MYFATHER
Episode 20's
Yudi woke up with a headache...
He frowned and held his head.waiting until the stoning pain disappeared slowly...Mirna did not stop him from drinking the bottle until the last drop and he must have been too drunk, or maybe even fainted, because absolutely no memory of what happened last night and how he could end up in bed...
What happened last night?
The sound of the taps from the bathroom stopped followed by the humming of women who came out from there. Mirna smiles to find the young man awake, while Yudi who finally realizes what happened to him last night curses his insolvency in the heart. The girl greeted cheerfully, ”Let's get up, slacker! It's morning already. Breakfast is prepared for us below.”
Yudi unceasingly cursed himself for such negligence. Allowing himself to get drunk and make love to the girl in his own home was obviously an unforgivable folly. Heran, Mirna looks mediocre with forbidden acts that occur here. Or maybe nothing happened last night, and the fear was just his feelings.
given last night's incident but his brain could not return it at all.
Rain spots outside accompanied when they, Mirna and herself, had breakfast together that morning without the presence of the mother who was apparently busy with her own activities in her room, ”Painting...if so he will forget the time..and ask him to come down for breakfast or lunch is the same as looking for things..”.
After eating both of them around the house to kill time, moreover, the raindrops still fall non-stop so that it will be better to do activities inside the house, and Mirna takes Yudi around in almost the entire room, except the third floor because they do not want their presence to disturb Mother Rose in her room on the top floor.
Yudi was amazed to find the room next to his room turned out to be an art room containing extraordinary wooden sculptures. The wood that becomes the ornamental material of various objects is made of various types; mahogany, balsa, sandalwood, dogwood, pine, even teak, with a level of density that also varies; starting from the very thick so that it takes great physical strength to form it, until thin wood that needs high accuracy so as not to break or damage when formed. The various objects of the statue seemed to bring the atmosphere in a remote corner of the jungle of Borneo because its shape takes the appearance of various animals such as arowana, piracucu, strange beetles with curving horns like a crescent moon, tigers in an attacking pose or who duck in fear, deer grazing, wolves in a howling position with their heads held high. The older the age of the statues Yudi found the carvings more refined.
”That is because the teachers of the past had more qualified knowledge, their sculpting ability emerged from a pure conscience, which made them capable of sculpting with so much detail. Their next generation might be able to replicate the technique but not necessarily all the science could be absorbed properly. So too with the hearts of the old masters.”
”Then how do you know these sculptors are learning from each other? Not necessarily the younger generation is always the disciples of the older generation. And it could be that they do have different styles according to their interests and level of intelligence on detailed things,” commented Yudi.
Mirna responded, ”Well, that's what you should pay close attention to. Come here..let me show you something awesome..” Mirna held a thirty-centimeter-tall rooster statue while Yudi approached. Inadvertently the young man's nose smelled the jasmine scent from his long black hair so Yudi had to concentrate hard on every word of Mirna. ”...see the grater on his neck? Then look at the wings formed from contours and circular patterns? Now try to compare with this statue of the banyan crowd Rawen, see the same grater down the formation of the tree trunk up to the roots and then the circular pattern becomes a complex decoration of the leaves.”
Yudi nodded. He just realized it now. There was indeed the same of these two art objects but he found that despite having similar styles but circular patterns in the banyan statue was not perfectly round in shape but more oval-like. The pattern is so small and flexible that it will not be seen with just one glance. He said that and Mirna nodded happily.
”Ya, at first glance it looks the work of the same person but actually not. This chicken statue was made by Datuk Mahendra, a nobleman north of Sampit in the 15th century, while this banyan tree was made by Prajangga Nanta, the son of Datuk Mahendra. Although studying directly from his father is still the quality of the two is different, as well as between teachers and students."
"Prajangga Nanta is not easy to mimic the characteristic of Datuk Mahendra who is famous as a full moon carver with its circular pattern, it is visible from the circle of his sculptures perfectly round like a full moon. You can see in this work of Prajangga Nanta, there is a slight defect in the form of an unsymmetrical bulge in some parts, obviously he was not able to absorb all the knowledge of his father well.”.
”Or maybe his father would not give it away because that's his characteristic that he does not want to give to anyone, even if it's to the child, or maybe Prajangga Nanta chose a different style so that he could escape from the shadow of his father.”
Mirna again smiled at Yudi's rebuttal, ”It could be so, unfortunately both of your allegations are wrong. This full moon circular pattern is a sacred pattern and all Dayak great sculptors will be willing to do anything to have this kind of skill, because that is able to make it will occupy the highest caste, honorable place, and dubbed as the guardian of heritage. That must be what drives Prajangga Nanta to master it, instead of creating a new style that is unknown or even will be underestimated by the community.”
”Yang apparently failed to master it. What happened to Prajangga Nanta?”
