Kelabit Dances

00:00:01mo, ruka sinih teluh mala lem ayu'
so this time the three of us are talking about

00:00:04arang lun tauh, lun kelabit keyh
Kelabit dances

00:00:07am tungen tuih mileh ngarang
I'm not very good at dancing

00:00:08kadi' pengeh uih neni'er dulun ngarang malem
but I've seen other people dancing in the past

00:00:11dela'ih lun merar
old men

00:00:14dela'ih lun merar, dedtur lun merar
old men, old women

00:00:16taman pawa', sinan pawa'
middle-aged fathers, middle-aged mothers

00:00:19anak-adi'
and children

00:00:21am tungen teh burur uih mileh
but I, myself, am not very good

00:00:23lem sekenan kudih
as I recall

00:00:26kayu' ko' kuwan kuh na'ah ih
as I said before

00:00:27let ngi bawang kedeh ngilad keyh, bawang atau kampong Pa' Main
we are from Pa' Main village

00:00:33renga' ineh ngilad, rayeh kampung sineh keyh
at that time, the village was big

00:00:36mula' lemulun
there were many people

00:00:37dteh teh ruma' kadang
we had a very long longhouse

00:00:39tak ko ni'er let edteh lipa keyh
if you look from one end

00:00:41madi' teh lemulun keli' muh pedingi keyh
the people the other end look tiny to you

00:00:44kineh ken kadang ruma' ngen narih ngilad
that's how long the longhouse seemed to me back then

00:00:47kadi' neh, tak inan sakai
so, if there were guests

00:00:50inan lun beken marih let mado ngi
or people who had come from far away

00:00:52neh nideh raut
then they would play games

00:00:54lun kampong raut ngedeh keyh
the villagers would entertain them

00:00:57neteg sapey' lah
they played the sape

00:00:59mey neh lun, kayu' edteh dela'ih mey ngarang pu'un
and, for example, a man will dance first

00:01:02demonstrate, mey mada' kapeh ayu' arang sineh
to demonstrate the nature of the dance

00:01:06pengeh beruh, mey teh...
afterwards, then the...

00:01:09neh nideh muit sakai (sakai kedeh ngedeh keyh, the guests) mey ngarang lah
then they ask the guests (they called them "sakai") to dance

00:01:15ena' meto' ideh keyh, doo' meto' serawey deh
how do I say it, they were very polite

00:01:19am tebey' ideh pernah nenaru' arang sineh malem
they had never done the dance before

00:01:21kadi' deh nuru' deh mey
but people asked them to try

00:01:23mey tideh mey maak lemulun nuru' deh mey, lun kampung
so they did it to please the people who asked them to go up, the villagers

00:01:27pengeh ineh neh, pengeh dideh dela'ih
afterwards, when the men's dance was finished

00:01:35ru'en deh neh edteh dedtur idih ngarang meto'
they ask a woman to dance as well

00:01:39mey neh edteh dedtur edteh mey mada' kapeh ayu' arang tauh
so a given woman will go and show our dances

00:01:43lun Kelabit, dedtur Kelabit
the Kelabit ladies' dance

00:01:45um
um

00:01:46pengeh ineh, iten deh, en deh ngeruid neh sakai keyh, sakai
after that they invite the guests

00:01:50mey ngarang lah
to dance

00:01:51at tebey' ileh deh, ta'on ideh
they don't know how to do it, poor things

00:01:53kadi' maya' adet men ideh keyh
but they follow the etiquette

00:01:54doo' meto', doo' nideh kebaya' deh karuh
and just do as they are told

00:01:59kadi' nideh, mey nideh nutun ngarang, kayu' ineh ih keyh
so they go and try to dance, or something like that

00:02:03adi' kekamih anak-adi' ih metutun keyh
so us children we would peep

00:02:07metutun maya' rawang ih ngi bubpu' ih keyh
peep through the gap in the door

00:02:10metutun deh kinih
they peep like this

00:02:12ta'ut kamih ngedeh la' muit kamih mey ngarang
we were scared they would ask us to dance too

00:02:14kadi' neh kamih dara' mey ngi tawa' ngi
which is why we didn't want to go onto the veranda

00:02:17metutun kineh
so we peeped like that

00:02:19tak kamih ngelinuh deh la' marih nekap kamih
if we thought they were going to come and look for us

00:02:21upun neh kamih buro
we would run away

00:02:23neh edteh ena', adet, enun tebey', raut lun tauh ngilad
that's a Kelabit custom, or what do you call it, game in the past

00:02:29merar beto' narih kedi'it keyh
when I was a bit older

00:02:31am neh narih ta'ut tu'uh keyh
I wasn't as scared

00:02:32kadi' neh narih nutun-nutun lah
so I had a go

00:02:34mey suk belaan deh ko' arang kadang
at what they call the long dance

00:02:37atau suk nibar ih
or the one where we line up

00:02:38narih mula' tuda' burur narih ngarang keyh, edteh ngatur
several of us dance in a single line

00:02:44naru' tupu maya' lemulun suk pema'un kineh ih
and just follow the person in front

00:02:47neh teh edteh nuk pengeh belajar narih ngilad, mo
so that's something I learned in the past, yeah