum Album Zwesche Salzjebäck un Bier begann am 15. und 16. Juni 1984 mit zwei Konzerten im Archäologischen Park in Xanten. Sie wurden vom ZDF aufgezeichnet und später in einer Zusammenfassung gesendet. Die Tour dauerte bis zum Februar 1985 und übertraf von der Zuschauerresonanz her noch die von 1982/83.

 

Am 2. März 1986 begann in Lohmar bei Köln die Tournee Ahl Männer, aalglatt. BAP spielte zunächst einige Konzerte im ländlichen Raum, bevor die Band am 15. März 1986 in der Essener Grugahalle bei der 17. und letzten Rocknacht des WDR-Rockpalast auftrat. Die Rocknacht, bei der auch Jackson Browne und Big Country auftraten, wurde wie schon das Festival auf der Loreley 1982 via Eurovision von vielen europäischen Radio- und Fernsehstationen ausgestrahlt.

 

Von April bis Juli folgten zahlreiche weitere Konzerte. Wegen der anhaltenden Popularität wurden teilweise auch größere Hallen ausgewählt. So fanden die „Heimspiele“ der Kölner Band erstmals in der bis zu 8000 Zuschauer fassenden Kölner Sporthalle, der damals größten Veranstaltungshalle der Domstadt, statt. Bei dieser Tournee gab es mit Christian Schneider erstmals auf einer Tournee einen Gastmusiker, weil die zum Teil sehr komplexen Keyboard-Arrangements des neuen Albums live mit nur einem Keyboarder nicht zu realisieren gewesen wären. Schneider spielte neben Keyboards bei einigen Stücken auch Saxophon. Den letzten Auftritt der Tour absolvierte die Band am 26. Juli 1986; genau drei Monate nach der Atomreaktor-Katastrophe von Tschernobyl auf dem legendären Anti-WAAhnsinns-Festival gegen die Wiederaufbereitungsanlage von Wackersdorf in Burglengenfeld.

 

Nach Ende der Tournee 1986 legte BAP eine kreative Pause ein (u. a. bedingt durch bandinterne, künstlerische Meinungsverschiedenheiten), die Wolfgang Niedecken zur Veröffentlichung seines Albums Schlagzeiten und zu einigen Solo-Konzerten nutzte. BAP stand erst im September 1987 bei zwei Festivals wieder auf der Bühne, um sich auf eine Tournee durch China vorzubereiten. Diese Tournee ist im Buch BAP övver China dokumentiert.

 

Das Album Da Capo wurde von Oktober bis Dezember 1988 zunächst bei einer ausgedehnten Hallentournee präsentiert. Bei dieser Tournee legte BAP die Scheu vor den ganz großen Konzertarenen endgültig ab. So standen auch die Frankfurter Festhalle und die Münchener Olympiahalle auf dem Programm. Im Sommer 1989 folgten weitere Konzerte, teilweise auch im Rahmen von Festivals gemeinsam mit Joe Cocker. Eines dieser Events fand in der Berliner Waldbühne statt.

 

Auch die Tournee 1991 wurde in mehreren Teilen durchgeführt. Kurz nach der Vollendung der deutschen Einheit standen im Januar 1991 zunächst die ersten Konzerte der Band auf dem Gebiet der ehemaligen DDR auf dem Programm. Anschließend ging BAP in Westdeutschland auf Club-Tour und absolvierte eine Reihe von Auftritten in beschaulichem Rahmen, zumeist in kleinen Hallen. Das Konzert im Kölner E-Werk wurde aufgezeichnet und später auf dem Album Live – Affrocke veröffentlicht.

 

Im Mai und Juni 1991 folgte eine Tournee ausschließlich durch die größten deutschen Konzerthallen und bei verschiedenen Open-Air-Festivals. Als Gast bei den Konzerten trat Julian Dawson auf. Am 26. Januar 1994 startete die Tournee zum im August 1993 erschienenen Album Pik Sibbe. Nach wie vor war die Nachfrage in der BAP-Hochburg Köln groß, in einigen anderen Städten blieben die Zuschauerzahlen etwas hinter den Erwartungen zurück. Die folgende Tournee zum Album Amerika begann im November 1996. Der Tourneestart in Koblenz wurde für den WDR-Rockpalast mitgeschnitten und später im Fernsehen ausgestrahlt.

 

Mit dem Ausstieg von Bassist Steve Borg und von Gründungsmitglied Manfred „Schmal“ Boecker verließen zwei Musiker die Band, die BAP über viele Jahre mitgeprägt haben. 1999 stieg auch Gitarrist Klaus „Major“ Heuser aus, der während 19 Jahren Bandmitgliedschaft die überwiegende Zahl der Lieder komponierte. Außerdem verließ Keyboarder Alexander „Effendi“ Büchel die Firma BAP. Diese Abgänge und die darauf folgenden Neubesetzungen veränderten den musikalischen Ausdruck von BAP nachhaltig.

 

Zu den Gründen für den Ausstieg von Major sagt Wolfgang Niedecken rückblickend im März 2011:

  

„Der Major ist ein toller Gitarrist. Aber er wollte, dass BAP international ausgerichteten Radio-Pop spielt. Ich wollte beim Kölsch-Rock bleiben. Beide Positionen waren nicht vereinbar. Ich bin ihm dankbar, dass er selbst gegangen ist. Ich hätte ihn nämlich nie rausgeschmissen.[7]“

 

Als Neuzugang an den Keyboards stieg Michael Nass bei BAP ein, der zuvor in den 1980er Jahren in der DDR-Musikszene musikalisch sehr aktiv war, u. a. bei P 16 und später in Liselotte Rezniceks Frauenband Mona Lise. Gitarrist wurde Helmut Krumminga. Im Sommer 2001 gab BAP vor der eigentlichen Aff un zo-Tour ab Herbst 2001 zwei Vorabkonzerte, darunter das „Konzert an der toten Brücke“ (Soda-Brücke) in Euskirchen, das auch vom WDR aufgezeichnet und wenige Tage später in der Sendung Rockpalast gesendet wurde. Das Album selbst stieg wie der Vorgänger Tonfilm auf Platz 1 in die deutschen Charts ein.

 

Im Januar 2006 war die Kölnarena zwar anlässlich des Starts der Jubiläumskonzerte zum 30-jährigen Bestehen der Band mit 25.000 Zuschauern an zwei aufeinander folgenden Tagen fast ausverkauft. Bei anderen Auftritten hatte man sich von vorneherein durch die Wahl kleinerer Konzertorte angepasst.

 

Auch das im Mai 2008 erschienene Album Radio Pandora stieg auf Platz 1 in die deutschen Charts ein. Im Winter 2008 startete die Tournee dazu, am 2. Weihnachtstag gab es das Heimspiel in der Köln-Arena (Lanxess-Arena); sie dauerte (mit Unterbrechungen) bis zum Sommer 2009, wobei die Band von Anne de Wolff (Violine, Bratsche, Gesang) und teilweise von Rhani Krija (Percussion) begleitet wurde.

 

Für November 2011 war der Start der aktuellsten Tournee geplant. Aufgrund einer schweren Erkrankung Wolfgang Niedeckens wurde der Start der Tour auf Anfang Mai 2012 verschoben.[8][9][10]

 

Auslandsauftritte [Bearbeiten]

 

BAP ist im Laufe der bisher 35-jährigen Bandgeschichte in vielen Ländern der Welt aufgetreten. Nachdem sich die Bandmitglieder anfangs kaum vorstellen konnten, dass ihre kölschen Texte außerhalb des Rheinlandes verstanden würden, durften sie erleben, dass ihre Platten weit darüber hinaus gekauft wurden. Tourneen waren dadurch auch im Ausland möglich.

 

Die ersten Auftritte außerhalb Deutschlands waren im Dezember 1982 in der Schweiz (Basel und St.Gallen)[11] und bis Mitte der 1980er Jahre in Österreich, Luxemburg, Belgien und Dänemark (Roskilde-Festival). Seitdem gehören Auftritte in diesen Nachbarländern zum Bestandteil jeder Tournee.

 

Spätere Fernreisen wurden zumeist als Begleitung zu künstlerischen oder politischen Themen organisiert; häufig war nicht die komplette Gruppe unterwegs; manchmal auch nur Wolfgang Niedecken alleine oder in Begleitung von Musikern seiner Solo-Projekte:

Mit einigen Gästen tourte BAP im Oktober 1987 vier Wochen durch China. Acht Auftritte wurden in Peking, Shanghai und Kanton absolviert.[12]

Wolfgang Niedecken spielte 1987 auf Einladung der Kulturstiftung Casa de los tres Mundos (ein Projekt des Schauspielers Dietmar Schönherr, des Produzenten Peter Reichelt und des Kulturministers Ernesto Cardenal) mit seiner Complizen-Band in Nicaragua.

