Friday 29 April 2011

EXAMS!!! THEY'RE OVER!!!

Yeah. They are. So now I begin doing all of the shizz that I haven't had the time to do. Anyhow, for now maybe I'll just put down the bucket list of ALL the stuff I want to try to get done. Let's see how much I'll be able to achieve within a three month break.

Cosplay:-
Human-scale Wing Zero Custom
Black Rock Shooter (Kaito version)

Dance:-
Generally: Get Rag dance done (ok, this isn't really a project since I HAVE to get this done anyway)
B-boying: Get some floats (e.g. crikets, turtles, etc) and some air freezes (e.g. Nikes)
Locking: Clean up my EVERYTHING
Tricking: Get a clean butterfly twist

Art:-
MOAR wallpapers!

Games:-
Finish Portal 2 (my inner gamer appeals to anyone who plays video games, YOU HAVE TO GET THIS GAME!!!)
Finish Ace Attorney series
Finish Machinarium
Play MapleStory again

*Update*
All in all, it seems that I did not manage to strike a lot of the things off my holiday list but at least I managed to get half of it done-ish >.< (I blame Rag for eating up all my time).

Friday 15 April 2011

A Personal Tradition

Today was the last day of the semester, which means today I put on my last day of semester clothes. Now what the heck does that mean? To put it into perspective, last semester I wore a beret, my Lion Heart necklace, a short sleeve shirt, a skinny tie, black jeans and sneakers. This semester I decided to kick it up a notch.

So this time around, I walked into my first lecture wearing a white fedora hat, a white long sleeve shirt, a black velvet vest, a black skinny tie, black working pants and black leather shoes. To say the least, it was a surprise for all my friends in the lecture hall (and the lecturer himself). And such was the rest of my day. Every time I passed by someone I knew, they would give me the 'woah' look and ask me what the occasion was, to which I always replied, "They're my last day of semester clothes =D".

So what is the point of this celebration of the last day of the semester? Well, for one, it's to mark the last official day of the semester in which have to go to uni (save exam days). Other than that, it's my personal excuse to crack out my good clothes because I always found it a waste to have nice clothes in my wardrobe but never actually having the chance to wear them. Perhaps I also take a little inspiration from a friend of mine who used to dress up practically EVERY SINGLE DAY last semester. And maybe, just a little, I want to make my daily life a little more special than usual.

Then again, what's wrong with dressing up and looking good for no reason every once in a while =D

Friday 1 April 2011

Post-SUAD Thoughts

Well, it's finally over. Shut Up And Dance 2011 comes to a close. Okay, fine. It actually came to a close last Sunday but I've been spending the last week picking up the pieces of my life. Just a little bit of context for everyone. Shut Up And Dance is a concert put up by the NUS Dance BLAST! club. This year in particular is really special since it marks the club's 10th anniversary so the scale of this concert was A LOT bigger than anything I've been a part of before.

It's really on hell of a crazy ride for me. I'm only a junior this year so I was only a part of the finale item in which they shoved all 40~ of us juniors plus another 20~ seniors into. That plus the fact that I'm practically a bottom feeder within the club, so I had a nice cozy time in the back corner of the stage. So to make use of this situation, they committee decided to make use of the extra muscle and drafted all the junior guys into the backstage props team while we were not dancing.

But that didn't make the experience any less awesome. I've been in concerts in secondary school before and recently I was also a part of the CAC concert as a b-boy but the scale of those concert do not even come close to SUAD. It's an inspiring experience watching the seniors and alumni dancing on stage. Almost breathtaking when you watch the sheer level of quality in the choreography and execution.

It's one thing to be blown away by professional dancers from the comfort of a nice cushioned chair but witnessing a performance of that level from the wings just takes it to a whole new experience. Sure I don't get to see the big picture of all the blocking and there will be a lot of instances where I can't see what's happening on stage because I'm blocked by the wings but there are nuances of a performance that can only be witnessed up close.

I'll just try to retell one example that sent chills down my spine. One of the dances used the song "Love The Way You Lie" by Eminem and Rihanna and featured one of the most amazing solo dancers I've had the honour of meeting, Chun. Her solos by themselves are already insane enough with the amount of energy she puts into her performances. Still, the thing that totally knocked me off my feet was how into the character she was. In the silence after the song, just before the stage completely blacked out for the next segment of the dance, I heard the faintest of whimpers coming from Chun and I was like taken aback by how immersed she was into the role to the point it almost became real.

Still, as inspiring as watching another dancer is, nothing can replace the feeling of being the one on stage. 60 people on stage forming the biggest 'dance armies' to grace the concert. Standing in front of a sellout crowd, there's a feeling that drives you to throw out everything you have and leave it on the stage floor. After an emotionally charged choreo to an equally emotionally charged song (Eminem's solo in B.O.B.'s Airplaines Part II), I ran into the wings and for a few seconds I almost thought I would puke after just throwing out so much energy during the performance. A really super crazy 4 minutes.

But I think my greatest takeaway from this concert is not the inspiration or the time on stage but the new friends I made. When I first auditioned for BLAST!, I went in alone and got in not knowing anyone at all. For the longest time, I went to weekly practices without actually getting to know 90% of the other people in the studio but thanks to this concert, I finally managed to sit down and attach names to the faces I've seen for so long. Like Pat (our resident choreographer) said, the concert is sort of a 'baptism of fire' and that we are now inducted into what is the BLAST! family, soon to become the seniors I so greatly admired.

To wrap up my thoughts, this concert for me is really a rite of passage as a dancer stepping onto the next level of my dancing life. So onwards I go, to become the senior who inspires juniors like I have been inspired.

1600 people in the audience, 10 years of BLAST! history, 1 unforgettable experience.