kecak

What a wonderful surprise it was going to the kecak performance last night. We were greeted at the entrance to a temple by some men that placed a flower behind our ear as we entered the small courtyard and picked among the plastic chairs that were set up in a u shape facing the inner court. In the center was a circle drawn on the ground which would be the stage. We were about 40 foreigners sitting there and suddenly, in the dark of the night we heard 100 men singing rhythmic sounds from either side of the inner courtyard. And out came these men, bare chested with black and white plaid sarongs on, and while chanting their beat quickly formed 3 concentric circles one inside the other around the drawn circle on the ground…and the show began.

It was very powerful seeing them sitting one foot away from us, not on some stage with stage lights, and swaying and moving their shoulders all in unison with at least 4 part harmony going on and no accompaniment. The smaller inner circle had a pillar of fire made with small oil containers with wicks lit, which provided the lighting for the performance. The story being enacted was from the Ramayana, and soon the two female dancers (one playing Rama, a male) entered the circle and the musical began.

They were excellent. I had seen the same dance done several times already by young girls in the village, but these older girls were so skilled in not only the dancing but also in emitting the emotions of the love scene through their small head, eye or finger movements. No words were spoken by them, There was a storyteller in the circle of men that chanted out every now and then in Balinese the story and its lessons.

What was so fascinating for me was that there were no props, no stage set, no microphones, no conductor, no musical instruments, no translation, no stage lighting, and you felt like you were in the greatest musical ever done. The characters in the drama are always shown with the same physical attributes; the bad guy being wide shouldered, barrel chested, big black mustache, etc. these are the permanent costumes and features used, just like santa claus always looks the same for us,.

After the hour performance of sound and dance and opera and drama we applauded, and then they put metal borders around where the actors had been and poured a pile of dried coconut shells in the middle along with tons of kerosene poured on them and lit it. As the huge flame rose, some of the men returned and began chanting again and another one walked into the middle of the burning embers and just started kicking them all about, barefoot, against the metal borders. Each time he would finish doing that, two others would come and gather whatever embers were still left into another pile and exit and again he stomped on them all, barefoot. I had never seen someone in a trance that could walk on fire without being burnt and it was quite impressive, especially being a foot away from them.

In the end, we were invited to take photos of the soles of his feet, and to tell all of our friends how much we enjoyed the performance and that they should come to bali to see kecak performance in ubud…but only at this temple, and not the other one!

this morning during the yoga class that a lovely young swiss man teaches us, he mentioned that what we saw last night, with the balinese men sitting on the floor, chanting to the right, bending to the left and making a exhaling sound, raising their hands to the sky etc, is exactly the same as what we are discovering in yoga asanas, and sufi meditation, and going to our place of "flow" while hooping ...that all of these are means to reach that quiet place within where we feel connected to our "source". it is very strong here in bali....