Sudung

The Orang Rimba · Bukit Duabelas, Jambi

A sudung is an Orang Rimba shelter in the forest of Bukit Duabelas: a single sheet of leaf on a light frame, over a floor just off the ground, put up in an afternoon out of whatever is within reach of the spot. It is not a smaller house — it is what a house is for people who move. Three things make it worth building here. It ends because of an event rather than a decision: when somebody dies, the family leaves and does not return, and the shelter is left standing. Its plan is a row of people lying side by side — the only body figure in this project that sets a plan rather than a height. And the whole building is bounded by what can be cut nearby and carried by hand. The sun in this model is computed for Bukit Duabelas, 2.0° S and 102.6° E.

This is the thinnest-sourced pack in the whole collection, and that should be read first. There is no published measured drawing of a sudung; the sources on the Orang Rimba are about ways of living and moving rather than about the dimensions of buildings. Every metre here is the author’s reading. Beyond that: sudung vary a great deal with purpose and length of stay, and what is built here is the basic form; what a family carries with them is not modelled; the prohibitions and seloko that govern much about place and direction cannot be checked by any model; and it matters to say that the Orang Rimba are living people, in a forest that is shrinking fast — this building is not a survival, and this page is not a record of the past.