Workshop with Sanggar Cudamani today

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.

Selamat Hari Raya Kuningan

Just wanted to wish all my timpal-timpalne sane wenten ring Bali a Happy Kuningan - the conclusion of a most holy period.

A picture of Pura Tirtha Empul

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.

The story of Galungan

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!

Selamat Hari Raya Galungan dan Kuningan! (Happy Galungan and Kuningan)

Well, this past week and a half has been very interesting for the folks in Bali. Last Wednesday was the beginning of one of their holiest feasts, called Galungan. It's basically a period when people reflect upon the victory of dharma (one's destined duty) over adharma (not following one's duty). The story about this victory is quite interesting, and has a quasi-historical basis, but I will not repeat that story here right now. The 10-day period (which always starts on a Wednesday and ends on a Saturday, which is called Kuningan) takes place once every 210 days. I have fond memories of Galungan - eating lawar (a ceremonial meat hash which the Balinese absolutely love but most foreigners (not me) either often despise or find too hot for their tastes) and paku, the local fiddlehead ferns growing wild somewhere within the nearby dense bamboo groves.

However, this Galungan period was no ordinary one: another significant religious day took place in that period - the day called Hari Nyepi (from sepi 'silent, calm'), when no one is allowed to light fires (or use electricity nowadays) or even go out of their houses. (BTW, this is strictly enforced.) The purpose for this, as I've understood it, is either an island-wide purification or another opportunity to reaffirm the Balinese faith.

Since it's way past the beginning of Galungan and Hari Nyepi, I thought that I would give this recipe for a vegetarian version of lawar (almost an oxymoron for many Balinese - for them, this must contain meat of some kind). Think of it as a spicy salad that accompanies a simple bowl of steamed rice. One of the essential elements of lawar is the tebteban, an ingredient that provides a crunchy and resilient texture to the dish. The word is apparently from tebteb, an onomatopoeic word describing chopping through resilient matter such as meat, skin, or cartilage. Now that I've put that delightful image of sliced cartilage into your fragile minds ;), let me give you my recipe for vegetarian lawar.

1 1/2 lbs. yard-long beans
1 seedless cucumber
1-2 T salt
1-2 T peanut or vegetable oil

Spice mixture:
10-15 green bird-eye chiles, thinly sliced crosswise (be sure to not ub your eyes or nose during this procedure and to wash your hands thoroughly afterwards)
5-10 fresh kaffir lime leaves, thinly sliced
1/2-1 t shrimp paste (blacan), toasted
1" piece ginger, peeled and finely chopped
6-8 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped
2-3 shallots, peeled and thinly sliced
1/3 C unsweetened shredded coconut
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
1) Boil some water in a fairly large stockpot. Once the water boils, put in the beans and cook until just tender, around 5-7 minutes or so. Drain off water and briefly rinse with cold water to refresh the beans. When cool enough to handle, drain again and slice beans about 1/8" thick crosswise.
2) Shred cucumber and sprinkle slivers with salt. Let stand for at least 10 mins. Wrap slivers in either a piece of cheesecloth or sturdy paper towels and squeeze as much water as possible. Set aside.
3) Heat oil in wok over med-high heat. When heated, put in shrimp paste and cook until fragrant. Put in coconut and fry until fragrant.
Put in garlic, ginger, and shallots; fry until fragrant, taking care not to burn them.
Then put in sliced chiles and kaffir lime leaves; cook until fragrant.
Put in sliced beans; heat until beans are warm. Season with salt and pepper and take off heat. Cool for about 5 minutes. Add shredded cucumber and mix thoroughly. Serve with hot steamed rice.

Well, that's all there is to it. It's pretty easy, but at the same time, it takes a rather long time to prepare - all that slicing!

I got some money, I got some money!

Good news on the linguistics front - I was awarded with a $2500 grant to complete my research (i.e. gather data in Bali) for my dissertation - yes! Just the thing I was looking for... Anyway, I'm really quite surprised by this windfall - I didn't even think that I would get such a thing after failing to comply with a point of protocol (out of complete ignorance on my part).

You see, I was supposed to submit my application through a regional director of the program (which shall remain unnamed) on campus. I didn't know about this until the research grant office rnoticed this and said that perhaps I would have to reapply since I didn't follow protocol. Stupidity on my part. Well, I thought nothing of it really until today, when I saw the envelope from the grant program. I was expecting, of course, a short rejection notice - you know, the generic ones they send to all the grant "losers" out there. Oddly enough, there were two pieces of paper in the envelope. I took the first one and saw that it was a "transfer of funds" sheet. Weird, I thought, why would they give me a "transfer of funds" when it's obvious that I've disqualified myself from the grant competition. But then I realized that I may have gotten something from this debacle after all. I opened up the other sheet of paper, which was a letter that said that I would be awarded $2500 for the project. I was just stunned... First I fail to follow protocol, and then I get awarded money regardless of that? What gives? (But I'm not one to look a gift horse in the mouth...) The people at the grant program agency must have been really, really impressed with my application, or else they wouldn't have given it a second thought. Heh, go figure.

