While most people are afraid of snakes, there is a small subset of pet lovers with a passion for the scaly serpents. Unfortunately for one Indonesian man, his love of pythons led to his own death after his favorite snake strangled him.
Jana, a 42-year-old resident of Citiru Village, in the Kutawaringin District of Bandung Regency, was found dead on Friday morning. He is believed to have been bathing his favorite python when it wrapped itself around him, killing him.
According to Jana’s wife Elah, it was their child who discovered Jana’s lifeless body behind their house that morning. In accordance with Islamic tradition, his body was buried soon after on Friday afternoon.
Elah told reporters that Jana has long raised reptiles as a hobby and often sold snakes to others.
“I have resigned myself to the fact that my husband died because of a snake, it was fate,” Elah said as quoted by Tribun.
The 17-kilogram python reportedly escaped down a water channel around the toilet behind Jana’s house after killing its owner, but it was eventually captured and killed to prevent it from attacking any other humans.
Rukiman, the head of the local neighborhood association in Jana’s village, said the snake was laid to rest next to its victim/owner.
“The snake that killed him was also buried close to Pak Jana’s tomb,” Rukiman said.
In another sad case of a snake owner being killed by its pet, a 17-year-old in Palangkaraya, Central Kalimantan, died last year after being bitten by his pet cobra. His parents refused to believe he died for several days after doctors told him he had passed away, hoping that a pawang ular (an occupation that might loosely be translated as “snake shaman”) could conduct a ritual that would bring him back to life.
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