JUMPING MEN OF NIAS

Evening Star, Issue 23325, 22 July 1939, Page 6

JUMPING MEN OF NIAS

miHED TO SIX-FOOT LEAP Nias, a little island 80 miles off the coast of Sumatra, in the Dutch East Indies, is the home, of the jumping men (says the 1 Christian Science Monitor*’). In everv one of the 60 villages of Nias you will find a 11 jumping stone,” and at every stone the natives will provide amazing feats. Nias is easy to locate on the map if you rule a line due west from Singapore, at the tip of the Malay Peninsula, straight through the island , of Sumatra. ' ■ • '' , XT . Stone appeals to the people of Nias, All about the little.island run narrow roads of paved stone, there are-broad stone steps leading up ,to the ' villages, which a traveller is ,inclined to decide are all perched on mountain tops.,- Before the houses in these villages. ara stone pillars and benches of carved

stone. . ’ , The jumping stone_ continues the pattern. For jumping is the sport of the men of Nias. From an early age every boy is trained to jump. They ara trained not merely to -clear the stone, but to do it with style. There is a. classical liiethod of jumping in Nias, and the man who would win the applause of his watchers must adopt it. There seems no fixed height tor tba jumping stone. Many of them, however, are over 72in, and 80iu seems to be an agreed limit. At the age of 10 boys begin training for the day ivheu they will attempt to clear these stones. They start jumping a rope stretched between two bamboo' sticks set beside the stone columns, and they have some of the most skilled jumpers' as their instructors. From the first-they are forced to adopt the approved technique, with their legs drawn up, armaf widely spread for balance. As the boy’s skill grows the ropo beside the stone is gradually- raised. Finally it is placed from 4in to Sin higher than the stone itself.. s It- s only after the jumper has mastered tins leap, which may take, him many-years •of effort, that he is allowed to -attempt the stone itself. Even after ha customarily clears the higher rope it is not certain that he will be able to leap the stone. The best jumpers seem drawn from the men of-medium height; They are rather slender in build to eyes, and have sturdy legs. They may be anything from 17 to SO year.age. They take a run of from 12yds to 15yds, .'anti about 6ft from the stone they launch their effort. In front or the column there - is a flattened boulder,'about 16in high, from which tha jumper takes off. . If he fails to strike just the right pose as he gets over the stone he will never be considered a jumper. Not even the best Idapers are likely to succeed in clearing the ni'lar affthe-’-firet effort. If they succeed they will repeat the effort six or eight times, winning praise according to the graea of their, performance. There are no matches between the villages, as far as I could discover, but every village is anxious to have a number rtf good leapers. , Efforts of the correspondent to d«cover records of this strange sport were unsuccessful. The people of Nias It s no script, it seems, and ' consequent* v no written histories, hut in their lm'- : e poems, handed down from very nr : - times, they have passages which do honour to'famed jumpers, who are invariably heroes.