2011年马来西亚之夜——夜市之独特

2011年9月3日，我们10位初出茅庐的新生执委完成了一个艰巨的任务——组织马来西亚之夜。这个活动是10位来自不同州属，不同背景的马来西亚新生三个星期以来辛勤不懈的成果。我们从设定主题，策划，付诸执行，一步步地走过来了。值得庆幸的是，我们还是完成了这个来到KE7 Hall的第一个任务。结局纵然不臸完美，可至少我们尽力了。

今年的主题：马来西亚夜市。夜市本就是马来西亚的本土特色。任何人都对大马夜市的食物赞不绝口，而事实上，大马也因为她的特色传统美食而闻名于KE7的国际学生之间。夜市美食应有尽有，从槟城叻沙到柔佛乐乐，从怡保白咖啡到马六甲鸡饭，从砂劳越芋头糕到沙巴海鲜。而今年，我们就这样几乎把大马夜市给搬到这里来了。

设定主题永远都是筹委会最头痛的问题。我们考虑过办一个小型营火会，还提议过把活动办成一个表演舞台，甚至是嘉年华形式。我们的脑中有太多古灵精怪的想法，但基于我们只拥有10个人的力量，夜市的想法就这样悄然诞生了。夜市既不浮夸，也不逊色，更重要的是我们还可以把整晚的焦点放在台下。偶然间的台上表演还可以把气氛给炒热，一举三得，何乐而不为？

经过两晚的绞尽脑汁，主题出来了。下一步，策划和执行。头儿在这一步遇到了难题。没法之下，每一个人都是重任在身，你管食物和灯光；我管设计和宣传；他管节目和流程。这全都不是简单的工作，可伟大的各位执委们还是给它熬过来了。学业和活动的双重压力也压不死咱们蚂蚁般的精力。

紧张的筹备工作进行中

两天的彩排，我们在学长的带领下熟悉环境，流程，怎么控制灯光，如何播放音乐。头儿得确保当天的每一个环节都不能出错，至少不能错得过于离谱。当天晚上，这个活动在7时正准时开始了。值得令人庆幸的是，今年的反应比预期中的要好得多。美味的食物，精彩的表演，就这样为当晚的活动拉开了序幕。

第一个上场的是马来传统打鼓表演。多亏学长们的热心帮忙，这个表演完美地打垒，得分。表演流畅之余，还把轻松的气氛带到台下。

各部门就位中

第二个让观众参与的舞蹈游戏也得到观众很好的反应。我们也非常荣幸地请到了毕业的 Chun Keat 学长在现场为我们高歌几曲。

参赛者们得随着舞蹈“翩翩起舞”

 

第三个接踵而来的表演是由4为来自留新大马独中生联谊会为我们的活动特别赞助的。她们高昂的音乐和热情的表演把整个活动推向了高潮。压轴表演：KElaysians大合唱。这个是最震撼人心的时刻。

Satu Malaysia!

整个活动很顺利地在9.30左右结束了。我们真的很感谢所有学长姐们的热心帮忙。没有你们的倾情相助，这个活动根本不可能完成。期望下一年的Malaysian Night会更好！

大合照

Malaysia Night 2010: Tour de Malaysia – Audience’s Perspective

Writer: Adrian Chia

Editor: Pearly Neo

“I’m feeling very excited now…erm…maybe more nervous…”

– Ivan, Head of Malaysia Night Committee 2010/11, before the start of the event

When the Malaysian freshmen first arrived in Hall, most of them were strangers to one another. However, together they embarked on a journey, which brought them much, much closer and at the same time, showcased the unique culture of their home country to guests from around the world. Tour de Malaysia, the theme of Malaysia Night 2010/11, was the ultimate fruit of their labour after a month of hard work.

The organisers certainly intended to bring the Malaysian culture as close to the audience as possible. As the guests made their way into the Communal Hall, they were welcomed by ushers dressed in brightly-coloured traditional costumes. An Ang Pao containing a slip of paper introducing various facets of the Malaysian society was handed to every guest. The early birds also received a pen from Tourism Malaysia as a souvenir!

