Ponari & His Magic Healing Stone
Feb 26th, 2009, in News, by Lairedion
The magical faith healing stone of young boy Ponari is big business for a small village in East Java.
East Javanese village is earning big bucks with its boy wonder
Even Ponari must go to school. He hasn’t been there for three weeks and this Monday is the time. The school director takes him there personally on his “moped”, and a platoon of riot police officers run alongside the 9 year old prodigy to protect him. It is not easy to get the boy away from his village. Thousands of people crowd between the houses and when they see Ponari they even press harder. But people have to wait because Ponari must go to school.
A month ago Ponari was hit by lightning, according to his story. When he regained consciousness there was a stone on top of his head. He threw it away but the stone came back so he took it home. There he discovered the healing effects of the stone: a neighbour healed of fever after he had touched it, the village head got rid of a bad pain in his arm and the local police officer, a pious Muslim, swears he has seen with his own eyes how Ponari healed a boy who had not spoken a single word for five years.
The news about the miraculous healings spread quickly and people started to flood to the small village of Balongsari, a few hours drive from Surabaya. First dozens, then hundreds, and now there are thousands. They bring cups, bottles and buckets of water in which the boy wonder plunges his stone. This allegedly turns the water into a powerful panacea. Ponari is carried around by his father. He looks tired.
A party tent protects him against the sun. There are barriers of bamboo put down to control the crowd. This has already led to accidents: four people have been trampled to death and an unknown number got injured. And also the healing doesn’t work that well. A child of three died after his parents had given him wonder water instead of taking him to a doctor. The media are interviewing more and more people who have been drinking the miracle water but didn’t notice anything. Hamzah (53) says that his eyes are just as bad as before. Such information may not deter visitors. They keep on flooding to the village.
Yet there is growing criticism of the Balongsari circus. Especially Muslim organizations condemn what is happening there. It is superstition and therefore sinful but also dangerous. Child welfare agencies demand closure of this ‘practice’ of Ponari in order to protect the boy against exploitation. Even his father says now enough is enough. He has already tried a few times to get Ponari to school but was always stopped by the crowd and his own neighbours which keep the family more or less as hostages. They want Ponari to continue because they earn big money: they sell food, they rent out parking spaces, sleeping places and sell water in which Ponari has immersed his stone. This poor peasant village is making a daily turnover of one billion rupiah (70,000 euros).
As long as the faithful continue to throng there’s no way back. Ponari says nothing. After school he is back on his father’s shoulders and he immerses his stone in water until he cannot hold it anymore….
This post is a translation of an article which appeared in Dutch daily “Volkskrant” on 24 February 2009 (link: http://www.volkskrant.nl/buitenland/article1154300.ece/Indonesisch_dorp_teert_op_wonderkind).
249 Comments on “Ponari & His Magic Healing Stone”
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Mike Oxblack says:
AAB.. When are you going to drop the blackies bit? you ignorant swine.
Indeed harping on about racism whilst himself using racist slurs, a common trait in this country. Apparently he’s not even Indonesian anyway but just pretending to be.
easy way out is to avoid embarrassing question time
Was there one? I must have missed that.
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schmerly says:
MO..
Apparently he’s not even Indonesian anyway but just pretending to be.
I’ve no idea what it is, I just think it’s a weirdo.
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Suryo Perkoso says:
Don’t encourage him Air Haitch. No cider for you if you carry on…
See all is not at all well in the State of Denmark at the moment – the swan eating catering consultant has turned turtle and swapped camps, post counts can go down as well as up and many more dark and mystical things that can only be revealed in the presence of Kiki (Rani’s OK though) and a nice sweet jagung.
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Aluang Anak Bayang says:
@ Misterrr Mike Oxblack,
Indeed harping on about racism whilst himself using racist slurs, a common trait in this country. Apparently he’s not even Indonesian anyway but just pretending to be. All rather childish.
In Indonesia, we don’t give a crap about slurs. We may call you a whitey, a blackie or tambi, if that hurts your feeling, then you are in the wrong place. We treat everyone as equal and this is what counts.
Whiteys are good with pc-ism, but beneath that benign smile hides a more sinister intent. Javanese are not easily fooled by
whitey
calling us ‘brother’ or ‘fellow citizen’. Unlike Blackies, we will not be herded into reserve, and having our wealth stolen. Mbak Oigal can explain more.
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Clearly old AAB’s struggling to wrap his ZX81 noggin around the race issue in any logically coherent manner. Stick with the jagung, for corn will bring true enlightenment cookie boy.