In ähnlicher Zusammensetzung spielten Wolfgang Niedecken & Complizen 1988 in Mosambik eine kleine Tour.

Die politischen Veränderungen in der Sowjetunion unter Gorbatschow machten es möglich, dass BAP im Mai 1989 je drei Konzerte in Moskau und Wolgograd gab.[13] Dort kamen die Musiker auch mit Fans aus der DDR ins Gespräch. Nachdem die BAP-Tour durch Ostdeutschland 1984 abgesagt wurde, war der Umweg über die UdSSR die einzige Möglichkeit, als DDR-Bürger mit der Band zu sprechen.

 

More info and other languages available at:

 

de.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAP

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Beamish Museum is the first regional open-air museum, in England, located at Beamish, near the town of Stanley, in County Durham, England. Beamish pioneered the concept of a living museum. By displaying duplicates or replaceable items, it was also an early example of the now commonplace practice of museums allowing visitors to touch objects.

 

The museum's guiding principle is to preserve an example of everyday life in urban and rural North East England at the climax of industrialisation in the early 20th century. Much of the restoration and interpretation is specific to the late Victorian and Edwardian eras, together with portions of countryside under the influence of Industrial Revolution from 1825. On its 350 acres (140 ha) estate it uses a mixture of translocated, original and replica buildings, a large collection of artefacts, working vehicles and equipment, as well as livestock and costumed interpreters.

 

The museum has received a number of awards since it opened to visitors in 1972 and has influenced other living museums.[citation needed] It is an educational resource, and also helps to preserve some traditional and rare north-country livestock breeds.

 

In 1958, days after starting as director of the Bowes Museum, inspired by Scandinavian folk museums, and realising the North East's traditional industries and communities were disappearing, Frank Atkinson presented a report to Durham County Council urging that a collection of items of everyday history on a large scale should begin as soon as possible, so that eventually an open air museum could be established. As well as objects, Atkinson was also aiming to preserve the region's customs and dialect. He stated the new museum should "attempt to make the history of the region live" and illustrate the way of life of ordinary people. He hoped the museum would be run by, be about and exist for the local populace, desiring them to see the museum as theirs, featuring items collected from them.

 

Fearing it was now almost too late, Atkinson adopted a policy of "unselective collecting" — "you offer it to us and we will collect it." Donations ranged in size from small items to locomotives and shops, and Atkinson initially took advantage of a surplus of space available in the 19th-century French chateau-style building housing the Bowes Museum to store items donated for the open air museum. With this space soon filled, a former British Army tank depot at Brancepeth was taken over, although in just a short time its entire complement of 22 huts and hangars had been filled, too.

 

In 1966, a working party was established to set up a museum "for the purpose of studying, collecting, preserving and exhibiting buildings, machinery, objects and information illustrating the development of industry and the way of life of the north of England", and it selected Beamish Hall, having been vacated by the National Coal Board, as a suitable location.

 

In August 1970, with Atkinson appointed as its first full-time director together with three staff members, the museum was first established by moving some of the collections into the hall. In 1971, an introductory exhibition, "Museum in the Making" opened at the hall.

 

The museum was opened to visitors on its current site for the first time in 1972, with the first translocated buildings (the railway station and colliery winding engine) being erected the following year. The first trams began operating on a short demonstration line in 1973. The Town station was formally opened in 1976, the same year the reconstruction of the colliery winding engine house was completed, and the miners' cottages were relocated. Opening of the drift mine as an exhibit followed in 1979.

 

In 1975 the museum was visited by the Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, and by Anne, Princess Royal, in 2002. In 2006, as the Grand Master of the United Grand Lodge of England, The Duke of Kent visited, to open the town masonic lodge.

 

With the Co-op having opened in 1984, the town area was officially opened in 1985. The pub had opened in the same year, with Ravensworth Terrace having been reconstructed from 1980 to 1985. The newspaper branch office had also been built in the mid-1980s. Elsewhere, the farm on the west side of the site (which became Home Farm) opened in 1983. The present arrangement of visitors entering from the south was introduced in 1986.

 

At the beginning of the 1990s, further developments in the Pit Village were opened, the chapel in 1990, and the board school in 1992. The whole tram circle was in operation by 1993. Further additions to the Town came in 1994 with the opening of the sweet shop and motor garage,Beamish Museum 2014 followed by the bank in 1999. The first Georgian component of the museum arrived when Pockerley Old Hall opened in 1995, followed by the Pockerley Waggonway in 2001.

 

In the early 2000s two large modern buildings were added, to augment the museum's operations and storage capacity - the Regional Resource Centre on the west side opened in 2001, followed by the Regional Museums Store next to the railway station in 2002. Due to its proximity, the latter has been cosmetically presented as Beamish Waggon and Iron Works. Additions to display areas came in the form of the Masonic lodge (2006) and the Lamp Cabin in the Colliery (2009). In 2010, the entrance building and tea rooms were refurbished.

 

Into the 2010s, further buildings were added - the fish and chip shop (opened 2011) band hall (opened 2013) and pit pony stables (built 2013/14) in the Pit Village, plus a bakery (opened 2013) and chemist and photographers (opened 2016) being added to the town. St Helen's Church, in the Georgian landscape, opened in November 2015.

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Vandaag, net na de hagelbui, kijken naar Marken vanuit Hemmeland - Monnickendam -

 

Geschiedenis

 

De geschreven geschiedenis van Marken begint in de 13e eeuw. Marken lag in het uiterste Oosten van Waterland, een veengebied waar het land overging in het water van het Flevomeer. Aan die overgang van veen naar water ontleent het eiland waarschijnlijk zijn naam: Marken, of vroeger Markaland, is zeer waarschijnlijk een afgeleide van het woord ‘mark’, in de betekenis van grens. Markaland, betekent namelijk 'grensland'.

 

Maar er is ook nog een andere verklaring voor de naam; Toen Marken nog aan het land van Noord-Holland vastzat heette het Markerhoofd, ook wel Merkenhovede. En in het Marker dialect wordt Marken als ‘Merken’ uitgesproken, wat de link naar Merkenhovede ook zou kunnen verklaren.

Vroege geschiedenis

 

Ver voor onze jaartelling (ca 3000 - 500 v C.) bestond de plek waar het IJsselmeer nu is uit moeras en veengronden. Het meer ontstond als gevolg van een serie overstromingen, maar ook door het afgraven van veengronden door de Friezen in West-Friesland, waarbij steeds meer land verdween dat het oorspronkelijke binnenmeer van de Noordzee en de latere Waddenzee gescheiden had gehouden. Rond het begin van onze jaartelling ontstond een rechtstreekse verbinding en werd het binnenmeer een binnenzee. Deze stond niet in open verbinding met de zee en bevatte dus nog zoet water.

 

De Romeinen ( ca 57 v.C.-400 n.C.) die destijds ons land beheersten, noemden deze binnenzee Mare Flevo of Lacus Flevo. In deze periode ontstond een groot veen- en merengebied, zo groot als het huidige Noord Holland. Ook Waterland was een onderdeel van dit gebied. Na het vertrek van de Romeinen in de 5e eeuw werd de binnenzee "Het Aelmere" genoemd. N.B.: De naam kan verwijzen naar "paling/aal", maar het kan ook een verschrijving zijn, daar de naam later geschreven werd als Almaere, wat groot meer betekent. Pas vanaf begin 1500 gebruikte men de naam Zuiderzee.

 

De ontginning

 

Tijdens een iets drogere periode rond 900 na Christus kwamen de lager gelegen veengebieden in Noord-Holland voor ontginning en bewoning in aanmerking.

 

Vermoedelijk begon men de veenontginningen aan de oostkant vanaf de oevers van het Almaere via de daarop afwaterende veenriviertjes, zoals Ilp, Waterlandse Die, Leed, Purmer Ee, Middel Ee en Ooster Ee. Terwijl aan de westkant werd begonnen vanaf de al bewoonde kuststrook via Zaan, Wormer, Beemster en andere riviertjes.

