Dance Together for Peace PDF Print E-mail
A dance troupe from Cambodia will be performing in Australia early next year, in a tour to foster friendship and introduce the Jesuit Mission-assisted work that is taking place in a country recovering from decades of war.

Some 13 young dancers, mostly 17 and 18 years of age, accompanied by singers, musicians, dance teachers, chaperones and instructors will visit and perform in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Sevenhill in the Clare Valley and Melbourne in March and April 2008 at schools, parish halls and in public arenas.
The young dancers will meet and mingle with Australian young people in the Jesuit schools during the day, according to Fr Steve Curtin SJ, director of Jesuit Mission. Evening performances will be open to the larger public.

Jesuit Mission hopes the tour will help Australian and Cambodian youth to learn about each other and discover how they each live out their faith.

The troupe comes from the village of Ta Hen, on the outskirts of the Cambodian Battambang province. Many people in the village were killed during the wars that plagued the country in the second half of the 20th century- fighting for independence from the French, civil war with the Khmer Rouge and a war against the Vietnamese.

During that time, Catholic ceremonies were limited to private reunions and many people lost touch with traditional practices. Dancing was revived around 10 years ago, and since then has become an important way for young people in Ta Hen to learn about their cultural heritage and values.

Fr Curtin says music and dancing in very important in Cambodian culture.

‘They dance and sing at any religious celebration.'

‘Masses are very participative as the whole community sings cheerfully, and dancing is used as a mean to express this joy', he said. ‘Even theatrical representations of the scriptures are not uncommon'.

‘These music and dancing groups, like the one from Ta Hen, are responsible for recovering rhythms and scenes of the life in the countryside and the rice fields, of the land and the water: impossible love stories, feastings and blessings.'

Evening performances will showcase eight to ten dances from a repertoire of 30 classical, folk or traditional dances.

The group will perform in Sydney on 27 March at St Ignatius Riverview and 28 March at St Aloysius Milson's Point, in Brisbane on 1 April at Stuartholme Girls College and 2 April at St Rita's College, in Adelaide on 4 April at St Mary's College, in Sevenhill, SA on 5 April at St Michael's Church Hall, and in Melbourne on 8 April at St Ignatius Parish Hall, and 9 April at Xavier College Kew.

Tickets to these performances may be purchased from the Jesuit Mission Office in Sydney. Contact Tas Rafeeq on (02) 9955 8585, or email tas.rafeeq @ jesuitmission.org.au