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Mr Tic Tac Toe says:
Tn. ET, Yth:
Can you elaborate? It would be interesting to know what faults you see in yourself as a people.
From time to time, since the failure of tan malaka, to the failure of reformasi,
from laziness, to xenophobia, I think this is the reason:
Lack of conviction.
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Burung Koel says:
Lack of conviction.
Certainly a problem in the case of Tommy Soeharto! 🙂
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Oigal says:
TTT..
Interesting ..but generic..failure of reformasi, lazy (?) (although xenophobia, I would say is a definate issue). But the others are motherhood statements that dont really mean anything.. no improvement of the all foreigners are bastards line..
I would hardly call the sayur man who comes every day lazy..
Why did reformasi fail…Is it because of a failure to protect the a free press.. a lack of education in the democratic process by the government (is so why?).
Is all about style over substance..The Buddha bar being a classic example..reams of paper of the name and “oh my gosh” yet very little on the dubious process of ownership..
Press..How can Indonesia seriosuly be considering presidential candidates who perhaps cannot travel overseas for fear of arrest for crimes committed during their previous incantations as protectors of ….red and white .. or somethign anyway..
If nothing else, help me out to understand how the king mud brother still holds a cabinet position..
Thes are the sorts of things that I have trouble gasping from an outsiders perspective..sometime raise a smile other times a sigh
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Tn. Oigal, Yth. :
First, forgive my highschool grade english, if i say something strange. Since most people here seemed to prefer on ridiculing language skill.
On Laziness:
Tukang sayurs do it becoz they have to. Not becoz they believe that what they are doing is for the greater good of our people as whole.We have no weber here. No concept of protestant ethics or such.
We dont have enough faith on either capitalism or socialism, or the warmly fuzzy ekonomi pancasila, let alone to adapt on failures of any of them.
Those who feel save, cease to innovate. They choose to forget. They prefer to become religious instead.
I say: mere survival is not enough!
But i still dont have enough conviction in miself to go out and preach about it.
Laziness is also the reason of corruption. Are all those corruptors evil? i dont think so, at least not all of them. Indonesian-style of corruption is not even driven by simple capitalistic greed, i think. They simply see no other ways, they dont believe that they are capable to make enough by honest ways.
On reformasi:
It fails on so many levels. First, of course, we failed to use the momentum to fix many things at the first years, so people grew tired already. Less and less people believe that reformasi has and will bring positive improvements to the country, let alone to participate.(The failing to use the momentum thingy is a chronic disease since the beginning of 20th centuries, btw… Soo many missed opportunities…)
We also failed to put our faith on our own constitution. One of my friend argued, that indonesia ceased to exist when they overthrow gusdur by ignoring his dekrit. But then, he is biased. I still think gusdur is too unstable to govern.
We failed to implement any kind of economic-discipline before SM. We dont trust our judgement on it, so we keep changing it. We were too afraid to make mistakes, so we chose to stay in a convenient-enough crisis instead.
I am not even sure that SM believes on what shes doing.
On media:
We dont reaaaally believe in media moguls, so the press failed.We watch the news, only as a getaway to channel the angers by swearing at the box. But will we do something on the matter?
No. Big chance tommorow we will not remember anything about it.We still have clouded history.
We know something was wrong in the 20s, 40s, 60s, 90s-2000s, but we are not THAT sure. Too many disinformations.We know certain person is not the best according to the media or history, but since we dont reaaallly believe the media anyway, between the media and the gut-feeling, errr… the truthiness, we pick the latter.
We are desperate to believe in something…. ANYthing. We might aswell become fundies.
On Xenophobia:
We dont have thomas jefferson. So we have no conviction in the “all men created equal” thingy.Most of us still believe bules are half-gods, with the greed of mere mortals (there is a reason for it, and its a veeeerryyy long story). We dont believe we can compete with foreigners, so we are afraid of them.
It is even emphasized by the actions of all-knowing-expats who keep ridiculing pribumis just like our colonial masters did in our collective memory. This HAS to stop, the only way to erase xenophobic sentiment is to stop fueling it, unless you want it to keep it going.
On king mud,
If the average populations dont reaaaalllyyy believe the media, what makes the president any different?On your genetical “Question”:
Perhaps i failed to differentiate an honest question with a rhetorical one. But a similar question has been asked more than a century ago by some colonial acehnese-slayer named snouck hur-something. So forgive me for going ballistic on your century-late “question”.Perhaps you’re just ignorant about our history, but hopefully not as bigoted as that snouck guy (which was, btw, also late around 300 years when throwing that similar question)
…..
