the high high priest ceremony

it started with a comment that on saturday the big big ceremony will be taking place at a neighboring temple about 20 minutes from here and that probably the womens' gamelon temple band will be playing there. not one to miss that, i decided to go and possibly meet the women and try and arrange to practice with them here in the village, since getting back and forth to the womens band in the neighboring village where they practice each night would be nearly impossible. i asked what exactly it means the "big big" ceremony?! (since each time there is a big ceremony i am told "this is the really big ceremony!" but it happens about once a week, so ....)

i was surprised to hear the answer that this time the higher level holy man will be blessing everyone, not just the priest! "not just the priest"! and here i thought these down to earth priests are so cool because they are very personable and human, not anything untouchable or super serious about them...and it turns out that "they" are "just priests" but 2 levels higher than them is a very holy man that only he can do this ceremony so everyone goes on saturday because he will be there concluding the month of music and offerings that all of the surrounding villages have been participating in. ( how come no one told me until now?!!) and that at this closing ceremony it would be all the different dancers that i have seen in their costumes, but not seen dancing yet....so ...not to miss another puzzle piece, i decided i would definitely be there, somehow, some way.

"when does it start?" oh...the typical fuzzy answer "i will be going at 3 but it probably really begins at 6, but at 4 you will probably hear the gamelons." uh huh....okay..so, i deck myself out in the white kabiya blouse (after clarifying with her that for this ceremony i should wear white? yes! in the end, few among the thousand wore white...) and picked and washed (and dried so they wouldn't be all soggy like last time) flowers for the prayer ceremony, and bought some incense from a lovely old woman that ran a little kiosk and could hardly walk but was outside ...yep, sweeping...and i needed toothpaste and tried to figure out how not to get charged double since i am a "foreigner"=rich) but when i looked in the little glass cupboard i saw that the big tube said 8000 on it...a big $1...so with the price on it i knew i was safe, and also what a bargain! at home it would have cost $6! how do they get it so cheap? and then i wanted some incense and picked out a package and asked how much....even though i have learnt the numbers (or so i thought) adding so many zeros always leaves me totally confused. i pulled out a 10,000 bill, and got the no sign from her, okay...and then figured okay..add another zero and started to pull out five 20,000 rupia bills and she started to laugh and pushed them back in my wallet, also returning the 10,000 one and took one 20,000 and gave me change...ah yes...the incense...10 packs of 10 sticks each...cost...yep...another $1....so silly of me to think 10 packs of incense would cost $10!

anyways..was dressed, had a little bag with my flowers and a banana leaf to lay them out on so they are honorable and not just tossed in my plastic bag, and my incense and off i went (and with $2 stuck in my bra in case i need a bus ride and something to eat all day). i started to walk down the road in the village in order to catch a van/bus to drop me off at the temple. i had asked my friend to write the name down so i would know what to tell the driver; Pura Ponjok Batu. ah...me and languages...tried repeating it as i walked along the road so that i wouldn't have to take out the piece of paper to tell him. batu i already knew because i have been drawing mandalas on stones (almost 100! already... yes i am obsessive and know it but until it causes pain, it is a positive trait;) ) and when we were joking about the possible names for my new stone mandala business the owner told me that batu means stone. so that stuck in my mind. but how to remember that "j" in ponjok?! and as i am walking and practicing i see a beautiful woman in temple clothes, picking a bugonvillia flower to put in her big black bun of hair, as her husband waits in the car at their driveway (yes, wealthy, most do not have neither car or driveway, bugonvillia, yes). she handed him a little flower too for his black hair and black kerchief on his forehead. i chanced it: "anda akan pura ponjok batu?" "yeh" and then did motions of me going in their car with them. but she motioned, "no room in car"....since the windows were dark, i couldn't see in and figured it was full of family members...a good try...thanked her and continued walking.

the car drove off ahead of me and then stopped 10 meters on and the driver got out in his impressive black jacket and orange satin sarong and started to prop up his trunk with a pole. ah! he's going to let me sit in the trunk...isn't that nice of him! (no one obeys traffic laws, at least in the villages). but instead he opened the back door, took out a little suitcase and motioned that i can sit in the back seat of the private. so that was why she said no room?! good thing he was a little more ingenious!

i sat down, thanked them, clarified again that we are going to the temple, since i realized how naive i am to think that just because it is 3 in the afternoon and i see a woman in temple dress it means she is going to where i am. everyday, all day, there are people in temple dress since there is always a ceremony somewhere...so i better make sure. he said they were going to denpassar where he is a teacher and lives, so i assumed they would drop me off at the temple along the way. and off we drove. he tried to speak with me, but my indonesian wasn't too good, and his english wasn't too good, but he managed to tell me that next month he leaves for australia for a gamelon performance. aha! he plays the gamelon! another chance for me to try and find out about the womens band...but alas, a lack of language and sitting in the back seat did not reveal anything tangible.

