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I Was Part Of A Real Headhunting Family · Tales from Incredible Tales

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: It's like ushering me.
• 0:01
  Speaker 1: It's a figure, it's more like a shadow. Hey, uncle,
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: is that one of the, the, one of the people
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: from next door down there, refuses to face me, refuses
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: to change his line of sight, and said, do not
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: pay attention to whatever that thing is.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: My name is Norm.
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: My name is Fur, my name is Wayne. My name
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: is Kyle, and this is Tales from Incredible Tales, inspired
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: by the classic horror series, we explore Southeast Asia's supernatural culture.
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: Our guest is new to this show, but not new
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: to us. He was a guest on our other podcast
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: that air way back in, I believe, 2024. He is
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: the world's second podcast librarian with over 200 credits on Podchaser,
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: writer of the 2024 romantic memoir for A 1000 Springs.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: And someone who has deep knowledge about folklore and the
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: Iban culture. He is truly a creative who goes above
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: and beyond with any medium.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: Norman Chella, welcome to the show.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks for having me. Um, pleasure to be here
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: and I'm happy to talk about this again.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: It
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: It's been a while since we've done that intro, like
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: the specific details. I'm like, oh yeah, we have gone
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: into the deep dive about everything surrounding Ipan culture, but
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: I'm really happy to.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Explore more about it because some new things are discovered
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: came about like this year.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: So in this episode, we'll be discussing Norman's heritage and
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: supernatural experiences in being part of the Iban people, exposure
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: to the dark topics at a young age, Western versus
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: Asian horror culture, and the discussion about continuing the conversation
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: about Iban culture.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: This episode was inspired by the classic Incredibletales episode, The Forest.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: So Norm is part of the Iban people, the largest
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: ethnic group in Sarawak, known for their fierce warriors and headhunters.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: They are celebrated for their rich culture, longhouse living, traditional dance,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: and crafts, and a centuries-long tales of exciting and dark law.
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: Norm, could you tell us a little bit about the
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: fascinating aspects of IBAN life as well as any macabre
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: or supernatural tales that you had from your
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: experiences?
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: I was not active during the headhunting era, but I
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: could shed some light on this, uh, so.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: In Borneo, we have around 25-ish different indigenous tribes. Like
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: you mentioned, Iban is the largest one, census is around
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: 750,000 Ibans, whether in or out of the state. We
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: are best known for, like you said, headhunting. Um, we
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: are also a river tribe, so if you were to
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: look at the island of Borneo, you can kind of
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: like guess or predict where all the longhouses are or
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: as we say, Rumapanjai.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: Where all the Rumapanjai, according to the river patterns throughout
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: the island, as people migrate and as long houses populate,
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: they have to separate their families because it's too big
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: to handle so many people in one area, so they
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: migrate into, uh, deeper into the island.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: For myself, um, I come from an area that is
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: a peaceful prefecture.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: We are a broken off segment or branch of the
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: main family which is in Batong. Those are the strongest
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: and fiercest warriors and
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: I guess we can talk about this later in the,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: in the episode, but they hunted so many heads.
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: And got so much glory and power and resources that
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: they couldn't.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: Take care of everybody. So they did one big family
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: meeting and said, hey, you're gonna move north, you're gonna
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: move east, you're gonna move, etc. etc. We're still gonna
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: be the most powerful one, but you are a branch
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: family of the Batong family. And so I'm part of
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: one of the ones that went, uh, further out. Part
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: of that meant that we, we need to have proof
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: that we are part of that family. So,
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: We carry some heads with us. We carry some preserved
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: skulls with us. So I grew up in my long
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: house and there are just these 89 skulls hanging above
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: my door.
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: And I didn't know what they were because at a
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: tender age of 5 or 6, I'm just like, oh, face.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: Until like later on, I asked my mom, I'm like, Mom,
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: what is that? He's like, oh, that's dead people. I'm like, oh, no,
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: I shouldn't be hearing about this at like 7 years
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: old or something. And the more that I hear these stories,
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: the more that, that I have my parents to thank
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: for this, um.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: They were very graceful in the way that they were
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: telling me about these stories, but it is quite violent.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: It is quite dark. Headhunting is a practice. It's not
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: just something that you do willy-nilly. You don't just chaotically
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: take people's heads, etc. There is actually honor. There's a
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: dual system. There are specific rules and criteria. For example,
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: you don't take the head of someone who does not
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: come from the land because it will mean that you
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: intend to duel.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: In a cowardly manner by fighting them in a terrain
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: that's disadvantageous for them. So it needs to be a
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: fellow warrior or another warrior, but of a different tribe.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: If one of the raid leaders from the long house
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: is like, we're going to raid this village, then a
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: group of maybe 7 to 10 of them go and attack.
