After deadly brawl, nightclub is ritually cleansed

DENPASAR: People walking along Jl. Legian on Sunday afternoon were treated to a rare sight: A solemn Balinese Hindus were ritually cleansing one of Kuta’s most raucous nightclubs.

The Bounty Discotheque (photo below) is best known for deafening music and scantily-clad ushers. But that afternoon the only music that filled the air was traditional Balinese music, a fixture of any religious ceremony on the island, while all the women wore elegant tradition costumes.

An elaborate array of offerings, including the meat and skins from sacrificial animals, lay on the ground. The sacrificial animals, which included a cow, a goat, a dog, a pig and ducks, were evidence that a Caru ritual was underway. Caru, which literally means sweet, is any offering or rite aimed at appeasing nature’s destructive or imbalanced forces.

“It is the Caru Lebur Sangsa ritual and we asked the Bounty management to perform the ritual,” Kuta customary village chief Gusti Ketut Sudira said.

The ritual was a social sanction imposed by the chief following a bloody brawl at the night spot in December that left one patron dead and one bouncer under arrest. The incident took place when Kuta residents were preparing for the major religious Ngusaba Desa ritual.

In Balinese Hinduism, any violent act, especially ones that draw blood, desecrate the sanctity of the land and disrupt the balance of nature. When the violence takes place during a religious ritual, its destructive impacts are amplified.

“That’s why we asked the management to organize a Caru Lebur Sangsa, which belongs to the higher level of Caru,” he said, adding that failure to hold the ritual would have brought negative consequences to the club and to the people of Kuta.

The nightclub spent Rp 100 million (US$11,100) to organize the ritual, more than the Rp 25 million paid by DJ Cafe to organize a similar event. DJ Cafe received a lighter social sanction because a separate violent brawl at the cafe did not take place when Kuta residents were holding a major religious rituals.

Bounty manager Made Sukadarma said that he had no problems spending Rp 100 million on the ritual. — JP