Christian Paraphernalia

You'll see more Christian paraphernalia in Toba than you will in the American Bible Belt. In Batak communities, homes are typically decorated with tapestries of a long-haired Jesus and gold cross necklaces adorn cleavage. The rice paddies and villages are cultivated around sober Protestant-style churches and tombs merging traditional Batak architecture and Christian crosses.

This was once the 'heart of darkness' from the perspective of the European and American missionaries and the first evangelists met their makers by the tips of spears. Good timing brought survival and fame to a German missionary named Nommenson. His arrival preceded a bumper crop and in return the Batak king traded in a few animistic beliefs for the lucky charm of Christianity. The resulting blend of traditional culture and imported religion, observable in the Batak countryside, puts a realistic face to those exotic tales of mannered missionaries and cannibalistic natives.