He was curious about us (where do we come from, what are we doing here, etc. etc) and eventually we found out that he is a Javanese Sugar maker. His morning routine is climbing up 7 coconut trees, each being more or less 17 years old, together with 2 buckets and his sickle, using cut-out footholds on the bark to help him climb up. Once at the top, he didn't harvest the coconuts, instead, he sliced the branch of the tree, so that a sweet sap, which we called "nira", could be drained into the buckets. He takes 5-7L every day.
If the flower of the coconut tree is tied in the morning, the Nira could be drained in the evening. If it was tied in the evening they could be drained in the morning.
The weather affects the amount of Nira that he could harvest. If it's dry season, there would much to harvest. If it's rainy season, not much were produced.
Nira could be made into sugar and Arak, a type of liquor.
If the Nira was taken later than the usual time, it won't be really good. But if it rains, the nira won't be affected, they won't mix together.
Pak Muhajir has been climbing the trees to harvest the nira since he's 15 y.o. In the past, more than 10 people made Javanese Brown Sugar in the village, but now he's the only one that makes it. His kids and other young people nowdays are not interested in making the brown sugar.
Other than being a Javanese Brown Sugar maker, he works as a field worker.
Next we went inside the home industry. The place was rather dim, but looks traditional at the same time. There, his wife Bu Kusnia was in the process of making the Javanese Sugar. She started learning how to make when she married Pak Muhajir.
First, the Nira is mixed with active chalk (gamping) so that the Nira won't be sour. You can check the quality of the Nira from its colours too. The best is a yellowish colour, though there are clear ones, and the whitish ones are bitter.
After being mixed with the active chalk, the Nira is boiled, until the colour becomes brown (the original colour is clear), then stir it until it cools/thickens. It takes about 40 minutes to cool them if there's only a little amount of them, but if there are much to stir, it may take more than 40 minutes. If you don't stir it and just leave it, the cooling/thickening process will be longer. Once the Nira are thick they'll look like peanut butter.
Once it thickens, you must immeadiately pour them out into bowls, or they'll harden in 10 mins (if they're stirred, it may take longer if you didn't stir them at all). But first you must rinse the bowls, or the hardened sugar won't slide out of it. You fill only half of the bowls. The Nira that was poured first (and hardens first of course) are slided out immeadiately to put on top of the ones that are hardening, so they would look like the ones you see in the middle of the table.
If the sugar wasn't slided out immeadiately, it would be hard to take them out, despite already rinsing the bowls.
The sugars they made ever failed because the Nira was sour, so they didn't taste good.
When I first tasted the sugar, I took a big bite. so it was too sweet for me (in Indonesian it's called eneg). That made a bad impression of the sugar to me, but then I learned to nibble it bit by bit, although that halts me from writing down notes. After several minutes I start to appreciate the taste, and I regretted not buying some :v.
When I first tasted the sugar, I took a big bite. so it was too sweet for me (in Indonesian it's called eneg). That made a bad impression of the sugar to me, but then I learned to nibble it bit by bit, although that halts me from writing down notes. After several minutes I start to appreciate the taste, and I regretted not buying some :v.
After that we all went back to each of our homestays, and I rewrote my notes. In about 30 mins, we all met up in Gatotkoco Homestay to discuss our newest assignments.
Next we were asked to interview 3 home industries, and we were suggested to go to the Tempe, Peyek (a kind of chips), and Ceriping. While we were walking we were to pretend we didn't know each other. As we had went to the Tempe and Ceriping Home Industry yesterday, and had planned to go there too, we went off to the Ceriping, though taking the wrong way, causing Marimas Rasa Soto to take the place first. We couldn't be in one Home Industry with another group, so we decided to visit the Peyek maker, as there were still information that we needed. It was taken too though by Nasi Uduk, so we went off to the Tempe Home Industry (see if there are any more questions that we have). On the way there, we passed the Ceriping Home Industry, and Marimas Rasa Soto looked as if they were about to leave, so we waited and went in right after they left. Here are our interviews:
Bu Tika owns the Ceriping Home Industry with Pak Naim. They both worked together, with Pak Naim peeling and slicing the ketela, and Bu Tika frying them.
First, the Ketela (Cassava) were peeled, and the skins were used as the cattle's food. You can't use the Ketela if they're too old, and the ones that aren't good will be thrown away (given to the cattles I suppose) The good Ketelas were rinsed and sliced with a machine called Kacit. They were rinsed because there's tapioka starch in the sap, then chalk water. The Kacit was used only for the Ketelas with small diameters, it's a manual machine, while the bigger ones were cut in an electric slicer. To know if you're cutting them well, the shape must be a bit curved. They were then seasoned with Royco (instant seasoning) and garlic, and in they went into the pan!
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| This is the manual machine called Kacit. |
Bu Tika uses 6 packs of 200 grm Royco a day.
The stove was made out of cement, but it looks more like an igloo, as there's a small hole on one side of the stove for the blower. Without the blower, it won't be hot enough, so it would be difficult if a black out happens. There's a large black wok on top of it, filled with coconut oil. The oil would be reused the next day, she would just add a little bit more when making the next production.
She usually buys 40 kg of oil, then keeps it.
Frying the sliced ketela must be done in a max 3 minutes, or they would burn if they were left in a longer time than that. There were 2 cockeries, one ladle and the other strainer a bigger one to strain the oil, and a smaller one to mix while frying, so that it would be light and easier. They were then left into a bigger strainer so that the oil excess would drip down.
