Arts

Where have all the tents gone?

by Asoka de Zoysa,

The Goethe Institute presented Pina Bausch and her ensemble way back in the seventies at the BMICH. At the close of the performance there was an icy silence. "Can all that gasping, panting and running around on stage be called dance".

The expectations of seeing anything vaguely connected with classical ballet had been rudely disturbed after seeing body movements without music or dancing to a recitation of a poem by Rabindranath Tagore. This was a culture shock long before the word was even invented.

How is it then, when the dancers in "Modern Dance" are not visible? Can our tolerance towards western innovations be stretched so far?

The tents on stage did not move to any rhythm of music. The "Letters from Tentland" were projected on the screen, post card texts, each word appearing with a slight pause giving the audience time to anticipate the next thought. We were obviously reading a very private correspondence between two women. One in Europe, the other one in Tentland, somewhere in the world.

At the very start, a "visual overture" of picture-postcards showing views of cities were projected in a sequence. What was out of place in each picture was a coloured tent. Like an uninvited guest the tent stood spoiling the picturesque well known city-scapes of London , Paris , Madrid of Munich.

In the very dim light the tents on the stage begin to move very slowly - obviously there was some body inside. Bad lighting. No music? Or has some thing gone wrong?

One only hears the sound of wind blowing, like a very soft hum, never ending and monotonous. Nothing seem to very much happen on this night's minimalist show 'Celebrating over five decades of German Culture in Sri Lanka'.

A further disappointment: The music did not reflect the rich tradition of German music in any way. What does this type of middle eastern or oriental music have to do with Germany?

Finally, the six tents stood up in a line. Through each of the rectangular openings of the shape less tent, a most beautiful living face was seen. Each framed face was lit by a rectangular light that made the staring faces within look like passport photographs.

A voice on the off was heard: "Where do you come from?" A kind question, it seems to be.

Have I come here to return back home?

A question familiar to any one who has been living in Europe , who's face doesn't merge into the city scape. "You are going back to your home, aren't you", would be the next polite question - Helene Waldman has left out this most obvious second question.

"At each boarder I am a passport picture, which belongs to no where.

Those who belong to no where, belong every where?. The tents begin to move, skip, jump, tumble and fly. Enmeshed in each tent was a soul in desperation, in joy or in fear.

Strong hands now emerge out of each tent. They reach for each other, fight with each other, grab for the same thing, argue and comfort each other too.

"Every time we are standing here, again and again, Assorted. Piled up. Arranged in a line. Shaped in some anonymous form. To your eyes we look the same. We're behaving according to our own rules.

Controlling each other to keep us safe.

"Perhaps you ask yourself how can we move? How can we breath? How can we sing? We start to create everything from the beginning, again and again.

We invent how to move, how to sing, how to dance.

But some times this is very tiring and we loose control".

Is the Goethe Institute offloading the problems of some Muslim Migrants in Germany , to us here in Colombo under the dimmed chandeliers of the "Waters Edge". Each section of dance is paused with a video projection.

Mini texts appear on the screen, texts known to us always signalling a disappointment when sending a letter or a parcel like "Undelivered", "Damaged", "Parcel opened", "Contents missing". In all European languages and in Arabic these messages parade from right to left and left to right on the screen.

I was later informed that Helena Waldman, choreographer had been collecting these messages from Post and Telecommunication Departments in Europe and Iran .

Each emigrant's link with Home, the parcel, the letter, the telegram on an uncertain journey from "Home" to Tentland is not received as expected. In times when 'Home' has no fixed addresses, tents too are kept moving. The displacement of the displaced. Or may be the link with the Heimat'

Homeland is disrupted due to surveillance of the authorities and corruption of the custom officers. The shame and pain of seeing that a personal gift has been opened its contents scrutinized or an intimate letter written by a loved one has been read aloud in the police station flashes in the mind.

The anxiety of not being able to receive a gift from a loved one far away fades out from the screen. Dim lights come on.

The tents keep appearing, negotiating at times. Is this only the problem of modern Germany having given asylum to refugees from all over the world?

Black and white photographs of kids appear on the screen. Family photographs taken at reunions, weddings, birthdays or when on holiday. Then, these photographs keep fading in and fading out. The back ground is the urban landscape of housing blocks piled up on each other.

The happy moments of family reunion frozen in the photograph get lesser. Finally, the anonymous city scape dominates the screen like a giant college. The same prefabricated blocks housing families making up that living space which we all identify as our 'Home'.

This 'Home' is hidden somewhere in the noise of the traffic and concrete Jungle. The names of the cities are interchangeable - Teheran, Kabul, Karachi, may become Chennai, Mumbai, Dakar or Colombo.

Judging by the large queues in front of High Commissions and Embassies, and the foreign exchange earned by our migrant workers that gives the life blood to our economy, Sri Lanka too will have to deal with the problems of migration more sensitively.

One may ask the question, to what extent do our Sri Lankans feel safe and welcome, when exposed to foreign bureaucracy, strange working ethics and attitudes. Not forgetting the fact, that migrant workers are exposed to the same discrimination of "Living in the Diaspora" like all those who seek a safe space to live in, called by different names like "Asylum seekers", "Refugees", "Displaced people".

The fact of being a stranger way from home, is one of the most powerful themes since the end of the Cold War.

The Goethe Institute which has brought reputed dance ensembles like those of Susanna Link, Pina Bausch and Sascha Walz or the "Tanzforum" of Cologne, have after fifty years now dared into a new field - making a political statement with a troupe of women migrants living in Berlin. In spite of being banned in some cities in our region, the narratives from Tentland were heard in Colombo.

The Choreographer Helena Waldmann has named the program "Return to sender". The title reflects the feeling of those in the Diaspora. Like the parcel or letter that never reached the destination, the people too do not belong to the strange country, where they hoped to find a new home. The tent is living space, cover and shield.

Europe has the largest percentage of political refugees from Sri Lanka , Norway , Switzerland , Germany and France in the front line.

The tent people living in those metropolis are uninvited guests, coping with strange life styles, moving from one country to another, from one city to another, looking for better prospects, when the prospects of "communing back home" seems to be a dream.

A post card from Tent Land says: "Do you know what is the biggest difference from living here to there? Here in Europe , the wings are clipped, when strangers seek freedom.

They seek freedom and are crushed by the authorities with their rubber stamps. I believe that those who come to Europe loose their freedom - at least the inner freedom, which I very much admire available in your country."

(The writer is Head of Dept. of Modern languages, University of Kelaniya)