Kecak, kecak... oonp, oonp!
- Futile attempts from us to be world class acts, Ubud (after much wine)
I got up to a nice warm hug this morning. With my loving half soaking up the early rays (and I was succumbing again to the white cotton mass within the confines of a traditional kelambu, another hour whiled away.
This is after breakfast at the treehouse looking restaurant (don't like calling it that but the hotel does, as I think this takes away the "Mowgli" feel as I tuck into my fruits medley while daydreaming away at the temples sites in front of me) and I am at the tail end of the enchanting opium of a kecak performance last night at Puri Saha Sari, Kota Ubud.
Overall, we took to spend a day over at the kota, stopping for a "Bintang" refreshment and watching the town passed us by. The only aggressive moment was when we edged ourselves into a sea of heads at Ibu Oka's babu guling joint. Cheap, local and completely aromatically guaranteed to knock you off your sandals. This was a rattan plate, lined with a small piece of banana leaf, and topped over with a generous helping of steamed rice, herbs, chopped vegetables, slivers of succulent suckling pig meat and some fried goblets, and ended with a piece of that crackle of its skin. We took to mainly Sewata Street, Hanoman Street (named after the Monkey God) and also the Monkey Forest Street (where I had to run away from an alpha that thought the gamelan improvised musical instrument I bought in a bag was his banana ration for the day).
Besides taking a peaceful stop at the Puri Ubud, the old palace, we decided to stay on for a local Balinese and milk bath opportunity. This was contemplated after another round of refreshments by the padi field.
All I have to say is this... How in the world did those little Balinese lasses become so strong as they kneaded your tired muscles? I was almost afraid to think if I pissed them off!
This took us to time to get to the Padang Tegal, for the climax of the night. I will write again about the performance. It's time to go out for a drive on the South and West parts of the island.
Uluwatu, Jimbaran, and a sunset at Tanah Lot await.
Love from day 3, here at the Ubud Hanging Gardens
Retrospectively speaking...
Could it be possible that one listens to the Ramayana a thousand times yet only hear it for the first with your eyes? You most definitely can. It was enthralling and magical. I had never seen anything remotely like it, every move and glance, every character was honed to perfection and you found yourself swept away by a wave of spiritual transcending.
The beginning was a shadowy cover of smoke from the central tree of burning lamps. By this hour, the eyes beseeched any form of light to make sense of the darkness. Setting up my camera and tripod, I told myself to not get too immersed in the gears that I be silly enough to let the whole show passed by me. At 7:30pm sharp, the chattering mimicking of monkeys started (hence, kecak) announced the entering of the troupe. Men, cladded in sarong came in via the staircase leading into what looked to me as an old temple. They swayed their arms upwards, continuing in that mind numbing chant and formed a circle sitting down. I noticed there were two seniors with an exceptional possession of tone. They alternated between themselves to start the different verses of chants, all the time transforming the whole open stage into a real jungle. Different characters from the epic came out, and not a single word (mostly). If you can ignored the occasional nasty white flash from the cameras, you almost can believe you were peeping into the heartbreaking search of Rama for his beloved Sita. My favourite part was when the good guy, Hanuman came out. This actor was practically cladded in white, but boy, could he do a hard core shriek! He even danced around his feeble monkeys, doing a bit of a pirouet, his lowly slaves all waving their arms up to validate his numero uno status wildly, teeth all baring. I was so loving this moment!
In the end, good triumphed over evil, and then the madness started. When I thought I could pack up and head out for a drink, after all, getting all entranced for two and a half hours was commitment, one man suddenly galloped into the centre stage. Yes, he galloped full on with a kuda kepang look-alike, sort of what you would find on a road kill (flattened) version of a mythical horse, bells and whistles together. Now, not that this was anything to get seriously hoo-haa about if not for what was in the centre stage.
The mother of all camp fire. Coconut husks, dried, kerosene. Matches. You get it.
Now, magnified the effect by ten times because Yours truly was silly enough to grab a front row seat.
That horsey guy was, well... not horsing around. He danced around in circles, winding up a frenzy of dust, fishing our curiosity by the second, we wondered "what was he going to do?" in loud amazed silence.
Then with a gust of surprise, he kicked the damned fire. Husks and all, came flying in the air amidst shrieks (not Hanuman this time I'm afraid) and of course the only thing that rang in my head was "if your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough" by Robert Capa.
Great wisdom from a great legend, yeah, and that's before he got too close to a mine, and got killed in Indochina!
Of course I did the reflex. I ran back!
Now I did brave myself to approach the subject of study and took some shots in the craze of the horsey man speeding up his trance. Looking back at the shots, I thought I was composing more of my own terror. The horse man didn't stop, he continued kicking up the fire again.
All's well in the end when the burning ambers died and some of his mates, comical as it seemed, orchestrated (perhaps) to the point to "catch" him. Horse man showed some attempt of "fleeing" his captors as the holy man came out to cast away the spirits that possessed him. So much for the trip back to Texax, yee-haw!
And there he was. Sitting sadly on the ground as his mates all left the stage. I thought by now, it was a political move to squeeze some tips from the audience and his blackened soles did most of the story-telling. Of course we were hugely impressed with this display of bravado and tips indeed we handed over. I guessed his mates at backstage were keeping their fingers crossed. The future of the night's reaping was resting on one man's shoulders, or should I say soles?
It was worth the stay out for this one. Will most likely to grab the next opportunity to watch it again. It was difficult having to decide (given our stay was short, we didn't have the luxury of checking out two separate performances) between the kecak and the barong. Just another excuse to return to Bali!