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: And if the signs don't come up, we can talk
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: about the signs as well, then they can battle, raid, pillage,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: take food, and you need to have a duel that
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: is witnessed by a third party, and then you will
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: have the right.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: Hunter.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: Wait, so it's not as simple as ABC? There, there
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: are rules. Oh, OK, OK, OK, I'm so intrigued because
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: I think this is the first time that I dive
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: into all that I get to know the, you know,
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: a little bit about the history of, um, the Iban tribe,
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: and I'm, you know, because, so I do MGWla, so
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: it's where, you know, people share stories with me and
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: then I share it on my radio show.
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: Uh, I heard a few stories that that came from Sarawak,
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: you know, which is the Iban people and stuff like that.
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: So it's interesting, you know, uh, you know, one of
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: them are part of, of their, their culture is, is
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: with you, and I'm listening to your story. It's amazing.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: So I can't wait to hear more honestly. Yeah, he's
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: super excited.
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: I, I wanted to ask, you said there's like 8
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: or 9 skulls hanging in your home when you were
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: growing up. Do you know how long ago they were
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: hunted?
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: Interesting. Uh, good question. I don't know. Um, they look
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: pretty old. Uh, so if, if I wanna give it
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: an approximate, there, there's a way to calculate that but
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: I just never made the calculation myself. So, we're looking
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: at maybe 6 to 10 generations before this time in
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: which the era of headhunting is active.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: And that's just before, you know, the, the ruling was
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: banned or the regulation for it became more strict.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: And that is probably the youngest it could be, but
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: it must be older because we are a migrated family.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: So technically, it doesn't come from our long house specifically,
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: we are derived from the main one and the main
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: one was most active maybe 1520 generations ago. Calculate that
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: by a number of years, assuming decades being like maybe
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: 3 decades, 4 decades per, and we're looking at maybe
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: Minimum.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: 200 years. I, I, I don't have a confirmed number. I,
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: I cannot confirm like unless you know someone that can calculate, uh,
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: but I, I, I urge you not to touch the
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: skull because it might provoke something. Yeah, so there are
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: some stories surrounding
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: that.
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: Minimum 150, 200+. I think that's a safe bet for
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: an answer. Yeah.
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: So Norm, as a child, uh, you had seen such
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: skulls hanging from your childhood long house or Roma, I
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: think in Malay it's called Ruma Panjang, right? And what
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: was the experience of being exposed to such dark topics,
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: you know, such as death at a very young age,
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: and uh how do you think it has changed your
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: perception of approaching taboo topics?
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: The term dark never applied. At the age of 5,
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: were you thinking about anything from a moral point of view?
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: All that we see when we're 5, is that we observe,
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: we wonder, and we're looking for the answer to it.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: And so, when I was young, I see these skulls.
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: They're not skulls to me.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: They, they are just details on the ceiling, right? It
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: looks like a head. It looks like a face. And
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: then later on, I would notice like, oh, in one
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: of those like child biology textbooks, it'd be like a
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: cross section of a body and I'm like, wait a minute,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: that looks like what I see where my grandmother lives,
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: which is back in the jungle. Um, and I was wondering,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: why are they there? Why are they not in a body?
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: So asking these questions to
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: Not only my parents, but also my grandparents. Remember, tribes
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: passed on their history orally. We don't have documentation. We
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: don't have systems. We don't have ways in which we
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: can track the validity of any form of truth except
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: through generational passing down of story. So the only source
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: of truth technically is my mother, my father, my grandmother
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: and my grandfather. And to note that I'm both Yvonne
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: on both my mother and my father.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: Which means that they have two different perspectives of Iban culture.
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: One is definitely much more into the living in the jungle,
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: strong headhunter, past, etc.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: So I would ask, this is on my father's side,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: I would ask my grandmother, like, what is the story
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: behind that?
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: And they would say that.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: When a man kills another man and they take their head.
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: Their blood is on their hands.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: And when they go back home to the Rumapanjai.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: They go back to their family
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: The vengeful spirit of the one who was slain can
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: smell their own blood, so they will come to haunt you.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: And it will haunt your family.
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: And what do you do when you are a warrior
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: in the longhouse with this understanding that 1, you have
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: killed a man, and 2, you may have brought in
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: something that you cannot detect, experience.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: Or observe. So what do you do?
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: You hang their skull.
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: In front of your door
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: And you show the spirit their own image of their
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: own death.
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: And you tell them to go away.
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: It
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: is a. Yeah. We warriors.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Have a, have a very interesting relationship with fear, whether
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: it's our tattoos, whether it's our culture, whether it's the
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: way that we hold certain proverbs and headhunting is the
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: same as well. Are we afraid of the spirits? Yes.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: How do we defeat them by becoming scarier than them.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: So we incite fear in the spirits that haunt us.
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: And that is why we hang the skulls above.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: Oh damn.