NOW. On what we need:
I have a feeling that we need another crisis, not just a convenient-enough-crisis like in the past, but HUGE crisis. The kind of “this is it!” crisis. If we cannot survive it as a people, as a nation, then perhaps we shouldnt.…And this time, dont help us. Please.
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@ AAB..
We treat everyone as equal and this is what counts.
You can’t be serious!! there are few country’s that can equal Indonesia, for sheer prejudice against their own people! or are you sticking your head in the sand again hoping it will go away, like you normally do so you don’t have to face the truth.
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@Schmerly,
You have clearly never travelled to Africa or indeed India. -
I’ve already told you once today sunbeam, now run along and play with your silly chums, and let the adults talk.
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Firstly I find it highly unlikely that I would get told by you once, yet alone twice.
As an aside I once owned a Sunbeam S8.
I’m not sure that you are in a position to refer to anyone as silly, and certainly not to imply that you are an adult. You appear to be very childish in fact.
So, do you have any experience of any part of Africa or India? Don’t be shy now.
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You have clearly never travelled to Africa or indeed India.
So, do you have any experience of any part of Africa or India?
Looks like you’ve already decided!! what a clown I really can’t be bothered with you.
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You have clearly never travelled to Africa or indeed India.
I feel India is an important parallel. The genuflecting to authority and power here seems very Hindu and caste based and goes back many hundreds of years into the country’s Hindu past. I think it has little to do with Islam, although Islam’s current prescriptive, strict exegesis obviously doesn’t help (and actually does a great disservice to the great scientific and philosophical debates of Islam’s origin).
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TTT,
I would be the last one to complain about english skills..You wrote a lot there and DID IT well and I would like to respond more later if I may as time is agin me tonight..If I may just take umbrage at couple of points on this occasion
Perhaps you’re just ignorant about our history, but hopefully not as bigoted as that snouck guy
I would like think I know more about Indonesia’s history than most although that does not say much..as history at best is subjective even with all the facts available which certainly is not the case in Indonesia..
As for the question it certainly was an “honest” question purposely put in a provocative way..but you do need to get over the raising the “hackles slighest imagined slight” it is a pre-conditioned product of the new order (I believe) to stop people questioning the real reasons for things that are occuring right now.
Your example of Aceh is a classic use of the evils of yesteryear as distraction to the real issue. Are you as concerned about the slayings that have happened there in the last 20 years..or the ugly trend that is happening as we speak? I am not picking any side here just questioning why something that happened 300 years ago seems to raise your hackles more than what is happening right now…
It is even emphasized by the actions of all-knowing-expats who keep ridiculing pribumis just like our colonial masters did in our collective memory. This HAS to stop, the only way to erase xenophobic sentiment is to stop fueling it, unless you want it to keep it going.
Sorry to disillusion you but this is your problem not the expats or welcome to the real world of no borders. In the majority of cases, the people ridiculed becasue they are fools not because of their race and you cannot seriously tell me they don’t deserve it. I note that the rent a mob have no trouble ridiculing the President Of the USA or PM Howard. Tell me when was the last time you saw a group of expats in this country or anywhere else for that matter burning the Indonesian flag for instance. The poor bugger me, we are just victims may make people feel good for a little while and serves a chosen few’s interests but achieves nothjing for the nation..time to grow up in this area..act like kiddies then for sure you will get treated like kiddies and taunted.
You mention you hope I am not a bigot and yet in the next breath you refer to the term “pribumis” that in itself is telling…Do tell what is a pribumi? Is is race based? Religion based? Service to nation based?
At what point, if ever does a person not of direct (although what bloodline is good question?) bloodline get the same rights as a pribumi in your eyes.
A question for you..If per chance, a foreigner should marry an Indonesian, raise Indonesian Children, live in Indonesia, pay taxes and create wealth for Indonesia at what point should he/she have the same rights to vote and complain as a “pribumi”.. Its ok to say never..but I assume that should other countries apply the same rules to Indonesians overseas than to would be fair and unbigoted?
most of us still believe bules are half-gods, with the greed of mere mortals (there is a reason for it, and its a veeeerryyy long story). We dont believe we can compete with foreigners, so we are afraid of them.
