THE MENTAWAIANS
ECHOES from SIBERUT:
The Mentawai Legacy
Part One
Shaman singing in uma. PM Photography. 2024
TREATMENT Part One
Echoes from Siberut, the Mentawai Legacy is a journey into the soul of an ancient forest and the people who live in spiritual communion with it. Filmed deep in the heart of Siberut Island, this documentary explores a worldview where the natural and the supernatural are inseparable — where shamans speak with trees, taboos protect balance, and leaves carry the memory of ancestors.
The film is structured around thirteen sequences that together form an immersive portrait of the Mentawai people and their sacred bond with the rainforest.
This documentary unfolds through a series of immersive sequences that reveal the living rhythm of the Mentawaian people — an Indigenous community deep within the rainforest of Siberut Island, Indonesia. Rather than explaining from the outside, the film invites the viewer to enter a world where the forest breathes, listens, and responds — not as a backdrop, but as a presence and its guardian respond according to its language through signs and oracles.
At the center of this world is the sikerei — the shaman — healer, spiritual guide, and guardian of ancestral knowledge. His chants, gestures, and rituals open the invisible channels between body and soul, between humans and the forest.
The forest and the community are the two main actors in this story. One rooted in trees, leaves, and spirits. The other in shared labor, rituals, and memory. Through their interdependence, the essence of Arat Sabulungan — the Mentawaian cosmology — comes into view. A belief system in which every being has a soul, and balance must be maintained through offerings, taboos, and ceremony.
It’s also called ” the recipient of sacrifices” (Reimar Schefold)
Each sequence is built from lived experience and intimate observation. There is no external voice guiding us. The narration emerges from within — told by the Mentawai themselves, shamans, wifes, elders, children and occasionally by those who have walked alongside them, like Toine IJsseldijk. a dutch man who was adopted by a Mentawaian family more than 30 years ago, Ed a very knowledgeable and accomplished guide
and one Mentawaian renown scholar, Dr Juniator Tulius.
The people stories weave together, rooted in place, each illuminating a dimension of the cosmology explored in the sequences that follow.
PART ONE - THE FOREST AS A LIVING TEMPLE
Rainforest. (Central Siberut) . PM Photography. 2024
Below is an immersive portrayal of Part One—followed by key participants introduction.
SEQ 1: The Spirit of the Tree
The film opens with a ritual — a nocturnal cleansing of the uma (communal house).
At dawn, fog curls through the rainforest canopy as a drone descends in silence drawing us into the sacred world of the Mentawai.
Inside the forest, a shaman chants as he gathers leaves:
“Turn down sickness, refuse misfortune, prevent bad luck…
May illness and bad spirits fade away.”
This is how every journey begins — with balance restored, protection summoned, and the boundary between worlds renewed. Leaves are selected with care. Chants are offered to the spirits. The air is thick with intention.
For the Mentawai, everything — every tree, stone, bird, or river — has a soul.
With humans, souls can connect with other souls and can influence each other.
The people know that the forest is not only a resource, but a sacred presence, alive with memory and meaning. Nothing is touched or taken without ceremony. A tree, before being felled, must be asked for permission. Its spirit must be honored, its place remembered.
This is not romantic nostalgia. It is daily reality — a lived ethic of care, restraint, and reverence. A quiet dialogue between humans and the unseen.
Aman Sasali. Shaman . PM Photography. 2024
Dipterocarps (Dipterocarpaceae family).
PM Photography. 2024
Aman Manja Shaman . PM Photography. 2024
SEQ 2: The UMA
A group of Mentawai women sits together, folding sago into palm leaves to make bread.
Their voices rise and fall in casual rhythm — talking about fishing, the rain, the bamboos, and their teeth.
Laughter drifts into the forest. Nothing extraordinary is happening, yet everything matters.
Daily life in Mentawaian society revolves around the uma — large communal houses where up to ten patrilineal families live under one roof. These are not just dwellings, but the living heart of the community, built along rivers and nestled at the forest’s edge.
Here, young and old share space, labor, food, and decisions. There is no fixed hierarchy. Authority flows through experience, not command. Tasks are distributed, voices are heard, and care is mutual. In this tightly woven world, no one is left to face hardship alone.