i opened the window for some air but after a while he asked me to close it. and we sat for another 15 minutes in a hot car....why they chose to drive like this, i was unsure. afterwards i asked someone if the balinese are sensitive to wind, or if wind is evil or if it is the dust from the construction work, or just not wanting their hair to be blown...yep...once you are all spruced up for the ceremony, you do not want your hair blown, even if it means driving in a hot car for 20 minutes.

we arrived at the temple, and they parked, so i realized they too were coming in and then later traveling to the south, so no chance to return with them. getting the lift in was already a godsend, so i had perfect faith that finding a way back at 10 at night would also work out fine....i hoped. whenever the thought occurred, i just reminded myself that everything is perfect. let go of fear.

the temple is right on the main road overlooking the sea and is very big and of black stone. i followed the man as he walked up a few flights of steps, since his wife was busy bringing her first offering to the priest that was at ground level. i was happy to have someone to follow around a bit. we entered a big courtyard with a bale set up with some 50 gamelons and drums and gongs. he pointed to the one where a person sits and plays with wooden sticks on 8 gongs and said this is special for todays ceremony! we sat and chatted a little. there weren't many people around. still early, and then i heard gamelon playing in the inner upper courtyard and decided to walk up that flight of stairs to and see who is playing.

as i entered the narrow opening at the top of the stairs i was surprised to see little 5 year old kids playing the temple music on the gamelons...they were all dressed up with their sarongs and kerchiefs on their heads and were so cute playing the music just like the adults! and here i thought that my being able to play was a sign of my ability to concentrate and my musical talent! inside the courtyard were men and women, hanging around, praying. there were very tall 7 tiered decorations made from colored dough in all kinds of geometric shapes and placed on long poles before the altars. each pole was a different color: yellow, black, red and white.

i continued to wander around the premises for the next 3 hours. even saw a big sign that had the whole program for the month and had just learnt the word for "wife" (which is also the word for woman) and read that the wives gamelon band had already played a few days earlier and so i missed that. when a group of 10 year old girls walked by me with their gold ribbons and white dresses i asked if they were going to dance now and with a nod and a smile and what is your name, i followed them down down down until we reached the sea. they sat down on the pebbles, i sat down on the pebbles...thinking aha! finally i will see the girls dancing...but after 1/2 hour i realized that this is probably just another ceremony since all the priests were hanging around, another gamelon band was playing the music i love so much, and non stop women filing down the stairs to the sea from the temple with their offerings, placing them on altars here and there that look out to the sea. since i never seem to feel like there is a beginning or an end, unless they say "om shanti shanti shanti om" and everyone gets up suddenly, i decided that i had had enough of sitting looking out at the waves, even though it was nice, and the gamelons were good, but maybe i was missing something up in the temple. i said goodbye and began to walk in the direction of the steps and suddenly realized that "the bell" was ringing and turned my head only to find the "high high" priest sitting right in front of where i was standing, in the middle of a ceremony! oops...made an about turn, and took another flight of steps up, where people were busy photographing themselves...it always amazes me how multiple things are all going on at the same time, and it makes no difference if people are walking, sitting , talking, on their cell phones, everyone is just doing his thing and no one says anything to anyone about what they "should" be doing.

back upstairs i found the man who had given me the ride was playing with the gamelon band already. i stood there and watched. they are all very nonchalant, smoking, looking about, not at all focused on what they are doing, they can do it blindfold. i spotted my former gamelon teacher and we smiled at each other. i tried to figure out what it is about it that fascinates me. i saw that each one is sitting next to someone else that is playing a different tune that echos each other. no written music, they are all just listening to the drummer who is the leader and signals when it is loud, soft, fast, slow, begins and ends. and if someone has gone off and his gamelon is not being played, someone else that happens to know just joins in, after glancing at his neighbor to know when to join in with the opposite beat.

