In Favor of the Sensitive Man and Other Essays (Original Harvest Book; Hb333) (16 page)

BOOK: In Favor of the Sensitive Man and Other Essays (Original Harvest Book; Hb333)
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The birthday of the king brings festivities; the Arabs on horseback, rushing, galloping wildly and shooting as they gallop. The colorful, hypnotic dances. Tents have been erected, sensuous tents, black and white on the outside, but red inside. Rugs were laid on the ground. Copper trays are passed around with figs and cups of sweet mint tea. The riders are on the beach and we sit on the pier so that they fly towards us, silhouetted against sea and sky. The white horses and the white burnouses seem born from the foam of the waves. Their burning eyes against the white and the white against an incredibly blue sky.

Another day, another tent. A sumptuous dinner on the beach. The sides of the tents can be raised to let the breeze through. The fires of the roasting pit and the torches are sharp in the night.

The vivid beauty of Morocco is compelling and magnetic. Returning to our ugly cities, we remember Morocco as an oasis when you are thirsty for beauty.

The Spirit of Bali
 

From
The Village Voice,
6 January 1975.

 

The dazzling physical beauty of Bali is an expression of its spirit.

It affects you from the moment you land in the soft climate, which prepares you to relax body and soul and fall into a rhythmic pattern like that of an underwater ballet.

The beauty of the people is universal; both men and women have flawless honey-colored skin, glossy black hair, and dazzling smiles. They wear colorful batiks tightly wound around the waist, down to the feet for the women and shorter for the men. As you drive to the hotel, the houses, both rich and poor, show the same stone wall covered with flowers and vines.

Taller than the walls are the family temples, pagodas with roofs of black thatch. In between the houses are the village temples for larger gatherings.

There are three thousand temples in Bali. Figures of many gods and goddesses ornament walls and gates, but the temples themselves are empty stages, awaiting sumptuous offerings from the people.

Gay colored pennants point the way to temples, to craft shops, to dances. They are made of palm leaves and often decorated with ribbons, flowers, shells. Other beckoning signs are bright festive umbrellas, once the privilege of priests only, in red, yellow, and blue with gold fringe.

The women, in orange sarongs, are small, perfectly moulded, with delicate hands and feet. Their voices are soft and have a chanting quality. A meal is served like a ritual, not to disturb the meditative, contemplative delights of the senses, drinking the smell of the sea, the velvet quality of the air, the smell of spices and flowers.

It is a land of few words, so that dreams are not shattered and dispelled. The Balinese believe that the nine months spent in the womb is a period of meditation. Everything is conducive to this flowering of the senses.

The beauty of the women, with their smooth skin, delicate soft features, graceful gestures; the charm of the houses, with the tips of small temples showing above the stone walls; the skillful and tasteful handicrafts; the sculptures on the temples, similar to the famous bas-relief of Cambodia and India; the intense colors of the rituals with accents on gold and orange, the opaline rice fields reflecting the skies in the sheet of water covering them—all this is permeated with meaning, with symbolic messages. That is why their work, their craft, their theater, and their music gives them joy. The first sight of a woman walking with sinuous steps, holding a basket on her head with her two arms curved like the handles of Greek vases, the grace and balance of unfaltering steps through mountain roads or rough terrain, is already an expression of their belief that physical balance creates inner balance, and that the evil spirits of illness or insanity can only enter and possess people who are out of balance.

There are suggestions of animism, of ancestor worship, of Buddhist faith in transmigration. The gods dwell in the volcanoes, and some in the depth of the sea. One must not travel too high or too deep.

Everyone has a natural courtesy, a natural smile. The word for foreigner is “guest,” not, as in other countries, “outsider.”

The Balinese have no word in their language for art or artist. Creativity is natural and widespread. It is a natural means of honoring the gods and serving the community. They are all artists in our sense. The fisherman may be the musician at night, the village girl working all day may be one of the sophisticated dancers. Art is craftsmanship, the trancelike state of creation is simply communion with the gods.

