Palm Climbing

PALM CLIMBING (English for PANJAT PINANG)is a game that only played during Independence Day celebration in Indonesia. This year, I had a chance to watch one. I didn't think that it took a long time to finish the game. It took more or less one and half hours!

Before the game started, the players were hidden in the security post. When the announcer called them, they came out one by one, wearing dasters (batik women night gown) complete with make-up. The announcer introduced them as female famous artists. Actually, it was not a common practice in playing this game, but the organizer wanted to make it unusual and more fun.

There were two groups of four persons. They had to climb the palm trunk provided. It was about 7 meters tall. At the top of the trunk was hanged many prizes; t-shirts, handphone, a box of instant noodles, a bag of coffee, a pot, 20 Rp 50000 notes, a pair of woman underwear! The underwear was red, one of Indonesian flag colors. It was also unusual!

The trunk was covered by oil to make it difficult to climb and slippery. Besides that, the players, the trunk, and the dirt were showered by water. So, it was more difficult. When, they fell down, they were covered by mud and the mud made their bodies slippery.
The players tried many kinds of formation to be able to grab the prizes. They fell down over and over, I didn't count how many times. More than 20 times, maybe!

After many trials and it had been more than one hour, the two groups decided to collaborate. Their formation was higher now. They could make 3 stories of human pyramid. When they worked in four, they only could make 2 stories. They started to cover their bodies with dry dirt. They wiped the trunk with the cloths torn from their dasters. The cloths were swept to the dry dirt first. Actually, it was illegal. But, the organizer was tired after waiting for more than one hour and let them do it.

After several trials, they still couldn't make it. At last, one player tried to climb by himself. Since the trunk was not slippery anymore, he could make it at the second trial. At last, he grabbed all the prizes, incliding the red underwear!

It was fantastic! I still couldn't imagine how he could climb easily, like a monkey! Maybe it was because of the prizes, or... the crowd's cheers? Who knows?