The first dance show we saw was staged in Ubud palace. It was a Legong dance. The story was a common story where the girl did not love the guy, and informs him of the hero who will come and rescue her. The villain guy gears up for the war, meet a bird in the middle as a bad omen, and kill the bird. But in the war, the villain is defeated. The dance was beautifully depicted, especially the bird and the heroine, who was really beautiful. The dance resembled in many ways, the dances in India, especially the beauty of the dancers.
The second dance was a Barong dance. Barong was a mythological animal which represents the spirit of Bali. It was more of a comical dance, with a monkey character involved. The dance, or more of a show, also involved interaction of monkey with the audience. The Barong was enacted by 2 humans, and we were amazed by the synchronous movement of both of them, which resulted in producing a movement like a single monster.
This was followed by a dance depiction of a short story from Mahabharata. Two asura brothers, Sunda and Upasunda set to conquer the world, get blessings from a god. When they are about to capture devaloka, Indra, as he usually does, send a beautiful apsara who seduces them, and they both fight with each other for her, and become desperate, and lose their power. The apsara was so damn beautiful; her dance had the power of seducing the audience more than the asuras. I really enjoyed the dance, first in my life time, mainly because the story print out was given to us, and secondly, because it was colorful and beautiful.
The next dance we saw was the Kecak dance in Uluwatu temple, with the sunset as backdrop. It was a depiction of Ramayana. Around 30-40 people would sit and form circles and they kept repeating the work Cak (pronounced chak), and this was the music for the dance. The chak-chak sound was there for the entire course of the dance, represented the trees of forest, Ravana’s men and so on. The dance was not so colorful, but again we were given the print of the story. The story was enacted fast, again, Sita was beautiful, and the sunset in the backdrop was gorgeous. There was also fire in the dance, when Hanuman sets Lanks on fire and frees Sita. It was a traditional performance clubbed with two clowns who entertained the audience, which I felt was totally unnecessary.
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