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: I think that's the perfect reaction. Whoa, whoa, that's why
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: they are a warrior tribe. Yeah, you see, like I said,
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: you know, this is like the first time I dive
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: into like, you know, I, wow, it's so interesting. Just
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: just
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: to preface as well, um, this kind of history is all,
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: it's not just in Iban tribes, the other tribes also
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: do head hunting as well. I can only speak from
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: the point of view of my
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: The stories that I've heard growing up specifically for the
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: Ibo peoples because I think some of the other tribes,
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: they do a little bit different. Yeah, yeah. Some are
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: more like black magic, voodoo things and then we're like,
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: we're scared. We can't kill that. We can't kill what,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: what doesn't have skin or blood or bone. Um, so
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: there are ways in which we have this relationship with,
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: you know, spirits but also manna. There's like a definition
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: of manna in, in our lore, but
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah, fight fear with fear. That is how we
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: battle. I mean, you touched on a little bit when
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: you said the relationship that Iban people have, it's manifested
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: in stuff like the tattoos. How, how, what is that
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: connection between your tattoos and Iban culture?
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: So we in our lore, not only vengeful spirits, we
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: also have these beings.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: In different, shall we say realms or dimensions that are
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: far beyond the human realm.
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: And one of those is what we call the giants
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: and giants are creatures that are very insurmountable. They're hard
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: to comprehend. Their morality as well is a bit vague.
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: So if you meet a giant, you don't know if
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: they're like a good giant or like an evil giant.
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: The general sign is, it is a being that is
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: towering far above the trees, yet it's still humanoid in
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: shape and you don't know if they're good or bad.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: Now, to answer your question, there are some that are
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: extremely bad. So, my family, we have family shields. We
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: have them ingrained on ourselves, either in the pieces that
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: we have created or tattoos, or my arm is filled
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: with both my father's shield and my mother's shield, and
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: the paintings on the shields are depictions of those giants,
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: depictions of other animals, mythical creatures.
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: And like I said, we fight with fear. So we
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: paint onto the shield that is facing our enemy, creature
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: of all evil because we intend to point it outward
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: to the people we're about to slay.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: Because when we see you from far away and we
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: intend to raid you, the very first thing you see,
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: it's not your figure, it's not your spear, it is.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: The huge black eyes of the, there's like a giant,
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: there's like a soul sucking giant painted on the shield
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: that is charging at you.
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: Once again, fear tactics.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: So norm, I mean, I mean we we talked a
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: little bit about your, you know, tattoos and your law.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: What about like supernatural stories? Like do you have any
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: encounters and whatnot?
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: I
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: have some, I have some that are more personal. Um
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: they weren't in like an Iban context. But I have,
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: I have one that was very specifically Iban. One time
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: it was one of those trips where the family would
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: go back to the long house.
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: So our long house is like 4 or 5 hours'
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: drive from Kuching. So that's the closest large city, right?
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: So you're driving in, luckily they have a highway and
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: all that, but you're driving through the highway and then
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: suddenly you're in the jungle and then you veer off
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: into this off-road path and then suddenly there's life in
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: this long house where we are celebrating something or, or
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: a family event is happening. On one of those trips,
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: we were there and I was staying over for a
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: while and I was just taking a break on the
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: balcony and balcony at night.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: Has no other view except the forest in front of us. So,
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: It starts to rain a little bit, like not too heavy.
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: But I was just enjoying the, you know, the rain,
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: the breeze, the wind.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: And then I saw a figure from the forest.
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: And then the figure was like ushering me like this,
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: like this, and in my head, because you never know,
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: I was drunk. I was like, oh, is that like a,
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: like an uncle want to go pee, is it like
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: or something, you know, you never know, right? Because you
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: wanna check on each other, we're like, oh, and
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: It was like ushering me.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: It's a figure. It's more like a shadow.
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: And I turned to the uncle next to me, it's
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: because we're all like friendly with each other, right? And
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: we're like, hey, uncle, is that one of the, the,
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: one of the people from next door down there? And
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: then he does this.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: He's also facing the balcony outside, OK. The, the, the figure,
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: the person was on that way.
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: Refuses to face me because I'm next to him, refuses
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: to face me, refuses to change his line of sight,
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: and said,
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: Do not pay attention to whatever that thing is. And
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: then after a while, when the rain got harder, that
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: the figure just disappeared.
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: And I'm like,
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: Oh no. So the next day.
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: I woke up, everyone's like sober and normal, and I
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: saw the same uncle again, and he's just like relaxing
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: and just having fun, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like,
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Hey, uncle, uh, what was that yesterday? I didn't, I
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: didn't really understand what it was. Was it something like
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: serious or was it real? Was it like a family
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: friend or whatever? And then he said that, um, I
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: don't remember the exact words.
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: But it was something along the lines of, you shouldn't
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: ask too many questions about what you're unable to understand.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: And I don't know
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: About the the gravity of that answer.
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: But all I remember in that moment.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: Was that he's a very relaxed uncle. He's like, he's like,
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: Like this, right? But then when, when I asked the question,
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: he just tensed up and then he looked at me
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: dead in the eye and he said that, and then
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: he relaxed again and then he just continued on with his.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: Usual other conversation. So I never got to know what
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: the source of that was.
