The Pasisir in the Age of Steam, Sail, and the Railway 27

Chapter 1 The Pasisir in the Age of Steam, Sail, and the Railway

Whenever the dalang topeng Dasih (d. 1985) visited her former student, the Bandung choreographer Enoch Atmadibrata (1927–2011), she always bore the same two gifts from her village, Ciluwung in Palimanan, Cirebon: cookies and a handful of dirt. The sweets were standard Indonesian fare, but the dirt left Atmadibrata nonplussed. When Dasih was near death, Atmadibrata, then in his fifties, traveled to say goodbye to his beloved teacher. Realizing this was his last chance to solve the riddle, he leaned in close to his guru and asked, “Why do you always bring me dirt?” Dasih whispered, “Mbah Kuwu1 once preached in my village.”2 There are two points to be made here. First is the intangible power of secrets that has the serious student searching for meaning throughout their life. Everyone knew that Cirebon’s storied first Muslim, Walangsungsang (another name for Mbah Kuwu),3 had proselytized there, including Atmadibrata; yet nearly twenty years later, he still puzzled: “Why dirt?” “Perhaps because way- farers’, mobile entertainers’, and laborers’ first contact is with the earth,” I replied. “Or because it is where the raw material of the mask literally takes root—where sustenance and decay do business together.” It would also become the final home of Dasih’s failing body. Dust to dust. Wayfaring and transculturation were synonymous with Cirebonese culture even before the advent of Islam. This once-vassal state of the Sunda kingdom was founded as an Islamic sultanate under Syarif Hidayatullah (d. 1568) in the late fifteenth century. He is said to have been born to an Egyptian father of Hashemite descent, Syarif Abdullah Maulana Huda, and a Sundanese mother,

1 Mbah Kuwu literally means grand village head. In this context, Dasih is referring to Cirebon’s first Muslim, Walangsungsang, who is the founder of the village of Trusmi, with its rich history of batik guilds. 2 Enoch Atmadibrata, interview by author, tape recorded, Cimahi, West Java, 24 December 2004. 3 Dalang consider referring to Walangsungsang by his name disrespectful. Also known as Pangeran Cakrabuana, Walangsungsang—the storied founder of the village of Trusmi—was the elder brother of Sunan Gunung Jati’s mother and the regent of Cirebon under Pajajaran’s suzerainty. Dalang consider themselves descendants of Sunan Kalijaga, who traveled the countryside performing with masks and puppets, yet it is to Walangsungsang that they pray and make offerings.

Nyai Rara Santang—the daughter of the King of Pajajaran (Sunda), Prabu Siliwangi.4 He was posthumously named Sunan Gunung Jati, which translates as “Lord of the Teak Mountain” in reference to the location of his grave complex in the Gunung Jati district of Cirebon. Sunan Gunung Jati is considered one of the Wali Songo. One of his nine wives, Ong Tien Nio, was of Chinese descent. The sealed entrance to her grave (makam) is in the adjoining space to her husband and the graves of other prominent Chinese Muslims. Their proximity to Sunan Gunung Jati’s tomb5 conveys the importance of their union and the accep- tance of ethnic Chinese over many centuries in Cirebon. Such tolerance makes Gunung Jati’s grave important for ziarah (Ar: ziyāra, which is visiting graves, usually to request something) to Peranakan6 Chinese and Native Muslims alike. In addition to Chinese merchants, Indians and Arabs (mostly from the Hadhramaut province of Yemen) created independent communities in Cirebon, cornering the markets of both luxury goods and products that were otherwise unobtainable there, including silk and coins from China. The colonial regime’s efforts to maintain control of the Natives and foreign commerce, included inventing three racial categories of citizenship: “Euro peans,” “Foreign Orientals” (Vreemde Oosterlingen),7 and “Natives” (Inlanders,

4 For the history of Syarif Hidayatullah and the Astana Gunung Jati, see Sudibjo Z. Hadisutjipto, Babad Cerbon (Jakarta: Department of Education and Culture, 1979); Amman N. Wahju, Sajarah Wali Syekh Syarif Hidayatullah: Sunan Gunung Jati (Naskah Mertasinga) (Bandung: Penerbit Pustaka, 2005). 5 “Tomb” refers here to a grave complex centered on a particular burial structure dedicated to its most important personage, such as the tomb complex of Gunung Jati. In its vernacu- lar use, tombs refers to shrines of all types, including ones pre-dating Islam and the graves of kings and religious leaders, e.g. Molana Hasanudin—the son of Sunan Gunung Jati and founder of the Banten Muslim dynasty—and his son, Molana Yusuf. More recently, Sukarno’s grave in Blitar became part of the ziarah circuit. Henri Chambert-Loir, “Saints and Ancestors: The Cult of Muslim Saints in Java,” in The Potent Dead: Ancestors, Saints and Heroes in Contemporary Indonesia, eds. Henri Chambert-Loir and Anthony Reid (Crows Nest, Australia and Honolulu: Allen & Unwin and University of Hawaii Press, 2002), 134–38. 6 Until the nineteenth century, the term Peranakan referred to those Chinese who had con- verted to Islam, usually through marriage. It is used more broadly to define Indonesian- born Chinese of mixed ethnicity. The Chinese in Indonesia are comprised of two groups: ethnic Chinese, totok or singkek, and the mixed-blood Peranakans. The Indonesian descendants of Chinese immigrants or Chinese mestizos are chiefly the progeny of Hokkien settlers from the Fukien Province. Mona Lohanda, The Kapitan Cina of Batavia, 1837–1942: A History of Chinese Establishment in Colonial Society (Jakarta: Djambatan, 1996), 6. 7 During the nearly two-hundred-year VOC regime, ‘Vreemde Oosterlingen’ also applied to Natives from the eastern islands of the Archipelago, reflecting their non-indigenous