Dancing Out of Bali

by John Coast

  "Pih," I would say. "How does that tune go where the attendant picks up the fans ready to hand them over to the Legongs?" Sampih would then play some very slow melody which I had never consciously heard before.

  "No, it can't be that, Pih. The fast one when Raka has the fans actually in her hands and is dancing with them. It's very rippling and very fast."

  "That's the part I was playing. The gending pokok. The melody." "But how is that possible? I didn't recognize a note."

  "He played it quite correctly, "Luce would say, nodding her head and looking irritatingly sure of herself.

  To prove it to me, next time we went to Pliatan and the Legong was rehearsing, Sampih and Luce sat on either side of me, and when my ears were ringing with the rapid surface notes of the smaller metallophones, Sampih said patiently and humouringly to me, "Now, listen only to the Anak Agung's metallophone. Watch his hammer—" for in the Legong music the Anak Agung played the leading metallophone, which sang under his hand, and Lebah with his long, bony fingers took the light drum.

  And the Anak Agung's hammer, to my surprise and disgust, did move in the precise slow rhythm that Sampih and Luce were humming in my newly awakened ear. So, during the next weeks I made an effort to sit or lie in the middle of the gamelan every night, and there I just began to pick out a few of the parts that went to form these complex pieces; but the fastest-playing metallophones, sit beside them nightly though I did, remained as untrackable as ever.

  The night was now approaching for our Legong to perform in public for the first time. The Anak Agung's family had woven the dark green and purple cloth, which was decorated in traditional patterns with gold paint; the jackets were cut out, and then kains and jackets were hung out to dry in the courtyard. Fine oxhide was bought, scraped white, and prepared to make the elaborate headdresses; the dressed skin was carved by hand with tiny chisels, and into it were encrusted jewels of glass and the whole was painted with gold leaf. The shallow crowns were studded with scores of little wire springs, each fastened by hand, and on each of which would be tied one quivering frangipani flower on nights of dancing.

  On the first night we were taking up with us in the jeep an old teacher named Ida Bagus Boda, who had actually taught Lotring. He was to be the tandak, sitting in the orchestra, where in a high nasal voice he would sing his commentary on the Legong story. From Gianjar the Raja was coming, Anak Agung Gde Agung's young brother, and from neighbouring Ubud we had invited the Tjokorda Agung, a lesser Raja whom we knew quite well.

  Very early that afternoon we drove up to the puri. Luce brought lipstick, eye pencil and rouge with her, for Balinese make-up is only crude due to lack of materials; and I wanted to supervise the lighting. The performance was to be given in front of the puri’s main gateway, and many offerings were made against rain.

  "I shall ask the priest from Tampaksiring to bring his kris," the Anak Agung had told us.

  "Is that a holy kris?" we had asked.

  "It is very powerful against rain," he answered, "Many times it has been used between Pliatan and Ubud, and each time the rain has fallen in other villages—but not where the kris lay."

  We arrived up in Pliatan just as the little girls were coming back from the Temple of Gunung Sari, where they had made their offerings and received purification before dancing, and now they were squealing gaily and trying on their stiff jackets, watching anxiously to see whether the perada, the gold paint, would flake off. After drinking a little coffee with a harassed Anak Agung, we went over to watch them get into their costumes.

  First they fastened their kains, purple and gold, and then their insect bodies were wound in long strips of white cloth, so that they appeared like slender cocoons. Then the miniature jackets, with safety pins for buttons. Then the ornamental belt and side pieces, their long bibs, sequin flashing and red, and their gold-painted arm bands.

  Very soon it was dark, and seated in the rehearsal verandah with one kerosene lamp sputtering on the floor, the second drummer, Gusti Kompiang, began to work on the make-up, while Luce, sitting near him, added the final touches. First he smeared on a yellow base, made from atal, a clay imported from China, which had been mixed with a rice powder; with a razorlike knife he shaved the eyebrows and the whole forehead, too, for imaginary fluff; then, with a match, he lengthened the eyebrows, accenting them with China ink, and there remained only the round, white beauty spots, which he applied with a leaf stalk dipped into a lime paste-placing one above the bridge of the nose, and one at the side of each temple. From Gusti Kompiang the children shuffled over to Luce, who smoothed over the powder, softened up its too-saffron yellow, and added a small touch of lipstick.

