Ketungau Tesaek, one of the Iban sub-groups in Sekadau, West Borneo, continues to uphold traditional customs, including this welcoming dance for guests. Photo by the author.
By Masri Sareb Putra
Among the many Dayak communities that shape the cultural landscape of West Kalimantan, one group stands out for both its demographic weight and its deep historical roots.
The Ketungau Tesaek are one of the dominant ethnic communities in Sekadau Regency, a region often overlooked by travelers who rush past its forests and rivers without realizing the layered human stories they contain.
A People at the Heart of Sekadau
Among the many Dayak communities that shape the cultural landscape of West Kalimantan, one group stands out for both its demographic weight and its deep historical roots.
The Ketungau Tesaek are one of the dominant ethnic communities in Sekadau Regency, a region often overlooked by travelers who rush past its forests and rivers without realizing the layered human stories they contain.The Ketungau Tesaek are not merely a geographic label. They represent a distinct clan identity within the vast constellation of Dayak peoples, numbering more than 150 sub-ethnic groups across West Kalimantan alone.
In the authoritative mapping work published by the Institute of Dayakology in 2008, the Ketungau Tesaek were documented under the name “Ke-tungau Sesae’,” complete with a specific distribution code and map reference. This was done deliberately, to distinguish them from other groups known as Ketungau, including those in neighboring Sintang and the twelve Ketungau subgroups identified there.
Today, the Ketungau Tesaek population is estimated at around 30,000 people, spread across more than 70 villages. This represents roughly 7 percent of Sekadau Regency’s total population. In political, economic, cultural, and educational terms, this is a significant presence. Yet beyond numbers, what makes the Ketungau Tesaek compelling is how their identity is carried through ritual, oral history, language, and the riverine geography of Borneo itself.
For cultural travelers, Sekadau is not simply a destination. It is a living archive where identity is performed rather than displayed.
Tesaek as a Journey, Not a Mistake
The word “Tesaek” is often misunderstood. In everyday speech, it has been variously rendered as Sesat, Tesat, Sesae’, or Tesaek, depending on dialect and pronunciation. Some have linked it to the idea of being lost. Yet among the Ketungau Tesaek themselves, the phrase “Tesaek jalae ne” tells a very different story. It refers not to a failed journey, but to a decisive one.
According to oral tradition, a group once traveling down the Sekadau River turned back after losing their sense of direction. Rather than returning permanently to the river’s mouth, they chose to paddle upstream along the Kapuas River, deeper into the interior, until they reached the Ketungau River. There, they built new longhouse settlements and began a new chapter of communal life.
This movement was not accidental. It was an act of cultural agency, a refusal to retrace steps already taken. In this sense, Tesaek is not about being lost. It is about choosing a different future.
Historical records collected by local researchers describe how the Ketungau Tesaek later divided into two major migratory streams. One group traveled through the Merbang River under the leadership of a figure named Punuk. Another moved via the Ayak River, led by Amuk, and remained for a long period at the river mouth before establishing permanent settlements further inland.
For travelers today, these rivers remain more than scenic routes. They are cultural corridors. Following them is to trace the logic of settlement, kinship, and survival in the rainforest heart of Borneo.
Language, Borders, and Shared Worlds
The Ketungau Tesaek speak two major dialects that reflect both migration history and cultural contact. The dominant dialect is known locally as the Sungai Dayak dialect, characterized by an “o” sound in everyday speech. Words such as balo, namo, and benuo roll easily from the tongue and can be heard across Sekadau Hulu, Sekadau Hilir, parts of Sanggau, and Belitang Hilir.
A second dialect, centered on the Kedah River, uses an “a” sound instead. Speakers say bala, nama, and tiga. Although these communities share the same ancestral customs, they often identify themselves specifically as Kedah people. One ritual distinguishes them clearly from other Ketungau Tesaek groups. On the first day of Gawai, they perform ngumpatn pala kabak, a ritual feeding of ancestral war trophies, some of which are still preserved at Lebak Kapae.
The Ketungau Tesaek live alongside many other Dayak groups, including Mualang, Jangkang, Benawas, Kerabat, Sekujam, Seberuang, and Ot Danum. These borders are not rigid lines. They are zones of exchange, where language, marriage, and ritual knowledge intersect. Over generations, this interaction has shaped subtle differences in intonation and speech rhythm that only fluent listeners can fully recognize.
For visitors, this linguistic diversity offers an invitation. To listen carefully is to hear how identity in Borneo is negotiated daily, not frozen in museums.
Ritual, Leadership, and Cultural Travel in Borneo
Art and ceremony among the Ketungau Tesaek are inseparable from community life. Rituals are not staged for spectacle. They are embedded in agricultural cycles, ancestral remembrance, and communal decision-making. Longhouses, though fewer today, still function as symbolic centers where history is told through song, gesture, and shared meals.
This is where Borneo’s potential as a cultural travel destination becomes clear. The Ketungau Tesaek do not offer curated performances detached from meaning. What they offer is participation through respect, observation, and dialogue.
Today, the community is represented by leaders such as Paulus Subarno, the head of the Ketungau Tesaek association. His work focuses on strengthening internal bonds while encouraging cooperation beyond ethnic boundaries. The vision is inclusive, rooted in the belief that cultural survival depends on openness rather than isolation.
For travelers seeking more than surface-level encounters, Sekadau offers something rare. It offers a chance to witness how an indigenous community maintains coherence amid change, how rivers continue to shape memory, and how identity can remain dynamic without losing its core.
In the wider map of Borneo tourism, destinations like Sekadau remind us that the island’s greatest richness lies not only in its forests, but in the people who have learned to live with them for centuries.
To travel here is not to consume culture, but to encounter it on its own terms.
