A random view of a gamelan-playing, food-loving linguist from sunny Southern California.
I think it's pretty amazing how these peonies change a little bit of their character day by day. Case in point: yesterday they were just in full bloom. Tonight, a little bit of their pink coloring has faded to a subtler shade - this is a nice effect. 
Here are more of the blossoms. 
One thing I'll hope for: I hope I get my $6.50 worth of blooming time.
This past weekend, I got my hands on a bunch of five stems of peonies, flowers I've heard that cannot grow here in California because it doesn't get cold enough. Well, at the local Trader Joe's, they were selling them for about $6.50 a bunch - not bad for such a rare find.
Here's what they looked like when I took them out of the bag and placed them in a vase filled with water:
After the first night, the peonies were on their way to full blossoms. Here's a picture of the most mature stem:
That was last night. Tonight all of the blossoms have fully bloomed. Here are photos of two of them, taken without the camera's flash (too garish) but with background lighting from a desktop lamp.
Overall, I think both the blossoms and the photos turned out quite well.
Check out my mask - looks freaky, doesn't it?
Anywho, this is me and fellow dancer Casey Lee after performing at the "Cafe 360o", a composition recital concept held on campus. The concept itself was simple: an audience would gather in the center of the playing arena while musicians and other acts would take place around them. Casey and I, along with some members of the UCSB Javanese gamelan ensemble, participated in one of the acts. This particular act had a story which illustrated the importance of cooperation: sayuk rukun, tandhang gawe, sing sayuk sing rukun, all that jazz. I played an extremely ugly and foolish temple priest, while Casey played a tree spirit who was toying with the priest ,who had the duty of lighting an important lantern before sundown. (She actually harnessed herself to get down the tree.) Got the story? Good.
The mask I used is known as cungih, which refers to a harelip, sometimes with "demon teeth" - teeth which appear where they shouldn't. Man, if I saw this mask as a kid, I'd freak out and run away from the scene as quickly as possible. I didn't like clowns in general when I was young - their garish and pallid makeup and screwy laughing manner reminded me of corpses with a sadistic sense of humor. Now I find it ironic that I play not one, but several clowns in my topeng (masked dance) performances.
To start things off, here's a picture of me with Pak Djoko, our guest director for the concert:
The performance itself was excellent - good energy from the musicians, dancers, and the audience. There were certainly many more audience members from last year - back then, we had a miserable attendance of 30. I think we got at least a 100 this time around. It doesn't sound major, but to get an audience which is mostly unfamiliar with the whole culture of gamelan is a major undertaking.
The only thing I had to complain about was the heat inside the concert hall. I think the boilers were on overtime since we had some cool weather in the past days. But on this day, the weather was warm and nice. This, however, meant certain discomfort in an overheated concert hall. At least we were wearing Javanese clothes, which in part were made for (overly) warm conditions...
Sorry if I haven't been updating this as much as I should - I just started a really cool part-time job at a local company. No, I'm not "flippin' burgers" - I'm actually using my linguistics background there...
Anyhow, just wanted to announce the concert that the UCSB Javanese gamelan will have on Friday, May 6, 8 PM in the Lotte Lehmann Concert Hall at UCSB. We'll have many guest dancers and musicians, including a few of my favorite teachers, Pak Djoko and the Wentens. Pak Djoko, what can I say about him - besides the fact that he still sounds like someone who just came here 10 months ago, when in fact he came over 10 years ago. He would say things like "OK, I don't think so he will come. OK, if not come, then play soooft, just like thaaat." You have to hear his speech - it's great.
Let me give you the rest of the info: ticket prices are $7 students/$12 general, at the door only. If you happen to see this blog, and are in the area, please let people know about this!
I meant to put all of these photos within one post, but oh well... Back to the pictures:
Ah, the convenience of velcro and cloth-backed wood paneling. Usually these posts are made out of stone!! But, in this case, all you had to do was to rip the paneling off the velcroed frames. Very effective sets - the background sets were beautiful to look at.
The barong, protective spirit of the Balinese village, standing there majestically. This was the last item of the performance. When it's performed, the dancing style reminds a lot of people like an animated overgrown puppy. Despite the auspicious nature of this figure, the pelawatan (costume) itself is a pain to dance in - it's heavy. It's made of a huge bamboo frame decorated with tooled leather, pandanus fiber, and mirrors - not to mention the barong mask. Imagine putting a 35-50 lb. load on the back of your head. Top-heavy, to say the least... And the fibers make the costume a sweathouse. However, when you dance, you don't mind these minor inconveniences.
Well, that's all for the concert here - I wish that the rest of their tour be a success as well.
