Taking the Stage As the Arab Street Looks On

We took a walk after dinner and came upon a festival, with pulsing rhythmic Arab music flowing from a corner of two streets in the Golden Triangle. It was the Festival Sampah, and the people crowding the stage and dancing wildly were all Arab. The music was hypnotic, the pulsing beat unwavering and rolling, and a man playing a small 12-string guitar called a sampah was singing in Arabic, the young men in the audience gyrating and cheering. At the back of the stage sat seven other musicians, all in white robes, playing tambourines, two bongos, two big Korg organs and a pedal steel guitar. Offstage, more singers added harmonies and back up to the man in front,

I love this kind of music and it is that steady beat, that endless pulse, and the indecipherable yet hypnotic words that keeps me rapt and fascinated. I watched men dancing with each other, arms waving, one man in a red checked kaffea, everyone holding up their cellphones to share the magic beat with faraway friends. I worked my way up to the front, loving the strange music trying to figure out who this guy was in his white robe. I was right near the front swaying to the beat, and then the music paused and an emcee took the stage.

Suddenly, he looked at me, in this sea of seething Arab youth, and walked toward me. Was it the Blazer? I did look mighty white in there with all of those men half my age. He gestured for to come over, and then soldiers undid the barriers to the stage and he called me to come up and join the band on stage. “Please tell me your name,” said the MC, Barnie Redzan. “Where are you from?” I answered “US,” and told him that I was here writing a story about Malaysia. “How do you like it here,” he asked over the PA. “I love it and I love this music!” I said.

Our words were booming out to all of the grinning Arab men. Then Barnie brought a woman on stage who held a mic, and I knew that I would be expected to dance. I did the best I could, to the hoots and encouragement of the crowd. I asked the male singer where he was from, and he said Indonesia. It was a brief moment there, trying to look cool while I swayed a little bit following the lead of the heavily made-up woman singer. Then he gave me a tee shirt and I left to the applause. The crowd was friendly, though I think if I had said I was from Singapore or France they might have cheered more.