Ikat hunting in Sumba

I had heard the ikats were good in Sumba, but I hadn't really any idea how good they were. Until Kevin, Sylvia and I hired a car for the day and went off to visit some villages south of Waingapu.

First stop Rende, home to some royal tombs and our guide for the day, Charma. He's royalty, but also a friend of Karel and Rosa's, and despite his mum being sick in hospital, agreed to show us around. Rende is a royal compound and the traditional houses facing the tombs are used for ceremonies and for the funerals of royal family members. The tombs are huge megaliths, carved with many animal figures, though more recent tombs are made from cement.

As if the tombs and houses weren't interesting enough, the women weave beautiful ikats as well. All using traditional dyes, meaning they are priced considerably higher than those made from factory dyed cotton. And I'm afraid I was smitten…

Horses are a traditional motif on Sumba, as are many sea creatures like turtles, prawns and lobsters, as well as roosters and cockatoos.

Another traditional motif is the mamuli, which is depicted on everything, from weavings to woodcarvings, to tombs. It's a depiction of fertility, namely a vagina!

After Rende we went to Pau, a village that is unique in weaving intricate designs using a technique they call Labaleko. I'm afraid my finances got cleaned out in Rende, so Sylvia and Kevin did the buying whilst I just took many many photos.

Finally we visited Kaliuda, down towards the southern coast, where ikat making is quite an industry. We saw some beautiful stuff here, got to see the weaving in action, and were impressed by the reasonable prices being asked. Unfortunately, I was right out of cash…

The following day I hired a motorbike driver to take me to the northern most point on Sumba. Wunga is said to be the first village settled when the ancestors descended from heaven at Cape Sasar, but these days consists of three run down houses in the middle of nowhere. It wasn't worth the effort to get there, and I point blank refused to pay the 100,000Rp they were asking for visiting and signing their visitor book.

The visitor book is an institution in any village that receives regular foreign tourists. You sign your name and nationality, a comment, and donate an amount of money for your visit. Most places leave it up to you to decide how much to give, but at Wunga they pointed to a note at the front of the book suggesting 100,000Rp per person, which is ridiculously overpriced for what is merely three run down houses, no views, no tombs, and no-one to even tell you about the place. My ojek driver, Lobo, even agreed with me, so I gave them a smaller amount, along with a bag of sirih pinang, a traditional gift when visiting the villages, but no substitute for cold hard cash!!

We drove back south, had a late breakfast, then headed up into the hills to visit another traditional village, Prainatang. This place is a true fortified village, completely invisible from below, with extensive river flood plains below which the villagers farm. The village elder showed me around, (once I'd hired a sarong to wear whilst in the village), pointed out various old tombs and the views of the farmland below, and sold me some slightly dodgy wood carvings. Now this place was worth visiting.

See the fortifications?

Entrance gate to Prainatang

Not a bad view

Pretty extensive river plain to farm

Finally Lobo took me to a more modern village called Padadita, to meet the king. He was unfortunately away on official business, so I got to have a look at some ikats instead. I fell in love with these, but unfortunately I was still out of cash, awaiting the obligatory day or 2 for a money transfer to arrive in the appropriate account. So I was saved from myself…

In central and west Sumba I saw no ikats, only normal weaving, usually with factory dyed cotton, and most designs were similar. The quality varied considerably, and I gather most of the production is either for local use or to be made into tailored clothing. From a textile hunting point of view, it's slim pickings.

I purchased this piece once it was finished. I think it will make nice cushion covers...

How the design is created

But East Sumba, wow! Only it's all considerably more expensive than elsewhere in NTT. Not surprising really, when you consider the amount of work that goes into making these beautiful textiles.

Ikat hunting in West Timor

I think I died and went to heaven!

West Timor, for the textile enthusiast, is still an untapped gem. In every village there will be women on hand looms, creating beautiful works of art. But to really experience it properly, you need a guide.

After staying the night in Kupang I took a bus the next morning to Kefamanau, popularly known as Kefa. This is about 3/4 of the way to the East Timor border, is up in the hills a bit, so has a slightly more pleasant climate than the sultry humidity of Kupang. Over the following few days I visited some traditional villages and then met a local guide, named Aka, who with over 25 years of experience as a guide, offered to customise a tour for me. We would travel by motorbike to visit many weaving villages, markets and textile dealers, plus visit a traditional village or two. After attempting to travel independently, I had quickly realised that a guide who spoke the languages and understood the complex cultures, would be worth the investment.

And thus begun my incredible adventure into the world of weaving.

There are two main cultural groups in West Timor. The Belu live in East Timor and the eastern portion of West Timor, and have their own language and traditional architecture. The Dawan live in the central and western end of Timor, and also have their own language and distinctive beehive huts. They all weave, and they all have their own traditional designs and motifs. In fact, within a small village there may be different tribes living, and each will weave the motif of their tribe. It's like having an individual signature: look at the motif on their sarong and you know exactly what tribe and where they come from.

I discovered there are essentially 3 types of weaving done in the region.

First there is Putus, which means tie dying, and is the process where the thread is tied in the pattern required and then dyed a number of different colours, and then woven. This is the process I had also seen around Maumere and Alor. But in different villages, different motifs. Here's a slide show and video for you.





Then there is Buna. This is where the loom is thread first and then the pattern is twisted on to the warp. The warp is the lengthwise cotton, the weft the crosswise cotton. After one row of the pattern is twisted on, using many different colours, it's kept in place by a cross weft of plain cotton, the same colour as the warp. Once the weaving is finished, the ends are all cut off to create the finished piece. It can take an entire year just to make one piece, not that the ladies actually weave all day every day, they have other work to do as well. Here's a video of the process and a couple of examples of the product.

There is also Sotis, which is the quickest form of weaving, usually done with purchased pre-dyed cotton. The warp is threaded with various colours depending on the design and then the pattern is woven in as it goes. One of these may only take a week to finish.

Some weavings have a combination of techniques, and may also include some embroidery. Some use all homespun cotton and natural dyes, others are all factory cotton, others a combination of both. And if you visit a textile dealer, of which there are a few, you can even see really old weavings, some using cotton imported from Holland over a hundred years ago. The latter are called Letras, and are extremely valuable, asking prices from $3000 upwards.

I can't really describe the sheer variety out there, so I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

If you have an interest in textiles and would love to experience seeing these works of art and culture made, I'm thinking of organising a tour, travelling in a little more comfort than the way I did it, but no less authentic an experience. Send me a message if you'd like to come, and we can talk.

But next, a story about some of the villages themselves….