Last weekend I went on a small getaway to Washington DC to see a longtime friend, which I had been really looking forward to. I haven’t been to DC in ages! The only time I had ever gone was in the early 90’s and I don’t remember much besides the Lincoln Monument. This was basically going to be a whole new city for me. So, last Saturday I hopped on a cheap bus from NYC and I was off!
My friend, being the ever gracious host had planned quite a few activities for us that day, our immediate goal being the Indonesian festival held on the Mall. When we got there, we discovered that the Smithsonian Folklife Festival was going on and explored a bit of the Colombia exhibit. This is absolutely what I love about a city like DC, random culture springing up anywhere. For example, when I’d make my way back to my friend’s house, I would look for the embassies of Botswana (p.s., nice house, Bots!) and Argentina.
But we had a mission. During the week, my friend had received an email saying that the Indonesian embassy wanted to try to break the Guinness World Record for largest angklung ensemble and they were handing out free angklungs and teaching people to play. Um… what?? What the hell is an angklung? Well, this is an angklung!
Mine had two pipes which only play one note (mine was A), tied securely into a bamboo frame. You play it by holding the frame in one hand and shaking the bottom back and forth. There are larger angklungs but I imagine it’s hard to ship them to Washington and give them out to 5180 participants. It’s a nice sound but you know, you can only play one note. The emcees said that this makes us all have to work together and “make harmony” in order to play a song.
And we worked pretty hard to make harmony. With an accompanying band and singers, we practiced and practiced on the songs “Country Roads” and “We are the World”, that song being the song that broke the record. It was a bit tricky to get at first but once we settled in, everyone became quite good. Each angklung was marked according to one of the Indonesian islands – Sumatra, Kalimantan, Java, Bali, Sulawesi, Lombok, Maluku, Flores, Papua, and Halmahera – and had a corresponding hand signal. Everyone was directed to look to a screen with a chart of the signals and the conductor for the event, Daeng Udjo, the maestro from the Udjo House of Angklung (Saung Angklung Udjo) in Bandung, West Java. This guy was awesome because he kept cracking himself up. I especially enjoyed the fake pistol shots (pew pew pew!!) during the “…When you’re down and out, And there seems no hope at all….” part.
Finally it was the Moment of Judgement and the emcees introduced the “adjucator” from the Guinness Book. That’s in quotes because I was impressed by such large words on a hot day. We were instructed to not be taking pictures, looking around and focus on the task at hand because this was Very Important and we risked not achieving our task. And, frankly, it would be pretty sad if 5180 people showed up and didn’t make it into the book. I wondered how they would know. I mean, I didn’t see any swat teams with cameras flying overhead making sure we toed the line. They didn’t even take our names!
So the music started and I was quite impressed at our having developed a sufficient angklung prowess that I’m sure would put most US angklung novices to shame. We angklunged our hearts out and it showed. I also didn’t realize how long that damn “We are the World” song is, which seemed to stretch forever when you are furiously concentrating on putting yourself down in history. In the end, the organizers complimented us and marveled that for a bunch of people that probably had never seen an angklung before we were completely awesome. However, unfortunately to my disappointment, no one offered us any exclusive recording contracts, merchandise opportunities or a world tour.
In the end, to great cheering, we were informed that we had indeed broken the world record and certificates were handed out to everyone. I was rather disappointed that I had to write my own name onto it, but I enjoyed it all the same. Through the whole event I had wondered who had held the world record before and if anyone tries to break ours, it’s on, bitches!! I promise will angklung you into oblivion!
For your enjoyment, here is us in all of our awesomeness:
