Review by Khor Wei Ken
TL;DR If you want to watch an intense, thought-provoking, haunting performing arts show (acting, monologuing, poetry, literature, dancing) that triggers your deepest thoughts and possibly unpleasant memories, that makes you stare mental health in the eye, look upon its ugliest faces and listen to its gravest stories, go to this. A human exhibit, like an art gallery, but alive, moving, real. Mature audiences only; contains explicit elements.
Long version (possibly spoilers? You probably need the context anyway..):
The beginning. A student (her role in the act, I assumed), kinda OCD and a bit nervous, introduced us to mental health, supported with stats on the rising number of mental health issues particularly in Malaysia. Low public awareness didn’t help, hence this show. Even gave us a safe word — a forewarning of the scares to come.
And then we took the plunge.
The circle of words. On and on and on. Signifying endlessness and repetition, recurring thoughts and persistent visions.
Strings of words and feelings and fears, forming a large round zero in the middle.
Signifying nothing.
Her accented enunciation of that word. Nightmares.
Memories of my own came flooding back, the nights spent wandering along the borders between dreams of desperation and stretches of unconsciousness, between daydreams of longing and moments of pitch-black darkness. Emptiness. Voidness.
“My lungs are like airplanes; every rib is a love letter from my head to my heart…” The hollow sound of airplanes, uproarious and deafening. That’s how it feels when the memories surround you, her voice, the dialogue, the conversations, constantly, repeatedly booming all around you.
A mask that hides the scars beneath, covers up the torn soul within. An episode that exposes the shock of promiscuity and licentiousness.
(Subsequent discussion with the writer herself, Melissa Kong, revealed that it was about the PTSD effects of rape — having to notice every hand position and movement of the man because she feels threatened.)
“Out of Darkness, Light” was the theme of #artspire2017, a performing arts festival I directed last year as a Teach For Malaysia Fellow. In the Artspire workshops, one of the skills we aimed to cultivate in the students was poetry.
Back to the event, in the next scene, we formed a line along the corridor, while a solo poet recited a monologue, standing bare inches away from us. He wept for the loss of his family and lamented the superficial “lights” in life that people crave for impulsively, seek after without restraint, pursue without forethought — the glimmering lights of Hollywood, the sparkling lights of gold and fame, the glaring lights of city buzz, the blazing nightclub music, the splendour of disco ball and special effects LED and party lights, the high of the drink tower.
“Cahaya… kelab-kelab malam Kuala Lumpur!” His voice was rising to a peak.
Yet there is a greater light, a different light, one we often neglect and forget. He reiterated the importance of family, the possibility of finding light in every corner, the authenticity of the light within.
“Dari kegelapan kita datang.. ke kegelapan kita akan pulang… Yang paling penting itu.. keluarga… Cahaya.. boleh ditemui di mana-mana sahaja…”
It reminded me of ARTspire 2017, of how the students overcame all kinds of challenges and difficulties to muster up the courage to perform onstage, the confidence to express their voice and share their ideas, the conviction to stand tall before a multitude of watching eyes. Their story has been one of discovering light out of darkness, creating order out of chaos. I was drawn into their world; their energy and enthusiasm dispelled all dullness. I witnessed their growth in every rehearsal, every practice session, every public performance. It was a journey from the quiet classroom to the platform under the spotlight, a spectacular display of sheer talent and creativity before an audience of hundreds. I was never prouder during the yearlong initiative.
I observed the poet intently. His every word, every move. The lines were so good I hung onto every word for fear of losing them, as indeed I would, as indeed I did. I want to revisit and reread them so badly I sometimes rehash that scene over and over again in my mind.
“Bangkit!” He bellowed. Perhaps to force us out of the slumber of our sleep. Our blindness to the truth. Our delusion of comfort in worldliness.
His gestures and body language. Every turn of expression. Every burst of emotion. One day, perhaps, our education would allow our students the space, the freedom, the opportunity to be this. good.
She was screaming in there. Dark voices clawed out to engulf her. She sobbed furiously. Shrieking. “Stop! Stop!”
“It’s your fault. You messed up.” The darkness retorted.
The girl in front took a step back, frightened by the pounding on the door. I offered to move forward, taking her spot. Leaned an ear closer to the door.
A dragged, ear-piercing wail. “Nooo! Stop!”
Guilt. Regret. Denial.
Thump thump thump. The door trembled.
The voices echoed and resounded through the tiny, narrow space.
And she had no answer. Only tears.
In attempt to numb and to forget, she turned to alcohol. She looked at us and asked, “How do you do it?” Someone in the audience responded, “Sleep..” I thought to myself, “TV..”
What a question. How do we do it? We do all sorts of things. We consume. Substances. Media content. Entertainment. Intoxicating ourselves. Distracting ourselves. To turn ourselves away from living and being, so we could carry on.. eating, working, sleeping.. existing. For living.. is too painful. Too raw. Too real.
A new job, a new goal, a new friend. A social circle that would finally care about him? A career that would finally fulfil him? No matter. Don’t bother. Failure after failure. Giving up and moving on. As long as you get a chance, change your goal, move on to the next big thing. Because this time it would finally make you happy eh? When he blurted out “no matter”, he smacked a palm onto his forehead. He had this sick, forlorn expression on his face, accompanied by a dismal glee, a wretched, gasping laugh: life is a complete joke. His alter ego took over. “It’s raining. People running!” That vision was imprinted in my mind’s eye — I imagined the heavy downpour on the streets, I saw the scatteredness of the people, of their lives, their dreams.
Harmed by neglect, abuse, and abandonment during her childhood, she was torn apart inside, grappling with her own gender identity. In the end she revelled in her vengeful authority over her slave, wielding a twisted sense of power and control.
“We’re trying to belong
pick up the pieces left of us
We’re burning down
We’re burning down
we’re the ashes on the ground”
Two dancers danced to the song, a contemporary sort of slow dance. Played with the lights, spinning and whirling the strings that held them. Glowing flashes of colour and radiance in the dark, cold room. My head was spinning along as I listened attentively to the lyrics. Struggling to find the pieces left of me. Struggling to find an answer to whether or not I would ever be whole again.
Whether I was ever whole.
Final station: the human brain. Dancers jumped from one scene to another, the jagged transition and the sudden, unpredictable shifts representing our minds’ tendencies to go on an irrational, crazy ride consisting of random images and episodes that compete for our attention. What Buddhist psychological scholars dub the “monkey mind”. Reaching for branch after branch, swinging from tree to tree.
“Where is it? Where is it?!”
One dancer stared at me as she shouted in my face. I read the expression on her face. There was some anger, some worry. Looking for something. Not finding it. Not finding anything. Wide-eyed, she held her breath, defensive, probing, demanding an answer.
Or maybe it was I who was holding my breath.
She lunged towards me. I was stunned. My instinctual reaction: withdrew a step or two. Let out a soft “I don’t know”.
That happened to be precisely life’s stinging reply to me as well. I don’t know. Not a clue.
All three dancers scurried around the space, searching every inch. The hurried steps, the shouting, the questioning, reflected a deep sense of loss.
Hurried, to maintain a pace that keeps the pain at bay.
Shouting, to fill our lives with noise, with commotion and crowdedness, to avoid the quiet, the solitude. The aloneness.
Questioning, in hope of an answer that never arrived.
End of the show. We walked out. Deep breaths in attempt to pacify my overwhelmed emotions. Then they briefed us about the mental health movement in Malaysia.
After the show, we had a nightlong discussion on the themes, symbolic representations, and motifs present throughout the show, adding our own interpretations and articulating our perspectives on mental disease and emotional experiences, on the way the actors and performers expressed and manifested the trauma and the pain of the past, the continual haunting in the present, the dreading of the future. Thank you so much Shu Yee Chee Jiunn Wen Tan for inviting me to the show, for the wonderful hospitality, the food, and the company. Sharing thoughts with friends is such great fun 
#TheHumanExhibit #THEM #DearMentalHealth This show aims to raise awareness about mental health in Malaysia and their partner, Relate Malaysia, offers free screenings and provides mental health care support. In the end, what struck me was that while perhaps we do need a higher psychotherapist-to-citizen ratio — while perhaps we do need to create structures and systems to make the logistical and financial procedures more bearable, even erase the social stigma associated with seeing a counsellor — perhaps none of these surpasses our universal, deep need to find that one single teacher for every human being — the great physician, the knower of the world.
