Not many people know about dayak culture and it was very refreshing when a "Dayak Culture Festival" was announced in Jakarta a few weeks ago. Since YUM has a working area in Central Kalimantan, we deal with dayak people every day, and some of our projects actually involves the preservation of the dayak culture. Unfortunately since it's still quite a remote area, not many people know about it, and the preservation projects are not as many as say in Bali or Java. As you'll see below, dayak art and handicrafts are actually quite beautiful:
One huge project that YUM is currently trying to find funding for is the construction of a Vocational Training Center not far from Palangka Raya. More than 90% of the population where our project area is situated lives below the poverty line, mainly because they lack the education and skills needed to find a decent job to feed their family and improve their lives. One of the skills we are hoping to teach involves dayak culture and handicrafts because a) there is hardly any dayak handicrafts sold in the area and b) to keep the dayak culture alive. If you want to know more about this project, you can see a video that we made: http://vimeo.com/40845388
