And Bulan dances..<\/p>\n
By Anton Kurnia<\/p>\n
I have heard several different accounts of my father and
\nmother. One of them was told to me by my grandmother.<\/p>\n
It goes like this: My father and my uncle were identical
\ntwins. Their parents gave them exotic Javanese names -- Sugriwa
\nfor my father and Subali for my uncle.<\/p>\n
They resembled each other physically, temperamentally, and
\neven their voices were alike. So it was no easy matter to tell
\nthem apart.<\/p>\n
Moreover, there existed between them a peculiar bond. If one
\nof them fell ill, the other would fall ill also.<\/p>\n
In the common phrase, they were like two halves of the same
\napple.<\/p>\n
When they grew into adulthood they went into business.<\/p>\n
At the age of twenty they moved to Bali from their little town
\nin southern Central Java.<\/p>\n
There they opened up a textile business. They sold various
\nproducts: songket (cloth with golden embroidery), shawls, cotton
\ncloth, batik, silk, earthenware, etc.<\/p>\n
My father settled in Denpasar and would send my uncle on
\nbusiness trips to the other cities in Bali.<\/p>\n
After some time, my father fell in love with a girl named Ayu
\nBulantresna, or Bulan, a dancer in a pura, Balinese temple.
\nBesides performing ritual dances, she was also an acolyte in the
\ntemple.<\/p>\n
She was a hot-blooded, dark-skinned girl with an incredible
\nfigure, long black hair, and beautiful doe eyes accentuated by
\nslender eyebrows.<\/p>\n
I can picture Bulan, my mother, dancing seductively to the
\nmusic of gamelan, a loud but monotonous music, a music of
\nmysterious significance, concentrating in itself all the secrets
\nand passions of the people of Bali.<\/p>\n
As she performs her rhythmic steps, the consecrated movements
\nof the temple dance, Bulan unfolds like the petals of a flower.<\/p>\n
What a hypnotizing effect all of this must have had upon my
\nfather.<\/p>\n
Above all, the experience could only have been enhanced by the
\nacrid, peppery smell of her sweat mingling with the sandalwood
\noil she wore on her body and other perfumes redolent of the
\nessences of exotic trees that arouse sensations that slumbered
\nhitherto in the depths of the consciousness.<\/p>\n
All these things revived distant, dead memories in my father's
\nmind.<\/p>\n
He fell in love with Bulan, so deeply in love that he embraced
\nthe dancing girl's religion.<\/p>\n
After some time, she became pregnant and was discharged from
\nthe temple.<\/p>\n
Soon my uncle returned to Denpasar from one of his trips.
\nApparently, when it came to women, as in all other matters, his
\nreactions were identical to my father's.<\/p>\n
He fell passionately in love with my mother and consequently
\nseduced her.<\/p>\n
Because of his physical resemblance to my father this was not
\ndifficult for him to achieve.<\/p>\n
As soon as she learned the truth, my mother said that she
\nwould never again have anything to do with either of them unless
\nthey agreed to undergo \"trial by snake.\"<\/p>\n
If they agreed to the trail, she would belong to the one who
\nsurvived.<\/p>\n
The trial consisted of the following. My father and my uncle
\nwould be enclosed together in a dark room in which a poisonous
\nsnake had been let loose. The first of them to be bitten by the
\nsnake would open the door of the room and take the other out to
\nsafety.<\/p>\n
Before the two were shut up in the room, my father asked Bulan
\nif she would perform the sacred temple dance for him one more
\ntime.<\/p>\n
She agreed to do so.<\/p>\n
Outside, twilight faded into night. Denpasar was enveloped in
\ntotal darkness except for the dim light of the moon that shone
\nthrough the fleecy clouds, casting a pale light over the streets.<\/p>\n
And, under the moonlight, Bulan danced, with her significant,
\nmeasured, gliding movements. Bulan danced, with her bosom bare,
\nher slanting eyes black as the dark night of eternity, swaying
\nthis way and that. As she performed her rhythmic steps, Bulan
\nunfolded like the petals of a flower. Each movement had a precise
\nmeaning and spoke a language not of words.<\/p>\n
Then my father and uncle were shut up in the room with the
\nsnake.<\/p>\n
Instead of shrieks of horror, what the listeners heard was a
\ngroan mixed with wild, bestial laughter.<\/p>\n
When the door finally opened, my uncle stumbled out of the
\nroom.<\/p>\n
His face was ravaged and he looked considerably older now. The
\nterror aroused by the sound of the snake's body as it slid across
\nthe floor, its furious hissing, its glittering eyes, the thought
\nof its poisonous fangs, the horror of all this drove him mad.<\/p>\n
In accordance with the terms of the agreement, however, Bulan
\nbelonged to my uncle now.<\/p>\n
The frightful thing was that the \"trial\" had deranged my
\nuncle's mind and he was never the same after that.<\/p>\n
Could it be this story has some strange bearing upon my
\npersonal history, and that the horror of the \"trial by snake\" has
\nleft its imprint on my soul and is somehow pertinent to my own
\ndestiny?<\/p>",
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