![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Garuda, the Jambu Grove, and the Queen of the South Seas?
I mentioned to a couple of people that I'm fiddling around with a reinterpretation of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe using Southeast Asian folktales and a cosmology that focuses on cycles rather than linear trajectories and dichotomy. What I'm thinking is, it's still four kids, but instead of the crisis in this world being WW2, it's the 1997 Asian financial crisis. Instead of the kids being sent out of the countryside to escape the Blitz, the parents have to leave the country because there were no jobs in Indonesia. The kids have to stay with their weird uncle. Anyway, I started writing it.
Writing non-autobiographically about Indonesians in Indonesia weirded my brain out. It kept on switching to "speaking Indonesian*" mode (not my most articulate mode, lemme tell ya), and I found myself trying to remember Indonesian vocabulary and sentence structure before I remembered that OH YEAH I'm writing this in English. It was just that my brain was going, "Okay, time to deal with Indonesian people who have X mannerisms and Y ideologies. Adjust!" And then it does. So, I have a few pages written, but the writing's stiff and the diction is off, trying to stay in English but instinctually veering to Indonesian.
I found myself asking, "Are these Indonesian names too off-putting for a non-Indonesian reader?" Then I had RaceFail flashbacks and I was like, "D-:!" wtf. My real name has always been a source of contention for me. It's the typical long foreign name, and people would be like, "Say your name, dude!" like it's just entertainment. And one time, after performing my name, one girl was like, "Yeah, but what is it without the accent? Say your name without the accent." Bitch, that was my name without the accent! diaf :(
In college, I changed my nickname to something simpler - not a Western name, just something monosyllabic (and spelled with two letters, but it still gets misspelled all the damn time anyway I JUST CAN'T WIN) - and my buddy Asef from high school was like, "I can't call you that. You're not that." He says it's colonial mentality on my part, and he talks about how Kang Wook goes by Kevin in Indiana now, and Bilal goes by Billy in Oregon; he makes a face and shakes his head. I don't know if I should be flattered or ticked off at this attitude. On the one hand, I respect his intentions, sure, down with the global western hegemony etc. On the other hand, don't tell me what I should call myself. Who are you to tell me who I am and what my reasons should be?
I also found myself asking, "Who the hell wants to read about Indonesians and Indonesia anyway?" But then I remember that questions like that are why I wanted to write this in the first place.
* Can I just say it kind of SHITS ME OFF when people say "Do you speak Bahasa?" 'cos that just means 'language'. Indonesians don't say we speak Bahasa. Bahasa Indonesia means 'Indonesian language'. It grew out of Malaysian (Basa Melayu?).
And now for something completely meme-ish! Tell me in the comments something you think I'd never ever write, then I try to commentfic this thing I would supposedly never write.
Writing non-autobiographically about Indonesians in Indonesia weirded my brain out. It kept on switching to "speaking Indonesian*" mode (not my most articulate mode, lemme tell ya), and I found myself trying to remember Indonesian vocabulary and sentence structure before I remembered that OH YEAH I'm writing this in English. It was just that my brain was going, "Okay, time to deal with Indonesian people who have X mannerisms and Y ideologies. Adjust!" And then it does. So, I have a few pages written, but the writing's stiff and the diction is off, trying to stay in English but instinctually veering to Indonesian.
I found myself asking, "Are these Indonesian names too off-putting for a non-Indonesian reader?" Then I had RaceFail flashbacks and I was like, "D-:!" wtf. My real name has always been a source of contention for me. It's the typical long foreign name, and people would be like, "Say your name, dude!" like it's just entertainment. And one time, after performing my name, one girl was like, "Yeah, but what is it without the accent? Say your name without the accent." Bitch, that was my name without the accent! diaf :(
In college, I changed my nickname to something simpler - not a Western name, just something monosyllabic (and spelled with two letters, but it still gets misspelled all the damn time anyway I JUST CAN'T WIN) - and my buddy Asef from high school was like, "I can't call you that. You're not that." He says it's colonial mentality on my part, and he talks about how Kang Wook goes by Kevin in Indiana now, and Bilal goes by Billy in Oregon; he makes a face and shakes his head. I don't know if I should be flattered or ticked off at this attitude. On the one hand, I respect his intentions, sure, down with the global western hegemony etc. On the other hand, don't tell me what I should call myself. Who are you to tell me who I am and what my reasons should be?
I also found myself asking, "Who the hell wants to read about Indonesians and Indonesia anyway?" But then I remember that questions like that are why I wanted to write this in the first place.
* Can I just say it kind of SHITS ME OFF when people say "Do you speak Bahasa?" 'cos that just means 'language'. Indonesians don't say we speak Bahasa. Bahasa Indonesia means 'Indonesian language'. It grew out of Malaysian (Basa Melayu?).
