The Royal Cremation: “It Takes a Village” Quite Literally
The commonly used expression “it takes a village” gets a whole new level of significance here, as the 27 metre tall tower and the cremation bull is carried literally on the shoulders of hundreds of villagers from nine alternating villages, through central Ubud, to the cremation site in the cemetary. The preparation for the royal cremation ceremony takes several months, involves over twenty thousand people, and is attended by several thousand of locals and tourists.
The Dutch began to colonize Indonesia in the early 17th century; the islands were occupied by Japan from 1942 to 1945. Indonesia declared its independence after Japan's surrender, but it required four years of intermittent negotiations, recurring hos... ... read more 