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: I think, I think that's way creepier. Let's say I
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: see something and then you ask me, so what is that?
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: If you don't know anything, you just shut up. Something
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: in that line Singaporean context that is way creepier. It
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: is not knowing. I feel like not knowing is way
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: scarier than knowing. Yeah, definitely. I mean, not in my
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: context in the studio lah, but still, you get what
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, right?
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I know, no, I was curious. I was like, yeah.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: I mean, I did entertain the idea of like, oh,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: this is something spiritual, it might be too powerful for me, etc.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: I did walk into the forest during the day to
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: see like, are there any footprints? Are there any marks, etc.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: Couldn't find anything. I, I really couldn't find anything. However,
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: what I did think about, and this is like a
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: week or two after, because I was fine, so I
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: don't think anything latched onto me. What I thought about
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: was that we did have this interesting conversation within the
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: family about
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: The kinds of spirits or the way that things manifest.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: In the forest through living beings. So like, for example,
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: If a monkey comes into the farm, don't ever try
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: to capture or interrupt it, or else.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Your ancestors will enter your dreams and tell you, let
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: go of the monkey or something bad will happen, etc.
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: So we have a strong like seer slash visionary element
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: in our family. So my grandmother still dreams of specific images.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: The way that these manifest, sometimes if it becomes so strong,
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: it would manifest in the visible realm, but the only
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: time you can make the connection and that you can
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: perceive it with your, your actual eye.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: is when there's enough manna as an energy basically, and
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: the only time when there is enough manna.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: That's when it's in the forest at night, untouched by
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: human hands. Yeah.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: No, I don't think, I don't think it's a giant. Actually,
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: speaking about a giant, you said giant is like as
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: tall as a tree or it could be bigger and
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: it's like a humanoid figure, right? Sorry, for, for my
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: imagination purposes, right? Is it like Attack on Titan?
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: Jack?
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: Ah, I, I think so. Yeah, the cartoon, yeah,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: yeah. Do you know Aku, the main, the main villain?
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: Do you know how he was designed?
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: Do you know, do you know how they designed it?
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: I'm curious. Yeah,
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: Balinese tattooing. So, tattoo culture in, in, in Saraw was
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: brought in by the Cayan tribe who learned it from
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: the Balinese people. And so there's a lot of inspiration
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: that came from Balinese tattooing and art styles. And so
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: when the Iban tribe learned from the Cayan tribe.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: They're like, what can we draw? Of course, we like fear,
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: so we'll draw everything that scares us. And so we
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: started drawing depictions of what a giant could look like
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: because 9 times out of 10, if you see a giant,
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: you're like that, right? The, the, the, the Western equivalent
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: would be like Cullu. It's Lovecraftian. If you, if you
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: witness it, you will go insane because you cannot comprehend.
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: That is the level in which they did describe it.
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: So Norm, as someone who has experienced living in both
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: West and the East, why do you think horror is
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: perceived so differently between Western and Asian audiences? Do you
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: think we could ever bridge that gap and how?
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: I, I moved when I was really young to Netherlands.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: Do they have any depictions of horror there? Very little,
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: at least compared to Malaysia.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: And, you know, moved again, moved again and then went
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: to Australia. And do they have any forms of horror
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: in Australia? I wouldn't say horror as in spiritual, but
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: maybe more like true crime. It's a little bit more direct,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: and tangible. And then I would be back and based
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: in Malaysia.
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: And I noticed that horror is a very strange language
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: and it is used very differently in both Western and
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: Eastern contexts. So Western has a very explicit form of
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: language when it comes to horror. This is a ghost.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: It's scary, it will kill you.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: But there are subtleties in eastern horror.
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: And the subtleties are what shape our behavior, and that
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: is where our fear stems from.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: It's not the ghost, it's the influence of the ghosts
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: and their presence in our lives. Growing up.
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: The skulls above us are spirits trying to get us,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: and they're afraid of their own image. If we ever
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: touch those spirits,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: Or, or if we ever touched those skulls, something might happen.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: I've also heard another story. I had this conversation with
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: my dad a long time ago. There is a chest
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: somewhere in the long house full of bloodied weapons. There
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: was like a, almost like a very strong talk of
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: like don't ever touch the box ever or there will
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: be something bad that's going to rain upon us all.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: And I'm like, OK, I guess I shouldn't go to
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: the attic.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: But then in Western civilizations or Western forms of horror,
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: it is more like, this is scary, you should be afraid.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: If you don't, consequence. It is formulaic, it is linear
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: to answer your question. When we're looking at the differences
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: between the both and see if we can bridge the gap,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: I think.
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: It's not about bridging the gap. I think it's about
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: mixing both and having a very robust translation layer and
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: once you have a very strong translation layer, you can
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: make something completely new that doesn't just base itself off
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: of either Western or Eastern because what you ultimately want, right?
