Meticulously stylized and hauntingly beautiful, many traditional dances of Bali generally tell tales from the Ramayana, one of two ancient Indian Hindu epics. Accompanied by ethereal gamelan gong music (sometimes taped but more than not performed live), dancers labor to reach an artistic perfection which seems to be epitomized by an ability to maintain thigh-blasting half-squats, twitching side-to-side eye movements and backwards curving fingers. Although it sounds like a bad cocaine withdrawal, they make it look good. (I was informed, too, that the best dancers tend to be teenagers, since we adults are pathetically unable to bend our fingers backwards.)

Dancer Ni Nyoman Irat in Bunutan, Amed,
on the northeast coast of Bali

© Dominic Arizona Bonuccelli