Jakarta

Jaran Kepang in the Kampung

I was just walking through the kampung behind my apartment, looking for somewhere shady to read my book, and came across a small gemalan orchestra accompanying the famous Jaran Kepang, the traditional Javanese dance portraying soldiers riding horses made from highly decorated bamboo. Just just my luck: they were doing the less common version where each dancer enters into a trance and then walks through fire, eats glass and endures a good flogging (the man doing the flogging went into a trance himself and was possessed by a demon much to the delight of onlooking children). Just a regular Sunday afternoon in the kampung. I didn't have a camera but this picture from http://vinoimagination.blogspot.co.id looks just like it...