Laughter Therapy

​​Well, this is a story that didn’t turn out the way I expected. Who knew that laughing could be so stressful? This was one of those unexpected and quite crazy experiences that involved saying ‘yes’ to what seems like an intriguing and interesting experience and then turned out to be… well, quite terrifying if I’m honest.

At Sundara’s priest ceremony back on my second day in Bali, I’d met a lovely Japanese lady who'd invited me to go with her to a laughter therapy class in Nyuh Kuning on the outskirts of Ubud. She’d explained that the man who runs it, Kadek Suambara, is famous for not only having created the ‘Bali Happiness Movement’ but also for 'curing' all manners of illness in a wide range of people by laughing it out of them. Apparently people have been to him from all over the world to look for a new lease of life and to brighten up their days.

Naturally, I was intrigued but, while I’d said yes to going along with her, we never made it out there due to other plans coming up with her. However, when exploring down a little side street in Nyuh Kuning on my own one day, I did actually come across Ashram Ambara. I decided on my last evening there to go along and see what the Bali Happiness movement was all about. My brother couldn’t be convinced to join this time so I went alone.

I was first invited by these friendly ladies at Ashram Ambara, Nyuh Kuning to pray.

I had first walked into the ashram, which I believe is also Radek Suambaro’s house, earlier in the day to check the class was running and found a small group of friendly people sitting down to work. They'd been very enthusiastic about me joining: I had a great feeling about it and was thoroughly looking forward to going. When I arrived for the class later that evening, a few ladies invited me to pray with them in front of some statues - they gave me incense and an offering to place before the statues and, after a while of sitting with them cross-legged, stuck rice to my forehead as I have often seen in Bali. I walked through into the ‘back garden’ where, I suppose I’d expected to see a small group of people sitting in a circle, waiting calmly for the class to start… Instead, the gate to the garden gave on to a buzz of chatter and activity: there were a couple of hundred local Balinese people sitting in rows on yoga mats facing a stage. Gosh. This was a big operation! I hadn’t realised it was going to be like this and still did not know what I was in for.

The crowd of laughter therapy attendees only grew larger and larger after I took this photo

I was ushered by a few friendly locals to sit on the front row - was this a spot reserved especially for Bulé? I hadn’t spotted any other foreigners yet - this wasn’t a worry for me at this point since I love to be involved in traditional, local experiences. Later, I did realise there were four more foreigners towards the back who obviously hadn’t been fooled into sitting on the front row like I had.

The class began with a man coming onto the stage to ‘warm the crowd up’. Everyone stood up and laughed along as he seemed to tell a few jokes. A lady then came up from the audience and did a bit of soft aerobics on the stage which everyone followed along to while smiling and chuckling. This was great fun! What a wonderful thing to be part of: surrounded by smiling, happy people, with everyone enjoying a bit of movement, I was feeling extremely welcomed into this environment. I was delighted that I’d come along to experience this and

could easily see how this would lift people’s spirits and help ‘cure’ some illnesses.

The Bali Happy Movement: Movement really can lift a person's spirits!

My feelings were soon to change, however. After around five minutes of aerobics, another man entered the garden to huge roars and cheers. Wow - this man was some sort of local hero. He stepped up onto the stage and quickly hushed the crowd. However, he soon set them off again by looking straight at me, saying something I had no chance of interpreting, and making the whole crowd laugh. All eyes were on me, all laughing, smiling (??) eyes, encouraging me to laugh too. I did… to begin with.

The man, who I guessed to be the famous Kadek Suambara, was very much like a stand-up comedian. It was incredible, yet very intense to watch his effect on the crowd. He was clearly telling a lot of jokes and funny stories and people were roaring with laughter, most of which seemed to me to be pretty fake. Of course, not being able to understand a word, I was just smiling and chuckling at everyone else’s laughter at this point, despite having been the butt of his first joke when he walked on the stage.

He had us all stand up and this is when it started to get really weird. He forced people to ‘do' different types of laughter. This is very difficult to explain but, for example, we were encouraged to make a ‘hood-hooo-hooo’ sound for a couple of minutes then an ‘eeeeeee-eeeee-eeeeee’ sound for another couple of minutes and so on with different noises and laughter types. Plastic bags were handed round for people to spit in - I suppose a build up of phlegm happens and needs to be... realeased. While I didn't need to succomb to the spitting, I joined in with the ‘laughter’ sounds well enough and thought I was doing an alright job. I didn’t want to be the butt of one of his jokes again so did as I was told, even though for me, this was not real laughter but more the forced sounds of it. I looked around to see everyone following these instructions with so much enthusiasm, concentration and so many smiles and didn’t know whether to be impressed or scared. My decision was quickly made when Kadek again decided to make me the centre of everyone’s attention by bringing his face right up to mine from the stage and screaming, ‘Can’t you laugh? Why can’t you laugh? LAUGH! LAUGH! LAUGH!’

Laughter therapy may well look innocent and joyful in this video but, trust me,

the truth, if you are made a laughing stock, is far different!

Well. I couldn’t help but feel slightly embarrassed at this point. I mean, I was following instructions, making the sounds, doing as I was told. Was I not smiling enough while doing it? Could he tell that I wasn’t really laughing but just going along with the instructions and forcing it out? Was everyone else really finding this hilarious? Was I too distracted by looking around at everyone else? Was he just using me as a new way to keep everyone laughing? Everyone around me was looking at me, while making these crazy fake laughter sounds and, while their eyes encouraged me to join in and keep going, I kept thinking, ‘Oh my GOSH. This is like one of those horrific teenage dreams where you walk into the school canteen without your pants on and hundreds of people group around you to point, stare and laugh’. I wanted to run. I wanted to march on out of there and never look back!

I felt like I was in some sort of mental institution. It’s difficult to describe this experience well on paper, really. This torture continued for 30 - 45 minutes with everyone returning to sit on their mats every five minutes or so to listen to more stand up comedy style banter - all the while he would return to me, say something in Balinese or even English to make them point, stare and roar with laughter, before standing up again to repeat the whole process. How I managed to sit through this, I don’t know. But honestly… it was not a comfortable experience and I just had remind myself was that if I can bring so much joy and laughter to people (even if it does seem forced and fake) then at least there’s that and I don’t mind being used as a tool for this purpose just this once. Agh! This is the mantra I kept flowing through my head and repeating as the staring, pointing and laughing continued. Hundreds of people. All pointing, staring, laughing, laughing, laughing, at ME! Not pleasant, not pleasant, not pleasant!

The Bali Happiness Movement

I couldn’t wait to get out of there. It is such a shame that this is how the night ended up and I was determined not to let it put me off saying yes to experiences in the future but… honestly, I was pretty traumatised and shocked when I left and my brother, who had expected me to come back full of joy and perhaps even giddy from the experience, was himself shocked at my down-trodden and traumatised mood. Note to self… some experiences are best shared with a friend or not at all :(

Hahahahahahahahaaaaa!