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THE BULL RACES AT NEGARA
Time is a universal commodity

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Throughout the world people chase the fleeting, feet of time.
The charlady checks the clock for knock-off time.
The chairman's wife glances at her diamond studded watch, to make sure the chauffeur gets her to the Opera on time.


Business moguls set their faith in Greenwich Mean Time.
Bucolic farmers go beserk at the mention of enforced Summer Time.
And then, of course, there is that oft-quoted, unfathomable mystery - Bali Time.
Like distances in Bali - time also is elastic.
"How far is it to the temple" you ask.
"Oh, quite close," a smiling Balinese will assure you. "Just 100-yards down the road."

Likely as not you will walk a full mile before you reach that temple.
"What time does the Legong dance begin tonight" you ask.
If you are told "About nine o'clock, Bali time," then you know you can safely arrive around ten o'clock and still see the start of the performance.
Let me tell you about the Bull Races at Negara and you'll get the idea:
In the Tjampuhan dining room, lunch was almost over. The bar boys had already cleared away the rystaffle dishes and placed bowls of fresh mangosteens on the tables.
Abruptly the after-lunch lethargy was broken as Geoffrey, one Of our more exotic guests, came scampering down the steps, flung into the diningroom posed himself dramatically against a table and announced breathlessly to the room at large:

Scream after scream shattered the quiet of the temple as the participants writhed and twisted. Inexorably the priest dragged his followers, all hysterically clutching the cotton rope, towards the glowing coals.

A figure darted out of the shadows, ran through the centre of both piles, kicking at them with his bare feet, to send a shower of blazing embers through the air like a fiery snowstorm.

The boys, waving their long spears, began dancing wildly, backwards and forwards through the coals. The girls, jerking convulsively and still screaming, followed in their wake. Their cotton rope became entangled. One girl stumbled, fell, and was dragged lengthwise through the coals before helping hands could pull her to her feet again.

The screaming intensified as the girls, now wrapped together in a writhing knot by the twisted rope, tumbled out through one temple gate, circled a stone statue and returned through another gateway. The boys, who had been kicking out the last ashes, stumbled, exhausted, back into the bale. Minutes later, the huddle of girls also staggered up the stairs and sank onto the floor in a tangled mass.

Gradually the screams and sobs subsided. A girl's voice clear, calm and authorative rang through the silent temple. After the demented yammerings, the change was electrifying. Like a teacher instructing her pupils, the voice continued.

When, the bar boy, was whispering at my elbow....
"The god is now speaking through one of the girls. That is good. We will know what we must do - perhaps we have neglected to make the proper offerings; maybe we have done some wrong thing. Who knows. Whatever it is the god will tell us now, and we, can put it right. All will be well for the coming year. We can sleep in peace."
After such a night, - could anyone sleep - in peace or otherwise

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