The harmony of Balinese life has been achieved, it is the expression of an attitude. It is not that they ignore the darker forces of life. They know well that the world is full of dangers. But gods can be propitiated by beautiful rituals, elaborate, decorated offerings, prayers, by dancing and music. The gods are human. They enjoy beauty, music, dances, the three thousand temples built for them, treasure houses of sculptures. The Balinese confront evil by exteriorizing it in distorted, frightening sculptures, familiar with their threatening, contorted angry faces, which they carve in masks. On the stage the witch, the evil god, never dies. The Balinese are realists, but they are artists in their expression of rituals and ceremonies. They reach peaks of aesthetic beauty unequalled even in Japan.

Dancing is not just an art form, it is an interpretation of life. Bali is the island of unending festivals, and dance and music are constant.

At ceremonies they dress with a taste for blending of colors which is faultless. The women use primary colors for their blouses, which they now wear because of the offensive stares and snickers of tourists. The sarong is in rich blends of colors and designs. The features of the Balinese are delicate, their eyes deep and brilliant. Their hands are finely shaped, even in the women who work. They adopted the bath towel to wind around on top of their heads as a cushion for the weights they carry.

They do not heat their meals. At any time, while at work, or by one of the little stands on the roadside, they open the carefully folded palm leaf and eat rice and a bit of chicken or fish. There is no slavery to the clock. If the men tire of work in the fields and are far from home, they build a small shed and sleep during the hottest hours of the day.

My guide is a young man from the university. He originally wanted to be a doctor but the studies took too long and the death of his father, shot by his best friend when they both worked on the police force, obliged Wayan Subudi to go to work early. He graduated in literature and might have been a writer but admits he is lazy. Subudi, with his Oriental slanted eyes, his good profile, his dazzling white teeth, his black softly curled hair, is an ideal guide. He possesses great knowledge of Bali but waits for questions, does not drown you in long speeches. He allows time for absorption, meditation, silences, and then when one asks a question he answers it simply and directly.

His brother runs a lime kiln (they crush and heat coral to make lime); his mother has a shop outside the compound in which they live. When I visit his home, he leads me to a simple whitewashed room with a window opening on rice paddies filled with ducks marching in formation. He shows me photographs of his relatives, of his father’s cremation ceremony (the cost of which left the family penniless). When I first come in, the mother is in the open building cooking over a brasero.

He intimates that the university dissipated many of their beliefs but did not affect their sobriety (no drinking of alcohol, no overeating, no drugs). What other youths seem to obtain from drugs, they obtain by fasting and meditation.

He wants to know if I believe in transmigration. I say, “I wish I did.”

He translates some of the signs in the temples. Some forbid women to enter during menstruation. Others forbid entrance unless one wears the sarong and headgear appropriate to the place. He permits me to rest, sitting on one of the walls, and later tells me it is forbidden as it is a sacred wall. He is like the spirit of Bali itself, like the bamboo xylophone, delicate and muted, resigned to working for his family. I give him a diary book to write in. His gentleness and soft way of imparting knowledge stays with me.

Everything about Bali stays with you. It is made of aesthetic and spiritual elements that touch something far deeper than the eyes. It is like the temple incense which clings to your clothes.

Each day Subudi takes me on a different voyage. In the daytime, the voyage is through villages, rice paddies, rain forests, mountains, volcanoes, lakes, temples. These intricate explorations through unmarked roads can only be done with a guide. Subudi always knows the historical, religious, or cultural significance of each sight.

We begin a journey of immersion in temples. Nehru called Bali the habitat of the gods. In ancient history it was described as “The Morning of the World.” Each temple has a different spiritual dedication. They are usually composed of several towering pagodas, topped by black thatch roofs. They are empty stands for the reception of offerings. The women come in dazzling costumes, carrying offerings on their heads. These are sometimes two feet tall, a pyramid of fruit, flowers, mirrors, plaited bamboo shaped like flowers, birds, feathers, bows. They are artfully composed. The fruit and food lie there while they pray, surrounded by their children. During that time the god is said to absorb the spirit of the nourishment, and then the women can take the food home.