This collective spirit — rooted in listening, sharing, and mutual respect — is what sustains the Mentawaians.
In a world increasingly marked by isolation, the uma remains a place of connection, memory, and belonging.
Mantawaian women in uma. Butui. PM Photography 2024.
SEQ 3: FOOD - SAGO
A shaman stands in front of a sago palm tree — towering with a fibrous, starchy trunk.
From this tree, the Mentawai shaman Aman Sasali extract the staple food, the sago.
Before cutting, he places his hand on the bark and chants softly. He is asking permission. The tree’s spirit must be acknowledged.
Nothing is taken without a ritual of respect.
The process of harvesting sago is laborious — a collective task of cutting, splitting, pounding, and washing the starchy pulp from the tree’s core.
Bai Sasali, the shaman’s wife will help in the process of gathering the flour.
Later in the corner where the fire is, women will gather around wooden troughs, filtering the fibers into edible flour, while children look on, learning through observation.
Sago is not just sustenance — it is survival. Drawn directly from the forest, it represents nourishment, memory, and cooperation.
Each gesture is part of a choreography passed down for generations. Hands move in rhythm, guided by repetition and care.
In the act of preparing food, the Mentawaians reaffirm a truth that runs through all things: that life is received, not taken. And that feeding the body also nourishes the bond between people and the forest that sustains them.
Sago harvesting ( tree. collecting flour and washing ) Butui. PM Photography 2024.
SEQ 4: THE MEDIATORS - Leaves, chicken and pigs
Leaves are sacred messengers.
In the Arat Sabulungan belief system — the ancestral cosmology of the Mentawaians — all elements of the natural world are animated by spirit.
The word Sabulungan refers to the “bundle of leaves” the Batsa Katsaila used in rituals, symbolizing the bond between humans and the invisible world.
It is also called “recipient of sacrifices” (Reimar Schefold)
Each leaf is chosen with intention — for healing, protection, or prayer. Shamans use them to read signs and guide rituals. Women craft offerings that speak to unseen forces.
This sequence honors the intelligence of the forest — not only as a source of life, but as a spiritual companion.
Before any ritual, the shaman walks deep into the forest, gathering a sacred bundle of leaves known as Batsa katsaila. Each leaf is chosen for its role — some to call ancestral spirits, others to protect, to purify, to heal. These leaves are not symbols; they are mediators between the visible and invisible, participants in a dialogue older than memory.
But leaves are not alone in this role.
Pigs and chickens — raised within the village — are both sustenance and sacrifice. Their role extends far beyond food. To become a shaman, a man must own pigs. The more pigs he possesses, the higher his status among the clans. Pigs are essential offerings in rituals, and their blood seals the ceremonial bond between humans and spirits.
Yet pigs are more than spiritual tools — they are also currency.
They are traded between clans as gifts, offered to solidify alliances, and exchanged during weddings, funerals, and initiations. Even with Sumatran merchants, pigs hold value as barter. A single pig may carry the weight of a promise or an ancestral debt.
The sacrifice of a pig is not taken lightly. It is preceded by chants, blessings, and divinations — often through the reading of chicken entrails, believed to reveal signs or oracles of harmony or disruption.
This sequence reveals the multiple dimensions of mediation in Mentawaian life — through plants, animals, blood, and spirit.
The forest provides not only life, but a language to sustain balance.
Collecting leaves Butui.Batsa Katsaila. Ritual before pig sacrifice. Wild pigs. PM Photography 2024.
SEQ 5: HEALING (medicinal plants) and the concept of "Bajau"
A child lies quietly next to his mother — a four-year-old boy, he is unwell. But this is no ordinary act of care.
His father is a shaman, and in Mentawai life, the shaman’s primary role is that of a healer — one who bridges the natural and the supernatural, the visible world and the unseen.
At dawn, the shaman sets out toward the river, retracing the path where his son first fell ill. He chants softly, calling into the forest. In Mentawaian belief, illness is rarely just physical — it signals a rupture in balance. The soul may have drifted. Or worse, something may have followed the ancestors in the land of the dead.
Ghosts — the spirits of the dead, especially those who died suddenly or violently — are not at peace.