 

In de 11e eeuw is ook de eigenlijke ontginning van Waterland (en Marken) begonnen. Omstreeks het jaar 1000 na Chr. was van het eiland Marken vooralsnog geen sprake. Langs veenstroompjes en op de hoogste veenbulten, begon men dorpen te stichten, waarbij het water meestal werd uitgediept. Het veengebied strekte zich aan de oostkant uit tot ver in het huidige IJsselmeer. Met de gewonnen grond werden dan de oevers opgehoogd en werden huizen gebouwd.

 

De nog altijd onregelmatige verkaveling op Marken, die we ook zien op historische kaarten, wijst op een 'vrije' ontginning van boeren die zelf het land uitkozen zodat dit als bouwland kon dienen. In de vroege middeleeuwen liep er een hoofdrivier 'De Waterlandse Die', van Amsterdam naar Monnickendam. Deze waterloop heeft als ontginningsbasis gediend voor Marken. Het gebied tussen Monnikendam en de Uitdammer Die werd ontgonnen.

 

Al snel steeg de zeespiegel. Door het stijgen van de zeespiegel en hevige stormen vonden er grote overstromingen plaats. Het gevolg hiervan was een afzetting van klei op de veengronden. Bij latere overstromingen sloeg het veen op veel plaatsen weg, maar waar het met een kleilaag bedekt was bleef het veen liggen.

 

Bij de drooglegging van de Zuiderzee is gebleken dat deze oorspronkelijke vorming in een relatief korte tijd is gebeurd: men denkt tussen 1200 en 1250. Het feit dat enkele eilanden bleven bestaan was te danken aan de beschermende kleilaag die zich al op deze eilanden had afgezet.

 

Door stormen en overstromingen ging veel land verloren. Maar er ging ook veel land verloren doordat mensen zelf veen uit de grond haalden. Steeds meer land kwam lager te liggen, doordat het veen werd opgegraven. De zee nam dorpen als Ruthne, Marcnesse, Nagele, Emelwerth en Bidningahem (Deze namen zijn nu terug te vinden in plaatsen van de provincie Flevoland, evenals Almere, vernoemd naar het Almaere).

 

Geleidelijk aan kwam de binnenzee in open verbinding met de Noordzee te staan. Door veel overstromingen kreeg de binnenzee, in deze tijd "Almaere" genoemd, in de loop van de tijd een verbinding met de Noordzee. De Zuiderzee was geboren. Door deze open verbinding kreeg ook het getij, eb en vloed, vrij spel en werd het zoete water brak en later zout.

Overstromingen

 

Van 16 op 17 februari 1164, op de naamdag van de heilige Juliana, trof de Sint-Julianavloed (ook Jurriaansvloed genoemd) Groningen, Friesland en Noord-Duitsland. Hierbij werd grote schade aangericht. Het is de eerste schriftelijk overgeleverde stormvloed in het Noordzeekustgebied. Als zwaarste werd het kustgebied van het huidige in Nedersaksen liggende Oost-Friesland en de Landkreis Friesland getroffen. Ook de tegenwoordig in Nederland gelegen gebieden Groningen, Friesland en het toekomstige Zuiderzeegebied werden zwaar getroffen. Ook Markaland (of Markerhoofd of Merkenhovede) werd van Waterland gescheiden door de Sint-Julianavloed. Marken werd een eiland.

 

Op 1 en 2 November 1170 werden vervolgens grote stukken land weggeslagen bij een andere grote storm: de Allerheiligenvloed. De Allerheiligenvloed was een grote overstroming die ontstond toen de Noordzee tussen het huidige Huisduinen en Texel door de duinenrij brak. De beek Marsdiep kreeg een verbinding met de Noordzee en werd een zeegat. Wind en water herschiepen het veengebied ten noorden van het IJ geleidelijk in een aantal (schier)eilanden. Het Creiler Woud (of Kreilse Bos, liep ongeveer van Texel tot Enkhuizen, bekend van de jachtpartij die Floris II van Holland er in 1119 organiseerde ) werd verzwolgen door de zee. Texel en Wieringen werden eilanden.

 

De overstroming markeerde een begin van het vergroten van het Almaere en het openen naar de Noordzee, zodat de Zuiderzee en de Waddenzee uiteindelijk konden ontstaan. Dat Marken niet ten prooi viel aan de oprukkende Zuiderzee, dankt het aan de monniken van het Friese klooster Mariëngaarde uit Hallum (Friesland, gemeente Ferwerderadiel).

Monniken

 

Begin 13e eeuw heette het huidige Friesland, Oost- Friesland en een groot deel van het huidige Noord-Hollands heette West-Friesland. In het jaar 1232 kregen de norbertijner monniken te Hallum, gelegen aan de andere kant van de Zuiderzee in Oost-Friesland, Marken als gift van een groep gelovigen. Zij stichtten daar een heiligdom, het Mariahof, waar nu de Kerkbuurt ligt. Op de plaats van de huidige begraafplaats naast de Grote Kerk lag het klooster Mariëngaarde.

 

De geschreven geschiedenis van Marken begint bij de monniken van het klooster Mariëngaarde bij Hallum, in Friesland. Abt Ethelgerus (1241 – 1259) bracht met enige volgelingen gedurende een winter een bezoek aan het eiland "Markaland" en werd daar opgehouden door het invallen van de vorst. Volgens een oude Friese kroniek van ca. 1270 kwam Marken tijdens het abt van Sirbrandus (1232 – 1238) in kloosterlijk bezit. Een ander kroniek noemt in dit verband het jaar 1232. (J.A.J. Vervloet, Marken, een terpenzwerm uit de late middeleeuwen). Er woonden waarschijnlijk slechts enkele monniken op Marken, maar wat zeker is dat het klooster centraal stond. Het kleine aantal bewoners van Marken werkten samen met de monniken op het land.

 

Het kloosterbezit bestond onder meer uit twee boerderijen: een ‘westhuse’ en een ’oesthuse’. De Monnikenwerf (nu: Kerkbuurt) is de vroegst bekende werf op Marken en is vermoedelijk ontstaan op de plek waar vroeger het westhuis heeft gelegen, een van de twee kloosterboerderijen op het eiland. Het oosthuis moet waarschijnlijk gezocht worden ter hoogte van de locatie waar eeuwen geleden de Kloosterwerf lag.

 

Het was geen kostbaar eigendom, maar een drassig stukje land dat er lag 'voor eb en vloed'. Het eiland, daarvoor ontstaan als gevolg van afslag van veengrond, waardoor de verbinding met het vasteland was verbroken lag destijds in de Zuiderzee. De Friese monniken vestigden een nederzetting op Marken, gingen ijverig aan het werk en legden een dijk aan rondom het eiland en zorgden voor een afwateringssysteem. (* Mogelijk zijn ze ook initiatiefnemers geweest voor de afdamming van de waterloop ter plaatse van de latere Fluwelen Burgwal in Monnickendam, met de Middendam. Dit is de ’Monniken dam’ waaraan het stadje zijn naam heeft ontleend. Niet duidelijk is of de Norbertijner monniken betrokken zijn geweest bij het opwerpen van de vroegste werven, of dat men pas na hun vetrek hiertoe is overgegaan. )

 

Wellicht zijn in dezelfde tijd ook de dorpsgebieden van andere Noord Hollandse gemeenten omdijkt en dammen in de mondingen van de veenrivieren gelegd. Zo werden in de 13de eeuw dammen gelegd bij Monnickendam, Uitdam, Durgerdam en mogelijk Nieuwendam, Edam, Schardam en Hoorn. In de dammen werden ebsluisjes geplaatst om bij eb het overtollige water uit het binnenland te kunnen afvoeren.

 

Het land bleef eigenlijk toch te nat voor goede akkerbouw dus gingen de monniken zich vooral bezig houden met veeteelt. Ze hielden varkens, koeien en paarden. Ze bezaten ook een opslagplaats op het vasteland, in Monnickendam, waardoor handelen beter mogelijk was.

 

Het eiland kwam in die tijd tot ongekende bloei. De producten werden veelal afgevoerd naar Monnickendam, waar de kloosterlingen ook bezittingen hadden. Zij dreven handel met Amstelland, Gooiland, Waterland en Westfriesland.

 

Niet het hele eiland was nog eigendom van de Monniken, in 1250 verkoopt Nicolaas van Persijn, (1150-1250; ridder, kleinzoon van Dirk, zoon van Jan Persijn, Jan; ridder en heer van Waterland, in 1227 overleden. Nicolaas huwde eene dochter uit den huize van Haarlem en overleed in 1250), Ridder en Heer van Waterland en Marken, de andere helft van het eiland, als uithof, aan abt Sybrandus voor 100 Hollandse ponden.

