I grew up in Indonesia in Indonesia
taking traditional dance lessons as a
child it's as common as being in Little
League or you soccer so just like every
other kid I started dancing dances from
the island of Java
I'm Javanese and Bali since I was five
it is so common that you even get graded
on it in elementary school and here's me
playing the role of an angel at our
Christmas pageant
complete with Javanese dance
choreography somehow Indonesia's are
able to combine the traditional with the
modern the old and the new and our
culture into our daily lives then when I
was 12 years old my parents moved us
from bustling town of Jakarta to
middle-of-nowhere State College
Pennsylvania I didn't speak a word of
English so they put me in ESL or English
as a second language
I was a complete certified fob
fresh-off-the-boat
someone who is an American enough it's a
12 year old I was devastated I was going
through a crisis
I acted different I looked there friend
I sounded different I just wanted to fit
in and then the worst my parents made us
perform at Penn State's international
night don't let the smile fool you if I
wanted to fit in I was failing miserably
so that was it
I quit dancing from then it was English
only to get rid of the accent walked a
lot of college football and hung out
with fair-skinned boys immersed myself
in pop culture
I even rocked the 90s bangs
it's becoming look a real American
teenager complete with a slight
obsession of boys to men then life
continued I went to college got a job at
corporate America married a boy with
pronounceable last name then these two
happened these are my happy girls look
there's nothing Indonesian about them
they don't look Indonesian they don't
speak Indonesian they don't even eat
Indonesian food I know if I wanted them
to know the other half that I spent
years decades shutting off I needed to
get back to my roots to my heritage so
what's the easiest thing to do dancing
so me and the girls we join an
Indonesian traditional dance troupe and
music got more into dancing I realized I
wasn't doing it for them I was doing it
for me I was the one missing that half I
was the one that ignored that half
shamelessly you know all these fears
choosing to become an American and
disregarding my Indonesian heritage that
wasn't the complete me what if I
embraced both so here I am dressed like
a bird of paradise because I realized
that mixing the modern and the
traditional the American and the
Indonesian that's me and for many
immigrants we are both so what better
way to embrace myself and continue this
journey than performing one of the more
unique dances in a more elaborate
costume we're performing a dance from
the island of bali called chandra Wasi
or bird of paradise the dance represents
their mating rituals or these birds of
paradise and some of the movements are
not traditional it mimics the movement
of these birds like skipping showing off
the tail
and shaking off the feathers
mix in our traditional technique
typically a Balinese dancers cannot show
our teeth so our expressions are done
through our eyes
and the constant finger movement is also
very traditional this is also an example
of a dance that's a combination of
modern and traditional the dance isn't
classical or sacred it was choreographed
to protect and preserve the bird of
paradise from extinction in an our
version we have two male birds that will
be joined by a female bird