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: Is that you want either audiences from Western or Eastern
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: cultures to enjoy the thing that you have. If you
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: want to bridge the gap, I think you need to
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: make new spirits. I think you need to make new
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: spirits or make a new language of horror to translate
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: Eastern spirits into Western culture or Western into Eastern. We
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: don't mess with this ghost. But in the, in the
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: American film it's like,
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: Uh, there's something there and then that's it.
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: I think the language for fear is darkness. Generally, la,
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: it doesn't matter if you're east or west, right? I
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: ask you to walk through like a long tunnel that's
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: completely pitch black, you would just say no. You're scared.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: Here's a, here's a suggestion. There's someone from Western forms
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: of thinking, someone from eastern forms of thinking. They see
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: a spirit, they see a being.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: The Western one sees a specific type of spirit, the
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: eastern one sees a different one. They both react differently
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: because they both comprehend it differently. The horror is not
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: in the spirit, the horror is how they depict it
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: and they react to each other. I think that's, I
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: think that's scary. I think that's scary because firstly, the
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: fear is imprinted in the human interaction. And secondly, you
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: can probably do it in like a very filmic way.
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: You can
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: Depict the same scene multiple times.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: With different spirits and you can see how people react differently.
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: And I think that'll be a very beautiful way to translate, oh,
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: this is how you see dread in Southeast Asia. You
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: see dread not as this jump scare, not as this
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: this cheap trick, not as this thing where if you
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: see it, you die. No, it follows you into the afterlife.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: It follows your family, blood on your hands. We smell you,
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: we'll find you. The lingering fear, the subtlety.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: Do you speak this word out loud, and once you do,
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: it becomes reality. Are you going to attract them?
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: So now you share us some ghost stories mostly related to,
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: while you share with us one very specific ghost story
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: that was related to Iban culture. Do you have any
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: other stories that you want to share that don't aren't
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: necessarily related to the culture itself,
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: but
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: I have one that I still think about even until now.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: So when I was 8 or 9 years old, this
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: is before I moved overseas, so we're in Miri, we're
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: in Starwalk in the middle of the night, my dog
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: at the time ran away. I guess the gate was
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: open or something like that, right? And I heard like,
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: you know, scuttling sounds. I heard like the dog like.
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: Went away from the house, went into the field, there's
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: like a big field nearby the house. I look out
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: the window and I see the dog running out to
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: the field. I'm like, oh no, my dog is running away.
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: I need to go get him. And the last thing
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: I saw was that the dog went into this, this shed,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: it's like a wooden shed in the middle of the field, like, OK,
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: I saw him. I'll go get him in my pajamas,
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: just walk out because I'm worried that maybe there might
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: something might happen to him. So I ran in and
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: I saw the shed. I'm like, huh.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: I don't remember the shed being here before because I
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: grew up in that house, right? So I know how
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: the field looks like. It's just an open field, but
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: I opened the shed and I walked in and I
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: remember this very specifically.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: The inside was a lot bigger than what the wooden
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: shed looks like outside. When I say wooden shed, I
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: mean like, this is the shed made out of wood
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: and then you go in, you put like your tools.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: It's that small, it's like a booth, almost, right?
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: But I walk in and it's like a two-story wooden house.
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: And two things. The first thing is that when I
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: walk into the door, when I see the inside, to
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: my left, there is a, like a plant, a seedling.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: It's like this small.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: And I saw nothing on the 1st floor, and then
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: on the 2nd floor.
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: All I saw were stairs going up to what looked
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: like a door and then there was like a hallway
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: going horizontal.
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: How big is this place?
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know. Yeah, it just seemed
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: bigger at the time. So I'm trying to find my dog.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: I'm like, you know, calling. I'm like, where are you?
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: Where are you?
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: And then I didn't see him on the 1st floor,
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: so I thought to go up to the 2nd floor.
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: And when I went up to the 2nd floor, I
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: went step by step. And then on the 4th step,
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: the step creaked like really, really loud. And at the
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: same time, I saw a white figure.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: Float across the second floor, like horizontally. That figure had
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: like a cloth or a piece of paper covering their face,
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: so like this, right? And just out of peripheral.
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: I see his eye darting at me.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: It just turned like that, and it was golden color.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: And for some reason
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: Even at the tender age of 8.
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: My instinct told me I need to go now, so I.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: Froze immediately went back down and ran away, and then
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: right before I left out the, the shed, that same
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: plant became a full tree.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: Wow. The tree went all the way up to the
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: ceiling of the house or the shed or whatever it was.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: But I remember walking in, it's like this tiny like
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: branch or a piece of wood.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: Went up the stairs, got scared, went down tree.
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: And I ran out. Turns out the dog was never
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: in the shed. I walked into the shed by myself,
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: because when I left the shed, the dog was waiting
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: there for me.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: And then I was crying miserably, obviously, I'm like 8
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: years old, and then I peed myself because I'm 8
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: years old, and then, uh, I ran into the bed, uh,
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: ran back into the house, went to bed, tried to sleep,
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: I couldn't sleep. Eventually I did, and I woke up
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: and I was like, that was the worst dream I've
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: ever had in my life.