It's a Friday now, so it's been two days since the concert. However, I'm still beaming from the energy these guys had during the concert. The concert was a great success - the house was almost full, and these guys had a standing ovation. They deserved it, too - I've seen too many performances where standing ovations were given but weren't really deserved, imho.
Anyway, photos weren't allowed during the performance, but there was nothing preventing me from taking pictures after the performance. So, here are some shots:
Group shot of Çudamani (with me, the "white" one, in the back and center). I have another shot of them doing similar poses. These guys take their music very seriously, can't you tell? But they also like to have a really good time.
Hanging out with Pak Dewa Berata, the leader of the group. He was one of our directors for Gamelan Sekar Jaya, the group I was with for two years during my Berkeley "career". He's also helped me out during my research.
Some of the gangsa (metallophones) of Çudamani. This set is the one the group uses whenever it comes to the US. 
Mr. HEBO doing a Baris-styled pose, my friend Sonja doing telinga kelinci (rabbit ears), and another friend, Sabrina, holding something or other. These folks obviously like to yuck it up for the camera...
And it was great. Great - to see my friends from Bali, to see what they've been up to, and so on. They're performing here tomorrow night, and I think the show's going to be completely mind-blowing! 
Sanggar Cudamani playing a tabuh pisan (lit. "composition in one") piece. They sounded awesome! 
Here they are playing kotekan (interlocking parts) facing each other, a style usually seen when a piece is being taught to an ensemble. These guys are insanely fast and nimble - I wish I had a video clip to illustrate how fast they were playing. But their parts weren't muddled at all - they had precision.
Sanggar Cudamani playing Gabor, a traditional Balinese dance. Gus De (the guy in the white shirt) is playing the lead drum called kendang wadon (lit. 'female drum').
It'll be great to see them in concert tomorrow.
Just wanted to wish all my timpal-timpalne sane wenten ring Bali a Happy Kuningan - the conclusion of a most holy period.
This is Pura Tirtha Empul, the site of Indra's healing springs created after his army drinks the poisoned waters of Maya Denawa's spring nearby. And these springs are still quite active today.
I thought that I'd tell the traditional account of Galungan, and why it's a celebration of dharma over adharma. (Please look at yesterday's post for definitions.)
Anyway, here's the story as told to me by my teacher:
In Bali's seemingly far yet still palpable past, there was a just king in the ancient Balinese kingdom of Balingkang. He has a son, Maya Denawa, who possesses great magical powers. One day, the just king dies and his son takes over the throne. As soon as he becomes king, Maya Denawa starts to call himself a most powerful deity, and commands that his subjects make offerings to him and only him (that was definitely not his duty), not to any of the proper gods (i.e. Siwa, Iswara, Wisnu, Brahma, etc.). He also bans any public religious celebrations. Pestilence, disease, death, and famine follow this period. The suffering people finally appeal to Indra, so he comes down to subdue this insolent despot.
During his search for Maya Denawa, Indra and his army rest in an area due southwest of the Balingkang throne. Maya Denawa, in a magical disguise, manages to sneak by the god's camp to create a magic spring nearby. To sneak past the camp, Maya Denawa walked on the sides of his feet in an area in Bali now known as Tampaksiring, "footprints with the sides [of the feet]". When the army awakes, the soldiers find the spring and drink its waters. Unknown to them, the spring's waters were magically poisoned by Maya Denawa. Once they drink the water, the soldiers immediately collapse and die.
Indra, seeing the collapse of his army, creates a purifying spring called "Tirtha Empul" (tirtha is the High Balinese word for "water", or in this case, holy water) and revives his entire army. He then sets off after the fleeing Maya Denawa, who constantly changes into various forms such as a chicken, a nymph, and finally a sandstone rock (paras). Indra sees through this ruse and shoots an arrow straight through Maya Denawa's heart. The dying Maya Denawa changes back into his human form while his blood falls into a nearby river. Indra curses the river for 1,000 years. BTW, the river today is called Petanu (any guide book will say that this means 'cursed', but I'm skeptical).
Apparently, people were wary to take water from this river to irrigate their crops - the crops would grow well enough, but come harvest time, any plants irrigated with this water would bleed and smell like rotting corpses if cut. And the curse was lifted supposedly during the 60's.
Why the connection with Galungan? Well, the death of Maya Denawa is traditionally held to have taken place on the Wednesday (Buda) of the Balinese week Dunggulan, the period known as Galungan.
Well, that's my teacher's story. And I'm sticking to it.
I'll post a picture of Tirtha Empul in my next post. Da-da!
There's a glimpse of a rather enigmatic person - someone who likes gamelan and cooking. Luckily, you won't find it here - all you get is the story of a big goofball... who just so happens to like gamelan and cooking. Hence, "Gongs and Tongs". This goofball also happens to be a grad student in linguistics.
