Orang Rimba people struggle to learn, reach their dreams

Orang Rimba people struggle to learn, reach their dreams

Jon Afrizal, The Jakarta Post, Jambi | Archipelago | Mon, May 06 2013, 8:53 AM


“Ake ndok jadi peneliti guding, pamono caronye.” (I want to be a researcher, how can I be one?)

Fourteen-year-old Beteguh’s voice broke the still of the night in a learning hut for the Orang Rimba traditional community in Kedundung Muda in the heart of the Bukit Duabelas National Park (TNBD) in Jambi province.

“I want to become a cultural scientist for the Orang Rimba community,” said a boy who is a student at the SMP 12 state junior high school in Sarolangun, Jambi.

If he could achieve his dream of becoming a researcher, he said he would later make the world pay attention and respect the presence of the Orang Rimba tribespeople.

According to the Indonesian Conservation Community (KKI) Warsi Jambi, around 1,700 Orang Rimba tribespeople live in the TNBD area, 450 others live in the southern part of the Bukit Tigapuluh National Park, while 1,800 people live in a number of areas across Jambi.

The past years have been difficult times for the indigenous people living in the TNBD as 70 percent of the total 60,500-hectare area of the TNBD has been damaged.

Beteguh himself has observed various facts, such as forest destruction committed by a number of logging companies, saying that illegal logging in the area was one of the reasons why he wanted to be a researcher.

Beteguh, who appeared before participants of the National Female Camping Jamboree in Jambi in 2012, attends school two weeks a month and the other two weeks in the jungle to help his parents earn a living and serve as a teacher for his younger siblings and other Rimba children.

Not all school-age children in the forest attend school due to difficult access to education. Together with several friends who have acquired adequate skills in reading, writing and counting, Beteguh serves as a Rimba teaching assistant.

He visits Orang Rimba communities found in the southern section of the TNBD, such as those in Sungai Gemuruh, Sungai Punti Kayu, Sungai Tengkuyungon, Tanah Kepayong, Pisang Krayak and Nuaran Godong. Getting there is no easy task as the distance between the communities is far and can only be reached on foot, which takes up to three hours.

“I wish that no more Orang Rimba children would be illiterate, and no more Rimba children could be easily fooled just because they are illiterate just like my parents’ generation,” he said.

Beteguh is the other side of how the Orang Rimba younger generation responds to the changing times, but does not neglect the noble values as part of Orang Rimba, inherited from parents and ancestors.

KKI Warsi Jambi spokesman Rudy Syaf said that at least 400 Orang Rimba people were able to read and write through a long learning process.

“The Orang Rimba has been struggling to get a proper education and it takes some time for us to teach them,” said Rudy, adding that activists of some NGOs had started to teach the people in 1998.

He said that it was not easy to teach the Orang Rimba tribespeople as they were initially against things from the outside world for fear that it might change their roots.

Back then, since the tribespeople were mostly illiterate, they were easily fooled by businessmen, who wanted to take some of their valuable land or produce.

The late Yusak Adrian Hutapea was one of KKI Warsi’s activists who struggled to provide education for Orang Rimba.

Thanks to Yusak and other KKI Warsi activists, the Orang Rimba tribespeople can now negotiate with outsiders who want to buy something from their land. “We will continue Yusak’s spirit in educating Orang Rimba people. They have their rights as Indonesians,” said Rudy.