Tumpek Wayang
Nyepi, Çaka 1925 New Year

A series of celebrations of ‘Nyepi’ Çaka 1925 New Year will take place in various events. The rituals are to begin by the melasti procession in a parade of tens of kilometers by foot to the beach, followed by Tawur Kesanga, ogoh-ogoh parade and at last “Nyepi” Holy Day itself. During Nyepi Holy Day, the Island of Bali is tranquil. Nobody braves to go out, not to speak of traffic by means of transports, bringing about 24-hour condition free of air pollution. Nyepi Holy Day is an annual event and this year comes out on Wednesday, 2 April 2003. It is a Hindu traditional event existed nowhere outside Bali.

‘’Melasti”
Melasti procession by the village community starts early at dawn after people rush out to ‘Balai Agung’ temple as soon as wooden bell sounds in the village pavilion, this means the community members are to immediately take implements of melasti ritual parade out of ‘Balai Agung’ temple and to carry deity in such-called Jempana Bhatara en masse seaward. Children and youngsters march during the parade while bearing various implements such as umbul-umbul, lelontek, spears, parasols, and so on. On the other hand, grown-up people are to bear jempana on shoulders and various sesuhunan’on heads, such as barong and demon.
Consequently, all villagers start to march to the beach in a common parade to traverse at least 10-km distance. On the way to beachside, pemangku priests sound holy songs in harmony with beleganjur a traditional marching band sounding melodies to challenge krama desa villagers to walk with high spirit to the finish without being tired.
On arrival at the beach, pemangku priests are busy reading out mantras in accompaniment of sacred sesaji offerings to Sang Hyang Baruna God of the Sea, following the layout of ritual implements and the housing of sesuhunan in the holy site. By offering of sesaji, human beings propose a sense of thanks to Sang Hyang Baruna’s grace to distribute the sacred water of life taken out of an unlimited source.
Such is the atmosphere of the melasti ritual taking place on 30 and 31 March, two days preceding Nyepi Holy Day. Apart from thanking Sang Hyang Baruna, melasti contains also a sense of purification of bhuwana agung (macrocosm) and bhuwana alit (microcosm or human beings). The seaside is a symbol of cleansing these cosmic worlds of any dirtiness.
If the seawater always looks clean, the cause is the living cycle and natural cleansing process taking place. Prof. Dr. I Gusti Ngurah Nala opines, big and small fish dispose of organic remnants, which under bacterial influence change themselves into organic products. These products become food enabling growth and development of seaweed and planktons, which are sources of food for small fishes. In return, small fishes are a source of food for big fishes.
The living cycle goes on when big and small fishes die with their remnants changing into inorganic material to become food for seaweeds and planktons. Such a process takes place completely underwater enabling the seawater to keep clean. Consequently, preserving the holiness and cleanliness of seawater is not less important for Hindu adherents than to maintain the holiness and the survival of mankind. Former time hermits have defined the sea as eternal holy water resource to dispose of all world and human dirtiness away.

”Tawur Kesanga”
Following the melasti ritual, there is Tawur Kesanga a ritual conducted on Tuesday, 1 April 2003, when there is dark moon, known among Balinese as Tilem Kesanga (the Ninth Dark Moon of the Year) Tawur Kesanga takes place precisely at the time when the sun is straight on man’s fontanel, around 12:00 at centers of desa pakraman or desa adat villages in Bali, of which there are about 1,300 villages. Denpasar is to organize the ceremony at Puputan Badung Plain. Some villages have a tradition of organizing the ritual in the late afternoon. Nothing is questionable about these traditions because Hindu rituals always take place concordant to traditions or customs inherited.
The Tawur Kesanga ritual symbolizes human strain to restore balance and harmony of the universe and all it contains. Hindu religion has guided human beings to preserve balance of nature, or said otherwise, people are not allowed to be greedy in exploiting natural resources more than they need. The deterioration of the ecological environment and air pollution has brought about thinning of the ozone layer. There have even been some holes in the layer due to human disability to preserve natural environment and harmony.
Still relating with Tawur Kesanga, in the twilight, family members perform Ngerupuk ritual by walking around their house while carrying firework, sounding some instruments, and spewing some house corners with a meswi mixture of spices having been chewed in the mouth. The sense of this ritual is to neutralize the forces of nature to maintain serene peace among those living there.
At desa adat’s scope, members of youth organizations parade idols of giants personifying bhuta kala evil spirit around the village. In Denpasar, the ogoh-ogoh parade becomes an attractive entertainment to the public, because various ogoh-ogoh idols are carried around on people’ shoulders followed by beleganjur the marching band. The ogoh-ogoh statues have been products of great artistic creativity by spending tens of millions of rupiahs collected from sincere donators. The hectic parade reflects a sense to deter bhuta kala evil spirits back to their own original places affecting their stop of disturbance of human life.
The following day, Hindu adherents of Indonesia celebrate Nyepi Holy Day, Çaka 1925 New Year. All Hindu believers arrive at a serene sipeng day in full peace. According to Lontar Sundarigama Manuscript, Hindu adherents are dutifully engaged in what is termed as brata penyepian in a living condition without fire, physical activity, travel, and in complete entertainment shows. Just because of these spiritual duties, the earth of Bali is in complete peace as if it were an island without ruler, while during the evening it is completely dark.
The atmosphere becomes extremely serene and free of pollution. There is no Hindu going out of their home, except pecalang, the police of desa pekraman patrolling the village. During 24 hours, Bali is a sterile island free of various kinds of pollution and human greediness in exploiting natural resources.
The brata penyepian abstinence is in effect a lesson to human beings to show how to calm emotion by shepherding sensual lust. Bhagawan Wararuci in his Sarasamuccaya Book says: “In effect, the senses are both heavenly and hellacious. If you were capable of shepherding it would be heaven, otherwise it functions as hell”.
On the following morning, Hindu adherents perform ngembak geni, an activity to stop fastening by engaging themselves in dharma santih, an interaction of excusing each other for what they have done wrong. You could not dismiss public opportunity of welcoming the Sunrise of Çaka 1925, a new year for Balinese. Ketut Sumadi
Lecture at “STAH Negeri Denpasar”
(Denpasar College of Hindu Studies)
He is chairperson of the “Sari Kahyangan Indonesia” Foundation.

Stars, Time and Seasons

Stars in the sky do not only enlighten the dark night, inspire the beauty of the night to the poets, some of them also give guidance for people about the seasons. This guidance then leads people to arrange their activities easily. At least they have adjusted theirs to natural signs with reference to their empirical knowledge. When the position of Orion is just over the head in the evening, it means it is the sasih kesanga (the ninth month of the Balinese calendar). It’s time to plant rice in the paddy fields.
‘Month’ on the Balinese calendar is called sasih. A year consists of twelve months as well. Here are the months arranged in succession as follows Kasa, Karo, Katiga, Kapat, Kalima, Kenem, Kapitu, Kaulu, Kasanga, Kadasa, Jiyestha and Asada. The prefix of ka- in the first tenth months above refers to ordinal numbers. A month division along with its number of days is called pranatamangsa. The first month of the Balinese calendar corresponds to July. But they are not exactly the same. Here are the months with their number of days and it’s corresponding dates to the Christian calendar by I Wayan Gina.

Punia
Contributor of Bali Travel News

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