Looking at the Making of the Padewakang Boat

It is not only to romanticize the glory of the past with the “maritime”; with a song that was often heard in childhood, “My ancestors were sailors …”

How can they go out to sea, even across islands, eliminating the ‘boundary’?

Luckily, three days ago, my friends and I were invited by Muhammad Ridwan (Instagram @ridwanmandar) and Yusuf Wahil (Instagram @yusufwahil) to see the making of Padewakang boats (‘outrigger boat’) that has been used hundreds of years ago by Makassarese people in bantilan (‘boat workshop’) H. Usman in Tanah Beru.

Seeing the initial process of making a boat. It starts with the making of lunas (the very bottom of the ship), as the backbone as well as the spirit of the ship. How knowledge and technology have been used ‘beyond’ his time, even with simple tools.

And looking at some ritual processes: how ‘sexuality and religion’ converge and become an important role in the birth of a boat. And so on!