Next they were cooled off on a long metal desk, then whisked into a large plastic bag below using something like a dustpan. She could make 25-30 bags a day, and each costs 70k. Smaller packs were made too, and each costs 3k each.
She ever tried frying the sliced Ketela from factories, but when fried the results were hard chips.
Next we set off the the Peyek maker:
The data are combined from yesterday's interview:
Yesterday there was only Bu Dispriyati, but today we met another person with her, who I suspect as Bpk. Ramdan(?). Bu Dispriyati made 2 kinds of Peyek, Peyek Kacang and Peyek Bayem, tempe chips included. She got the peanuts, tempe, and spinach from the Borobudur market. She used to own a Spinach garden in front of the part of her house where she made the Peyeks, although now that bare area was for the chickens.
The Spinachs used were the ones that were harvested along with their roots. It meant the Spinachs were new. If we pluck the spinachs starting just from their stems, the leaves would regrow, and the same thing will happen over and over again, making the spinach "old". But if they were harvested along with their roots, and then replanted using only the seeds from, they would be "new" spinaches.
The leaves of the Spinaches were dipped inside a mixture made from the combination of "aci" (tapioca starch) and rice flour, 1 ounce of garlic, 1 spoon of salt, 1 teaspoon of micin (MSG (Mono Sodium Glutamate)), and 2 teaspoons of grinded corriander. It took 10 minutes to make one mixture. The dipped spinaches were then put into a large wok filled with palm oil, put above a stove. The oil were bought in plastic jerry cans for 20 L, bought from the Borobudur market, while the stove looked like a really short well made out of cement and clay, with firewood in it. The oil that were left in the pan after the day ends will be used for tomorrow's production, all Bu Dispriyati had to do was add a little bit more of oil on the next production process. The amount of Peyek Bayem made were based on order, so if no one orders it, none of them would be made.
Eating the Peyek Bayam will be a bit chewy because of the spinach.
It took 1 hour to make 2 kg of the Peyek/chips,
The tempe used to make the tempe chips were special tempes for chips, and the knives used for slicing them was modified from a saw.
They also showed us their main staple food, Gethuk, which we were allowed to try, and I really liked it, I wished I could have more.
Bu Dispriyati ever lived in Jakarta, around Pulau Gadung, and has been making Ceriping/chips for 10 years.
Our time were mostly spent answering Bu Dispriyati's and Bpk. Ramdan(?)'s questions about homeschooling though. Pak Ramdan also showed us the Gethuk that he use a a staple food (other than rice)
Next up we met up in the Criping Home Industry where we followed Pak Naim to harvest the Singkongs (Cassavas) from the Singkong plantation. It's really close to the village.
Pak Naim showed us how to do it, which is bending your legs with your back to the tree, then pull up the tree with your two hands. Don't make your legs close to each other. If you pull up the tree with your front to it, your back will most likely hurt, although I never experienced it before. It looks easy, but then it depends on the tree. If it's too hard to pull up, it would be hard, but sometimes it's relatively easy...
We were only allowed to pull up the trees in one part of the area, one time we got carried away in the fun so some of us wanted to pull up the trees on the other side. However, after pulling up the trees, none of us tidy it up. We just left it then went to another tree.
Next we were taught how to take the singkongs off. Pak Naim used a type of knife to cut off the Singkongs, while most of us just use our hands. I'm scared of the earthworms there, so I don't dare touch much of the mud covering the Singkong, but I do enjoy cracking the Singkong off.
We ate in Pak Pudi's house for lunch:
Next we went to fetch (more like borrow) our bikes at Pak Pedo's house and biked off to Candi Borobudur, starting with a warmup led by Yla. I thought that I could ride the bike well, although I haven't ridden it for a few years (maybe 3 or 4 years?), because I used to be a good biker who can do several tricks when I was younger (around 5 or 6 y.o.). It's OK at first, until we came to a ramp up road. It was too heavy for me but I refused to show any signs of tire, because I don't want to be the last person of the group. Why? Because I chose a sports bicycle even though I'm already offered the bicycle with basket on it (I presume that it's lighter?) but I refused. So.. well.. I have to keep up to my "reputation":p. Lesson learned though, because the next day I got a sore leg.
When we reached Candi Borobudur it was so crowded and full with tourists and school students. We were given the choice of either exploring the Candi in a crowded situation (making the visit an unpleasant one) or going back to our village. We chose the latter. So off we went back to our village.
On the way back to our village, we took the wrong way back, but we found it at last. We did not directly go to our village though. We stopped by Ibu Marsinah's rice field and some of us asked questions. I didn't really pay attention though. But I did try to plow the field.
On the way home we took photos. We used the way where we can see a little bit of Candi Borobudur.
After that we biked back to our homestay, bath, and prepared ourselves. Then off we go to Gatotkaca and discuss our personel assignments. In the middle of dicussing our assignments, the local boys came to play ball in front of Gatotkaca, They wanted to play with us, We were asked to make the decision of either playing with them or discussing our assignments. Our mentor said that if we wanted to play we could, but the consequence was that we may be tired and sleepy when discussing tonight. Or, we could do our discussion, and miss playing ball. We decided on discussing.
We discussed about our personal assignments and we will do our research about them in the market we will go tomorrow.
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