It was my second trip to Bali and my second time in Ubud… I’d done my research before my first visit and taken in a sunset kecak dance at the Hindu temple, as well as the barong and legong dances at Ubud Royal Palace, and now I had returned to try and scratch the surface. This time it was the elegant and courtly legong dance that I was seeking to know better. Another form of dance drama and ritual, performed by both men and women,
I had taken a homestay in a traditional Balinese family compound not far from the Royal Palace. These ornate quarters, surrounded by a wall, include several small, slightly raised huts with low and often exposed thatched, wooden or tiled roofs. They are comprised of a single story single room containing a teak bed and some sort of a chest of drawers, with a door that opens directly onto a small terrace covered by the extension of the roof held up by slender pillars and with a table and chair outside. In short, they are simple and charming.
I had come to Bali wanting to learn some aspects of the legong dance, but without any means of gaining a formal introduction I hung around the palace in the hope of meeting one of the performers. At some point around mid-afternoon on my second day a couple of men turned up and started to tinker with the gamelan instruments on stage. I introduced myself and expressed my interest in learning legong. Serendipitously, the gentleman I spoke to, Wayan, was not only the leader of the gamelan orchestra, but also head of the family of performers. The name Wayan, in fact, means first born, as does Putu and Gede, and these names can be used for both males and females; similarly, Made or Kadek are used for the second born, Nyoman or Komang for the third and Ketut for the fourth, whereupon the cycle begins again with added denominators such as Wayan Balik, meaning roughly “another Wayan”, and so on. Wayan agreed to introduce me to his sister, one of the leading dancers, whom he said would be happy to teach me.
After the show that night, I waited by the stage to see what would transpire. When almost everyone seemed to have packed up and gone home, Wayan reappeared and told me where his family compound was, which was not far from the Palace, and invited me to come around the following morning. Still unsure as to whether this would prove fruitful, I turned up the next day ready to begin. Wayan was nowhere to be seen, and it was unclear whether or not I was expected, but nonetheless Wayan’s sister Nyoman seemed warm and open and we began right away.
Nyoman led me up onto the terrace of the main building in the family compound, which was large enough to form a small stage. She began to demonstrate a few simple moves, and, raised in the tradition of Western dance classes I began to try to simultaneously mirror her. I quickly learned that, in fact, this was not how things were done! Rather, Nyoman would execute a short sequence of movements, which I would stand and observe as closely as possible, then mimic facing the same direction and to the same side as she had performed them. I soon discovered that what had looked simple, gentle and effortless was, to my inexperienced body, awkward and challenging. The long, tightly wrapped sarong severely and deliberately restricted my movements in a way that I was not used to, and I found affecting the fairly deep bend in the knees of many of the postures difficult.
Nyoman taught me how to walk with my legs close together and knees bent, how to make what Indian dancers call the tribhanga, the pose seen in Hindu sculptures such as those of the Apsaras at Angkor Wat. It is a triple bend in the body at the neck, waist and knee, so that the head tips slightly to one side and the torso angles the other way, while the second bend at the hip causes it to push out and the upper leg angles in the same direction as the hip, facilitated by the third bend which is of the knee, so that all in all the body makes a sort of zig-zag shape. She also taught me how to use my eyes, opening them very wide, and using different movements and gazes to create different effects, all of which was new to me, and my performance of which, I have to say, she found somewhat unsatisfying. She showed me how to hold and use my fingers elegantly, though she explained how young dancers are trained from an early age to flex their fingers backwards to form a deep curve that mine would never make.
Nyoman began to teach me a short sequence that was the opening of a well known and popular piece of dance drama repertoire called “The Bumble Bee” which tells a story of courtship and love. For the entrance, the female dancer walks forward in the manner described earlier. Once downstage she strikes the tribhanga pose with one elbow out and the forearm in front of the chest and the other extended forward on a diagonal. Both palms are down and the fingers curve back, with the hands trembling in a manner that signifies the buzzing of the bee, while eyes are wide and dart keenly from side to side. Needless to say, Nyoman’s execution of the sequence was exquisite, mine awkward and unnatural, but Nyoman was a patient teacher and gentle critic.
