The Festival Budaya Isen Mulang (FBIM) has been held annually since 1993. It showcases the Dayak tribe culture and traditions with 16 competitions in 2022, that include traditional arts, dance, music, food and various sports. In the Dayak language, it means “Never Back Down.”

One of the competitions was Indonesian martial arts, which focuses on combat and self-defense. There are hundreds of different styles, but Pencak Silat has been adopted globally and recognized as a piece of Intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO. Silat Melayu is one of the silat styles and is associated with field hand positions, low stances and slow dance-like movements.

Watching these competitions, they seem more like choreographed dances than any unarmed combat that Westerners may think of when envisioning martial arts. You can see how a typical competition proceeds in the 90 second video clip above.

The competitors showcase the intricacies of the Indonesian martial arts form. This competition was held on a muddy field, with drums beating and boisterous crowds supporting their favorite fighters.

Another competition was the talent show held at the Governor’s Palace. The competitor’s danced and sang. Unfortunately, for the first time, the organizers tried to turn this into a high-end glitzy presentation, with massive LCD screens behind the competitors showing videos of their home village during their performance. The result was hugely distracting, as well as making photography difficult.

Another Indonesian sport represented was catching fish bare-handed, which is the old way of catching fish. In this competition, competitors jumped into a muddy pond filled with fish. People would then try to steer the fish into a netted perimeter fence and entrap the fish with weeds, then stuff the fish into a burlap bag held by their partner. At one point, the announcer offered an additional One Million Rupiahs for the person catching the eel.

Watch the 12 second clip above, to see the first competitor to successfully catch a fish and land it in their partner’s basket.