THE village of Liyodu was heavily cloudy on one afternoon in January. For over a month the rain poured down on the hilly village in the subdistrict of Bongomeme, Gorontalo regency. A moustached man with a beard as white as smoke stood in the middle of the courtyard. His face looked up to the sky while his mouth muttered a mantra. Miraculously, within minutes the raindrops vanished, blown away by the wind. “We usually call the ritual to stop and