By now, our first session was over, and to be honest, I felt disappointed with myself and wondered if Nyoman was secretly frustrated with me. The whole manner of the movement, with its highly restrained and contained energy was so different to what I was used to: ballet, jazz and contemporary, with their wide, expansive extensions and leaps. Years later it would be explained to me how the dances of much of South East Asia, including Thailand, Cambodia and Indonesia, share an aesthetic with their architecture, which is based on the premise of contained and internally circulating energy. As the edges of the roofs of traditional buildings in these countries curl up and back around, so the energy follows, and it is the same with the dance, from obvious embellishments like the fingers that directly resemble those roofs, to the contained, curvaceous energy of the poses and walk. Whether this understanding would have helped I do not know, but I was left feeling lost and uncomfortable in a body that I was used to commanding easily.
The following morning I returned to Nyoman’s compound, whereupon I was told I needed to move in with them immediately. This being done with no great difficulty, as I had only a small backpack, Nyoman and I returned to the large terrace to recommence dancing. No sooner had I began that I felt a firm but gentle slap on my arm and turned to see Nyoman’s grandmother behind me. She didn’t speak a word of English, but beckoned me to follow her, which I did, and she bid me sit down with her on the edge of the terrace of what I assume was her own dwelling. There she had arranged shallow baskets of flowers, palm fronds, rice, and other assorted plant items. She motioned for me to copy her as she took up first the palm fronds and wove a basket small enough to hold in one hand; then took white, red, yellow and green flowers and placed them inside the basket; then finally placed some betel nut, lime and a small ball of rice in the centre.
This is the canang sari, with canang meaning basket and sari meaning essence, a daily offering made to the gods, which can be seen in temples, shrines, and even on the streets of Bali every day. Scattered over the roads, I was surprised on my first visit to see them knocked into the path of traffic, and half eaten by Bali’s ubiquitous dogs and monkeys! Why was no one protecting something which was clearly an offering? I was soon told that once the canang sari has been offered to the gods its purpose is served, that it is, in fact, in the making of the offering that the reward is earned. Making it myself this second visit, I felt the creation and placing of the offering was a meditative process of contemplation and gratitude.
That morning, having sat with Nyoman’s grandmother for around half an hour quietly communicating through gesture while following her expert hands, I felt at peace, and moreover I felt extremely grateful for this opportunity to spend time with these people, to even try to learn something about not only their dance but their culture. While my canang sari was by no means as well constructed or beautifully arranged as Nyoman’s grandmother’s, I felt her stern yet gentle approval. This moment remains one of my most treasured experiences in all my travels.
Having finished making the canang sari, Nyoman and I resumed our dance practice. While I normally remember well, the unfamiliar nature of the movements meant that I had forgotten most of “The Bumble Bee”, though it quickly came back to me once we got started. Perhaps this second day was a little easier, perhaps I had made some progress, but Nyoman and I relaxed with one another and there developed a rapport of relaxed playfulness between us.
In the afternoon Wayan took me to the Royal Place theatre to show me around the gamelan instruments. He introduced me to the gangsas, the Balinese xylophone style instruments; and the horizontal gongs arranged in rows and three sides of a square in the centre of which the musician sits; and the vertical gongs. Wayan, as leader of the gamelan orchestra, plays the kendhang, a double ended drum. For the remainder of the day he taught me various patterns on each set of instruments and how to follow his lead on the drum. Gamelan music is, perhaps, transcendental, and has captivated Indonesians and non-Indonesians alike for decades. The resonances of the various gongs, played in complementary pairs, created complex, layered and rhythmic frequencies that transport the listener to a state of enlivened upliftment, beyond the self and the temporal and mundane.
For the remainder of the week I lived, danced, slept and ate with the family. Mealtimes were some of my favourite moments, usually consisting of a simple and typical Balinese meal of rice, chicken, vegetables and sambal (a delicious chilli paste), which we ate sitting on the floor of the terrace. I had no idea what was going through their minds as we ate, since few of them spoke any English, and those who did only a little. However, their acceptance of this stranger into their lives for a few days was something they seemed to take without surprise or reservation, by and large even without a great deal of curiosity. Though I was told by Nyoman that this was a relative first, their openness, warmth and kindness was given automatically and seemingly wholeheartedly.