Rabaho Duwüe
Rabaho Duwüe (Lüota: beating fruit) is a percussion instrument used in family celebrations of arrival or departure. A halfling family’s rabaho duwüe is one of its most cherished possessions and is typically held by its eldest member during journeys large and small.
Description & Construction
The rabaho duwüe is built by drying, hollowing, and polishing two gourds of differing sizes. The smaller gourd is then inverted and attached at the neck to the larger gourd. Finally, a sound hole is cut in the base (now the top) of the smaller gourd.
The instrument is strikingly similar to the iwo heke of Hawaiian Earthlings from iterations of reality where the halflings are not present.
Conspiracy theorists who take literally “The Myth of the Nested Reality” believe that either the Sister Goddesses or their supposed creator implanted the idea for the rabaho duwüe into the halflings’ collective unconscious. This they did after hearing the iwo heke being played to hypnotic effect in the video game Civilization VII, or so the conspiracy theorists believe.
Usage
The rabaho duwüe is traditionally used only in celebrations of arrival or departure, but modern halflings have found ingenious ways to stretch those definitions and play their wonderful instrument on occasions besides births, weddings, and funerals. No matter when it is used, the playing of the rabaho duwüe is typically accompanied by singing, chanting, and dancing.
The rabaho duwüe, like the iwo heke it is based on, may be played in one of two ways. Which method is employed all comes down to comfort, and depends entirely on the size of the instrument and the size of the percussionist.
In both methods, the non-dominant hand is used to hold the instrument by the neck. In both methods, the dominant hand taps out one of the instrument’s two different sounds. The difference comes down to whether the other sound is played by striking the bottom of the larger gourd with the base of one’s palm or if it is instead created by striking the bottom of the gourd against the floor or another surface.
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