Indonesia Comes to Ohio

[David]

I was pleasantly surprised last week when i found out that Middfest International, and annual international festival just 40 minutes from my house, was featuring Indonesia this year as their main country of interest. More than 100 dignitaries where coming all the way to a little town in Ohio to share their arts, music and other information with us. I called their offices to find out what they might be offering in the keris. Well, they had a complete gamelan orchestra (weighing over 5000 lbs.), wayang puppet theatre, dance, acrobats, textile displays and so on, workshops and lectures on many aspects of Indonesian life, but not a stitch of information on the keris. At first i was aghast. This seemed so wrong. It is, after all, an intrinsic part of the cultures of the area. I explained to them it's importance and the recent Unesco designation as a heritage masterpiece. Then i did something somewhat out of character for me. As many of you know i don't do too much show-and-tell on this forum. I tend not to post photos of my blades, though i do sometimes show images of dress. I believe in keeping my collection private, just for the viewing of close friends. But it just seemed a bit of an injustice for this big festival to go on with no display of keris at all. Sooooo....i offered them a loan for display. This all came down very last minute. I was setting up the display on Friday afternoon with the opening ceremonies just hours away. Nothing was ideal and they never got the individual name tags with the specific info i had given them on each keris printed up, but at least the attendees got a taste of what these wonderful weapons are all about. I tried to give them a selection as diverse as my meager collection would allow.
I do apologize for the photo quality. I only had my wife's point-and-shoot to photograph the display case and it doesn't do the professional job that i am used to with my big camera.
Here's a link to the event: http://www.middfestinternational.org/