30 November 2007
Nyepi, the Silent Day and UNFCCC Conference, Bali 2007
Posted by webmaster under: Articles .
By I Gusti Raka Panji Tisna
In 1999, I wrote a short article entitled “Nyepi, the Silent Day” for the Bali Travel News, a biweekly English publication on Bali’s Tourism and Culture, for the occasion of welcoming Nyepi, which marked the arrival of Saka New Year 1921, seventy eight years behind the Gregorian year. The Saka New Year is “celebrated” in Bali by silence (Nyepi) for a period of 24 hours, where the Balinese and others living on the island are refrained from working, going out of the house, lighting fire, making noise and indulging in pleasurable activities.
The short article (reprinted below with minor editing) was written to inform Bali’s international visitors of what Nyepi is, how it is observed, and to point out its present state amidst the modern world and its positive global environmental impacts.
It is interesting to see that eight years later, 2007, an idea parallel to my casual remarks about Nyepi’s positive global environment impacts is seriously thought through by a group of people under the Bali Collaboration on Climate Change, a civil society forum initiated by several NGOs (Walhi Bali, PPLH, Wisnu, BOA) and supported by the Third World Network, to introduce the concept of Nyepi and its direct contribution to cut Green House Gases emission during the Conference of the Parties, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 13/MOP3 UNFCCC) in Nusa Dua Bali, 3-14 December 2007. And interestingly, through a providential twist, I am to be part of the group who will introduce Nyepi to this vital international forum.
Although the 13 members of Bali Collaboration on Climate Change are attending the conference mainly as observers, nevertheless, we will have several opportunities in the side events to introduce our centuries old local wisdom and practice, Nyepi, as a tangible action to cut Green House Gases emission, and propose to the world to observe some kind of World Silent Day or Silent Day for the Earth tentatively on March 21st. The World Silent Day or Silent Day for the Earth is to encourage people of the world to stop (minimize) activity and energy consumption for one day to let the Earth rests.
Our idea has received full endorsement from the Balinese public. Furthermore, the Chairman of the Indonesian House of Representatives (DPR-RI) Mr. Agung Laksono has made a statement that the Indonesian Government should accommodate the Balinese local wisdom to propose Nyepi as a day to allow the Earth rests, which resonates with the Government’s effort to mitigate global warming (See Bali Post, 30 November 2007).
Reprinted article from the Bali Travel News, 1999
Nyepi, the Silent Day
On March 18th of this year [1999], we, the Balinese, are going to celebrate the Saka New Year or Nyepi of 1921. The Saka year is 78 years behind the Gregorian year since it was dedicated in 78 AD to mark the crowning of King Kaniska of the Kusana Dynasty, India. The New Year falls at the end of the Chaitra or Kesanga (the ninth month) of the Saka year which corresponds to a date sometimes in March or April. The Saka calendar presumably found its way to Bali through the spread of Hinduism from India to Java and eventually Bali.
For the Balinese, Nyepi is a day of silence and non-activity. Visitors arriving in Bali on that day can find the New Year a shock. Not only do they fail to see a grand celebration, an image often associated with Bali and New Year’s celebration, but also they find themselves stuck in the airport, or confined to the hotels during the 24 hour period. After all, the Balinese are “celebrating” Nyepi—a day of silence to welcome the New Year.
During other times, Bali is usually busy with life, rituals and celebrations owing to the island’s main religion, Balinese Hinduism which intertwines tightly with the socio-economic life. One tangible aspect of this interconnection is the presence of a whole list of prescribed ceremonies to be performed by the Balinese. These ceremonies number in hundreds, differing in types and frequencies. They take place daily, every five days, monthly, every six months, and every year, as well as the major ones every ten, one hundred, and even a thousand years. They are celebrations to honor the Gods, the ancestors, humans with their life cycles, and nature. And they take place at the State, community, clan, and family temples as well as at many other places. Traditionally, although the combination of ceremonies and working in the fields has kept most Balinese busy, nevertheless we still were able to maintain a pleasant way of life. More recently, however, tourism and modernization in general are changing this pleasant mode of life into a more and more hectic one. The notion of “time is ceremony” is now challenged by “time is money.”
Thanks to the foresight of our forerunners, we still have Nyepi: one day of the year reserved for silence when we can abandon social obligations and economic activities. On Nyepi we are suggested to refrain from lighting fire, working, feeding the senses, traveling or getting out of the house. Those of us who are serious about Nyepi even refrain from speaking. In its most ideal and truest form, Nyepi is to train the Balinese to be dead to the world but fully alive spiritually.
Outsiders may argue that Nyepi is a farfetched concept, impractical or even an impossibility in today’s world; that life, especially in big cities and industrialized nations, has grown so complex that it is practically impossible to halt even for a couple of hours, let alone for the whole 24 hours. That’s precisely where the problem of modern life lies. We have created such an artificial environment with a range of modern conveniences to the point of total dependency on them. We look up to people who are hectic and busy and consider them to be ideal citizens. As a result, many of us compete fiercely allowing hardly any time to simply sitting and observing our inner or outer environment. We miss the opportunity to develop awareness of our actions and consequences, or noticing any sign of false belief. Thus, we may also miss the opportunity to find true direction to follow. Many of us turn into highly productive but not necessarily effective and efficient robots who build incredible cities and machines, but who also wreck the very Earth we live in. And as we loss much of our sensitivity, we recklessly exploit our environment—pollute it, poison its land, air and water. In our forgetfulness, we ultimately poison ourselves.
Likewise in today’s modern Bali, the ideal of Nyepi is hard to meet. Some Balinese do not observe Nyepi consistently. And the pressure of modern economic life, the status quo, forces some Balinese to still have to serve or amuse tourists stuck in their hotels.
A cynic may asks, what good does Nyepi do then? Well, one day is better than none. The reality is that there is hardly any society in the world with a population of nearly 3.5 million people that does what Bali does. To rest an entire island for a day in the 21st Century takes a mighty conviction. And think of the positive environmental impacts generated by even one day of non-activity by more than three million people who otherwise ride thousands of cars and motorbikes, operate modern machineries and gadgets. On such day the world most certainly experiences its lowest levels of CO2 and CO, noise pollution and waste generation.
Imagine if countries of the world agree to take turn to observe a day of silence. And imagine a global day of silence!
Consider our “celebration” of Nyepi in Bali an inspiration to the rest of the world that life is not all about producing and consuming but also about resting and reflecting. And that it is possible to rest for a full day or more without causing the world to collapse.
I Gusti Raka Panji Tisna
Student and Promoter of
Spiritual, Ecological, and Aesthetical Literacy
Bali, Indonesia
panjiku@telkom.net
Loading ...
June 6th, 2008 at 2:17 am
I love bali to relaxing,but bali is good for gathering too