What does it mean to be an expat? Expat –expatriate, one who lives outside his/her country of birth. Having been enamored of the idea of living abroad, being a nomad out to see the world, taste the flavors and textures of another culture, I’ve been here for a year now. Here in Beijing, I’m one of many expats who sifts in and out of the city's already migrant population. The city has sprawled its way out into six rings that are suffocated by smog, people, incessant traffic and construction. Drawling ‘er's' and 'ar's’ tumble of out native Beijinger's mouths as they articulate their ‘shi’s’ vs. ‘si’s;’ ‘zhi’s’ are clearly enunciated and not to be confused with ‘zi’s.’ These are the external, insignificant details that cling to the wandering clouds of cigarette smoke that meander across the room and detract from the fact that for me, being an expat is living in a modified state of constant alienation.
I saw Akram Khan’s newest work, ‘Bahok,’ a collaboration between Khan's international group of dancers and the National Ballet of China. It made its world premiere in Beijing and will tour to London. 'Bahok' is translated into Chinese as ‘相聚' (Xiang Ju) –meeting. Khan explores what it means to meet another, to meet yourself in a work that attempts to transcend the boundaries of nation, language, and culture through the meeting of a collective body comprised of eight dancers-five from Khan’s company and three from the National Ballet of China. The dancers speak English, Spanish, Korean, Chinese, and Hindi to each other, the audience, imaginary customs officials, and into their cell phones, while breaking off into brief duets and group sections that ranged from sinuously statuesque to something resembling choreographed combat--all of it laced with varying amounts of raw, unleashed energy.
‘Bahok’ strips the scene down to an international waiting area. An old-fashioned overhead board with flipping letters reveals the titles of sections: Water, Air, Fire, Earth. It serves as an unfeeling omniscient voice of knowledge: ‘machines don’t feel,’ it tells you at one point, which perhaps, allows it to interrogate you—‘What’s in your papers?’ and ‘What are you carrying?’ before answering its own questions: ‘your body, memories, home, hope.’ And in some small way, that is enough.
There is a simple truth to this dramatic work which explodes with primal athleticism that is mitigated by startling and often poignant moments of cut-throat stillness. You realize that in this lifetime of water, air, fire, and earth, you are always waiting. You are also remembering, asking, hurtling through the space of memory. ‘You cannot know where you are going if you do not know where you come from,’ says one of the dancers. She wants to know where everyone is from because she does not know where she herself is from—only that she is not Chinese and that you must take a plane to where she is from. All she has, she tells us, is an image of rain, her papers, and memories which get more convoluted as she tries to tell us her story.
What would be my story? What does it mean to meet another, to meet myself on foreign soil in the ever-present waiting room of life’s ubiquitous transitions from one gate to another, one exit to the next entrance. 'Bahok' reminds you to embrace the fact that you are home no matter where you are because you carry home with you. Home is your memories, your corporeal body, your skin, the texture of your hair. Maybe it’s just allowing yourself to be home, to be at home with yourself, blending into and highlighting the material differences in the external circumstances, grasping them for a moment before letting them go. You speak one language while I speak another; yet, we are both at home when we meet each other on the platform waiting for the train, the bus, the plane that will take us to another manifestation of home.
