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Scenes of Main Puteri

I was in Machang, Kelantan where I witnessed for the first time Main Puteri, a traditional healing ritual practiced for thousands of years in the east coast states of Kelantan and Terengganu. Main Puteri, practiced in the traditional way was banned by the two state governments years ago and only performances that appeal to the the palate of tourists and religious authorities have been allowed. What we witnessed here, was in reality illegal and there's a religious edict, a 'fatwa' that entirely prohibit this and other ceremonies that invoke or calls on the help of spirits. Many Main Puteri events have been forcibly stopped by the authorities. But over the last few years, the authorities seem to be allowing some slack and rituals in the traditional way appear to be making a quiet resurgence. But what is 'Main Puteri' and why the urge to ban the ritual? Well, Main Puteri is one of a number of ritualistic healing ceremonies with a medium or 'witch doctor', for want of a better term, communicating with the spirit world to determine a patient's illness be it psychological, physical or even spiritual i.e caused by an unseen entity. It is set pretty much in the open, but beneath a makeshift ground-level 'stage'. There's a traditional musical ensemble, some people who assist the medium, called the Tok Puteri and the patient. There's also a Tok Mindok who is the intermediary for the Tok Puteri to communicate with the 'real' world. There are other essential parts of the ceremony -- a 'kayangan' represented by a cloth tied by its four corners to the roof of the enclosure where the spirits/deities live, a bowl of rice and other offerings for feeding the spirits/deities and a structure made of bamboo and thatched leaves that represents the house where the bad spirits go into, to be discarded at the end of the ceremony. The Tok Puteri invokes the spirits and sometimes, seem to be possessed by it/them and banters with the Tok Mindok. And so ... spirits, deities, elements of animism, Buddhism and so forth ... these are anathema to Muslims and Islam, even though Quranic verses and praises to Allah are uttered. Somewhere in the village crowd I heard someone exclaiming 'Kurafat!' which was ignored by everyone else ... Shot with Canon XF100