Lessons from the Baduy

Zair Ahmed

In an evolving world that has forgotten the wisdoms of the past to move forward, the Baduy have much to teach us.

Deep within the lush rainforests of West Java reside the Baduy people, an Indigenous Sundanese ethnic group, sometimes colloquially referred to by foreigners as “the Amish of Indonesia”. Early this year, I had the tremendous opportunity to visit the Baduy, an experience equally eye-opening and worrying.

After a six-hour drive from Jakarta, past Mount Krakatoa and into deep, rural Indonesia, where the only settlements were palm oil plantations, I arrived at my destination - a small town that was the gateway to the vast Baduy area beyond. These dozens of villages are roughly divided into two groups: the outer Baduy, who interact more with the outside world, and the isolated inner Baduy, who retain their traditional way of life.

From the stone-paved streets of outer Baduy, I could only get glimpses of life in the inner villages. It took a gruelling four-hour hike through rainforests and mountains to reach inner Baduy. Mind you; this was the hardest hike of my life. Sweat, pain, the fear of slipping, falling and breaking a bone without any phone signal to call for help were just some obstacles. But perhaps the biggest obstacle was the hit to my ego every time someone would saunter past effortlessly, barefoot and carrying my body weight’s worth of goods to trade with other villages.

The inner Baduy people do not use electronic devices, shoes, toothbrushes, soap, vehicles or modern sewage systems. In the rare instances that foreigners are allowed into inner Baduy villages, they must abide by these local customs. I was lucky enough to be with a tour guide who not only spoke the local dialect but was also acquaintances with people from inner Baduy which allowed us to access parts I would not have been able to otherwise. This meant that we were able to communicate with those living in inner Baduy and ensure that we knew when it was appropriate to take pictures. All photographs in this article were either taken in outer Baduy or in areas surrounding inner Baduy with permission from the local elders.

Weaving through the narrow streets, I got to talk (through a translator of course) to some of the inner Baduy. They welcomed us to their homes with open arms, but not open doors, because there were no doors. The drastic shift in lifestyle extended beyond the mere absence of modern devices and objects. Many concepts familiar to our culture do not exist in inner Baduy to this day. There is no strict private property, nor a fear of crime. The sense of deep-rooted materialistic desire, the ideology of constantly seeking ‘more’ than those around us, is absent here. These are tight-knit communities built on mutual cooperation — crime is rare and punished by banishment.

Their houses are made entirely of bamboo and palm thatching and devoid of furniture. There is no desire to gain or differentiate materialistically — there is no concept of money. Nor is there food wastage — the Baduy diet mostly consists of rice grown from surrounding fields, along with nuts, vegetables and poultry from farm animals. Their piping system is wholly made of carved bamboo, intricately using the hilly terrain in place of any industrial irrigation or piping system.

Art by Max McFarlane

The Baduy have mostly been able to maintain their way of life and pass on their environmental ethics to the next generation. While they have no formal schooling, a key aspect of children’s socialisation is their environmental education which enables them to form a deep-rooted connection with ecological preservation.

Biocentrism is the view that humans and their environment are interdependent, assigning value to all living things. The Baduy have put this philosophy into practice with their long-standing insistence on leaving their environment untouched. In every conversation I had, there was always a consideration of the environment. It ceased to be an afterthought; it was, rather, at the centre of every thought.

The Baduy have many lessons that can inform our lives. They know we are not the masters of the environment but only guests in a world that was here billions of years before us and will persist billions of years after us. We should be aware of our dependence on it and therefore, more considerate of it.

Contemporary Western capitalism has fostered a deep tendency to prioritise human interests over any other considerations by framing our existence and interests as superseding that of the environment around us. The Baduy have managed to stave off this ideology. Yet even deep within these villages, the tendrils of industrialisation and materialism reach in. Even here, where you cannot call an ambulance nor access a toilet seat, piles of rubbish have found their way. The waste-free, sustainable lifestyle is slowly being contaminated by the towns and cities of surrounding Java.

There are lessons to be learnt from the Baduy. The most salient lesson is their mindset. We have exploited our environment to the point of crisis, stripping our oceans bare and creating the existential threat that is global warming. Fundamental to tackling these issues is a shift in our perspective and adopting a biocentric view of the world.

We should be conscious of our impact on the environment when making any policy decisions, no matter how big or small. Rather than neglecting our world and then trying to make up for our negligence, we should adopt a proactive view in ensuring that the environment is a primary consideration when deciding anything. The environment is of paramount importance in the daily lives of Baduy individuals as well as the community as a whole. It is about time we start making it ours.

Art by Jasmin Small