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: And then I saw my pajamas had mud, so I
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: did go out there. And then the next day, right,
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: on that same day, I went to the field.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: I couldn't find my footprints and there was no shed.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: So now there's no wooden shed, and I have no
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: way to prove that I, I went out to the
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: mud in my pajamas. How was I supposed to explain
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: to my family like I did this.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: Because I was trying to save my dog, so it
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: didn't make any sense, so.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that freaked me out for a while. Yeah, yeah,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: it made me not want to like leave the
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: house.
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: OK, I think the closest you could say is sleepwalking. Yeah, yeah,
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: but then, yeah, and that's the thing I wanted to
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: ask as well. So you mentioned earlier on that I
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: culture there's this idea of of you being vision sees
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: as well. So how do you, when you have instances
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: like this, how do you
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: Differentiate, is it real? Is it a vision? Is it
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: just a bad dream?
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: When I try to explain it, it sounds really, really crazy,
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: but the better person to ask this is my grandmother
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: because she would often share scenes in her head that
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: just don't make sense whatsoever. So, months ago, uh, my
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: uncle passed away and it was, of course, a very
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: tragic event, um, and we had the, the wake back
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: at the long house. So,
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: Um, it was a sudden thing, so we all flew in,
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: drove to the long house, and we stayed with, you know,
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: the body in the wake and everyone came in and
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: then the family came in, etc.
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: My grandmother at this time is very, very old, and
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: we didn't want her to see.
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: Her son in, in, in that state.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: So we kept her, you know, away from that area.
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: Just staying within the confines of the family home, but
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: I remember I was talking to her and I was just,
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: just taking, just doing small talk.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: And then suddenly she stops me and she's like, where's
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: my son? She said something along the lines of, I
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: saw my son fly away.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: And there were windmills in the background.
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: And he was going somewhere I cannot reach.
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: And I tried to call out for him and then
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: he couldn't hear me. And then he kept asking, she
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: kept asking, where's my son? And so to answer your question,
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: there is, I think, a very strong element of
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: Visionary work
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: Of dreams, of imagery, of the wise who have these
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: very strong vivid imaginations and somehow it gets transplanted into
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: something real. I think it's derivative of instinct. Someone's instinct
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: is so pure that even what they imagine is very
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: close to what is real.
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: So, uh, the Iban culture is centuries old and is
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: currently undergoing modernization.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: Uh, long houses are upgraded to contemporary versions. Uh, traditions
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: and myths are being digitized and reimagined. Customs are frequently
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: celebrated at cultural festivals like Gawai Daya, uh, state level
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: harvest festival. As someone.
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: Uh, who regularly organizes and documents podcasts and, and media.
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: Why is it important to you that we keep these
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: tales about the IBAN alive and what is the best
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: way to carry forward the legacy of the IBAN
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: culture?
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: In my day job, of course, I deal with things
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: like shows and episodes, etc.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: But technically, all of these are just digital recorded voices
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: of information talking about something that has existed or that
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: has been made present in the world. Someone is talking
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: about something somewhere. This show is talking about stories from
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: all walks of life, different guests, different experiences, and it
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: gets recorded, and then it gets organized, and then it
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: gets presented to the right person because someday,
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: Someone who is going to be listening to the show
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: or listening to this episode will hear what everyone here
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: is saying and will be like, wow, that was extremely
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: entertaining or amazing. I'm going to remember that and it's
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: going to add to my life and maybe I might
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: pass that down to my kin. Technically, podcasting is in
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: itself an oral tradition. Hence, systemically.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: It is a form of being alive. Now, in Iban culture.
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: We didn't have podcasting. We don't have, bro, we don't
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: have microphones and cameras. I wish we did because it'd
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: be so cool to be like, hey guys, what's up?
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: He's your boy. We're about to go raid a village.
• 33:31
  Speaker 1: But like, if, if we, if the, the only way
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: in which we can document that which has happened.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: Is true story
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: One book that comes to mind is a book called
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: The Past is a Foreign Country. To give you like
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: a summary-ish of a one-liner of the book. It explores
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: how whenever we depict whatever has happened, it is technically
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: foreign because it is now existing in the past. It
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: is not part of the present time. So we can
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: argue for things like, oh, the winner's design history, um,
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: the perspective can change depending on point of view when
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: talking about the same scene or the same event, etc.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: But then, when you're talking about something that's been provided top-down,
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: tribal history, oral history, tradition, why we can't do certain things,
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: like my family cannot do certain things, but then this
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: other Iban family can. For some reason.
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: We're not allowed to eat python.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: Very specific animal. When I asked my parents why, they're like,
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know, we just cannot. I'm like, OK, cool.
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: We're also not allowed to eat crocodile because we were
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: a river tribe and if you smell like the predator
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: that lives in the water, the crocodile is gonna smell
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: him and, and you and be like, oh, yeah, you
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: ate my brother. To answer your question, it is important.