And now for something completely meme-ish! Tell me in the comments something you think I'd never ever write, then I try to commentfic this thing I would supposedly never write.
no subject
YES THE COLORS. Things are so much more blurred underwater too, and they're softer and you're lighter and then you come up and it's too loud and harsh.
AAAGH EDMUND/HERMIONE YES. Susan has such nice hair, you can't fault her for objecting to other people's! (Ron <33)
no subject
I wrote the beginning of IndoLWW about a week back, where they're at the airport and the parents are saying goodbye before they fly off to wherever. That's the one wot I was talking about was stiff-feeling, and also feels to me sort of like a vehicle for talking about Indonesia's economic problems, though I'm not sure yet if that's a writing quality thing or because it is... actually set in Indonesia so of course these things are gonna come up.
Softer and lighter! I'm going to plaguerize myself and take this idea from my Red Dragon fic. Wheresit. Here: "If you breathed, you died. If you're at rest, you float upwards instead of staying down. The water held such contradictions. These days Will swam more than he used to, trying to find in the water the opposite of whatever was inside him."
And maybe being in the sea is kind of like flying, because you can swim up and down. Maybe sort of like being in a dream because you can't run. Hmm. Maybe it is like walking on the moon? I am pretty hooked on the image of Gita (the Susan-ish character) walking on the ocean floor, and then she feels something watching her, so she looks around but sees nothing but a shadow on the sand. She looks directly upwards and is face to face with the Sea Queen, who is just hovering, her feet pointed at the sky. Before Gita can scream, the Queen clamps a hand over her mouth. (I think if this were a movie, this part could be like horror-film scary.)
One time when I was snorkeling I saw this motherfucker in the water (http://images.google.com.ph/images?hl=tl&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&hs=6pa&q=sea%20krait&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wi). It was a good distance enough away from me, and it was swimming in the opposite direction anyway, but all I can think of is how sea snakes are like SUPER VENOMOUS. In the event of a stand-off, the sea krait has wound itself loosely around Arif's (Peter's) torso, its open mouth on Arif's neck. Nyai Roro Kidul asks Gita, "What is your choice?"
OH ACTUALLY PERFECT. I just went googling for a picture of Nyai Roro Kidul and it turns out that her symbol is A SNAKE. \o/! The pictures aren't that big (http://library.thinkquest.org/07aug/01235/Ilustration.htm), but oh well. Some rando's entry (http://bumimanusia.deviantart.com/art/Nyi-Roro-Kidul-81040197?offset=10) into an urban legend art contest is also really gorgeous, and I dig the Artist Comments. At first I was like, hmm, where does she keep those horses underwater AND THEN I FIGURE IT OUT. Sea foam! White horses come from the crests of waves, 'cos you know how if you squint at the crests of waves, it kind of looks like them? I dunno, I read it in a manga once (lol omg "I read it in a manga once", would you listen to me) and I used it in 'Sea Change', I can use it again in this. Wasn't that what happened in 'The Last Unicorn'? When the unicorns were driven into the sea, didn't they become the waves?
Oh man, so then I further googled if this horse wave stuff is actually legit from folklore AND THEN. It is actually the name of a wave (http://www.thefreedictionary.com/White+horse)! SO, to borrow from this and from the traditional Little Mermaid, instead of the Witch turning ppl to stone, maybe she turns them into foam?? Or to borrow from Disney Little Mermaid, maybe she turns them into ugly polyp creatures that she will sometimes eat. YIKES.
Actually I don't know how I feel about horses underwater, it's kinda too jarring. Hmm, I wonder what will play the part of Beavers? Come to me, knowledge of marine biologyyyyyy.
no subject
Eeee, yes. Your research for all of this should include a lot of swimming and diving and snorkling. Also I always thought one of the things about swimming is that it's three-dimensional, you know? Like you can go in all three directions instead of two. It's bigger than land.
She looks directly upwards and is face to face with the Sea Queen, who is just hovering, her feet pointed at the sky. Before Gita can scream, the Queen clamps a hand over her mouth.
CREEPY. OMG. Also, I can't imagine a freaking sea snake trying to eat me! AGH. SWIM AWAY, ARIF, SWIM FAST. And jellyfish and those creepy glowy fish and freaking LAMPREYS OMG.
Sea foam YES. Is that universal? I seem to remember it from Poseidon too. Also if she turns them into foam HOLY CRAP. Then every so often she pulls them up into horses and they have a split second to hope they'll be themselves again. Do you think it'd be jarring? I think there are, like, some folktales somewhere of underwater horses? I will try to remember. Celtic mythology had kelpies but there were others, I think.
Seals? Seahorses? Whales? Dolphins? GIANT SHARKS? Duude, you need one of those kids' books that's like "Explore the ocean!" With pictures!