Now I wonder what the purpose of bureaucratic protocol is. Is it to ensure that undesirable options are weeded out? No, because bureaucracy can be random at times. Is it to ensure a sense of uniformity among everything submitted to it? Perhaps, but something must compel the system to choose a few among an endless sea of options. Did I learn anything from this experience? Maybe - I'll try to adhere to protocol as much as possible, but I can't help thinking that my brief departure from it might have been beneficial in some other unspoken way.

My new tonkatsu sauce

For those of you who don't know what "tonkatsu" is, it's a Japanese-style deep-fried pork fillet. The fillet is usually pounded as flat as possible (and to make the cut of meat appear more impressive than it actually is), dusted with flour, dipped in an egg-wash (2 T of water scrambled with each egg), then coated with Japanese-style breadcrumbs called "panko". Note: European breadcrumbs, I have to say, are a poor substitute for panko - might as well try to find it, even ordering it online, if need be.

Anyway, you deep-fry it in enough heated vegetable oil to fry the fillets whole (peanut oil is actually best because of its high smoking point). Deep-fry until the crumbs turn crispy and golden brown (they burn easily, so you'll really need to watch the temperature of the oil). Drain.

After the fillets have been fried, you usually serve them in thin slices with a plate of shredded cabbage and a dark sauce based on Worscestershire sauce (the Japanese name is so much easier to say: oosuta soosu). Anyway, I didn't have any of the Worscestershire sauce around, so I made the following sauce substitute:

Mock tonkatsu sauce

2 T dark soy sauce
2 T sugar
2 T oyster sauce
2 T basalmic vinegar
1-2 T Chinkiang (black) vinegar, or to taste
1 T Shaoxing wine
Juice of half a lemon
1/3 C water
2 T cornstarch dissolved in 3 T water
salt, pepper to taste

Combine all ingredients except for the cornstarch mixture in a medium saucepan and put over medium-low heat. Mix well and cover until the mixture simmers. When it begins to simmer, uncover the sauce pan and simmer for 5 more minutes. Then gradually stir in the cornstarch mixture and cook until the sauce becomes glossy and glaze-like. Turn off heat and let cool slightly.

Enjoy!

Had a colloquium yesterday - plus an interesting "go-go dancer" story...

And it went rather well. Lots of nice feedback, even though I felt that I was unable to clearly state my position at some points - it's that 3:30 slot - forever associated with the dreaded syntax class at Berkeley. Anyway, in terms of other difficulties during the presentation, the colloquium room has (almost) always been fraught with technical problems... My presentation was no exception.

Anyway, let me tell you about a funny story my gamelan teacher here told me: several years ago, he and a friend were visiting the Kraton (sultan's palace) in Yogya (Central Java) to watch a performance. They soon found the performance a bit dull, so they headed out of the palace grounds. When they got out, they came to a dark alley of some kind with some makeshift stages. On these stages were some "dancing girls" with some really short miniskirts and high-top boots. According to my friend, the girls weren't really dancing - they were just sort of swaying back and forth. Eventually, these friends spoke with one of the spectators there to find out what exactly was going on. The person said something like this: ah, yes, pretty girl. Sexy, yes! Like if it were some sort of peep show. My friend was thinking, "what the fuck is this?" It must have been so ridiculous-looking. (And hilarious at the same time.) After awhile, the two friends left the "dance" show. As they were leaving, they suddenly met up with a squadron of police officers who were going towards the direction of the "dance" show. As it turned out, they raided that "party". The next day, the main paper's headline said something like: "Police stop dangdut (a popular music genre in Indonesia) dance sex party!" Whoa, slightly swaying, fully (but scantily) clothed dancers with high-top boots as scandalous. Boy, we here have it so easy...

Janie (or Nat), if you're listening...

BTW, can you send me some of the photos you (and/or Nat) took at the restaurant? 고마워.

I can cook really well, but...

For some unknown reason, I cannot for the life of me make decent-looking kimbap (김밥) or makizushi (the sushi that comes in seaweed rolls). They all looked fucked up whenever I try to make them. But tonight I think I've narrowed the culprits down - either really tough seaweed or really mushy bap/sushimeshi/seasoned rice... Too bad. My nigirizushi, on the other hand, are quite well-formed. Go figure...

Anyway, this past Sunday, instead of watching the self-serving Oscars, I went to Oxnard with a couple of friends to have dinner at Swan BBQ, the best nearby Korean restaurant (and by "nearby", we're talking about 30-40 mins here). Of course, I ordered the beef tongue (again), while other people weren't getting plates of grilled meat but other dishes (personally I was sort of disappointed since that meant that I would be grilling alone :( .) The food, as expected, was great. And we actually managed to finish our panchan and two plates of kimchi! (Yay for kimchi!) Anyway, I'm planning on doing this (at least) once a quarter - Korean food tends to be quite expensive. However, you do get your fill if you manage to eat the panchan.