Werven

 

In de 14e eeuw waren er regelmatig dijkdoorbraken, waardoor het brakke water weer vrij spel kreeg. De bewoners van Marken probeerden zich er beter tegen te beschermen door meer terpen op te werpen. Deze werden werven genoemd. Van oorsprong bestond Marken uit de buurten Monnikenwerf en Kloosterwerf. Die laatste werd verzwolgen door het water. Monnikenwerf is later onderdeel geworden van de huidige Kerkbuurt.

 

Op het hoogtepunt van de terpen waren er 27 werven op het eiland te vinden. In de loop van de eeuwen zijn twaalf daarvan door het water verzwolgen. Anno 2012 zijn van de vijftien overgebleven werven er twaalf bewoond en één is begraafplaats. De inwoners van Marken gingen zich steeds meer toeleggen op de visserij, die in de 17e en 18e eeuw steeds meer het belangrijkste middel van bestaan werd. Daardoor was er een sterke groei van de bevolking.

Visserij

 

Eind 15e eeuw telde Marken zo'n 250 inwoners. In 1620 was dat aantal al gegroeid naar 750. De werven bleken niet voldoende ruimte te bieden. In plaats van nieuwe op te werpen werden er huizen op palen gebouwd. Een echte haven voor de visserij was er nog lang niet; het duurde tot de 19e eeuw voordat er zo'n haven kwam. In 1837 werd deze haven van het eiland aangelegd en in 1870 nog uitgebreid. De aanleg van de Afsluitdijk in 1932 betekende het einde van de visserij als bron van inkomsten. De meeste huizen op palen werden daarna aangepast, de benedenverdiepingen werden dichtgemaakt en werden zo als extra woonruimte in gebruik genomen.

 

In 1878-1879 verblijft de kunstenaar Xavier Mellery op het eiland Marken om er de plaatselijke tradities te bestuderen. Uit die periode komt een reeks fraaie portretten.

Goudriaankanaal

 

Begin 19e eeuw was Marken een onderdeel van het plan van Koning Willem I om een kanaal aan te leggen ter verbetering van de scheepvaartverbinding met Amsterdam, het Goudriaankanaal. Het kanaal zou Marken doorsnijden van het zuidwesten naar het noordoosten. De aanleg startte officieel in 1825. Bij Marken was al vroeg begonnen met de aanleg. Het project werd echter in 1828 stopgezet wegens geldgebrek en het kanaal werd nooit voltooid. Uiteindelijk zou het Noordhollandsch Kanaal (voorlopig) gaan dienen als verbeterde verbinding tussen Amsterdam en de Noordzee.

 

Het kanaal groeide dicht en werd gedempt. De grote parkeerplaats en de voormalige vuilstort liggen tegenwoordig op het tracé van het kanaal. Er resteren nog wel enkele zijsloten, waaronder de brede sloot nabij Moeniswerf.

Zuiderzeewerken

 

Bij de watersnoodramp van 1916 kwamen op het eiland 16 mensen om het leven en werden tal van mensen dakloos. Deze ramp gaf de stoot tot de aanleg van de Afsluitdijk en de Zuiderzeewerken. Een onderdeel daarvan was de Markerwaard, waarvan als eerste onderdeel de dijk tussen Marken en het vasteland werd aangelegd.

 

Op 17 oktober 1957 werd om 13:11 uur de dijk tussen het vasteland en Marken ontsloten. Sindsdien is Marken geen eiland meer. Oorspronkelijk was het plan dat Marken onderdeel werd van de Markerwaard. Deze nieuwe polder was onderdeel van het plan van Cornelis Lely om wat nu nog Markermeer is in te polderen. Maar na de aanleg van de Flevopolder werd uiteindelijk afgezien van de aanleg van de Markerwaardpolder. Daarmee is Marken nu een schiereiland, waarbij het eilandgevoel nog duidelijk merkbaar is.

Rock formations

 

Manarola (Manaea in the local dialect) is a small town, a frazione of the comune (municipality) of Riomaggiore, in the province of La Spezia, Liguria, northern Italy. It is the second smallest of the famous Cinque Terre towns frequented by tourists.

 

Manarola may be the oldest of the towns in the Cinque Terre, with the cornerstone of the church, San Lorenzo, dating from 1338. The local dialect is Manarolese, which is marginally different from the dialects in the nearby area. The name "Manarola" is probably dialectical evolution of the Latin, "magna rota". In the Manarolese dialect this was changed to "magna roea" which means "large wheel", in reference to the mill wheel in the town.

 

Manarola's primary industries have traditionally been fishing and wine-making. The local wine, called Sciacchetrà, is especially renowned; references from Roman writings mention the high quality of the wine produced in the region. In recent years, Manarola and its neighboring towns have become popular tourist destinations, particularly in the summer months. Tourist attractions in the region include a famous walking trail between Manarola and Riomaggiore (called Via dell'Amore, "Love's Trail") and hiking trails in the hills and vineyards above the town. Manarola is one of the five villages. Mostly all of the houses are bright and colourful.

 

Manarola was celebrated in paintings by the artists Llewelyn Lloyd (1879-1949) ("I ponti di Manarola" [:The Bridges of Manarola, 1904] and "Tramonto a Manarola" [:Sunset at Manarola, 1904] and Antonio Discovolo (1874–1956).

 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

Bali is an island and province of Indonesia. The province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Ceningan. It is located at the westernmost end of the Lesser Sunda Islands, between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. Its capital of Denpasar is located at the southern part of the island.

 

With a population of 3,890,757 in the 2010 census, and 4,225,000 as of January 2014, the island is home to most of Indonesia's Hindu minority. According to the 2010 Census, 83.5% of Bali's population adhered to Balinese Hinduism, followed by 13.4% Muslim, Christianity at 2.5%, and Buddhism 0.5%.

 

Bali is a popular tourist destination, which has seen a significant rise in numbers since the 1980s. It is renowned for its highly developed arts, including traditional and modern dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking, and music. The Indonesian International Film Festival is held every year in Bali.

 

Bali is part of the Coral Triangle, the area with the highest biodiversity of marine species. In this area alone over 500 reef building coral species can be found. For comparison, this is about 7 times as many as in the entire Caribbean. There is a wide range of dive sites with high quality reefs, all with their own specific attractions. Many sites can have strong currents and swell, so diving without a knowledgeable guide is inadvisable. Most recently, Bali was the host of the 2011 ASEAN Summit, 2013 APEC and Miss World 2013.

 

HISTORY

ANCIENT

Bali was inhabited around 2000 BC by Austronesian people who migrated originally from Southeast Asia and Oceania through Maritime Southeast Asia. Culturally and linguistically, the Balinese are closely related to the people of the Indonesian archipelago, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Oceania. Stone tools dating from this time have been found near the village of Cekik in the island's west.

 

In ancient Bali, nine Hindu sects existed, namely Pasupata, Bhairawa, Siwa Shidanta, Waisnawa, Bodha, Brahma, Resi, Sora and Ganapatya. Each sect revered a specific deity as its personal Godhead.

 

Inscriptions from 896 and 911 don't mention a king, until 914, when Sri Kesarivarma is mentioned. They also reveal an independent Bali, with a distinct dialect, where Buddhism and Sivaism were practiced simultaneously. Mpu Sindok's great granddaughter, Mahendradatta (Gunapriyadharmapatni), married the Bali king Udayana Warmadewa (Dharmodayanavarmadeva) around 989, giving birth to Airlangga around 1001. This marriage also brought more Hinduism and Javanese culture to Bali. Princess Sakalendukirana appeared in 1098. Suradhipa reigned from 1115 to 1119, and Jayasakti from 1146 until 1150. Jayapangus appears on inscriptions between 1178 and 1181, while Adikuntiketana and his son Paramesvara in 1204.

 

Balinese culture was strongly influenced by Indian, Chinese, and particularly Hindu culture, beginning around the 1st century AD. The name Bali dwipa ("Bali island") has been discovered from various inscriptions, including the Blanjong pillar inscription written by Sri Kesari Warmadewa in 914 AD and mentioning "Walidwipa". It was during this time that the people developed their complex irrigation system subak to grow rice in wet-field cultivation. Some religious and cultural traditions still practised today can be traced to this period.

 

The Hindu Majapahit Empire (1293–1520 AD) on eastern Java founded a Balinese colony in 1343. The uncle of Hayam Wuruk is mentioned in the charters of 1384-86. A mass Javanese emigration occurred in the next century.