  On the main gateway, Made Lebah and I were busy. The children of the puri were setting out more than forty hollowed pieces of coconut shell filled with oil, placing them on each ledge of the ornate gateway to add to the beauty of our decor; and the three kerosene lamps which had been borrowed for the evening we placed on special wooden stands, affixing shields of thin metal to divert their usual hot glare from the eyes of the audience.

  The club, meanwhile, had put on their new headcloths of silver and green, with white shirts—for it was thought old-fashioned, these days, to perform with bare torsos or shoulders—and outside their ordinary kain they all had tied an outer cloth of wine colour, heavily flowered. They sat gossiping on the mats that made our stage in front of the gate of entry.

  By now the Legong were being put into their hard and heavy headdresses. First, Gusti Kompiang tied up and twisted their hair into the tightest knots; then he balanced the headdresses on their heads, holding them level, and pulling the stiff leather down, firmly and gradually, onto the wincing heads of the girls After that ordeal was over, they were ready, and each in turn ran into the Anak Agung's room, where, in an ancient wardrobe glass, they saw themselves in full costume for the first time.

  "Bek!" they said accusingly, to one another. "I will be ashamed.

  Clearly this headdress is not on straight.” Or, "Look at Anom's headdress," Oka laughed. "It's all bent up at the back." And there they sat, joking and bickering friendlily, growing silent as their headdresses grew heavier and heavier, felt tighter and tighter.

  "It's already very late, Anak Agung,” exclaimed, looking at my watch. "Do you think the Raja is not coming?"

  "Oh, he has been here a long time. He is sitting in the punggawa's puri just down the road. Perhaps he will soon be here."

  And we were lucky, I suppose, because this smiling, plump young man, whose subjects all sat on the ground with hands clasped as he passed, kept us waiting only one hour. But at last we saw him walking up the road with a flashlight and his family, and we brought him to the chairs of honour, sitting down with him to hear his comments on our Legong.

  The two drummers took their seats, backs to the audience and facing the gateway from which the dancers would descend. To the right was the metallophone section; to our left was the long battery of gongs. The village audience surged forward, eager. Around the floor were rows of naked children, and on one side stood the women, turbans of towels twisted into their hair, some bare breasted, some with gay and pretty jackets, while opposite them were bunched the men, laughing, talking, raising their eyebrows invitingly at the girls, scarlet hibiscus flowers behind their ears. Hundreds of people had walked to Pliatan from afar, for this was the first time any real dancing had been seen in the village for years. At the back of the crowd we could hear yelpings as the warong women kicked at scavengers who snatched too greedily, and sometimes a wretched mongrel would sniff its way across our stage, where nobody paid any attention to it. The atmosphere was heavy, musky, sweetly scented, mixed with blasts of herbivorous wind.

  For the overture we played "Tabuh Telu," and then the Anak Agung handed over his drum to the care of Made Lebah, and got up and waddled over himself to play the leading metallophone. With a flourish his hammer picked out the
slow, hesitant introduction on the lead instrument, and on a first, soft chord, the gamelan flowed in to join him.

  At the top of the steps, the figure of a tiny girl appears, looking shyly down at her first audience, her gold and purple costume, darkly glittering, outlined breathtakingly against a blue-black gash of night in the narrow doorway behind her. As her musical cue comes near, the little girl vanishes, transformed into the Attendant of the two Legongs, and in time to the music she begins to move, easily, calmly, introducing the dance, while the voice of our old tandak in the gamelan hails her appearance.

