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Hi Everyone.
I arrived in Yogyakarta this morning and was really sad to say goodbye to Bali. I have to apologize for not being able to write I was staying with Pak Made Lasmawam a Gamelan musician and teacher in his home in the small village of Banga in the Tabanan district of Bali. It is a mountainous region of the island where there was no wireless internet, no western plumbing and not hot water. Pak Made's home is of traditional Balinese style, he has a beautiful compound complete with a family temple, housing for students, rice hut and tons of rehearsal space with Gamelan instruments. If you wish to bathe you have one of two choices. One you can take a half hour drive to the hot spring every couple of days or you can grit your teeth and do it the traditional Balinese way of ladling really cold mountain spring water from the basin over your bod. Fantastic! Better than a double shot of espresso and twice as effective.
Pak Made arranged for me to work with the village dalang which is a rare and wonderful opportunity. My teacher also named Made started our instruction with a ceremony at his home to bless the union between pupil and teacher. The ceremony was a beautiful affair where among other things he plead to Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of art and education to bless our time together. (I have pictures and video and will upload them ASAP. The broadband here is a bummer)
After the ceremony we retrieved a cow's hide, the traditional material for making Wayang kulit in Bali. I will not give you the details of how we obtained the cow hide but I will say I feel less of a vegan. The hide was also blessed and we began to draw our characters on the hide. We started with Arjuna that famous charioteer from the Bagavad Gita.
After drawing the character we also drew a traditional pattern of small shapes, spirals half moon shapes and and circles that will later be cut out with tools I was given by a puppet maker in Ubud. I was instructed on how to use my new tools which consisted of a wooden hammer and a series of chisel like tools with different shapes on the ends to 'tap, tap, tap' through the leather and thus creating a pattern where light will escape when performed behind the screen thus adding to their already stunning beauty.
It takes the average puppet maker days to finish constructing a puppet it took me about three days of work to get as far as I did. I haven't finish my puppet yet but am looking forward to working on it when I get home. During my off hours I learned how to play Gamelan music. Gamelan is an important part of Wayang performances not to mention dance here in Bali. I participated in a local ceremony in the village temple and didn't do too bad if I do say so myself. Must have been all that band I took in middle school.
It wasn't all work and no play however. I also had the opportunity to take in some of the local sights including the temple lake, the local market, and the monkey Forrest, not to mention walk through the stunning vistas of rice patties in this famous mountainous region. The rice here is a huge part of the local culture and is not exported which is really too bad because it is delicious. It is a red rice unique to the Tabanan region of Bali.
I even got to go to my first Balinese dance social which is quite a spectacle as you will soon see for yourself when I upload the videos from the event. The whole village turns up and the bring in about four traditional Balinese dancers. The idea is she is supposed to pick a young man from the crowd to dance with , picking a few partners so that all the fellas have a chance. The boys however are so excited they run out to the middle of the crowd to dance with the girl sometimes pushing others in the middles (yours truly included) to get a dance with the girl. It gets pretty racy in the end and a lot of macho showboating takes place.
Made for affording me with this rare and wonderful opportunity to Like all good things this to had to come to an end. I was very sad to say goodbye to my teacher and of course to Pak Made not to mention his wife Ketuit and her delicious cooking. Pak Made held a ceremony in his family temple for me and asked for blessings for my journey. It was all hugs and tears. I made a lot of lasting friendships that week including many of the villagers and local gamelan musicians and of course Pak Made and his wonderful family. Thank you Pakreally immerse myself in Balinese culture. I came to learn puppetry and gained a family.
So here I sit in Yogyakarta with a heavy heart and excitement of what is to come. Tomorrow I will travel East to the largest Buddhist monument in the world Borobodor to watch the sunrise over that amazing artifact. After that I meet with a Javanese dalang who calls himself Pak Eddie. He sounds like a great fella.
Well, good night for now, I've got an early day.
love and respect,
Daniel