 

PORTUGUESE CONTACTS

The first known European contact with Bali is thought to have been made in 1512, when a Portuguese expedition led by Antonio Abreu and Francisco Serrão sighted its northern shores. It was the first expedition of a series of bi-annual fleets to the Moluccas, that throughout the 16th century usually traveled along the coasts of the Sunda Islands. Bali was also mapped in 1512, in the chart of Francisco Rodrigues, aboard the expedition. In 1585, a ship foundered off the Bukit Peninsula and left a few Portuguese in the service of Dewa Agung.

 

DUTCH EAST INDIA

In 1597 the Dutch explorer Cornelis de Houtman arrived at Bali, and the Dutch East India Company was established in 1602. The Dutch government expanded its control across the Indonesian archipelago during the second half of the 19th century (see Dutch East Indies). Dutch political and economic control over Bali began in the 1840s on the island's north coast, when the Dutch pitted various competing Balinese realms against each other. In the late 1890s, struggles between Balinese kingdoms in the island's south were exploited by the Dutch to increase their control.

 

In June 1860 the famous Welsh naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, travelled to Bali from Singapore, landing at Buleleng on the northcoast of the island. Wallace's trip to Bali was instrumental in helping him devise his Wallace Line theory. The Wallace Line is a faunal boundary that runs through the strait between Bali and Lombok. It has been found to be a boundary between species of Asiatic origin in the east and a mixture of Australian and Asian species to the west. In his travel memoir The Malay Archipelago, Wallace wrote of his experience in Bali:

 

I was both astonished and delighted; for as my visit to Java was some years later, I had never beheld so beautiful and well-cultivated a district out of Europe. A slightly undulating plain extends from the seacoast about ten or twelve miles inland, where it is bounded by a fine range of wooded and cultivated hills. Houses and villages, marked out by dense clumps of coconut palms, tamarind and other fruit trees, are dotted about in every direction; while between them extend luxurious rice-grounds, watered by an elaborate system of irrigation that would be the pride of the best cultivated parts of Europe.

 

The Dutch mounted large naval and ground assaults at the Sanur region in 1906 and were met by the thousands of members of the royal family and their followers who fought against the superior Dutch force in a suicidal puputan defensive assault rather than face the humiliation of surrender. Despite Dutch demands for surrender, an estimated 200 Balinese marched to their death against the invaders. In the Dutch intervention in Bali, a similar massacre occurred in the face of a Dutch assault in Klungkung.

 

AFTERWARD THE DUTCH GOVERNORS

exercised administrative control over the island, but local control over religion and culture generally remained intact. Dutch rule over Bali came later and was never as well established as in other parts of Indonesia such as Java and Maluku.

 

n the 1930s, anthropologists Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson, artists Miguel Covarrubias and Walter Spies, and musicologist Colin McPhee all spent time here. Their accounts of the island and its peoples created a western image of Bali as "an enchanted land of aesthetes at peace with themselves and nature." Western tourists began to visit the island.

 

Imperial Japan occupied Bali during World War II. It was not originally a target in their Netherlands East Indies Campaign, but as the airfields on Borneo were inoperative due to heavy rains, the Imperial Japanese Army decided to occupy Bali, which did not suffer from comparable weather. The island had no regular Royal Netherlands East Indies Army (KNIL) troops. There was only a Native Auxiliary Corps Prajoda (Korps Prajoda) consisting of about 600 native soldiers and several Dutch KNIL officers under command of KNIL Lieutenant Colonel W.P. Roodenburg. On 19 February 1942 the Japanese forces landed near the town of Senoer [Senur]. The island was quickly captured.

 

During the Japanese occupation, a Balinese military officer, Gusti Ngurah Rai, formed a Balinese 'freedom army'. The harshness of war requisitions made Japanese rule more resented than Dutch rule. Following Japan's Pacific surrender in August 1945, the Dutch returned to Indonesia, including Bali, to reinstate their pre-war colonial administration. This was resisted by the Balinese rebels, who now used recovered Japanese weapons. On 20 November 1946, the Battle of Marga was fought in Tabanan in central Bali. Colonel I Gusti Ngurah Rai, by then 29 years old, finally rallied his forces in east Bali at Marga Rana, where they made a suicide attack on the heavily armed Dutch. The Balinese battalion was entirely wiped out, breaking the last thread of Balinese military resistance.

 

INDIPENDENCE FROM THE DUTCH

In 1946, the Dutch constituted Bali as one of the 13 administrative districts of the newly proclaimed State of East Indonesia, a rival state to the Republic of Indonesia, which was proclaimed and headed by Sukarno and Hatta. Bali was included in the "Republic of the United States of Indonesia" when the Netherlands recognised Indonesian independence on 29 December 1949.

 

CONTEMPORARY

The 1963 eruption of Mount Agung killed thousands, created economic havoc and forced many displaced Balinese to be transmigrated to other parts of Indonesia. Mirroring the widening of social divisions across Indonesia in the 1950s and early 1960s, Bali saw conflict between supporters of the traditional caste system, and those rejecting this system. Politically, the opposition was represented by supporters of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI) and the Indonesian Nationalist Party (PNI), with tensions and ill-feeling further increased by the PKI's land reform programs. An attempted coup in Jakarta was put down by forces led by General Suharto.

 

The army became the dominant power as it instigated a violent anti-communist purge, in which the army blamed the PKI for the coup. Most estimates suggest that at least 500,000 people were killed across Indonesia, with an estimated 80,000 killed in Bali, equivalent to 5% of the island's population. With no Islamic forces involved as in Java and Sumatra, upper-caste PNI landlords led the extermination of PKI members.

 

As a result of the 1965/66 upheavals, Suharto was able to manoeuvre Sukarno out of the presidency. His "New Order" government reestablished relations with western countries. The pre-War Bali as "paradise" was revived in a modern form. The resulting large growth in tourism has led to a dramatic increase in Balinese standards of living and significant foreign exchange earned for the country. A bombing in 2002 by militant Islamists in the tourist area of Kuta killed 202 people, mostly foreigners. This attack, and another in 2005, severely reduced tourism, producing much economic hardship to the island.

 

GEOGRAPHY

The island of Bali lies 3.2 km east of Java, and is approximately 8 degrees south of the equator. Bali and Java are separated by the Bali Strait. East to west, the island is approximately 153 km wide and spans approximately 112 km north to south; administratively it covers 5,780 km2, or 5,577 km2 without Nusa Penida District, its population density is roughly 750 people/km2.

 

Bali's central mountains include several peaks over 3,000 metres in elevation. The highest is Mount Agung (3,031 m), known as the "mother mountain" which is an active volcano rated as one of the world's most likely sites for a massive eruption within the next 100 years. Mountains range from centre to the eastern side, with Mount Agung the easternmost peak. Bali's volcanic nature has contributed to its exceptional fertility and its tall mountain ranges provide the high rainfall that supports the highly productive agriculture sector. South of the mountains is a broad, steadily descending area where most of Bali's large rice crop is grown. The northern side of the mountains slopes more steeply to the sea and is the main coffee producing area of the island, along with rice, vegetables and cattle. The longest river, Ayung River, flows approximately 75 km.

 

The island is surrounded by coral reefs. Beaches in the south tend to have white sand while those in the north and west have black sand. Bali has no major waterways, although the Ho River is navigable by small sampan boats. Black sand beaches between Pasut and Klatingdukuh are being developed for tourism, but apart from the seaside temple of Tanah Lot, they are not yet used for significant tourism.

 

The largest city is the provincial capital, Denpasar, near the southern coast. Its population is around 491,500 (2002). Bali's second-largest city is the old colonial capital, Singaraja, which is located on the north coast and is home to around 100,000 people. Other important cities include the beach resort, Kuta, which is practically part of Denpasar's urban area, and Ubud, situated at the north of Denpasar, is the island's cultural centre.

 

Three small islands lie to the immediate south east and all are administratively part of the Klungkung regency of Bali: Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan. These islands are separated from Bali by the Badung Strait.

 

To the east, the Lombok Strait separates Bali from Lombok and marks the biogeographical division between the fauna of the Indomalayan ecozone and the distinctly different fauna of Australasia. The transition is known as the Wallace Line, named after Alfred Russel Wallace, who first proposed a transition zone between these two major biomes. When sea levels dropped during the Pleistocene ice age, Bali was connected to Java and Sumatra and to the mainland of Asia and shared the Asian fauna, but the deep water of the Lombok Strait continued to keep Lombok Island and the Lesser Sunda archipelago isolated.

 

CLIMATE

Being just 8 degrees south of the equator, Bali has a fairly even climate year round.