These malevolent spirits wander, seeking attachment. Their presence disturbs the natural order. They bring sickness. They carry bajau, the spiritual energy that flows through all things —good and bad radiations, but if twisted, they can be out of balance and harm the souls and through it the body (sickness and even death).
Another example about “bajau” is ” when shamans meet for the first time, they perform “a ceremony to bring their souls closer to one another and to cool off the bajau” (Schefold).
To restore harmony, the shaman gathers medicinal plants along the water’s edge. Each leaf and root is chosen with care: one to lower the fever, one to soothe the spirit, another to shield the soul. These are not just herbal remedies — they are spiritual actors, alive with meaning and power.
Back at the uma, the ritual begins. Chants spiral through the air. The shaman calls on the ancestors — for protection, for wisdom, for release. His movements are steady, deliberate. He works not only with plants, but with memory, presence, and unseen forces.
In healing his son, he reweaves the fragile thread between body and soul, between his family and the forest, between this world and the next.
Shaman collecting medicinal plants. Chasing bad spirits by the river. Shaman ghealing young boy. Assembling leaves and plants. PM Photography 2024
On the left side the leaves have been identifyed as Centella asiatica (Pegaga, Gotu kola) – Common in Indonesia; used as a medicinal herb for wound healing, fever, and revitalization. Its leaves are usually rounder, though young shoots can look elongated like these.
Bottom right side: Local endemic medicinal shrubs – Mentawai shamans use roots as part of pajé healing rituals, often combined with chants and tattoos (the root becomes a “bridge” between the illness and the forest spirits).
SEQ 6: NIGHT RITUAL- Dances and the calling of the souls.
This is one of the rarest moments — a nocturnal ceremony inside the uma, where the living invite the presence of the unseen.
The drums begin. Firelight flickers against the walls. Plates are placed gently on the floor, each holding a small offering of food — a gesture to please the souls of the ancestors, as they are summoned to the ceremony and to the souls of those present, so the souls do not stray or grow restless.
The chants rise, bodies begin to sway. The atmosphere thickens.
This is no performance. It is a dialogue — between the visible and the invisible, the here and the beyond.
As the ritual deepens, some fall into trance.
A man shakes, overtaken by a force not entirely his own. Others enter a different state of awareness, possessed by higher spirits.
These could be ancestors returning from the land of the dead and who momentarily cross into human form.
This is Arat Sabulungan made manifest: the sacred order where spirits, people, and forest are bound in reciprocal relation.
The dance is not symbolic — it is necessary. It reaffirms the balance between worlds and the place of the soul within the body.
Mysterious. Raw. Intense.
This is the heartbeat of the Mentawaians.
Shamans dancing, chanting, in trance and with plates to call the souls of the attendees. PM Photography 2024
SEQ 7: TABOOS
Taboos in the Mentawaian world shape behavior: what may be eaten, said, or done — and when.
But taboos in Mentawaian life are not enforced by decree. They are lived. Their power lies not in punishment, but in the invisible web of meaning they sustain — a contract between people, spirits, and the natural world.
Taboos constrain many aspects of daily life: certain foods must not be consumed before a hunt or during ritual; sexual relations between husband and wife are strictly forbidden before hunting or while a shaman is healing someone, for fear of upsetting the balance.
No other forms of sexual relationships are permitted. To act otherwise is considered a grave transgression — one that invites misfortune, illness, or even death.
Marriage arrangements, too, must follow ancestral rules.
A wrong union may disturb the order that binds the community to the spirit world.
To break a taboo is to risk imbalance.
To observe one is to live with care and consciousness.
These rules are not written. They are carried in the body — passed down through gestures, silences, and shared memory.
Their authority lies in the unseen, in the long continuity of ancestors and forest.
Taboos are how wisdom moves through silence. They are the forest’s unwritten laws.
Shamans conversiing about taboos. Shaman couple. Aman Tarik and his wife Bai Tarik.
Two Mentawai shaman’s wifes. PM Photography 2024
SEQ 8: DAY CEREMONY – Beauty, Spirits and Sacrifices
At dawn, Mentawai women gather to prepare for a rare ceremony.
