BABYDOLL

i'm dyne or 智敏 (지민 [not a koreaboo i swear]・ちはや)

i'm a ling undergrad, however my interests generally encompass the social sciences and humanities

for all intents and purposes i identify as dayak

my l1s are english and malay, dusun is my heritage language and i am passively absorbing several other languages

i broadly associate with the furry and vocalsynth fandoms

last but not least, PLEASE DNFI YOU ARE UNDER 18!!

Jax's character is a perfectly self-contained Bambarayon-esque story, especially with regards to how both characters ultimately are sacrificial hinges for their respective narratives but still loom over them afterwards, one way or another. Being Dusun myself, realizing the parallels was very fascinating.

Despite this, Jax's arc does not put the feminine on the pedestal but leaves femininity in a neutral state and attempts to criticize tropes considered masculine instead.

For the sake of consistency, the male and female creator deities will be respectively called Kinorohingan and Suminundu, while their son and daughter Ponompulan and Ponompuhan, respectively. I also will refer to Jax with she/her pronouns.

One shared aspect is how the masculine rebels and retaliates out of greed and selfishness, with the unjust martyrdom of the feminine being the resolution of the conflict, just like how Ponompulan rebelled against his father Kinorohingan with humans on his side, followed by Kinorohingan unleashing the Great Famine upon humans in raging revenge disguised as justice, leading to Ponompuhan's (Ponompulan's sister) iconic sacrifice and the grieving of her mother Suminundu. Similarly, Jax's Ponompulan-like rebellion against her identity out of fear of truth causes her to sacrifice her transfemininity (Ponompuhan), snowballing herself towards abstraction.

Additionally, to balance out the selfishness of the masculine, the feminine is forced to be a symbol that fosters cohesiveness within the community. Ponompuhan's body parts become the various staple crops of the Kadazandusun today, and her soul becomes Bambarayon (spirit of the rice), whom humans lay out offerings to every year during Kaamatan (Sabah's Harvest Festival), led by bobolian (priestesses). Likewise, the abstraction of Jax serves as a constant collective reminder among the Circus cast of the danger of self-repression and distracting one's internal struggles with a facade of trickery, with Pomni harboring all of Jax's memories, including the idea of her transfemininity (Bambarayon).

Reading Jax's character arc as a retelling of Bambarayon's legend is a way to understand the latter from a fresh perspective, providing an apparatus to shift the main question from "why did Ponompuhan have to die?" to "why do the male deities act and react so violently in the narrative?". The moral burden of the legend is lifted from Ponompuhan as a symbol of women's quiet sacrifice in society, instead now laying on Ponompulan and Kinorohingan, and cisnormative masculine rage.

+ some taiko. ik i'm breaking a sort of unspoken rule by posting my face here but i rly loved this fit bc it's the first time i handpleated the ombak mengalun for a night out… which i realize i have pleated on the front instead of the hips. oops! it's okay, we grow and learn.

i also got inspired to wear my haori as a baju panjang because the collar really reminds me of a kebaya, with the additional benefit of the sleeves doubling as pockets!

because the baju panjang is historically thin, i'd actually you recreate this fusion look with a proper kimono (something akin to a yukata perhaps) instead, as it actually has an overlapping front and is wayyy longer, which matches the baju panjang's overlapping collar (albeit meeting lower down the chest) and overall length.