 

Day time temperatures at low elevations vary between 20-33⁰ C although it can be much cooler than that in the mountains. The west monsoon is in place from approximately October to April and this can bring significant rain, particularly from December to March. Outside of the monsoon period, humidity is relatively low and any rain unlikely in lowland areas.

 

ECOLOGY

Bali lies just to the west of the Wallace Line, and thus has a fauna that is Asian in character, with very little Australasian influence, and has more in common with Java than with Lombok. An exception is the yellow-crested cockatoo, a member of a primarily Australasian family. There are around 280 species of birds, including the critically endangered Bali myna, which is endemic. Others Include barn swallow, black-naped oriole, black racket-tailed treepie, crested serpent-eagle, crested treeswift, dollarbird, Java sparrow, lesser adjutant, long-tailed shrike, milky stork, Pacific swallow, red-rumped swallow, sacred kingfisher, sea eagle, woodswallow, savanna nightjar, stork-billed kingfisher, yellow-vented bulbul and great egret.

 

Until the early 20th century, Bali was home to several large mammals: the wild banteng, leopard and the endemic Bali tiger. The banteng still occurs in its domestic form, whereas leopards are found only in neighbouring Java, and the Bali tiger is extinct. The last definite record of a tiger on Bali dates from 1937, when one was shot, though the subspecies may have survived until the 1940s or 1950s. The relatively small size of the island, conflict with humans, poaching and habitat reduction drove the Bali tiger to extinction. This was the smallest and rarest of all tiger subspecies and was never caught on film or displayed in zoos, whereas few skins or bones remain in museums around the world. Today, the largest mammals are the Javan rusa deer and the wild boar. A second, smaller species of deer, the Indian muntjac, also occurs. Saltwater crocodiles were once present on the island, but became locally extinct sometime during the last century.

 

Squirrels are quite commonly encountered, less often is the Asian palm civet, which is also kept in coffee farms to produce Kopi Luwak. Bats are well represented, perhaps the most famous place to encounter them remaining the Goa Lawah (Temple of the Bats) where they are worshipped by the locals and also constitute a tourist attraction. They also occur in other cave temples, for instance at Gangga Beach. Two species of monkey occur. The crab-eating macaque, known locally as "kera", is quite common around human settlements and temples, where it becomes accustomed to being fed by humans, particularly in any of the three "monkey forest" temples, such as the popular one in the Ubud area. They are also quite often kept as pets by locals. The second monkey, endemic to Java and some surrounding islands such as Bali, is far rarer and more elusive is the Javan langur, locally known as "lutung". They occur in few places apart from the Bali Barat National Park. They are born an orange colour, though by their first year they would have already changed to a more blackish colouration. In Java however, there is more of a tendency for this species to retain its juvenile orange colour into adulthood, and so you can see a mixture of black and orange monkeys together as a family. Other rarer mammals include the leopard cat, Sunda pangolin and black giant squirrel.

 

Snakes include the king cobra and reticulated python. The water monitor can grow to at least 1.5 m in length and 50 kg and can move quickly.

 

The rich coral reefs around the coast, particularly around popular diving spots such as Tulamben, Amed, Menjangan or neighbouring Nusa Penida, host a wide range of marine life, for instance hawksbill turtle, giant sunfish, giant manta ray, giant moray eel, bumphead parrotfish, hammerhead shark, reef shark, barracuda, and sea snakes. Dolphins are commonly encountered on the north coast near Singaraja and Lovina.

 

A team of scientists conducted a survey from 29 April 2011 to 11 May 2011 at 33 sea sites around Bali. They discovered 952 species of reef fish of which 8 were new discoveries at Pemuteran, Gilimanuk, Nusa Dua, Tulamben and Candidasa, and 393 coral species, including two new ones at Padangbai and between Padangbai and Amed. The average coverage level of healthy coral was 36% (better than in Raja Ampat and Halmahera by 29% or in Fakfak and Kaimana by 25%) with the highest coverage found in Gili Selang and Gili Mimpang in Candidasa, Karangasem regency.

 

Many plants have been introduced by humans within the last centuries, particularly since the 20th century, making it sometimes hard to distinguish what plants are really native.[citation needed] Among the larger trees the most common are: banyan trees, jackfruit, coconuts, bamboo species, acacia trees and also endless rows of coconuts and banana species. Numerous flowers can be seen: hibiscus, frangipani, bougainvillea, poinsettia, oleander, jasmine, water lily, lotus, roses, begonias, orchids and hydrangeas exist. On higher grounds that receive more moisture, for instance around Kintamani, certain species of fern trees, mushrooms and even pine trees thrive well. Rice comes in many varieties. Other plants with agricultural value include: salak, mangosteen, corn, kintamani orange, coffee and water spinach.

 

ENVIRONMENT

Some of the worst erosion has occurred in Lebih Beach, where up to 7 metres of land is lost every year. Decades ago, this beach was used for holy pilgrimages with more than 10,000 people, but they have now moved to Masceti Beach.

 

From ranked third in previous review, in 2010 Bali got score 99.65 of Indonesia's environmental quality index and the highest of all the 33 provinces. The score measured 3 water quality parameters: the level of total suspended solids (TSS), dissolved oxygen (DO) and chemical oxygen demand (COD).

 

Because of over-exploitation by the tourist industry which covers a massive land area, 200 out of 400 rivers on the island have dried up and based on research, the southern part of Bali would face a water shortage up to 2,500 litres of clean water per second by 2015. To ease the shortage, the central government plans to build a water catchment and processing facility at Petanu River in Gianyar. The 300 litres capacity of water per second will be channelled to Denpasar, Badung and Gianyar in 2013.

 

ECONOMY

Three decades ago, the Balinese economy was largely agriculture-based in terms of both output and employment. Tourism is now the largest single industry in terms of income, and as a result, Bali is one of Indonesia's wealthiest regions. In 2003, around 80% of Bali's economy was tourism related. By end of June 2011, non-performing loan of all banks in Bali were 2.23%, lower than the average of Indonesian banking industry non-performing loan (about 5%). The economy, however, suffered significantly as a result of the terrorist bombings 2002 and 2005. The tourism industry has since recovered from these events.

 

AGRICULTURE

Although tourism produces the GDP's largest output, agriculture is still the island's biggest employer; most notably rice cultivation. Crops grown in smaller amounts include fruit, vegetables, Coffea arabica and other cash and subsistence crops. Fishing also provides a significant number of jobs. Bali is also famous for its artisans who produce a vast array of handicrafts, including batik and ikat cloth and clothing, wooden carvings, stone carvings, painted art and silverware. Notably, individual villages typically adopt a single product, such as wind chimes or wooden furniture.

 

The Arabica coffee production region is the highland region of Kintamani near Mount Batur. Generally, Balinese coffee is processed using the wet method. This results in a sweet, soft coffee with good consistency. Typical flavours include lemon and other citrus notes. Many coffee farmers in Kintamani are members of a traditional farming system called Subak Abian, which is based on the Hindu philosophy of "Tri Hita Karana". According to this philosophy, the three causes of happiness are good relations with God, other people and the environment. The Subak Abian system is ideally suited to the production of fair trade and organic coffee production. Arabica coffee from Kintamani is the first product in Indonesia to request a Geographical Indication.

 

TOURISM

The tourism industry is primarily focused in the south, while significant in the other parts of the island as well. The main tourist locations are the town of Kuta (with its beach), and its outer suburbs of Legian and Seminyak (which were once independent townships), the east coast town of Sanur (once the only tourist hub), in the center of the island Ubud, to the south of the Ngurah Rai International Airport, Jimbaran, and the newer development of Nusa Dua and Pecatu.

 

The American government lifted its travel warnings in 2008. The Australian government issued an advice on Friday, 4 May 2012. The overall level of the advice was lowered to 'Exercise a high degree of caution'. The Swedish government issued a new warning on Sunday, 10 June 2012 because of one more tourist who was killed by methanol poisoning. Australia last issued an advice on Monday, 5 January 2015 due to new terrorist threats.

 

An offshoot of tourism is the growing real estate industry. Bali real estate has been rapidly developing in the main tourist areas of Kuta, Legian, Seminyak and Oberoi. Most recently, high-end 5 star projects are under development on the Bukit peninsula, on the south side of the island. Million dollar villas are being developed along the cliff sides of south Bali, commanding panoramic ocean views. Foreign and domestic (many Jakarta individuals and companies are fairly active) investment into other areas of the island also continues to grow. Land prices, despite the worldwide economic crisis, have remained stable.

