Moni Mekhala, Goddess of the Sea and Lightning

Moni Mekhala is a celestial goddess of the waters, sea, and lightning in Cambodian tradition, best known through the sacred dance-drama that bears her name. In the myth she and the ogre Ream Eyso are fellow pupils of a hermit who promises his magic gem to whoever first brings a glass of morning dew; Mekhala wins by wringing the dew from her scarf, and thereafter the giant pursues her through the sky to seize the jewel. Her flashing of the gem is lightning, the giant's axe-blows are thunder, and their struggle brings the rain that renews the rice fields, so the dance is performed as a rain-invoking rite (Buong Suong) at the Khmer New Year. She is regarded as one of the most demanding and prestigious female roles in Khmer classical dance.

Domains

• sea and storm
• monsoon rain and fertility

Powers

• to flash blinding lightning from her magic gem

Relations

• enemy: Ream Eyso, the Storm-Giant of ThunderTheir eternal aerial pursuit, in which the storm-giant chases her for the gem and she blinds him with its light, is danced each Khmer New Year in the Buong Suong rain rite and generates thunder, lightning, and rain.Paul Cravath, Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama (Holmes Beach, FL: DatASIA Press, 2007). (secondary)

Sources

• Moni Mekhala is the Khmer goddess of the sea and lightning whose contest with the storm-giant Ream Eyso over a magic gem explains thunder, lightning, and the monsoon rains.: Paul Cravath, Earth in Flower: The Divine Mystery of the Cambodian Dance Drama (Holmes Beach, FL: DatASIA Press, 2007). (secondary); Toni Samantha Shapiro-Phim, 'Dance and the Spirit of Cambodia' (PhD dissertation, Cornell University, 1994). (secondary)