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The procession was indeed spectacular. Scores of women, from tiny tots to grandmothers, all arrived in elaborate temple dress, gold flowers gleaming in their hair, a length of goldembossed brocade wrapped tightly around the body from the armpits down, while a further length was pulled between the feet and out the back, to sweep behind on the ground in a long graceful train. To watch these exotic women parade barefooted along the busy highway was like seeing a fairytale come to life. A morning came when Agung's car pulled up in front of my hotel. The driver handed my houseboy a note - the houseboy passed it to me: "I am about to leave for Besakih to make special offerings for both my parents. Do you wish to come with me: Travelling through the sawahs in the early morning sunshine, we arrived at Mother Temple while the sky was still a cloudless blue. Expert hands quickly draped the various bales with long lengths of white cloth, offerings were laid out - those for the gods inside the bales; those for the demons placed on the ground. Mantras were recited, holy water sprinkled, music played. A permanku, briskly beating a small kul kul circled around the demons' ground offerings, systematically capsizing them all. This was the signal for the demons to clear out and keep out. A Balinese version of 'Here's your hat, what's your hurry.' "This evening the Ubud Barong will visit a little village across the ricefields - about seven miles away. I will be walking there and back with it. Would you like to come with me. Dear God' A 14-mile
hike across flooded rice paddies in the dark I didn't possess that kind
of stamina. Not so Agung. He went, spent the night praying in the temple,
and came striding back through the sawahs with the Barong at firstlight
next morning. |
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we must point out a very important distinction which the Balinese make between
two clearly separate groups of ancestors. The first of these groups consists
of the dead who are riot yet completely purified. This group is in turn subdivided
in pirata, those riot yet cremated, and pitara, those already cremated. The
former are still completely impure; the latter have been purified, but are still
considered as distinct, individual souls. The second group consists of the completely
purified ancestors who are considered as divine. Everything Bali Indonesia |