 

In the last half of 2008, Indonesia's currency had dropped approximately 30% against the US dollar, providing many overseas visitors value for their currencies. Visitor arrivals for 2009 were forecast to drop 8% (which would be higher than 2007 levels), due to the worldwide economic crisis which has also affected the global tourist industry, but not due to any travel warnings.

 

Bali's tourism economy survived the terrorist bombings of 2002 and 2005, and the tourism industry has in fact slowly recovered and surpassed its pre-terrorist bombing levels; the longterm trend has been a steady increase of visitor arrivals. In 2010, Bali received 2.57 million foreign tourists, which surpassed the target of 2.0–2.3 million tourists. The average occupancy of starred hotels achieved 65%, so the island is still able to accommodate tourists for some years without any addition of new rooms/hotels, although at the peak season some of them are fully booked.

 

Bali received the Best Island award from Travel and Leisure in 2010. The island of Bali won because of its attractive surroundings (both mountain and coastal areas), diverse tourist attractions, excellent international and local restaurants, and the friendliness of the local people. According to BBC Travel released in 2011, Bali is one of the World's Best Islands, ranking second after Santorini, Greece.

 

In August 2010, the film Eat Pray Love was released in theatres. The movie was based on Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling memoir Eat, Pray, Love. It took place at Ubud and Padang-Padang Beach at Bali. The 2006 book, which spent 57 weeks at the No. 1 spot on the New York Times paperback nonfiction best-seller list, had already fuelled a boom in Eat, Pray, Love-related tourism in Ubud, the hill town and cultural and tourist center that was the focus of Gilbert's quest for balance through traditional spirituality and healing that leads to love.

 

In January 2016, after music icon David Bowie died, it was revealed that in his will, Bowie asked for his ashes to be scattered in Bali, conforming to Buddhist rituals. He had visited and performed in a number of Southest Asian cities early in his career, including Bangkok and Singapore.

 

Since 2011, China has displaced Japan as the second-largest supplier of tourists to Bali, while Australia still tops the list. Chinese tourists increased by 17% from last year due to the impact of ACFTA and new direct flights to Bali. In January 2012, Chinese tourists year on year (yoy) increased by 222.18% compared to January 2011, while Japanese tourists declined by 23.54% yoy.

 

Bali reported that it has 2.88 million foreign tourists and 5 million domestic tourists in 2012, marginally surpassing the expectations of 2.8 million foreign tourists. Forecasts for 2013 are at 3.1 million.

 

Based on Bank Indonesia survey in May 2013, 34.39 percent of tourists are upper-middle class with spending between $1,286 to $5,592 and dominated by Australia, France, China, Germany and the US with some China tourists move from low spending before to higher spending currently. While 30.26 percent are middle class with spending between $662 to $1,285.

 

SEX TOURISM

In the twentieth century the incidence of tourism specifically for sex was regularly observed in the era of mass tourism in Indonesia In Bali, prostitution is conducted by both men and women. Bali in particular is notorious for its 'Kuta Cowboys', local gigolos targeting foreign female tourists.

 

Tens of thousands of single women throng the beaches of Bali in Indonesia every year. For decades, young Balinese men have taken advantage of the louche and laid-back atmosphere to find love and lucre from female tourists—Japanese, European and Australian for the most part—who by all accounts seem perfectly happy with the arrangement.

 

By 2013, Indonesia was reportedly the number one destination for Australian child sex tourists, mostly starting in Bali but also travelling to other parts of the country. The problem in Bali was highlighted by Luh Ketut Suryani, head of Psychiatry at Udayana University, as early as 2003. Surayani warned that a low level of awareness of paedophilia in Bali had made it the target of international paedophile organisations. On 19 February 2013, government officials announced measures to combat paedophilia in Bali.

 

TRANSPORTATION

The Ngurah Rai International Airport is located near Jimbaran, on the isthmus at the southernmost part of the island. Lt.Col. Wisnu Airfield is found in north-west Bali.

 

A coastal road circles the island, and three major two-lane arteries cross the central mountains at passes reaching to 1,750m in height (at Penelokan). The Ngurah Rai Bypass is a four-lane expressway that partly encircles Denpasar. Bali has no railway lines.

 

In December 2010 the Government of Indonesia invited investors to build a new Tanah Ampo Cruise Terminal at Karangasem, Bali with a projected worth of $30 million. On 17 July 2011 the first cruise ship (Sun Princess) anchored about 400 meters away from the wharf of Tanah Ampo harbour. The current pier is only 154 meters but will eventually be extended to 300–350 meters to accommodate international cruise ships. The harbour here is safer than the existing facility at Benoa and has a scenic backdrop of east Bali mountains and green rice fields. The tender for improvement was subject to delays, and as of July 2013 the situation remained unclear with cruise line operators complaining and even refusing to use the existing facility at Tanah Ampo.

 

A Memorandum of Understanding has been signed by two ministers, Bali's Governor and Indonesian Train Company to build 565 kilometres of railway along the coast around the island. As of July 2015, no details of this proposed railways have been released.

 

On 16 March 2011 (Tanjung) Benoa port received the "Best Port Welcome 2010" award from London's "Dream World Cruise Destination" magazine. Government plans to expand the role of Benoa port as export-import port to boost Bali's trade and industry sector. The Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has confirmed that 306 cruise liners are heading for Indonesia in 2013 – an increase of 43 percent compared to the previous year.

 

In May 2011, an integrated Areal Traffic Control System (ATCS) was implemented to reduce traffic jams at four crossing points: Ngurah Rai statue, Dewa Ruci Kuta crossing, Jimbaran crossing and Sanur crossing. ATCS is an integrated system connecting all traffic lights, CCTVs and other traffic signals with a monitoring office at the police headquarters. It has successfully been implemented in other ASEAN countries and will be implemented at other crossings in Bali.

 

On 21 December 2011 construction started on the Nusa Dua-Benoa-Ngurah Rai International Airport toll road which will also provide a special lane for motorcycles. This has been done by seven state-owned enterprises led by PT Jasa Marga with 60% of shares. PT Jasa Marga Bali Tol will construct the 9.91 kilometres toll road (totally 12.7 kilometres with access road). The construction is estimated to cost Rp.2.49 trillion ($273.9 million). The project goes through 2 kilometres of mangrove forest and through 2.3 kilometres of beach, both within 5.4 hectares area. The elevated toll road is built over the mangrove forest on 18,000 concrete pillars which occupied 2 hectares of mangroves forest. It compensated by new planting of 300,000 mangrove trees along the road. On 21 December 2011 the Dewa Ruci 450 meters underpass has also started on the busy Dewa Ruci junction near Bali Kuta Galeria with an estimated cost of Rp136 billion ($14.9 million) from the state budget. On 23 September 2013, the Bali Mandara Toll Road is opened and the Dewa Ruci Junction (Simpang Siur) underpass is opened before. Both are ease the heavy traffic congestion.

 

To solve chronic traffic problems, the province will also build a toll road connecting Serangan with Tohpati, a toll road connecting Kuta, Denpasar and Tohpati and a flyover connecting Kuta and Ngurah Rai Airport.

 

DEMOGRAPHICS

The population of Bali was 3,890,757 as of the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (for January 2014) is 4,225,384. There are an estimated 30,000 expatriates living in Bali.

 

ETHNIC ORIGINS

A DNA study in 2005 by Karafet et al. found that 12% of Balinese Y-chromosomes are of likely Indian origin, while 84% are of likely Austronesian origin, and 2% of likely Melanesian origin. The study does not correlate the DNA samples to the Balinese caste system.

 

CASTE SYSTEM

Bali has a caste system based on the Indian Hindu model, with four castes:

 

- Sudra (Shudra) – peasants constituting close to 93% of Bali's population.

- Wesia (Vaishyas) – the caste of merchants and administrative officials

- Ksatrias (Kshatriyas) – the kingly and warrior caste

- Brahmana (Bramhin) – holy men and priests

 

RELIGION

Unlike most of Muslim-majority Indonesia, about 83.5% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, formed as a combination of existing local beliefs and Hindu influences from mainland Southeast Asia and South Asia. Minority religions include Islam (13.3%), Christianity (1.7%), and Buddhism (0.5%). These figures do not include immigrants from other parts of Indonesia.

 

Balinese Hinduism is an amalgam in which gods and demigods are worshipped together with Buddhist heroes, the spirits of ancestors, indigenous agricultural deities and sacred places. Religion as it is practised in Bali is a composite belief system that embraces not only theology, philosophy, and mythology, but ancestor worship, animism and magic. It pervades nearly every aspect of traditional life. Caste is observed, though less strictly than in India. With an estimated 20,000 puras (temples) and shrines, Bali is known as the "Island of a Thousand Puras", or "Island of the Gods". This is refer to Mahabarata story that behind Bali became island of god or "pulau dewata" in Indonesian language.