Mirna shrugs, ”She's Datuk's son. The grandfather was the same as the little king in Java. What can small people do to him? Putting it aside, it's impossible! Prajangga Nanta still occupies his honorable place but the community loses their distinctive originality due to his failure to absorb the science of Datuk Mahendra. Even so he is a wise man and the public can still see his philosophical similarities with Datuk Mahendra.”
”Oh, what is it?”
”Patuk takes animal objects such as roosters or dogs while Prajangga Nanta dwells on forest trees. Both are symbols of the protector. Roosters protect humans from the blindness of the day by waking the sun while dogs become human guards and loyal friends. While trees have the meaning of protecting, many animals need a home as their shelter. Take a look at other works of Prajangga Nanta, he always makes a statue of a tree in a crowd or group, it means shade given by his government.”
Yudi listened while nodding, ”By the way you've been there? Rawen Forest?”
Mirna replied, ”The forest is not far from this house. Rawen is the most amazing place. There are not only trees like a forest, but the river flows clear, irrigating ’ natural gardens overgrown with wild roses. You are right about the object of the statue of Prajangga Nanta, the place is full of inspiration, no wonder if Nanta or Datuk poured a lot of things about the place in his work.”
”Then occasionally you have to take me there.”
”By pleasure..”.
The longer you are in the room full of the statue, Yudi feels himself getting smaller behind the historical greatness of the objects around. Not just small, but stupid at the same time, because little is known about this world and the life that happens in it. The girl took him around to another room on the second floor before moving to the ground floor. It turned out that exploring the house took almost half a day. Yudi dubbed the building an art museum, because the house turned out to store many art objects in addition to sculptures.
”Well, you've seen the art objects that are here. How about we look at the wine cellar?” Mirna.
”As long as there is no need I have to drink the supplies that are there,” Yudi joking. ”My headache can recur later.”
”You didn't seem to have a headache yesterday,” Mirna smiled meaningfully.
”What do I look like?” ask Yudi. ”I thought I was drunk heavily.”
”What do you mean?” Mirna did not respond to Yudi's question, continuing to walk ahead to the wine cellar.
As Mother Rose said, various kinds of wine are in the warehouse located in the basement. Stored in shelves sculpted along the walls as tall as himself, the wood intersects to form parallelograms that are decoration as well as storage rooms bottles. I've never seen a bottle of wine this much.
As the woman told her about Margou 1870, she found three large crates still full of bottles of this type of wine in the corner of the room. The aroma that goes out in the room consists of various wine entities that blend into one adjust the smell. Yudi took one of the bottles carefully, blinked for a bit to relieve the sense of dizziness from the intoxicating aroma that seeped from the rim of the cork-plugged bottle cap, and read the label neatly stuck on his stomach.
”Chauvignon 1770,” murmured.
”Extraction in the old-fashioned way that still rely on mechanical squeezer machine.”
”Bordeaux 1825,” murmured Yudi after taking another bottle.
”It is the best type.”
”How much is it now?” ask Yudi.
Mirna shrugged, ”Okay! I was never interested in knowing.”
Yudi returned the two bottles carefully, ”If I must have done so. Storing old wine just like an old house, the longer the price must be more expensive.”
”If it is so then why?” ask Mirna.
”Are you not interested in selling it?”
Mirna smiled,”We don't need money. Do you think we need it?”
Yudi felt himself a total fool. The Mirna family's condition clearly shows that money is not something that matters to them. But he had not won when his gaze was pounded on something in the right corner of the room. In the dimness of the room saw a round stone niche that only appeared the top only, while the bottom was cut by the floor layer, which was cut off, it looks like the bottom was made a niche in the form of stairs that jutted down and became the foundation for the new room. A wooden door covered the recess without the child's keyhole.
”What room is it?” Yudi pointed to the place.
His gaze was fixed on the recess until he did not see the change in Mirna's face, ”There was nothing there. Just an old door with no room behind it.”
”Then why make a door without any room to be covered?”
”My grandmother said it used to be an underground passageway, a makeshift road to escape during the colonial war. Now the hallway has been destroyed after an earthquake and the ceiling collapsed.”
”Then the place was used?”
”Once, maybe! But not since my grandmother's time.”
”Underground passageway. I thought it was only in castles abroad,” murmured Yudi.
”If you are satisfied to look around here we will see the last place,” said Mirna.
”Come!” sahut Yudi's. He had only stepped a few meters from where he was when his foot kicked a flat object that was poking out from behind a hole between the legs of the wine rack. The object shifted slowly and Mirna rushed to hold it with her feet so that the lump would not hit the wooden wall which would cause a noise. Yudi turned to look because the girl just stayed behind him.
”You're coming?”
”Yes, briefly! I thought I saw the rat here.”
”Mana?”
”Ah, she's already running when she hears you talk,” Mirna laughs tastelessly.
The girl guided Yudi out of the room after turning off the lights. Unfortunately, the dimness was unable to withstand the speed of sunlight that burst from behind the narrow hole that is the ventilation of the room, and fell on the white lump which turned out to be a femur of five centimeters long.
***