Faces are painted. Beads are woven into hair. Textiles are wrapped, handed down through generations. Each element is a story, a prayer, an identity.
Outside, chants rise. Inside, the women transform — not into symbols, but into living vessels of tradition.
This final moment closes Part One with beauty, presence, and reverence.At dawn, the uma stirs with quiet excitement. It is the day after the trance ritual — and a day of joy, reverence, and preparation.
Inside, women gather in small groups. Some weave palm fibers, others sort ceremonial feathers and arrange strands of yellow beads. Their laughter fill the house, light and musical. In this moment, beauty becomes an act of protection: the Mentawaians believe that adornment keeps the soul anchored in the body. To be beautiful is not vanity — it is vitality. It is a way to live fully and ward off illness while pleasing the souls.
Soon, their transformation is complete. Feathered headdresses shimmer in the filtered light, tattoos glisten with oil, and bodies move with quiet dignity. This is not costuming — it is identity made visible. Mothers and daughters, sisters and elders, sit together to honor tradition and themselves.
Behind the scenes, the shamans chant. Incantations call to the spirits of the ancestors. Sacrifices are prepared — chickens and pigs — to nourish not only the living, but also the unseen. Blood and innocence flow side by side: a necessary gesture to maintain balance.
As the ritual nears its close, a special meal is set. The shamans and their wives gather to share the ceremonial feast — food offered not just for sustenance, but for connection. Plates are passed, laughter returns, the air is warm with gratitude.
This is a day of love, of beauty, of remembering. A day to be fully Mentawaian.
Shaman wifes adorned in flowers and feathered hair dressings. PM Photography 2024
End of Part One
This first part of the film is grounded in close observation of a single Mentawaian family and its surrounding community, in the settlement of Butui in central Siberut, alongside a few invited shamans.
Each character appears not as an interview subject, but as a living thread in the fabric of daily life. Their gestures, rituals, silences, and interactions carry the story.
(A closer look at those who appear throughout the part one of the film)
Key Participants – Part One
Toine IJsseldijk.
PM Photography. 2024
Teteu the Mother.
PM Photography. 2024
Aman Manja (Shaman)
PM Photography. 2024
Aman Sasali (Shaman)
PM Photography. 2024
Toine IJsseldijk
Originally from the Netherlands and based in Bali, Toine has been immersed in Mentawai life for over thirty years. Adopted into a Mentawai family, his presence is quiet but deeply felt. He reflects on his journey, his late Mentawai father — the revered shaman Aman Patre — and the obligations of kinship, respect, and transmission. Toine’s path is one of quiet witnessing and enduring commitment.
Teteu
The matriarch of the family. After the early passing of her husband Aman Patre, Teteu raised six children on her own. Her strength, resilience, and quiet authority embody the spirit of Mentawai womanhood. She remains the center of the household.
Aman Manja and Aman Sasali
Sons of Teteu, deeply rooted in traditional practices. They are hunters and foragers, moving silently through the forest in search of monkeys and wild pigs — not just for food, but to sustain ceremonial life. Their skills anchor the family’s relationship to the land.
Bai Jalamati and Bai Bangin
Wives of the shamans, working daily within the uma. They prepare food, raise children, and maintain the rhythm of domestic life. In ceremonies, they play a supporting role — observers and guardians of tradition, carrying quiet wisdom.
Lily and Kakui
The younger daughters of the household. They cook, fish, and laugh easily, moving between forest paths and riverbanks. Lily and Kakui represent the emerging generation — rooted in tradition, yet aware of the changing world beyond the forest.
Baja, Aman Tarik, and Aman Noru
Invited shamans who appear in the ceremonies and healing rituals. Each one brings a different style and presence — some quiet, some theatrical, some fierce in their invocations. Together, they form the spiritual backbone of the sacred in the sequences of Part One.
Aman Tarik (shaman)
PM Photography. 2024
Aman Noko (shaman)
PM Photography. 2024
Aman Noru (shaman)
PM Photography. 2024
Bai Tarik, Bai Noru & Bai Noko Shamans wifes
PM Photography. 2024
Luat. Shaman coiffe. Butui. PM Photography 2024