Ramayana Ballet

I’ve been recounting my vacation in Indonesia in more or less chronological order. Today I’m going to jump around a little bit because I still have another 13 pictures to share from the Prambanan Temple complex, but I also have events the next day for which I have few if any good pictures. Probably the worst was the Ramayana Ballet.

I knew going in that the lighting would be too much for my camera. I took my little hand held anyway because it takes video footage. Unluckily, I had assumed it was still primed and ready to go without checking it. But batteries don’t stay full over the course of days, even if you aren’t using them, and I’d forgotten to clear my memory card. I got a few minutes of music and a narrator standing on the edge of the stage right at the beginning before I ran out of everything.

First we went back stage – which is where the picture was taken. Then we faced mosquitoes and sleep deprivation to learn some Hindu lore.

It seems there was a very happy couple – prince and princess who were madly in love. They went off on a picnic one day. There the princess saw a really cute magical gazelle go hoping by and demanded that her prince and his brother go capture it for her. Frankly, they were total guys about it and went off hunting with little provocation, leaving the princess unprotected.

It just so happens that some demon guy have fallen in love with the princess at first sight and got the gazelle to lure the guys away so he could nab her, which he proceed to do.

Now the princes must try to get her back. For a full year, with the aide of the monkey king and other such spiritual beings he and his brother sturggled to get her back.

When he finally gets her, there is some question of her virtue. To prove herself, she undergoes purification by fire. When she comes out alive everyone says she’s fine, except the prince. He still doesn’t buy it.

Now the story is already abbreviated for stage adaptation and a variety of traditions, and my memory a bit vague. But I’m pretty sure she has a baby which he refuses, and the kid grows up to be a wise man. As to the finer points to the story, your guess is as good as mine.