Pioneering in - Far Eastern Bible College

Although the things their hands have made are of rough andsimple construction, the ladders, the beams and pillars, and evencoffins, they have carved on them weird figurines and designs.And though they are not slaves to materialism as the cultured,whose bodies are become like a cosmetic showcase, they wouldsometimes adorn themselves with hats woven from twigs andgrass or wear silver ear-rings twenty to thirty at a time, so muchso that they weigh down to their chest. Male or female, theywould also wear brightly coloured glass beads almost a kati heavy(over a pound) on their bodies. An old superstition got them to filedown their teeth, but now they like to have them plated with gold(to the enrichment of merchants, for the gold used is not much totalk about). They tatoo their whole bodies, arms, legs and all,giving us an impression that they are an art-loving people.Music is a special ingenuity of sons of the tropics. The SouthSeas have produced not a few born geniuses. The Dyaks are notbehind others in the pursuit of music, so much so that they maketools of daily toil into instruments of music. For example, thestaves that the women use to pound their rice is a sort of musicalinstrument. Made of the hardest Bornean wood, these staves arehollowed at the top for the insertion of one or two wooden slabs.As simple as that the pounding stave can make music. In theevening sun one could see some young girls around a ricepounder,set high on a platform. As the pounding staves began towork, up-down, up-down, there was orchestrated a rhythmicsound most soothing to the ears.For pleasure they usually play several kinds of bambooinstruments. Apart from flute and pipe they use a thin slice ofbamboo which they blow with their lips while being tapped uponone side by a finger. The sound produced thereby also strikes aresponsive chord in one’s heart. However, their music produces alugubrious note which quickly induces sadness in the hearers.101