I.D. Nugroho , The Jakarta Post , East Java | Fri, 09/26/2008 10:58 AM | People
HASAN ALI: (JP/ID Nugroho)
Hasan Ali believes that the unique arts of the Using people truly show the beauty of the culture of Banyuwangi society.
That's why Hasan, 75, thought it desirable to make an effort to promote Using art by teaching it to children in school.
"If not, I would worry that Banyuwangi art would be lost, eroded by modern culture," Hasan told The Jakarta Post recently.
The afflictions of old age has seen Hasan, who was born in Banyuwangi in 1933, confined most days to the sofa in the lounge of his house.
But his spirit can still be felt through his direct gaze, and the tone of his voice which is firm and loud, especially when he talks about the gandrung dance and the Using language, his two pet topics.
"I've experienced three periods of history -- the Dutch, the Japanese and the Indonesian Republic. But all that time the gandrung dance and the Using language have kept me in love," he said from his home in Mangir village, Rogojampi subdistrict, in Banyuwangi Regency, East Java.
Hasan, who is the father of famous singer Emilia Contessa and the grandfather of singer Denada Tambunan, learned about Using arts, which are remnants of the culture of the Blambangan Kingdom, since he was a teenager.
"Since I was a teenager I liked Using art," he said. His hobby gained him more status when he joined an art group associated with the Indonesian National Party (PNI).
"Because of the art group, I was finally trusted by the PNI to become a member of the Banyuwangi Parliament where I served until 1966," Hasan said.
Ironically the political conflicts of that period also made Hasan's position dangerous.
This was particularly so when Muhammad Arif, the composer of the Genjer-Genjer song (a song associated with Communism), together with hundreds of members of the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), went missing after the 1965 incident known as the 30 September Movement.
That incident (an alleged coup d'etat in Jakarta) also suddenly linked and identified Banyuwangi art with the PKI.
But as Hasan recalls, what actually happened was quite different. The PKI wanted to eliminate Banyuwangi art, which it considered an art form that damaged the morality of society.
"It was really true that the PKI used Genjer-Genjer as a song of struggle, but apart from that the PKI forbade performances of the Banyuwangi gandrung dance, because it was considered that it would affect society's morals," he said.
Arif, said Hasan, composed the Genjer-Genjer song, during the Japanese period to lift the spirits of the community, which at the time was suffering from poverty.
The Banyuwangi Gandrung dance was nothing more than a social dance; there was no other purpose. The songs that were sung by gandrung dancers were like the local traditional poetry, which expressed wisdom and values.
The impression of immorality associated with the dance appeared because there were certain people who treated it improperly by performing the dance in Banyuwangi's districts frequented by prostitutes.
"Slowly the gandrung dance came to be identified as an immoral dance," he said.
The situation changed after 1965. At the time Hasan had a job as an official in the regional government of Banyuwangi. He was then approached by the former regent, Joko Supaat Slamet, to save the gandrung dance.
"My friends and I agreed to recreate the gandrung dance as a teenagers' social dance performed politely and correctly," he said. Dozens of local artists were invited to participate.
Soon after the performance, the gandrung dance was back in favor. There was even an invitation for the dance to be performed in the State Palace when former President Soeharto was in power. The gandrung dance then became a symbol of Banyuwangi Regency.
Hasan was also interested in another Banyuwangi jewel that had almost become extinct: the Using language that belonged to the Banyuwangi Using tribe.
The Using language had slowly started disappearing from society and nobody in the Banyuwangi community, including many Using people, used it.
"I don't know why, suddenly they felt too ashamed to use their regional language," said Hasan.
Hasan invited Banyuwangi artists to hold a small seminar titled "How to defend the Using language?". The most important recommendation that came from the seminar, which was held in the 1980s, was to introduce the Using language in elementary schools.
"But that wasn't an easy thing to do. It wasn't like the Javanese language where the history has been recorded well. At that time there was no reference book on the Using language," he said.
Therefore, he said, the first item on the agenda was to produce a Using language textbook.
Hasan collected all the data about the Using people that he could access, including 28,000 words of the Using language that were still in use. Ten years later, Hasan had published three books that covered the grammar and spelling of the Using language and a dictionary.
In the process of compilation, the former Banyuwangi Arts Council head had to use the Indonesian, Javanese and Balinese languages as comparative languages.
"I assumed that the Using language has some connection with the Balinese language because it can be seen that some words have the same meaning," said Hasan.
Till now the Using language continues to be taught in the local elementary schools. There are some who commend its beauty, and there are also those who strongly dislike the language.
Many say that it is a credit to Hasan the Using language is still being used.
"Even those Banyuwangi people who have left the region are still using the Using language when they communicate with other Banyuwangi people," he said.
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