  Slowly still, with careful measured rhythm, she descends the high steps, reaches the matting-covered floor, and the dance of the Attendant begins. Like a dragonfly skimming over a pond she hovers before us, first to the north, then to the south, moving in sweeps with her knees half bent, dipping and rising as light as a leaf in the wind. Now stationary, she forces her arms down beside her and her shoulders shiver to the rapid drumbeats, and, as the melody is punctuated, so she phrases her dance with side-glancing flicks of her eye or with sinuous undulations of her neck and head. Her arm movements are clean, brisk, square This is pure dancing.

  A break in the music and we see her bending on one knee, coolly sighting the fans which she must pick up and hand over to the Legongs, and which she now spies on the ground before the drummers. Then starts her swerving dance toward them, and when she is almost upon them, with a lightning stoop she picks them up and turns to face the gateway where the two Legongs now appear. Solemnly, too, the slender, delicate Legongs pause on the top step, then sway in unison down to the floor, where they trace exquisite patterns at high speed, as their Attendant dances before them. The three small bodies weave expertly in and out of one another, knees bending as they turn and fling around, working up to a crescendo, it seems, when suddenly, on an instant, they stop-all three of them—and the Attendant hands the fans to her Legongs.

  Now a new, stronger melody enters, and the two Legongs look with starting eyes at their Attendant before dancing off again in their intricate patterns, the Legongs holding their fans now before them, now stretched out to arms' length at their sides, weaving and interweaving, till the three meet in the very centre of the floor, and each like a slender hoop, bends slowly backwards, till their headdresses touch the matting; as their reed-like bodies straighten, they roll first sideways to the left, and sideways to the right, then miraculously they are upright again, and faster and faster they dance, floating over the ground, until the three of them reach the bottom of the steps, and there they turn in line and suddenly face the audience; the Attendant takes a half step forward, and with a captivating little shrug of leave-taking, becomes Raka again, walks up the steps, out of sight, to await her next entry

  The tandak now raises his voice, for here begins the story proper. One Legong is now the Raja of Lasem, that is Oka, and Anom is his courtier. As they regard each other from opposite corners, Lasem is proud of feature and bold of gesture. His courtier apes his every move, like an echo. Then the Raja stands in the middle of the stage, testing his strength, examining his armour, demanding praise, and faithfully his courtier prances and stamps around him, admiring, flattering, assisting. Again the music changes, and the proud Lasem is beating his breast as he bids farewell to his faithful wife, the same Anom, who now crouches, softly kneeling, in her new role before him.

  Once more the melody shifts and an ominous, pulsating rhythm is sped on its way by the now restless metallophones. The two Legongs, king and courtier, king and wife-or whoever they now represent, are torn apart as the moment approaches when the Raja must go out to battle against the Raja of Daha, whose daughter, Langkesari, Lasem has carried off. Lasem is left alone, making heroic poses, trying to give himself courage, for he has dreamt that today he will meet his death.

  And then through the black gateway there storms down and swoops in the golden-winged Bird of III Omen, again Raka. Immediately and frantically she assaults the Raja, dashing her wings into his face, and they swirl and clash, swirl and clash as they sweep madly around the stage. At times the bird leaps up the gateway's steps, where, as if from a tree, she looks down fiercely upon the Raja, who flourishes his sword and threatens her from below. In fury she sharpens her beak on a branch and falls once more into the attack.

  They battle and part continuously, the white frangipani blossoms flying off their headdresses in every direction, neither able to win, until at last, exhausted, the bird is driven by brute strength up the steps and away. The story has ended.

  Now Anom returns from the stool where she has been sitting quietly on the edge of the gamelan, and to a more formal, simple tune, the two Legongs advance upon us, paying their respects; their fans make weaving patterns, held at arms' full length, until at last they sink to one knee just between the drummers; their arms drop languidly to their sides, their eyes are lowered, and modestly glancing at nobody, they get to their feet and walk slowly up the steps again into the puri.

  The dance is over.

