BIWAR KILLS A DRAGON
This is a story from West New Guinea, an Indonesian province who has a stronger Pacific (Polynesian/Micronesian) culture. The people are similiar with the people in Papua New Guinea or Aborigines in Australia.
It's bordered with Papua New Guinea in the east, sharing the island of New Guinea (we call it Irian), the second largest island in the world.
The inhabitants in the village of Mimika were busy that day. They prepared 12 boats and set off to the upper course of the river, to find sago, the main food for people in New Guinea, like rice in most of Asian nations or wheat in the Western.
After three days, their boats were filled with sagos, and they headed home. But in the area of Tamanipia, they were raided by a dragon, and their boat were struck by great waves, caused by the swings of the dragon's tail. Most of them were drown, but a woman managed to save herself, jumped to the ground and hid on a tree.
She was the only one who survived and she was pregnant. She managed to survive in the strange tree, eating its fruits and roots. She was still cautious about the dragon, and listened to every noise that she heard until she gave a birth to his son.
She named her son Biwar. She raised Biwar and gave him some skills, like how to make various weapons, setting traps to catch animals, creating fire, and singing well, playing tifa, a traditional music instrument like African drums.
Biwar became a handsome, strong, and healthy man, he's so good in
aiming arrows and hunting, and he always brought home a lot of fish, deers
and pigs for food.
When his mother saw him bringing fish, she asked where Biwar got them. He said it was from the upper course of the river. Then, she
forbade him to go there and told him about his father and friends that were killed by the dragon.
Biwar decided to kill the dragon and set traps in the mouth of a cave. Then, he played his tifa and sang near it. It attracted the dragon and it
moved toward the cave's mouth. When it entered its head to the mouth of the cave, Biwar pulled the rope that linked to his traps, and numbers of weapons like spears, daggers, arrows, and clubs, hit the head of the dragon. It screamed and rocked its body very hard, then died.
Biwar came home and told his mother. The next day, they set the sail, to return to their homeland. The people in Mimika are very happy, and they held a ceremony, to welcome the Biwar as a citizen of Mimika.
Mario Rustan
Sago
Sago is powdery whis is taken from 'sago palm.'
To see a sago palm, please take a look at http://www.rhapisgardens.com/sagos/
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Dragon
Dragon is an evil figure in the Indonesian myrths as in the Western legends. The image is very different from the dragon in Chinese myths, which is a sacred symbol and often represents the power of the king.
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