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: To immortalize what has happened because the more accurate that
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: we do document everything in the foreign country that is
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: called the past.
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: And the better that we understand it.
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: The closer to the present it becomes.
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: To us
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: Because we now understand it from our modern point of view.
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: So legacy then becomes recognizing what is true.
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: Imprinting it.
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: Not forgetting it.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: And honoring that, yes, there are some things that we
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: can agree and disagree on.
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: But it is.
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: One of the many bricks or foundation that lead us
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: to where we are now.
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: I'm Christopher Nolan movie, you know, like I'm trying to process.
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: OK, you're right. I think this is the first episode
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: that I really keep quiet. Like I try to, yeah,
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: I really try to process, you know. Nice. I'm broke
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: him by being deep. In every episode, we have a
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: question for everyone here and those watching at home.
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: So, for this episode, I would like to know what
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: aspect from your own culture terrifies you the most. I'm
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: half Thai.
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: So let's go, you win.
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: I think the the the black magic part of the
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: Thai culture uh terrifies me. We, we see like it's
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: quite common in Thailand. So that that that scares me
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: a lot because uh I don't think the magic is evil.
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: I think people are evil, so people do bad things.
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: The magic is just there. Yeah, so people, you resort
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: to that to get rich or get revenge or whatever.
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: That that's what scares me.
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and the knowledge is out there if you really
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: seek long, long and hard enough. Yeah, that's what scares
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: me.
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: It's not a specific aspect. It is a it is
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: a situation that I'm most afraid of. In the forest.
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: When you're alone.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: Doesn't matter if it's day or night.
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: I
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: I feel like I can do well, but I would
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: just be so.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Delusional. I have a feeling that I will be very
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: afraid of the state that I'm in.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: If I'm alone in the forest.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: And I'm unable to determine if the being in front
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: of me is a real being or not. After that moment,
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: after the, like the story I told about like, you know,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: seeing this thing that can beckon, that can communicate with me,
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: that has signs that like deliver a message to say like, oh,
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: this is what you're asking of me? Sure. I'm worried
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: that
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: If I'm lost in the forest and I'm like, oh,
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: I see another human being, I'm like, oh, hey, I'm lost,
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: can you help me? Is that a human being or not?
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: I'm really afraid of that. And that I feel the
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: supernatural can just play with me like a toy. I'm
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: really afraid of that.
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: So the definition of a Eurasian in at least within
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: Singapore or Southeast Asian context is that it's constantly changing.
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: So it used to be, oh, Eurasians were the descendants
• 38:19
  Speaker 2: of uh colonists who come to Malacca, Singapore, Malaysia, and they,
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: they marry the locals and then, you know, through generations
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: those children become known as Eurasians. What terrifies me is
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: that the traditions that have been built up over the decades,
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: the centuries since Eurasian became a thing.
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: Those traditions and those aspects of our culture start disappearing,
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: like the Eurasian language of Christan that's spoken by very
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: few people now, the Eurasian food, Eurasian cooking.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: Certain other aspects of our culture will vanish as the
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: identity of what a Eurasian is changes
• 38:59
  Speaker 2: over time.
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: Eurasian identity is
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: So far away from the original core cultures that that
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: have blended to make you that you are now not
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: protected against the supernatural realm of those cultures.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: Well, now I have something new to worry about. Well, thanks, Don.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: You're welcome.
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: Oh crap. Just, just create a new ghost lah. Yo, go, go, go,
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: go talk to your like counsel and then say, hey,
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: we need a ghost for a sense of identity so
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: that I don't feel left out in incredible tales.
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: I want to be scared too, man.
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: That's why Asian culture is missing our own ghost. Come
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: on guys.
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: I share the same sentiment as Kayla. I think in my,
• 39:50
  Speaker 2: in my culture, it's very normal, you know, for people
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: to be envious, you know, uh, I think that's why
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: like the, the, the common stigma or like stereotype is
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: layu makan mlayu, you know, because one can't see another, uh, brother,
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: you know, is, is better or or higher than them.
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: So that's where they decide to.
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: Use black magic la like you say lah, you know,
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: it's so common, especially when I'm doing a horror content,
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: it's so common to, to read or to hear about
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: black
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: magic.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: Is malice
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: A human or spiritual invention.
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: It goes back to the old saying, hate breeds hate,
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: love breeds love. So if someone dies a wrongful death,
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: you turn into an evil spirit, but it's also by
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: the cost of humans. So if you go back to
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: one round, humans
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: are the ones that are causing a lot of the
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: problems in the spiritual realm, lah. Alright, so we're almost
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: at the end of the episode, and it's been a
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: very interesting episode, very deep conversation, very interesting conversation, um,
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: but let's wrap things up, as always, with our morbid
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: fact of today. Carl, take it away. So the IBA people, right,
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: traditionally practice animism, which is the belief that everything natural,
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: including landforms.
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: And inanimate objects have a soul. Before farming or hunting,
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: they should observe the behavior of the wildlife and would
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: stop the activity if they interpret natural events as warnings.
