Dear Friends,
The Kuala Lumpur season of Meniti Cakerawala 2.0 will be remembered for many reasons.
For one, the DBKL Auditorium allowed us to explore the production to its maximum artistic potential, especially in its choreographic intent and lighting design. These aspects achieved their epiphany in Meniti’s last KL performance on 27 July.
YAM Tunku Zain of N9, was the youthful and gallant guardian spirit, who lent his voice to the message of Meniti Cakerawala.
Even the foyer exhibition of ‘Cosmic Connections’ by artists of SPEKTRA, gave the season a spectacular atmosphere, rising to the the production’s high standing.
As was its premiere in December last year, where the first season saw the attendance of some prominent personages such as YAM Tuanku Muhriz of Negri Sembilan, YAM Tunku Puteri Intan Shafinaz of Kedah to Yang Arif Tun Tengku Maimun, this second season in KL was also attended by royalties and distinguished personalities such as DYMM Tuanku Zara (Raja Permaisuri of Perak), Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir, Sis of Islam’s Zainah Anwar and Chief Economist of World Bank, Apurva Sanghi, besides other luminaries.
We will always remember the commotion of having to cancel one of our performances (26 July) due to a large scale demonstration at Dataran.
Once, during one of our tours at NCPA (Mumbai), we were unfortunately in the vicinity just after the terrorist hotel bombing.
In another instance, I remember being rescued when I was caught in the burning of Solo (Indonesia) during the 1998 final fall of Suharto.
All these controversial happenings had created tense but exciting atmosphere. Naturally, they were indelibly etched as exciting times when one felt one was part of history when one remembers them.
The last day was also hectic as we had to do our photo-shoot for our next Odissi production, ‘Radhe! Radhe!’
We also presented a lec-dem for students just before the performance, on ‘The Making of ’Meniti Cakerawala’.