Sakuddei Myths: “Cat and Mouse” as recounted by Tengatiti | Translation & Commentary by Dr. Reimar Schefold
Cat and Mouse
as recounted by Tengatiti
Translation by Dr. Reimar Schefold
There is an old story in Mentawai about how the cat came into being.
Once upon a time, there was a man called Father Lelengguine and his wife, Mother Lelengguine. The two were traveling in their dugout canoe to the mouth of the river. The woman had prepared a bamboo quiver full of food, and early in the morning, they set out. At the estuary, they went fishing. After they had caught enough, perhaps after two days or three, they started back to their house upstream. When they had almost arrived there, the woman said, "Let's stop for a moment. I want to get some taro tubers in my field there for us to eat. But you, stay in the dugout and wait for me."
So, the woman climbed up the riverbank to go harvest taro. No sooner had she disappeared than a mouse came in the form of a woman. Now Mother Lelengguine was pregnant, and so was the mouse. The mouse said to Father Lelengguine, "Come, let's go, bleep, bleep, let's go, bleep!"
Father Lelengguine was fooled by Mouse-mouse, that was her name, and by her voice, as she happened to be pregnant too, just like his own wife. They continued upstream.
When the two had disappeared, Mother Lelengguine came back looking for her husband. He was no longer there. He was gone. She called him, "Father Lelengguine, wait for me, do wait for me!"
He heard his wife's voice and said, "Who is that making noise? Who is that calling?"
"Bleep, bleep, don't listen, that's just the voice of the gibbon ape, that's just the sound of someone poking with the dugout canoe, the sound of someone paddling, let's keep going, bleep, bleep!" said the mouse. So they paddled on upstream and landed at the Uma. There they stayed, stayed, and stayed.
But his wife, whom they had abandoned, built herself a little house. Not long after, she gave birth to her child, a boy. And through incantations, she made a beautiful house for them both to come into being. Many fowls and pigs made her and her child rich.
Not long after, Mouse-mouse also gave birth to a son. The two children grew up, hers and the child of the woman who had been abandoned. They could already find their own way in the forest. One day the two boys went hunting with bird arrows, hunting for birds and squirrels. The divorced woman's son - let's call her that - took his bow and arrow into the brush. He saw fruits on a sokut tree and many birds pecking at the fruits. He began to shoot at these birds. The child of the mouse had gone the same way and had arrived at the sokut tree as well. The child of Mother Lelengguine, the divorced one, shot at a branch on his side of the tree, and the arrows fell on the other side. The child of the mouse on the opposite side of the tree did the same, and his arrows also fell. He saw the arrows falling from the other side and wondered, "What, what are those arrows? Surely these are not my arrows?" And similarly, the child of the divorced woman wondered, "What, what kind of arrows are these? Surely these are not my own?"
It was not long before they caught sight of each other. "Hello, have we met before!"
"Yes, hello!"
"So those are your bird arrows I found there."
"Yes, it's the same with me. These are your bird arrows I found here.
"So, it is."
Now they continued shooting, and when they had enough, the child of the mouse and the child of the divorced woman each went back to his uma. The child of the divorced woman said to his mother, "Mama, I met someone who has become my friend."
"How tall was he?"
"He was as tall as me."
"So!"
And with the child of the mouse, it went the same: "Mama, I met a friend, Papa, I met a friend."
Then Mother Lelengguine, the divorced one, said to her son, "Tomorrow go again, and then you swing, and in time while swinging, you tell each other who you are." The next morning, she prepared food for her son, and once again, he went bird shooting.
At the sokut tree, the two met. They shot their arrows, and then the divorced one's child said, "Friend, come, let's go swinging."
"Good." And they made themselves a swing. The child of the mouse said, "I'll swing first, friend." And he swung and sang to it:
"Here I am swinging, friend,
my father, that's Father Lelengguine,
my mother, that's the mother mouse,
my grandfather is grandfather Shield Painter."
When he finished, the other said, "Now I go, friend," and began to swing:
"Here I go swinging, friend,
my father, that's Father Lelengguine,
my mother, this is Mother Lelengguine,
my grandfather is grandfather Shield Painter."
Now the son of the divorced one said to himself, "Then we are the same. We are friends."
They divided what they had shot with their bird arrows. One bird that remained, they split into two equal parts, one half for each. Then they had enough, and both the child of the mouse and the child of the divorced one returned home. Mother Lelengguine asked: "Did you swing, you and your friend?"
"Yes, we did."
"And what did he say?"
Her son repeated the song, and the mother said:
"Then that's your younger brother, isn't he, boy!"
"Really?"
"And you, what did you say?"
Her son repeated his own song.
"Good, it's true what you said." And so they remained.
The child of the mouse, however, felt the same way. The father asked his son about their songs, and the son repeated them. "Well then, this is your older brother, boy, or your younger brother!"