The Sea God Temple, Tanah, was built on a very small island and looks like a ship made out of rock. The black pagoda rises in silhouette against the sky. The tide is high but the women who bring offerings persist in walking into the water, which comes up to their hips. A rope has been strung on poles all the way to the island so they will not be swept away.

Many temples, many gods. Gods for the sea, valley, rice crops, fertility. Taman Ayun is surrounded by a moat which reflects the flowers and trees. Metal spikes, three-pronged like Neptune’s trident, are planted at the tip of the roof to frighten evil spirits. On feast days the offering stand is covered with a rug. Umbrellas and offerings surround the priests. Some temples are built by several families, joining their fortunes to build individual temples to their ancestors under the shadow of the Mother Temple.

The Bat Cave Temple is a huge natural rock cave to which thousands of bats cling, waiting for the night, when they forage for fruit. These are sacred bats. The women sit cross-legged by their offerings. If they are praying they are also observing other visitors and keeping a watchful eye over their children. One young woman is breast-feeding her child. The pandanus leaf, out of which they fashion so many offering designs, shines with a transparent golden tone in the sun.

The volcano erupted in 1963. The first time, its lava flow stopped just before engulfing the temple, and people felt the gods had control of fire from the earth. But the second time, it engulfed the temple. The people quietly decided the offerings had been insufficient.

You can walk for hours through fields, forests, mountain roads as carefully tended as private gardens. In your mind’s eye you will always see the tangerine, the violet, the green sarongs, the honey-colored skins, the black hair against a background of luxuriant greens. Some golden greens with the sunlight washing them, some glowing with dew or with water from a waterfall, or the gentle cascades of the rice paddies flowing from the terraced fields. So much dewy green fills one’s lungs with a mysterious oxygen. The walk of the old people, never stiff or brittle, reveals that their aging process does not deprive them of flexibility and grace. They do heavy work, ploughing, pounding, threshing, carrying weights and sheaves of rice or stones for the road. But it is all done with a natural rhythm, as they walk for miles, a rhythm never broken, no haste, no tensions, no driving force whipping them beyond their natural energy.

In the gentle rain, the scene changes. They use a date palm leaf for a head cover; our umbrellas are black, but theirs, canary yellow, shocking pink, tangerine, and lime.

I visit the instrument maker, who is highly respected in the community. Much formal bowing and many courtesies exchanged. On the right is an open-pit forge with three men working the bellows, where the metal is shaped. In other open buildings men are squatting, sculpturing the wood ornamentation of the
g’nder,
a musical instrument. In still another building instruments are painted and gilded. The big gong, which the instrument maker demonstrates, pounds on the heart, vibrates through the body.

The oldest village in Bali was isolated for a long time; it did not mingle with the other villages. It stands now as an austere example of simplicity. The stone houses were built in a uniform line on each side of a wide cobblestone road. A long shed with a raised platform, with a roof of sugar palm fiber and lit by an oil lamp, serves as a meeting place for the elders. Few belongings, few furnishings, no clutter; a loom, an ancient instrument, photographs of ancestors, a mat to sleep on. The elders dispense law and justice, set dates for rituals. The scribe, as he is called, sits cross-legged near the entrance of the village, carving mythological stories in Sanskrit and illustrating them. He engraves on palm leaves an inch and a half wide and twelve inches long, which are then tied together by a piece of bark and are meant to be opened like an accordion.

In Bali you are not judged by your possessions (they are contemptuous of wealth); you are judged by your manners and your hierarchy in the spiritual and artistic world. The musician, the dancer, the mask maker, the wood carver, the stone carver, are respected, for art is man’s tribute to the gods; every craft is sacred and meaningful.

Day and night the air is vibrant with what Colin McPhee, the composer, described as the golden metallic sound of the gamelan, a rain of silver. In the daytime there are rehearsals for the night. Exciting, striking at every cell, the sequined sound of the gamelan is like a multitude of bells. The wistful flutes rise above the metallic g’nder, and the ensemble is punctuated by the deep throb of the gongs. The animation comes from the multiple metal rain.

BOOK: In Favor of the Sensitive Man and Other Essays (Original Harvest Book; Hb333)
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