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: Trapping wildlife would be the equivalent of trapping a soul,
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: which will read as a bad omen. I think in general,
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: there's no mess with Mother Nature. That's, yeah, that's good.
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: Uh,
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: our, a lot of our rules are more about warnings,
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: right?
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: Like specific birds or like you see a monkey, don't
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: pay attention to the monkey, right, because that is a
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: soul in there somewhere, there's a spirit in there, and
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: if they're trying to get your attention, they're trying to
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: lure you away, be careful. Um, specifically
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: monkeys.
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, specifically.
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so, so the any like, anyone who didn't follow
• 41:59
  Speaker 2: the rule, then they go and mess with monkey and
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: then they're
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: gonna.
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, um, we had a family friend, someone in the
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: same long house, they had their farmers getting disturbed by
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: a monkey. And like, yes, you have the rule, but
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: I think there's like a certain line you don't cross when,
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: you know, your livelihood is getting wrecked by this animal
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: that's coming out of the forest and be like, ah,
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: let me just wreck everything. So it was maybe 3
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: to 4 days straight of this monkey causing a menace,
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: and he trapped him.
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: And then when he went to sleep.
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: Apparently, and this is what I heard from like neighbors
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: from the same long house, he had ancestors coming into
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: his dream and be like, let go of the monkey
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: or something bad will happen.
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: And it was like 3 of them, 3 ancestors, and
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: it was weird because for, for him.
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: They weren't ancestors of the same generation. They don't actually
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: know each other. So it's like the grandfather and then
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: the great great great great great grandfather or or something
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: like that. All he knew was that in the dream,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: he knew that they were of the same blood, but
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: they were not in the same timeline or the same era.
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: And they're like,
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: You're affecting our timeline, let go of the monkey. And
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: so eventually he had to like let go and the
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: rule basically is just, just let it play. Eventually, it'll
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: be bored and it will leave. So it took
• 43:22
  Speaker 2: a while, wait wait wait wait
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: wait.
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when I say affecting the timeline, I meant like, sorry,
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: not timeline, but like the bloodline of the, sorry, I
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: used the wrong word, but like,
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: Normally the way that we depict souls that exist in monkeys.
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: Is that they either show themselves in front of people
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: they have a connection with. 9 times out of 10,
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: it is someone of the same bloodline. But it's an
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: even more important one is sometimes it's someone who has
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: the same ancestor because, uh, and this is very apparent
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: for Gawai, um, Ibans have to always figure out how
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: related are we to each other and if we have common.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: Ancestors
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: So there's a chance it might be
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: Maybe not the same bloodline, but the same ancestor, but
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: it's like rooted in a different direction. So it's like
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: maybe my fourth cousin but from a different house and
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: I never met them, like that's a possibility.
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: So the monkey is also from the bloodline, supposedly. Supposedly
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: it has the soul of the bloodline, then it's just
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: there to like
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: Mess with things. Yeah.
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: I can't think of, I don't, I don't have a
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: reason why a monkey who is a complete stranger would
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: be like, hey, look at your farm.
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: But it's just one monkey.
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: It's just one.
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: That's the funny thing. It's just monkey, they got like
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: one whole group one, but it's just one. That means
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: that's what makes the scene. If it was a group,
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: they'd be like, oh, OK,
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: they're just being
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: animals, yeah, they're just being annoying, right? But this is
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: just like one and it's your farm.
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: Alright, thank you again, Nom for joining us and thank
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: you to all of you for tuning into Tales from
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: Incredible Tales. New episodes go online every week on MeWatch,
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: Me Listen, YouTube, Spotify and Apple Podcast.
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: My name is
• 45:13
  Speaker 2: Norm. My name is Wayne. My name is Kyle, my
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: name is F.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: And we'll see you next time. Tales from Incredible Tales
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: was hosted by Far Anwar, Wayne Rui, and Kyle Ong,
• 45:26
  Speaker 2: with special guests, Norman Chela, directed and produced by Kyle Ong,
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: written by Wayne Ray, Assistant Director, Chin Chin Wei, director
• 45:37
  Speaker 2: of photography, Shervin Chua, Gaffer, Jonathan Chan, art director, Jolene Lim,
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: sound recordist, Audrey Lee. Behind the scenes footage.
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: Shot by Ella May Walker, hair and makeup by Bino Lim,
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: Production assistance, Aishwarani Durias Singam, Ella May Walker. Post-production by
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: Fudge Studios. Assistant editor, Ella May Walker. Motion graphics by
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: Jolene Lim.
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: Camera support by Nikon Singapore, lighting support by Amaan, smoke
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: support by PMI gear, monitor support by Desview and DC
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: Pro Private Limited. Special thanks to Danny Kurdy from MIICorp.
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: Tales from Incredible Tales is a production of Hantu and
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: Media Corp. Follow the podcast on the Millient app, Spotify,
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: Apple Podcast, Google Podcast and YouTube. Thank you for listening.