I would disagree..but only on the “bule” How about as alternative theory that yes westerners are seen as bosses or leaders but the treatment is no different to anyone including pribumis who are viewed rightly or wronly as holders of postions of power and authority…This is where the genetics/culture comes in (and I will stand corrected) but it seems there is a almost insurmountable deference to authority figures whithout ever questioning the right of that person to that authority, can that ever be overcome or does Indonesian Democracy need to be “modified” (how?) to accept that as part of life.. I dunno
…And this time, dont help us. Please.
careful what you wish for.. with current world events it may just be granted to the detriment of all…
Oh and yes I am bigot.. i dislike all religions and thought police..but race n colour doesn’t matter a scap to me (if you knew me u would know why.. 😉 but I am saving that for AAB)
Nuff for now..
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Our lil’ calf lives another day. 🙂
And this time lashing out behind the skirt of Mbak Oigal. See what she wrote below instead of facing embarrassing question time,
Clearly old AAB’s struggling to wrap his ZX81 noggin around the race issue in any logically coherent manner. Stick with the jagung, for corn will bring true enlightenment cookie boy.
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AAB.. Oh our spoilt little white kid…do let me know when you get past the name calling stage.. I would relish the stoush although I suspect it will be but a fleeting diversion to my dark side.. kinda like using kittens for Murray Cod bait (ok, ok…we all have things we regret from our youth…Kinda like the chemist, who was dicking around with the test-tube you came in..He probably thought it was funny at the time tho).
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schmerly Says:
March 26th, 2009 at 8:57 pm
You have clearly never travelled to Africa or indeed India.So, do you have any experience of any part of Africa or India?
Looks like you’ve already decided!! what a clown I really can’t be bothered with you.
No, see the way it works is that “?” at the end of a sentence denotes that the preceding words are some sort of interrogatory, used to test knowledge. From this you may deduce that I am actualling asking if you have been to India or Africa, or if you are continuing your trend of talking out of your hat.
So, do you have any experience of any part of Africa or India?
Yeah, go Slank go, right on yeah dude.
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Mbak Oigal
Pathetic attempt to fan out smoke. I am sure Misterrr Mike Oxblack et al would like to hear what you think of Blackies. ‘Smoke for poke’ may be a good start.
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@ Bodoh..
You have clearly never travelled to Africa or indeed India.
Statement!
So, do you have any experience of any part of Africa or India?
Question!
Go back to school sunbeam.
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@ Oigal and Mr TTT
Thinking about your discussion, you might find this article interesting:
http://www.reason.com/news/show/33258.html
Cheers.
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See what she wrote below instead of facing embarrassing question time,
I’m still waiting for this bloody question. It’d better be a good one…
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ET says:
Mr TTT
from laziness, to xenophobia,
Sorry I’m a bit late to react. Yesterday was Nyepi and my internet provider was down.
For laziness I may have an explanation. In general – or more restricted to places like Java and Bali – life seems a bit too easy. To survive here one doesn’t need much extra’s. It’s always warm, food and fruit is in abundance, the simplest of housing will do, cloths are more of a luxury than a necessity. To be honest, this godgiven easiness is one of the reasons I live here. On the other hand it doesn’t provide much stimuli to go out and look for more. One could say that abundance breeds laziness. However the problems start when people fail to understand that the ‘other’ luxuries also don’t come as rezeki but need careful attention.
As for xenophobia, this is a different, more complex story. Before jumping into the obvious I have to do more research on it. But at first sight it seems to me that after more than 60 years this ‘collective memory’ of the colonial past is something that is lovingly cherished to avoid grabbing the bull by the horns. And as such it could also be reduced to laziness.
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fullmoonflower says:
Sorry I’m a bit late to react. Yesterday was Nyepi and my internet provider was down.
ooo ic…. so, you are in Bali….
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Achmad Sudarsono says:
Ibu Fullmoonflower Yth,
So lovely to have u back. 🙂 X O
Hope your move went well.
Hidup IM ! -
Pak Achmad, what has happened? You’ve been deleted.
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Thanks BK..Still confused tho..chicken and egg ..is it the people, culture or genetics in those countries who do reasonably well (and vise versa) or just blind luck the right guy in the right place when things were at their most formative stage (Singapore for instance?)
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Oi am a coider drinkerrrrr. Oi drink moi coider all day. oo arr oo arrr ay!
Comment on “Ponari & His Magic Healing Stone”.
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Indeed harping on about racism whilst himself using racist slurs, a common trait in this country. Apparently he’s not even Indonesian anyway but just pretending to be. All rather childish.
Was there one? I must have missed that.