Sulawesi Island
Seeing
shape of the island, Sulawesi has four “Arms” pointing in different directions
towards the provinces of East and West Nusa Tenggara to it’s south, Timor to
southeast. Maluku took it’s east and the Philipines to the North, respectively. Almost the hole interior of the
island is mountainous with spectacular scenery. Comparatively large plains
exist only in a section of it’s southern
arms and in southeast. The coastal strips are almost everywhere narrow.
Inhabited by about 12 million people, the island has plenty of space. Much of
the landscape is unspoiled, the seas unpoluted.
The island has long been known to European
seafarers as “Celebes”, presumably derived from the phrase “Celebres
Mocassares, the infamous Makasarese”, found in a chronicle written in 1563 by
the Portuguese Antonio Galvao. Another version has it that eraly Portuguese
Traders, mistaking the arms for separate island, named the island “Ponto dos
Celebres”, Cape of the infamous ones.
Whatever the case, Sulawesi, home to some of
the oldest setlements in Indonesia archipelago, has kept it’s secret from
western until relatively recently. Even in the 1920s and early 1930s, many
parts of the island were still unexplored. Cave painting believed to be
thausands of years old, have been found in the south of the island. Ancient
sarcophagi were found in the north.
The island is home to a variety of ethnic
population groups. Some of whom have a history of long and more or less intense
contact with the world outside. Among them are the Bugis and the Makasarese,
renowend navigators for centuries. Like wise the Toraja and the Mandar, the
Minahasa, the Gorontalo and Bolaang Mongondow as well as the people of the
Sangihe Talaud archipelago south of the Philippines. Some of them, as subjects
of sovereign kingdom in the past, carry a tradition of stubborn resistance
against foreign domination.
Sulaesi flora’s, like that of the other so
called Greater Sunda Island, Sumatera, Java and Kalimantan, belongs largely to
the mainland Southeast Asian type. It’s fauna, is rather peculiar, it’s belongs
neither entirely to that of western parts. It has among it’s native species
marsupials and three big mamals, the Black Crested Babbon, the Babirusa wild
boar, and and the Anoa Dwarf Buffalo. It also has many bird species, among
which the Maleo bush turkey with it’s huge eggs.
Sulawesi is also the most industialized
island in the eastern part of Indonesia. The port of Makasar at Ujung Pandang
is the busiest and most important in the region. It is a place of ancient
civilizations and proud traditions, and roots strong enough to face the advent
modernity with confidence.
Sumber Investigasi:
F. I. Fatrick &
www.guidingtoindonesia.blogspot.com