The Braiyan dance troupe is very different from others, and what they have to do is faithfully present their own life emotions on stage. So, every performance is very tired, they often want to give up, but finally in this rehearsal to see that you most need to face the pain of life is not who has hurt you, but you and their inner reconciliation.

Interview with Braiyan: Despite your call for my beautiful name, I don't know who I am

I don't want to admit who I am: "I didn't even dare to stop a taxi at that time because I was afraid he wouldn't take me."

So, during the school year, for seven years, he began to speak very little; even on the road to hire a taxi, "because I was afraid that he would not take me." Or just to go downstairs to the convenience store to buy things, he will start a special dressup: "I buy a bubble noodles, but also to take a bath, to grab hair, wear good shoes." Why? I don't want people to think I'm Aboriginal and look down on me. It's sick. 」

In the past, the natural lineage he had never suspected, when suddenly it was like a mark on him, and everyone pointed to him and said, "You're not the same." What's different? He didn't know that he always thought it was too conspicuous to make him feel at a loss, and to resist it everywhere: "I've been deliberately not drinking for a long time, and I seem to want to prove to others that the First Nations are not like that." Or, he began to practice hard how others talk, he wanted to correct their own bites, so that he also like an "urban man."

Speaking of which, he told another story.

"When I was a dancer, I had a choreographer and gave me a place, but how i didn't dance wrong, and when I came out of rehearsal, he said to me, "No!" 』。 I can't get his approval, and when I'm going to play, as soon as the second half of the flute comes out I'm going out, and I've been shaking in the lounge area. He dances and has always been confident. But at that time, he suddenly felt that he did not know how to get on stage. It was one of the most confusing times in his experience of learning dance.

And it seems to be very much like the look he had in the metropolis as an Aboriginal man: "I later felt that the biggest problem was because I didn't know myself." The First Nations are so long, and when you get to know yourself, you'll have the bottom, and you won't be so scared. 」

"For example, the year I went to New York, I remember the plane, and I said to my colleagues, New York is probably the end of my life. I love it too much there. 」

He remembers as soon as he got into the subway, where he sat, and he suddenly found himself very small: "I used to be in Taiwan, because of my pedigree, I would always pretend to be right." But here, you're aboriginal, here's the red, green, the bunch of people, you're nothing. 」

"In that moment, I'll put it down, and I'll feel free." 」

So you don't have to carry an identity anymore, you feel liberated.

And back to the frightened dancer, who was denied by the teacher: "You know what? Later told myself, if the light came on, I stepped out, and there was that person in my heart, I would never succeed. 」

There is an imaginary look, pressed in the heart of Shendian, watch your every move. He thought the look was from the city, Taipei or Kaohsiung, or from the choreographer, but in the end he realized that perhaps no one was looking at him at all. People come and go, someone passes your life, and if you always don't know who you are, whether these people today come to hurt you or pay attention to you, you can't really grow up because of it.

By the time he could get through it, he was in his forties.

I believe that going home is a fate.

When he first choreographed in 1995, he deliberately changed his name, from Guo Junming to Braryan, and said he wanted to give others the opportunity to call themselves that way to remind him of who he was. However, it has been another twenty years since we got my name back to actually returning to Taitung. This road step by step, now speaking fast, a few minutes of things, but he has walked very slowly.

I asked him, in his forties, would it be too late to finally find the so-called way home. What's the point in time for you?

And he answered quickly, saying it too late, who was in his forties, actually found himself with a dream.

"A lot of people used to ask, "Why doesn't your work have anything to do with Aboriginal people?" I would joke, why do I have to have a relationship with Aboriginal people? I'm Aboriginal! But think about it, And I'll say it because I can't do it. 」

Who I am, I can't even speak the language. You call me Brariyan, you have some imagination of me, but the voice shouts, are very strange: "I am a dancer, choreographer, then I would like to stay in the cloud door, want to perform, so learn, create is modern dance." Aboriginal dance is not mainstream. 」

I asked him, said so, ah, do you have to come back to do indigenous creation, in order to find themselves? You have so many opportunities to do modern dance, you can also interpret very well?

"But in fact, this creation to a certain stage will find that it does not seem particularly good, but not bad, every year i am still being asked to choreograph." However, you will feel as if there is nothing missing, there is a kind of high, low not on the feeling, just get stuck there. 」

It seems that this life can also be. And he wants to say that he feels that the creation will eventually return to the self, you will have a lot of choices, and it is very clear that those choices also contain a fate: "I would not have said this before, but I would say now, these are fateal arrangements, is the arrangement of the Zuling." I don't know why, originally seems to be not bad life, he does not need to decide what, but at this moment, in the face of this matter, he is suddenly good, but also willing to be so sure and righteous to believe.

I think of a story he once told on the day of the interview. In 2019 they released "Whether or not." Whether it's a probe, asking who you are, where you are now, and why you're here. This performance, for the dancers is a very emotional stress fulper, each time, they almost need to empty themselves, let the emotion son out through words and limbs.

"Tell you a joke, I don't have a father. 」

And every time one of the dancers came on stage, he began to break down: "He didn't see his father and he didn't have any impression of him, but when he performed, he would suddenly swear on the stage and start scolding his father." A few times down, he told me, teacher I can't stand it, I don't want to play any more. How could I have been scolding him like this? 」

"These stories come from his mother's dictation, his father's affair, what he did on his wedding day, and he felt he had a hatred for his father. But a few times down, he felt more and more uncomfortable. Do you know? It was then that he found himself in great need of fatherly love, and he needed this person to take part in his life. 」

"In fact, the harder he scolded, the deeper his thoughts and love for his father. 」

So, while you're desperately digging for yourself, you're not looking for a family member, not the absent family member, or a passer-by who has hurt you, and you want to ask for an explanation. What you're looking for, maybe it's always a possibility to reconcile with yourself.

Braiyan's way home, talking about life on stage, but also the real life of the stage. And his way home, no matter how old he really started, was because he was willing to be honest with himself. As they say, this work should be dedicated to all those who need strength in the process of growth; maybe life is not bad now, but if you always feel a little less, you need not necessarily the answer, but the determination to step out of the self.

There is no fear of the sun and rain, when you shout this out of your life, not because you are not afraid, but when you admit that fear, you will be in that moment, you will begin to grow a little courage.