Visitors to Kandawgyi park can get treated to a traditional elephant dance performed to hip-hop music by Yan Myo Aung dance group.

IF you ask most people what they expect to see when they walk into a park it’s likely that flowers, trees and dodgy food vendors will rank somewhere near the top. So how about Kandawgyi park where, in addition to the above, you might also see an elephant dancing to hip-hop songs by Sai Sai Khan Hlaing.

Alas, for animal welfare reasons (it would surely be wrong to subject an elephant to Sai Sai) the dancing elephant is not actually real, instead being a famous Kyauk Se elephant, named after the town in Mandalay Division where the tradition of dancing elephants originated.

The frame of the elephant is constructed of softened green bambo cut into strips with a separately made head and body that has an opening to allow two people to get inside.

The Kyauk Se elephant is an element of Myanmar’s traditional culture so it is rare to see such an elephant dance to hip-hop songs. The man responsible for the idea is Ko Htun Kyaw, leader of the Yan Myo Aung elephant dance group.

“We tried to create some new forms of dance to breakthrough in Yangon and we had the idea to create new steps to hip-hop songs,” explained Ko Htun Kyaw.

While such a modernisation is acceptble in Yangon, audiences in Mandalay prefer their dance to remain traditional added Ko Htun Kyaw.

Originally from Mandalay, the Yan Myo Aung group have performed their elephant dance in Kandawgyi park since 2006 although the original dance originated over a century ago when it is said an elephant stopped atop a hill in Kyauk Se, near Mandalay.

The elephant dance can be surprisingly graceful but the dance requires a lot of work from those inside.

“We couldn’t dance this elephant dance alone, because you can only make one step with two people so this dance teaches us how to work as a team. The dance doesn’t only require dance steps, you also have to hold the elephant’s head and shake as you dance,” said Ko Htun Kyaw.

Unlike many forms of dance partnership there is no one leader in the elephant dance. When the elephant is moving forward the back must follow the front but when the elephant turns around the leadership role is reversed. The person holding the head generally gets tired the fastest because of the added burden of rotating it.

“Unity is the most important thing that we need when performing the elephant dance because we can only achieve beautiful dance steps if we work together,” said another of the group’s members.

The most difficult aspect of learning the dance, according to Ko Htun Kyaw, is not the steps but the physical endurance required to move the elephant body.

“The dance steps are not that difficult, but the problem is when we dance we have to carry the body of the elephant and also it is very hot and suffocating inside the elephant so it causes dancers to get tired and exhausted easily,” explained Ko Htun Kyaw.

For those looking to watch some hip-hop elephant dance action, performances begin around 5:30 every evening in Kandawgyi park and last for an hour.