ethnic tourism

Taking the weight off your legs, enjoy a ride on one of Asia’s oldest forms of transport.

It is midnight in a highland town in West Java. All is peaceful. The shops, which during the day were a hive of frenetic activity, have now long shut their doors to the darkness. Street vendors, whose goods covered the pavement, have packed away their array of herbal medicines, antiques and mountains of fruit. Even the dogs have finished scavenging.
All appears to have stopped in this sleeping town. Everything, that is, save for the tell-tale “clack, clack, clack” of the becak driver, advertising a comfortable ride home for anyone with aching legs.

From Peking to Poona, Rangoon to Rajasthan, the trishaw has evolved into hundreds of regional variations. The oldest forms were originally pulled by the driver from the front, the passenger sitting in a mounted chair, and these can still be found in India and China. Nowadays, pedalled versions like the becak (pronounced bay’chak) with the passenger in front are the norm throughout Asia.

The average life span of a becak is well over 25 years if adequately serviced, making the market for new becaks small. They are repainted in bright new colours and serviced almost daily as a result of the unrelenting strain they receive from rough terrain, potholes and being pushed through floods. When the steel eventually does give way, the becak must be repaired or replaced, so it comes to one of the few becak factories that also repair and refurbish the machines.

From a side street under a bridge beside the river in Java’s royal city of Yogyakarta comes the noise of men at work behind the wrought iron gates of the Cenderawasih Becak factory. Sparks fly from a welding torch and a cat, tail waving, rubs itself against the sweaty body of one of the workmen, blissfully unaware that its tail has only narrowly avoided sudden combustion. An old wreck is being rejuvenated with an iron-work job, while another is having its rust sanded off in preparation for a paint job. Standing out proudly in the front is a brand new becak, bright-red paint glinting in the sun, new rubber tyres and a beautifully-worked canvas hood, oiled and polished.

Becaks are hand-made and each is therefore unique. The most customised part of the becak is the artwork over the wheel guards, painted extravagantly either in the factory or by the owner or driver. The classical painting is of a misty mountain scene with a blue river winding through a landscape of mountains, a deep-blue sky and wispy clouds. Others have pictures of animals or carry slogans.

The design can also identify the maker-the Cenderawasih factory only paints four motifs of its own. What happens to this design after the becak leaves the factory is a different matter. When the original paintwork has worn off, the becaks are usually repainted by the driver in a way that allows him to express himself. Becaks adorned with slogans like: “Cinta putus, aku biasa. Rem putus, aku mati!” (roughly translated as: “I’m used to losing my love, but if I lose my brakes, I’m dead!”) are commonplace near Jakarta, for instance.

At dusk, in the evening rain of a Javanese city, a becak stands alone, its black hood drawn down and its plastic sheeting tied down against the rain. Within, a wiry old man lies curled up in his sarung, settling down for the night after a long and exhausting day pedalling miles of dirt tracks and weaving through the city traffic. It’s a well-earned rest for one of the hardest-working men in Indonesia.