eventually all the girls came back in from the sea along with all of the priests and the high high one so i followed them into the inner chamber. the non stop filing in of women with offerings since 3 in the afternoon had continued but in greater quantities, and i decided that maybe i misunderstood the directions i was told about when to pray, and that i should join in now, at 6 p,m. while there is still room on the large grounds to sit and receive the holy water. again, i sit down, the heads turn, the giggles and nudges about the foreigner with all the rigmarole ( incense, flowers, matches...) and just as i am all settled in, a little girl comes up to me and i realize it is nyomans daughter telling me in balinese that i should join them in the front row, and i laugh, that after being there for hours with thousands of people, how just at this moment, we both appeared in the inner temple for this round of blessings and she found me! love that synchronicity! picked up my stash and moved next to them and it was nice to finally know someone. i realized that until now i had gone to ceremonies in the village where i am living, and there i always see a familiar face. but here....with villagers from all over, i hadn't seen a single person i knew...so that little nagging voice of "how do you think you are going to get home at 10 at night, 1/2 hour by car, if you don't know or recognize anyone here? and there is no public transport. and even if there was, i had already donated the money i had brought for food and transport, to the temple when i came in, having forgotten that there is always a donation table, and if i have come to enjoy, the least i can do is give them the $2 i brought with me!

so, went through the blessing, nyoman had to go home since staying out late with her baby was not worth risking her getting sick just in order for her to be blessed by the high high priest.her husband has the last word about that. also if someone divorces, the husband gets the kids. period. i stayed around, since all the dancing and priest was still to come. people had put out mats and had baskets with food, and it looked like picnic time. i couldn't make heads or tales out of anything. everyone was happy, easygoing, smiling, sitting on the ground, and a constant coming and going from three different entrances and exits from each courtyard....

then came the moment that nyoman had told me about, that everyone would come into the inner courtyard and that i should get a good seat if i want to see how the priest dresses, etc. and "
by chance" just where i sat is where the priest was busy wrapping a long blue and gold belt around his bare chest on the left shoulder and around his waist many times. his hair was in little knot on the top of his head, he looked about 40, and had a white sarong on and a white satin sheet wrapped around him. that was the most i understood of this high high priest. he was busy doing what he is supposed to do, on a raised platform (bale) while everyone continued to flow back and forth non stop. the dancers began to appear, the gamelons were playing, a balinese shadow play with fire behind a white sheet was going on,storytelling by the puppeteer (who is a very holy man that is gifted in this ritual performed only at the temple) along with the onkelon players for the shadow play , chanting by one and two people at a time, and a priest with a microphone speaking too, along with all of the thousands of people that were seated or mulling around and also talking and giggling....all at once! all i could think of was a 3 ring circus all in one tent. where to look next?

the area of the courtyard right in front of me was where the dancers appeared facing the altars and with the high priest behind the dancers. there was a series of about 7 groups that performed one after another, what looked to me like more or less the same movements, but in different costumes. there were usually about 20 dancers each time, in 2-3 rows all doing the exact same movements, which is more or less putting their weight first on one foot and then on the other, going forward a step, and backwards a step, towards the end, they turn 180 degrees and do the same thing in shortened version. sometimes it was with swords, or tall poles, or long daggers, or gold ribbons. no one was especially watching them, and i realized that this is a dance for god, not for the temple goers...no applause, no smiling, no stage fright, no photographing your husband or child, it all had to do with the powers of good and evil and the constant movement between them (if you ask me!) the plastic bags "on stage" from the rubbish people had left, did not seem to interfere with any of the dancing, at a certain moment whoever happened to be sitting right next to the dancer suddenly jumped up in order to put the sword or dagger into its case on their back, so everyone seemed to know the ritual of it all. nothing new. servants of god. period.

when it was over we all received the holy water from the priests, including the young woman next to me that was busy sms-ing in between praying and the other teenagers to my right giggling and teasing each other. some even got up before the "om shanti" ending, maybe to beat the temple rush? and as we all walked out i again thought, hmm...how am i going to find someone from tejakula? i don't see anyone i know. at most i will sleep in the temple and figure out how to get back tomorrow morning. this is in gods hands, not mine. i walked to where all the motorbikes were parked and where everyone was getting on and zooming off. i thought i will start by standing in the right direction...i need to go east! and then when i spot someone that doesn't have another 1,2, 3 people on the motorbike with him i can ask if they are going to tejakula. just as i made my game plan a man drove by me slowly alone on his bike, wearing a jacket with a little emblem that said "tejakula"! My man!! " Tejakula?" head nod yes, me motion that i want to go too, hop on and off we go. one of the fishermen that i see every morning suddenly appears and smiles at me and tells the driver that i live at cili emas in tejakula as we drive off. i laugh again at the synchronicity...thank god for the ride, and off we go. of course, even at 10 at night, with hundreds of motorbikes on the road returning to the villages from the ceremony, most of the men toot him and laugh about me sitting on the back of his bike. he doesn't speak any english, but with my little bit of indonesian i am able to tell him where to drop me off and thank him. i never even saw his face. just the emblem in the dark and happy that i got a ride home. i was dropped off on the corner after which he drove off, and i had my 20 minute walk home to try and digest again what i had just been through...what is it all about...i have no idea...but it works for them.