Black & White Batak House

This is another shot I took of a Batak house on the shores of Lake Toba in Sumatra, Indonesia. A previous shot of another house was shown in an earlier blog. For this image I post-processed to black and white using Silver Efex Pro 2 and this really brings out a lot of the details and tones of the old wooden building and adds a historical look to the finished image.

Batak Christian Church, Lake Toba

The area around Lake Toba in North Sumatra, Indonesia is predominantly Christian rather than Muslim and you can see many lovely Batak Christian churches on the banks of the lake like this one.

The Huria Kristen Batak Protestan (HKBP), which translates into the Batak Christian Protestant Church, is the largest Protestant denomination in Indonesia, with a baptized membership of 4,178,256. Its present leader is the Ephorus (or Bishop) Rev. Dr.Bonar Napitupulu.

It was founded in the 1880s by Dr. Ludwig Ingwer Nommensen, of the German Rhenish Missionary Society, who worked in the District of Tapanuli in Tarutung, North Sumatra. In 1930 it became the first independent self-governing Christian body in what was then the Dutch East Indies. Tarutung and the Batak region remain the stronghold for the HKBP in the mainly Muslim nation of Indonesia, although worshippers are found throughout the country.

Batak is a collective term used to identify a number of ethnic groups found in North Sumatra, Indonesia. The term is used to include the Toba, Karo, Pakpak, Simalungun, Angkola and Mandailing, each of which are distinct but related groups with distinct, albeit related, languages and customs. Occasionally it is also used to include the Alas people of Central/Southern Aceh, but usually only as relates to language groups.

Terraced Rice Paddies at Lake Toba

Terraced rice paddies on the side of Lake Toba in North Sumatra, Indonesia. The lake is the flooded crater of an ancient volcano and the surrounding land now provides fertile volcanic earth for the growth of rice and other staples.

In agriculture, a terrace is designed to slow or prevent the rapid run-off of irrigation water. Often such land is formed into multiple terraces, giving a stepped appearance. The human landscapes of rice cultivation in terraces that follow the natural contours of the escarpments like contour plowing is a classic feature of the island of Bali, the Banaue Rice Terraces in Ifugao, Philippines

Rural Sumatra

The current eruption of Mount Sinabung in Sumatra, Indonesia brought me back to the wonderful few days I spent in the Lake Toba area. The scene above was a very common sight with many pockets of fertile farmland being worked by the locals growing rice, vegetables, coffee and fruits. This simple agricultural lifestyle has been going on here for hundreds of years using simple, handworked techniques and tools.

Batak House

Most of the people who live around Lake Toba are ethnically Bataks. Traditional Batak houses are noted for their distinctive roofs (which curve upwards at each end, as a boat's hull does) and their colorful decor. Batak is a collective term used to identify a number of ethnic groups found in the highlands of North Sumatra, Indonesia. Their heartland lies to the west of Medan centred on Lake Toba. In fact the "Batak" include several groups with distinct, albeit related, languages and customs (adat). While the term is used to include the Toba, Karo, Pakpak-Dairi, Simalungun, Angkola and Mandailing. Occasionally it is also used to include the Alas-Kluet people of Central/Southern Aceh, but usually only as relates to language groups.

Supervolcanic Lake

Lake Toba is the largest lake in South east Asia and is also the largest volcanic lake in the world, 100km long, 30km wide and 505 m at its deepest point. It is located in the northern part of Sumatra, Indonesia and was formed after a supervolcanic eruption 69,000 to 77,000 years ago. This eruption is believed to have been the largest eruption anywhere on Earth in the last 25 million years. According to some anthropologists and archeologists it had global consequences, killing most humans and creating a population bottleneck in Central Eastern Africa and India that affected the genetic inheritance of all humans today.