And now Father Lelengguine went and scraped onam wood with the red juice. He scraped, and then he pressed it until the sap came out, and he took it along. He figured he would throw it on his son's friend like a spear and scare him, so he could then follow him to his Uma. He sneaked up on him, and then he threw the scraped onam wood at the son of the divorced woman. He threw at him - throw! - he hit him, and the boy thought he had been hit by a spear. His whole body had turned blood-red from the onam-juice! "Mama, get me. Mama, they threw a spear at me!"
He ran back to the uma, and the mother shouted, "What's wrong with you? Where were you? What were you doing there?" She looked at him, "Oh, it's nothing, boy. What is it?" And now the father came forth. But no sooner had she caught sight of him than she cried out: "What, don't come here, what do you want here, don't come, there's nothing for you here, you didn't care for us anymore, you just abandoned us, you rejected us, don't come, even if you do come, we don't want you anymore, you made us sad and we're ashamed, we weren't good enough for you, you've got a new wife now, you've got a beautiful wife now!"
And Mother Lelengguine blocked the door, locked it, and so the way was closed to him. Then she called out, "Listen, you mosquitoes, come in droves! And you, rain, fall in torrents!"
Then it began to rain in torrents, and the mosquitoes came all night long until morning. Now the man had felt the pain of the cold and the pain of the mosquitoes. There, in the morning, Mother Lelengguine opined again. "Now you've felt how it hurts. Come here then, come on up. So how could it happen that you left me, that you abandoned me?"
"No, when I left you, it wasn't on purpose. It was the mouse that lied to me. When you had gone ashore, that time when we came from the estuary, she came. 'Bleep, bleep, let's go, bleep, bleep!' Then as we went further upstream, I heard you calling for me, and I answered, 'What's that noise?' 'Don't listen, that's just the voice of the gibbon ape, that's just the sound of someone poking with the dugout canoe, the sound of someone paddling, bleep, bleep, don't pay attention!'"
"Oh! That's how it went?"
"Yes, just like that."
"Well, if that's how it went, let's not say much more then. Let's go home."
"And when we get there, how are we going to proceed? We have to find a way."
"Yes. When you get there, you say to Mouse-mouse..."
"I'll say there has arrived - a sister of mine, that's what I'll say. And we'll pretend like if you're sick, whatever, we'll find a way."
"So, let's go!"
Father Lelengguine went back to Mouse-mouse. He said, "Your sister-in-law is over there. She is not well. She is a divorced woman. She has many ulcers and severe pain. If it is all right with you, she will come to us. She can tend the chickens, she can tend the pigs, she can watch the boys."
"Bleep, bleep, go on then, make her come, make her come. Go get her. Go call her!"
And because everything was apparently all right with the mouse, Father Lelengguine said, "So tomorrow morning, I'll go and call her." And he went and called the divorced one, his former wife. He went through the bushes and said to her: "It's time. Let's go."
"So, let's go. But what did you say? Does she really want to, the Mouse-mouse?"
"Yes, she does. And so and so she said."
"I see." And now she started pretending. She wrapped her upper arm as if she was wrapping ulcers. She pretended. And while walking, she used a stick. Together with her child, she returned to her former house. They walked slowly, slowly, and then climbed up into the house.
"We are together, sister-in-law!"
"Yes, we are together!" And the man said:
"She's not well. Her ulcers hurt her. Her body isn't worth much anymore."
"Yes, bleep, bleep, it's just fine with me that she came."
Mother Lelengguine, however, murmured, "So, it's really all right with you. We'll have to think about that first."
So, they stayed there, and the divorced one set about cooking. And while she was cooking, she made a fish net. As she did so, she pretended that the net needle had fallen out of her hand, but she did it on purpose: "Oh, my net needle has fallen between the floor slats and under the house. Who will go and get it?"
The mouse replied, "Bleep, bleep, I'll go and get it. I'm off."
But now what was cooking in the pot was boiling. We don't know what it was, vegetables or bananas. And the mouse set off to the room under the floor. While she was going there, the divorced woman fetched the boiling water from the hearthstones. She fetched it and poured it through the floor slats over the mouse down there - "Bleep, she cried! If the maggots swarm out of me, they will know how to get you!"
That dirty face! So, the mouse died. But no sooner had it died than the maggots came crawling out of it and became the mice as we know them today! They crawled and crawled.
Upstairs, however, there was a wedding feast. They married once again as if with a brand-new woman. They celebrated the wedding, and Mother Lelengguine cooked pork for the feast. In the evening, when she had had enough, she went to sleep by the cooking place. But then a mouse came and gnawed on the crossbar against which the bamboo containers filled with the meat and broth were leaning. Mother Lelengguine was tired and slept deeply. The mouse gnawed and gnawed - so the bamboo containers fell and poured their contents over the sleeping woman.
Mother Lelengguine died. Everyone cried. They took her to the burial place and cried and cried.
At night, her child had a dream. His mother said: "You must come, motherless one, and look after me. Take a chicken basket with you. If you catch sight of something on the grave that looks toward the forest, do not fetch it. But if you see something that looks toward the watercourse, that shall be something for you and your brothers and sisters to play with. You must fetch that."
