i was picked up by Dakat and driven on the motorbike into the neighboring village, which i thought i knew more or less already, in order to go to his house and hear the women playing the gamelon chimes...i thought, " oh, how cute, his mother and sisters or wife, sit around every evening and play music together" little was i prepared for anything that unfolded after that! turning down a little sidepath, like all the other labyrinth looking ones that secretly open up to the main road as compound after compound of family units including temples are crowded one next to the other, with a few potted plants or a token tree offering some nature and greenery among the cement walls that surround each one. but this path went on and one, past the houses and we started to climb through the mountain side into the forest, with a few houses peeking out here and there,,,,and this was still part of the little village, and then i heard the chimes and we were passing by an old temple with huge colored dragons guarding it and women wearing sarongs streaming into it....and then stopped the motorbike 100 metres further and he said: this is where i live.
i couldn't believe that this security guard that sits at the entrance to the resort, lives in the middle of this beautifully amazing huge forest jam packed with trees and plants surrounding his house....we (carefully!) walked down the steep slope to his house which was big and still in the process of being built...so far only cement and bricks, no plaster, window, doors...and he apologized that he doesn't have a house (doesn't have a house??!! so what is this magnificent thing we are standing in at this moment in such an unbelievable place?? )
his 2 little girls 2 and 5) shyly peeking out at me, his extremely shy wife who obediently touched my hand in a gesture of a handshake when she was told to do so by him, than ran off to sit in the corner, and a bamboo bedframe for sitting on, and a chair, is what i was greeted with. as i sat there, looking out at the forest surrounding me, through the unbuilt home, with only gamelom chimes filling the air from the nearby temple, i thought this is unbelievable...growing up like this...
he brought me one of his wifes' sarongs ( never a problem of whether it will "fit" or not, since it is just a long piece of material that i wrap around me!) and "the scarf" which is a symbolic "bow tie" wrapped around my waist symbolizing that" we are serious now"....since he explained that the women are playing IN the temple, not at his house...
we sat in silence for a while, his wife telling me in PERFECT english "I am sorry that i don't speak any english"...(wish i could say that in perfect balinese!) and then he said, let us go now. and we walked to the temple across the road, and 2 minutes later i found myself looking at an 18 piece womens gamelon and drum orchestra in an old temple in the woods, which had my ears ringing with the gongs with beautiful music. and there was my gardener from the resort....the one that had climbed up the palm tree that afternoon and hacked away at it in order to pull it down, and the one that had wadded in mud knee deep that morning making a rice field, and here he was all dressed up in his sarong, teaching these women in the temple orchestra... dakat pointed out a tiny thin elderly woman playing a huge chime each the size of a steering wheel, and there were 8 of them one next to the other, and said that was his mother...and the rest of the women were of all ages, each banging away at chimes of all types and sizes and scales....
another man there was apparently the ringleader along with dakats father, and he would decide what the next song was and when they would begin by him hitting the first couple of sounds on his chime. they were arranged in rows but in a circle so they could all see each other. i was quickly offered to join in and sit on a little stool next to the one chime that was not being used ( meant for me??) ...never one to say no to once in a lifetime experiences, i immediately sat down next to the chime, picked up the little wooden pick hammer and dakats father sat at the chime next to me, and nodded with his head that i should just bang away, following what he is doing on his 12 metal chimes...
whoooo.....i just joined in without thinking and let my intuition guide me as i kept my eyes on every move his father made, and without looking at my chime, did the same, hoping it was the same notes...
what amazed me was the the leader would stop every now and then because someone was playing a wrong note....how he could even hear a wrong note in the million gonging different sounds i haven't the faintest idea...their sensitivity to things is so different than the western mind...in an entirely different vibrational range...
when the melody got too complicated i just watched and enjoyed, then they started another tune, and apparently not all of them knew it, so the leader and dakats father started going around to each woman and playing it forcefully in their face on their chime so they would learn it...and then the women would try and repeat it, making mistakes and forgetting what comes next, and again they would determinedly hit the notes again playing a series of some 30 notes that had no logical rhyme or rhythm to them, and expected the woman to imitate it....and suddenly, as i saw one woman trying again and again, i felt at home! and realized that this is how they teach, and that it really is so hard to learn a new tune, and all you can do is try again and again, and it is not that they have been playing for years....
all of this went on for about 2 hours...and then, we ended with a moment of silence in prayer, just as they had done before they began the actual playing, after the initial warm up by everybody....so special to see them all stop a moment, clasp their hands together and place them on the third eye and bow their heads in silent prayer for 1 minute or 2 and only then began to play.
when we left back for dakats house again, it was already starting to rain, his mom and dad live with him so they came back with us, and we all sat in silence in the cement hallway/living room/kitchen/foyer, and watched the rain pouring down and running off the corrugated tin roof in long shiney lines to the ground, just like the beaded room dividers that are sold in the west. the noise was so loud on the tin roof that we had to yell to each other if we wanted to say anything..but no one spoke...for about the entire 20 minutes of the storm...all of us just sitting on the bamboo platform or an odd broken chair or stool watching the lightening light up the forest and gardens surrounding us every now and then..... i am getting good at "just sitting in silence" when i am around everyone....and my thoughts wandered to a time some 30 years ago, as a young mother with 5 kids and a messy house and no money, and one of my spiritual teachers had requested through a mediator to come visit us at home in order to be friendly, and i kept refusing since i was so ashamed of all the dirty handprints on the wall, and the torn upholstery, and the fact that my house did not look a designer house, and he was from france, and what would he think of me. finally one day he came out and asked her directly why i wouldn't let him come to have a meal by me, and i said that my house is always a mess, and i don't know how to cook a gourmet meal, and i was told, that he laughed and said that none of that is important to him, he just wants to get to know me in my surroundings, simply.... which in the end i agreed to and it was so nice and simple, and here i was, having invited my self to dakats to hear them play, and both he and his father apologizing for "not having a nice house" and for me it was even more special just being in their natural surroundings and realizing how they live without any judgement, just admiration and interest and respect.
the gardener, his father, asked me one question in balinese along with the word
"holy bible"...wanting to know if i study the holy bible....i have a soft spot for this old man( turns out he is my age, but looks like a grampa, which he is, and i am a grama, but still feel so young!) because he is the one that at last years dedication ceremony at the resort, knew every single ritual and was the priests assistant the whole time. i was touched that that in fact is the only thing that interested him... do i study the holy bible. and his wife, that looks about 80 but is also probably my age, asked 1 question too: how old am I? (women are women!) and they were surprised when i told them in sign language 58....he smiled and said with his hands "same same"...
i asked how long the women have been playing together....3 months! (and they will be having a ceremony at the temple in a few days where they will perform, and i am invited.) so i realized there is still hope for me! after 1 day of trying...
when the rain finally stopped he drove me back to the resort
No comments:
Post a Comment