Kuda Kepang

Was at Woodlands today. On the way to the car park after visiting Su's cousin new born baby, saw many people gathering at a void deck. Quickly parked the car and together with Su, her mum and...everybody else, we saw that it was a birthday celebration. And in this birthday celebration we saw that a kuda kepang performance was being put up.

Armed only with a 28mm 2.8 lens, I went and seek out the head of the troupe and asked his permission to take pictures. He readily agreed. It was a long event but I was�spell-bounded...

It started with the dances coming out slowly and dancing to a traditional tune from the accompanying gamelan. I think that it took some 20-30 minutes of slow dancing when the action finally started. The dancers seemed to go into a trance and after some dramatic hesistation, they took to their horses. Some had to be baited using burning charcoal and incense. While waiting for the action to start, I actually spied a big plate filled with fruits like banana and coconuts. And not only were there edible stuff, but there were also broken glass. When I enquired further, these were meant as food for the dancers. Whoa!�

Anyway after the dancers got into a trance, some of them were fed broken glass, some of them got whipped, some were hit using a stick. It then appears that they acted as though they were horses...

More pictures in my album.