The next morning, the son said, "Dad, I had a dream." And he told him what he had dreamed.
"Really?"
So, they went to the grave and took a chicken basket along. And there they saw something that looked toward the forest. That was a wild cat. When it became aware of them, it made a leap - and it had already jumped away. But there sat something else as well, something for them to play with, and that was a house cat. They went and put it in the chicken basket, as the mother had said.
They brought the cat home in the basket, and there it caught sight of the mice crawling all over the place. It tried to get out of the basket and bit at it. "What is it with our toy? What does it want? Is it perhaps attempting to eat the mice?" And they opened the basket. No sooner was it open than the cat set upon the mice - jump! snap! snap! Before long, it began to smell foul in the house and the undergrowth around it from all the dead mice, the mice which she ate. Soon, some people started to scold: "What's this? She's scattering her food scraps everywhere, that nostril-haired one, that cat, the rotten one!"
Then the cat got sad. She went to the riverbank and sat down there in the sun. She sat and saw driftwood floating by. She jumped onto the driftwood and drifted with it. She drifted and arrived at the mouth of the river. There were Malays from afar, fishing there with their casting nets. They called out in their language, "Oh, djurumadjo, something for us to play with. Let's get it!" They fetched the cat, and when they went back to their villages, they took it with them as a pet for the Malays from afar.
But its origin, the origin of the cat, is here with us Mentawaians. Only when we get hold of one it always remains shy and soon runs away. And why is it shy around us? Because it had been scolded in the past.
And this is the end of our story. That's the story, and there is nothing else to tell.
Commentary
Among the animals that originated from humans in mythical times are the cat and the mouse. In this myth, however, not only the behavior of the human protagonists but also the peculiarities of the resulting animals themselves are used to explain such transformations. Indeed, much like in Western languages, the relationship between cats and mice is considered in Mentawai to be a model of innate enmity. It is the emergence of this characteristic to which the Mentawai tale refers. Moreover, as far as the cat is concerned, the story concludes by establishing another particularity that Mentawaians perceive in their cats. They complain that cats never want to bond to a specific uma but run away from the house at every opportunity. Indeed, unlike dogs, they are not treated as pets. They are not given names and are hardly ever fed. The fact that a small cat, which a neighbor had given me, came purring after some time at my call was a lasting source of astonishment for the Sakuddei.
The fact that in the story, it is two women between whom the enmity comes to fruition is certainly not accidental. Depending on the narrative's perspective, one can discover in it a male or female point of view. For the woman, the general rule that after marriage, she moves in with her husband and is taken into his uma remains a constant source of insecurity. After a divorce, she is dependent on her brothers to take her back in and provide for her. Since they received a bride price at the time of the marriage, which can be reclaimed by the remaining spouse depending on the assessment of guilt, conflicts and corresponding insecurity threaten the position of the woman. The fact that the abandoned woman in the story takes the reins into her own hands can be seen as a kind of counter-design from the female perspective. For the man, the insecurity lies elsewhere. He plays a rather subordinate role in the story, but the universal male concern can nevertheless be presupposed that a man is foisted, through his wife's deceit, with a child that is not his. Through the women's actions and the man's own retracing of it, this concern is put aside in the story. He then resolutely sides with the mother of his own child.
As always, the narrator Tengatiti turns out to be a master storyteller. A narrative detail such as the halving of the remaining bird at the dividing up of the prey to seal the new friendship between the two boys shows great empathy. A special narrative talent is also expressed in his account of the reunion between the betrayed father and his former wife. As in his other stories, Tengatiti intoned the interspersed verses in a sonorous falsetto that was admired by all of his listeners.
Dr. Reimar Schefold
Dr. Reimar Schefold is Professor Emeritus Cultural Anthropology and Sociology of Indonesia at Leiden University. He has a long-standing interest in material culture, art, and vernacular architecture, particularly that of Southeast Asia, which has been the subject of many of his scholarly publications and Museum exhibitions. He has conducted several extensive periods of fieldwork in Indonesia, notably among the Sakuddei of Siberut, Mentawai Islands, where he spent two years from 1967 to 1969 and several shorter stays later; the Batak of Sumatra, and the Sa’dan Toraja of Sulawesi.
He is, with Steven G. Alpert, editor and one of the authors of Eyes of the Ancestors: The Arts of Island Southeast Asia at the Dallas Museum of Art (Dallas: Dallas Museum of Art; New Haven etcetera: Yale University Press. 2013) and, with Han F. Vermeulen, of Treasure Hunting? Collectors and Collections of Indonesian Artefacts (Leiden: Research School CNWS/National Museum of Ethnology. 2002). His most recent publication is Toys for the Souls: Life and Art on the Mentawai Islands (Belgium : Primedia sprl. 2017) where in the Bibliography more of his writings on Mentawai can be found.
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