 

Balinese Hinduism has roots in Indian Hinduism and Buddhism, and adopted the animistic traditions of the indigenous people. This influence strengthened the belief that the gods and goddesses are present in all things. Every element of nature, therefore, possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. Balinese Hinduism is deeply interwoven with art and ritual. Ritualizing states of self-control are a notable feature of religious expression among the people, who for this reason have become famous for their graceful and decorous behaviour.

 

Apart from the majority of Balinese Hindus, there also exist Chinese immigrants whose traditions have melded with that of the locals. As a result, these Sino-Balinese not only embrace their original religion, which is a mixture of Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism, but also find a way to harmonise it with the local traditions. Hence, it is not uncommon to find local Sino-Balinese during the local temple's odalan. Moreover, Balinese Hindu priests are invited to perform rites alongside a Chinese priest in the event of the death of a Sino-Balinese. Nevertheless, the Sino-Balinese claim to embrace Buddhism for administrative purposes, such as their Identity Cards.

 

LANGUAGE

Balinese and Indonesian are the most widely spoken languages in Bali, and the vast majority of Balinese people are bilingual or trilingual. The most common spoken language around the tourist areas is Indonesian, as many people in the tourist sector are not solely Balinese, but migrants from Java, Lombok, Sumatra, and other parts of Indonesia. There are several indigenous Balinese languages, but most Balinese can also use the most widely spoken option: modern common Balinese. The usage of different Balinese languages was traditionally determined by the Balinese caste system and by clan membership, but this tradition is diminishing. Kawi and Sanskrit are also commonly used by some Hindu priests in Bali, for Hinduism literature was mostly written in Sanskrit.

 

English and Chinese are the next most common languages (and the primary foreign languages) of many Balinese, owing to the requirements of the tourism industry, as well as the English-speaking community and huge Chinese-Indonesian population. Other foreign languages, such as Japanese, Korean, French, Russian or German are often used in multilingual signs for foreign tourists.

 

CULTURE

Bali is renowned for its diverse and sophisticated art forms, such as painting, sculpture, woodcarving, handcrafts, and performing arts. Balinese cuisine is also distinctive. Balinese percussion orchestra music, known as gamelan, is highly developed and varied. Balinese performing arts often portray stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana but with heavy Balinese influence. Famous Balinese dances include pendet, legong, baris, topeng, barong, gong keybar, and kecak (the monkey dance). Bali boasts one of the most diverse and innovative performing arts cultures in the world, with paid performances at thousands of temple festivals, private ceremonies, or public shows.

 

The Hindu New Year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence. On this day everyone stays at home and tourists are encouraged to remain in their hotels. On the day before New Year, large and colourful sculptures of ogoh-ogoh monsters are paraded and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits. Other festivals throughout the year are specified by the Balinese pawukon calendrical system.

 

Celebrations are held for many occasions such as a tooth-filing (coming-of-age ritual), cremation or odalan (temple festival). One of the most important concepts that Balinese ceremonies have in common is that of désa kala patra, which refers to how ritual performances must be appropriate in both the specific and general social context. Many of the ceremonial art forms such as wayang kulit and topeng are highly improvisatory, providing flexibility for the performer to adapt the performance to the current situation. Many celebrations call for a loud, boisterous atmosphere with lots of activity and the resulting aesthetic, ramé, is distinctively Balinese. Often two or more gamelan ensembles will be performing well within earshot, and sometimes compete with each other to be heard. Likewise, the audience members talk amongst themselves, get up and walk around, or even cheer on the performance, which adds to the many layers of activity and the liveliness typical of ramé.

 

Kaja and kelod are the Balinese equivalents of North and South, which refer to ones orientation between the island's largest mountain Gunung Agung (kaja), and the sea (kelod). In addition to spatial orientation, kaja and kelod have the connotation of good and evil; gods and ancestors are believed to live on the mountain whereas demons live in the sea. Buildings such as temples and residential homes are spatially oriented by having the most sacred spaces closest to the mountain and the unclean places nearest to the sea.

 

Most temples have an inner courtyard and an outer courtyard which are arranged with the inner courtyard furthest kaja. These spaces serve as performance venues since most Balinese rituals are accompanied by any combination of music, dance and drama. The performances that take place in the inner courtyard are classified as wali, the most sacred rituals which are offerings exclusively for the gods, while the outer courtyard is where bebali ceremonies are held, which are intended for gods and people. Lastly, performances meant solely for the entertainment of humans take place outside the walls of the temple and are called bali-balihan. This three-tiered system of classification was standardised in 1971 by a committee of Balinese officials and artists to better protect the sanctity of the oldest and most sacred Balinese rituals from being performed for a paying audience.

 

Tourism, Bali's chief industry, has provided the island with a foreign audience that is eager to pay for entertainment, thus creating new performance opportunities and more demand for performers. The impact of tourism is controversial since before it became integrated into the economy, the Balinese performing arts did not exist as a capitalist venture, and were not performed for entertainment outside of their respective ritual context. Since the 1930s sacred rituals such as the barong dance have been performed both in their original contexts, as well as exclusively for paying tourists. This has led to new versions of many of these performances which have developed according to the preferences of foreign audiences; some villages have a barong mask specifically for non-ritual performances as well as an older mask which is only used for sacred performances.

 

Balinese society continues to revolve around each family's ancestral village, to which the cycle of life and religion is closely tied. Coercive aspects of traditional society, such as customary law sanctions imposed by traditional authorities such as village councils (including "kasepekang", or shunning) have risen in importance as a consequence of the democratisation and decentralisation of Indonesia since 1998.

 

WIKIPEDIA

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Another shot taken yesterday downtown. I hope you like this postproduction, though it is a bit overdone ad Guido says...

 

The elephant o "u liotru" , in Sicilian dialect, is the symbol of Catania. The story

is very interesting. You can find the wikipedia version here in Italian

 

Here some notes in English about its story

 

The symbol of the Catania is "u Liotru", or the Fontana dell'Elefante, and was assembled in 1736 by Giovanni Battista Vaccarini. It is made of marble portraying an ancient lavic elephant and surmounted by an Egyptian obelisk from Syene. Tall tale has it that Vaccarini's original elephant was neuter, which the men of Catania took as an insult to their virility. To appease them, Vaccarini appended appropriately elephantine testicles to the original statue.

 

The Sicilian name "u Liotru" is the deformation of the name Heliodorus who was a sorcerer and necromancer from Catania. He was a nobleman who, after trying without success to become bishop of the city, became a sorcerer and was therefore condemned to the stake. Legend has it that Heliodorus himself was the sculptor of the lava elephant and that he used to magically rode it in his travels from Catania to Constantinople. Another legend has it that Heliodorus could be capable of transforming himself into an elephant.

 

A similar sculpture is in Piazza Santa Maria della Minerva in Rome.

 

Catania's coat of arms is a red elephant on a light-blue field with an "A" (Agatha's initial or the first letter of Aetna) set higher above its back. Below the shield there is a bright red ribbon whose central part shows four inwrought golden initials.The sequence S.P.Q.C. hides the Latin expression "Senatus Popolus Quae Catanensis", the "Senate of the People of Catania" .

  

The folk presence of an elephant in the millenary history of Catania is mainly connected to both zooarcheology and popular creeds.

 

In the Upper Paleolithic, in fact, the prehistoric fauna of Sicily enumerated a host of dwarf elephants.

 

The Catanian Museum of Mineralogy, Paleonthology and Vulcanology takes care of the integral unburied skeleton of an elephas falconeri in an excellent state of conservation. The primitive inhabiters of Etna and whilom forefathers of the latter-day Catanians, molded such lavic artifact to idolize the mythical proboscidian they had considered the sole responsible of the resolutive ejection of all the vexing animals from the volcanic territories.

 

This venerated black sculpture survived the centuries to outlast till today. It is doubtless the most ancient Catania's monument, followed by the Syenian obelisk positioned on its spine.

 

In the official heraldry its scarfskin became red to recollect the colour of the ardent lava. But the most-told occurrence that will be fundamental to radicate this kind of affection for the beloved Liotru is on the other hand strictly due to the local and documented legend of the "magician" Heliodorus.

     

Have a look at my first book (updated version)

 

See where this picture was taken. [?]