  A few days later the Anak Agung brought the three children down to our house to spend the day with us. We took them to the Wisnu Store, owned by our friend, Chan Ling Siong, and we gave them presents of bright coloured cloth which they chose themselves to make new kebayas with. Then we drove down to Sanur, where they paddled and ran in the sea, while Luce and I, with the Anak Agung, sat in a bougainvillaea arbour in the garden of the Belgian painter, Lemayeur, chatting with his statuesquely beautiful wife, Polok, and who, when a child, had been an enchanting dancer herself.

  In the evening they ate Rantun's food and then we took them to see their first cinema. And though Luce and I sat between them and tried to explain the story with Sampih's help, to them it was all very confusing, and they hooted with laughter, holding their hands politely before their mouths, every time a man and woman kissed in public. "Beh! They don't know shame!" they cried. Only the Anak Agung seemed fully satisfied.

  "That was very fortunate," he said as we walked out. "The children understood nothing.”

  "It wasn’t a good film for them, I know. But I'm sorry they understood so little...

  “I am glad. They've seen one bad film and they won't want to see any more. It will be less trouble for me...

  Driving back that evening to Pliatan, feeling even closer to these friends of ours after a whole day spent in each other's company, we asked the Anak Agung to drop the formal Tuan and Nyonya and to call us by our Christian names.

  "With pleasure," he agreed, "when I can become used to it. But you must then call me Agung Adji, Father Agung. For to tell you the truth it is quite wrong, according to Balinese manners, to call me Anak Agung all the time. Agung Adji is not only more friendly, but more Balinese...

  And on the same evening I became Bli, elder brother, to Sampih, and Luce was his M'bok, his elder sister.

  I now told the Anak Agung with absolute sincerity that his Legong had so convinced me of Pliatan's possibilities that I was going to redouble my efforts to look for contacts abroad. I could have added, though to him it would have meant nothing, that the Pliatan Legong had something of the same perfect quality of "Les Sylphides", a ballet of which I could never tire.

  Accordingly, I typed out a six-page proposal for the tour of a company of Balinese dancers, and in it outlined a programme consisting of the six types of dancing we then contemplated. The group, I suggested, would be of about forty people, and my main selling contention was that thanks to the glamour, false or real, attached to the word Bali, such a company would bring its own impetus with it. This proposal I sent off to my actress cousin in London, Joan White, and to Charles Landstone in the Arts Council. In America, through my friend Matthew Fox, I was already in touch with several booking-agents, one of whom had to date only shown interest in a group so small that we would have had insufficient human material to build up a full programme. I was determined that we would do it perfectly, in a big way, or n
ot at all. We were being helped, too, by the Nielsens, the Danish photographers, who had seen the first performance of the Legong and become our enthusiastic supporters. One whole morning they had filmed our Legong, the Kebiar, and some masked dancers we had brought up from the village of Batuan, and they had promised to send us some publicity "stills" with a hundred feet or so of coloured movie film.

  1. John Coast envisioned and organized the project of bringing Balinese dancers and musicians to audiences in London, New York and other Western capitals in the postwar period. He first met Indonesians during his captivity following the fall of Singapore to the Japanese in 1942. He learned their language (Malay, the lingua franca widely used throughout the region), admired their culture and later joined in their struggle for independence. This 1950 was taken in Bangkok where Coast had been with the UK Foreign Office. He was later appointed by President Sukarno as his international press attaché.

  2. John Coast (second from left) and Luce (Supianti), later his wife, in their house in Kaliangu, Bali. On either side of them is star dancer Sampih (left) and Mr Suriono (right) from the Indonesian Department of Information. After Indonesia had won its independence, Coast retired from political life and withdrew to Bali to write. He soon found himself deeply immersed in the music and dance of the island.

  3. Mario (I Ketut Maria), the great Balinese dancer, training Ni Gusti Raka for the tour. Here he is shaping the young dancer's body with his own.

  4. Balinese dance and its music is not notated but is learned by endless repetition. Mario took Raka through weeks of rehearsals for the tour.

  5. The gamelan orchestra of metal gongs is led by the principal drummer. Here Raka, guided by Mario, learns the rhythmic patterns of the Bumblebee Dance.