Before the puppet performance, the ceremony is, as always, in full swing with large numbers of villagers milling around the outer and middle courtyard in particular. In the inner courtyard, villagers gather to pray and to present offerings. During the short ceremony, the worshippers place flowers behind their ears as a gateway to the gods and they are blessed with holy water. This ceremonial aspect is an important prelude to the performance as it is a conditioning into the more serious purification process of which the Wayang itself is a part. The offerings contain fruits, flowers, chicken, pork, incense and rice. There is no absolute rule, but generally men use white and fairly neutral-coloured clothes for attending the temple, whereas women wear bright colours such as pink, blue, orange and green. Women carry the offerings sometimes on their heads and sometimes in baskets or in metal containers.
Everyone finds a place on the concrete floor to pray as they sit and remove their shoes. Each person puts a small offering of flowers (needed for praying) and incense next to them on the ground, usually displayed on bases made out of banana leaf. Some people prepare small bunches of flowers arranged on a cone made of banana leaf. As the ceremony progresses, an allfemale gamelan orchestra plays in the background and a female singer sings into a microphone. After the holy water blessing at the end, the priest gives out rice to the attendants to distribute to the worshipers, who stick the rice onto their foreheads and throats as a sign that they have been purified and blessed. Putting the rice on the forehead signifies a request to the gods to
bless your mind and on the throat is a request to the gods to bless your heart. Once the rituals are complete, the villagers head off to watch the other events around the temple.
While this ceremony is taking place, the dalang and his team are preparing for the performance that will follow. This dalang has a larger than usual retinue of assistants and, unusually, two trucks and a minibus to transport his equipment and staff; this is an indication of his commercial success and popularity. The orchestra’s instruments are all arranged in a specific pattern and order behind where the dalang will sit, in the centre of the screen 60cm away from it. The screen is made of white, cotton cloth and suspended within a wooden frame that is painted red and gold, decorated with carved animal faces painted in pink, red and green. At the base of the screen on the dalang’s side is a log of a banana tree into which puppets can be stuck at various points during the performance, as the interior is soft. The screen itself and the platform that the dalang and musicians sit on are raised above the level of the concrete ground on which the audience will sit, so it resembles a low Western stage. However, what is entirely different and unique about the performance that will soon follow is that it can be viewed from multiple perspectives. It is not just in-the-round theatre, as the villagers may watch from the front, as though viewing a proscenium stage or from the back where they will not see shadows but the entire back-stage performance of musicians, dalang and his assistants. It is also possible to see from the side that allows partial view of both perspectives and spectators are allowed to move around from time to time and witness from different points as the performance progresses. The audience who stay at the front have an entirely different viewing experience from those at the rear.
The area behind the screen is crowded with musical instruments, electrics and sound-system cables, musicians and microphones on stands for the three female singers/narrators that will support the dalang and four assistants. These assistants will pass puppets back and forth, operate light and sound cues, prepare small props and help the dalang by passing water to him to drink and mop his brow. This is unusual as most dalang work alone on the narrative aspects of performance and are supported only by two assistants, one on each side. For this performance, a maze of entangled wires is everywhere, some connected to a home-made dimming system constructed from domestic light-dimmer switches. Above the screen is a small oil lamp that is mainly there as a decorative token reference to the oil light that usually illuminates the whole show. This dalang favours an electric source light that fits more comfortably with his use of special effects, with coloured lights and a smoke machine that is suspended in the centre at the top of the shadow screen. Within this packed, small area behind the screen the real drama will take place as the performance begins.
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