As the Hall slowly filled with guests, it was not hard to spot many different nationalities seated among the audience. There was a group of exchange students from Europe, and there were residents from China, Mauritius and of course, from Singapore. Everyone was certainly eager to know more about the Malaysian culture!

“I’ve been to Malaysia 3 times – to Tioman, KL and Mount Kinabalu.”

– Sebastian, exchange student from Germany, currently residing in E Block.

“I want to be part of KE Hall’s events. I’ve been to KL.”

– Simon, exchange student from France, staying in F Block.

All guests were given a rousing welcome by the two emcees for the night – Nian Ci and Hui Wei. With the arrival of the Guest of Honour, who was none other than our Hall Master Prof. Ho, the event went underway at 8pm. The national anthem of Malaysia – “Negaraku”, which literally means “My Country”, was played, followed by an opening speech by Ivan, who welcomed everyone on behalf of his organising team. Prof. Ho was invited up on stage next to officially initiate the event – by putting a stamp on a huge passport that marked the start of the night’s ‘tour’.

Dinner was next on the agenda, and before the stomach growlings got any louder, on the emcees’ cue, a snaking queue quickly formed behind the food. What a sumptuous meal awaited us! The menu was a selection of dishes rather representative of Malaysians’ unique taste buds. They included chicken curry, mutton, and otah, all of which were spicy (though honestly, most Malaysians would not mind if they were spicier)! On top of those, there were also fish fillets and Nyonya mixed vegetables. Not forgetting the Nyonya kuihs, which really fulfilled our cravings for sweet desserts. Given that there was ample food for all, everyone certainly had a great time eating their fill with all the delicacies!

“OK lah, not too bad lah. Different from Hall food.”

– Comment from Reuben, arguably the most professional food critic in Hall.

After satisfying our taste buds the ‘tour’ resumed firstly with a folk dance from Sabah, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo. JJ and Emelyne demostrated the dance steps once, before two members of the audience were invited on stage to join them. Gavin obviously needed more training in dance while Sheikh was certainly much better! The mini Gasing competition was next, signifying that the tour had reached the northern state of Kelantan. Gasing is actually a top which is spun using a rope, and is a traditional game among the Malays. 5 contestants had to spin the Gasing after a crash course by Jamil on stage, and the participant whose top spun for the longest period of time was the winner. Sebastian, an exchange student from Germany emerged as the champion, beating other contestants from Malaysia, Mauritius and China! Well done Sebastian!

The tour then proceeded to Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia. It is a vibrant city where many Malaysians from all walks of life converge, and it is from here that many people’s life stories truly begin. This was brought out by the 2 Chinese pop songs brought to us. The first “纯文艺恋爱” was the theme song of a locally produced romance-comedy, called “初恋红豆冰” which became quite a hit both locally and in the overseas Chinese market. The second song “浪花一朵朵” was a catchy and popular song which many among the audience sang along. The next stop was Malacca, which was represented by a Nyonya dance performance which fused both traditional and modern elements together. But perhaps most shockingly was among all the ‘female’ dancers there was a male cross-dresser spotted, cueing loud cheers of ‘Go Shao Hua!!!’! His superb and natural dance moves stole the show, and won the item thunderous applause. For the next programme signifying Johor, it was a Teh Tarik game which required participants to drink two cups of tea with a straw as quickly as possible. However, there was a catch – the tea was steaming hot! Nonetheless, Shiekh, the winner, managed to finish both cups in “about 10 seconds” (quoting the game master)!

A mass performance of the “1Malaysia” song was next, which saw all members of the committee singing a patriotic song together on stage. With that, Tour de Malaysia ended back in Singapore and a re-entry stamp was symbolically placed on the passport. It was certainly a great effort and brilliant performance by the Malaysia Night committee. Good job!

“Wah… now I feel relieved.”

– Ivan, after the event ended.

Editor’s Note: Pictures will be uploaded ASAP, we sincerely apologise for the delay!

Malaysia Night 2009

Writer: Pearly Neo
Photos: Kelvin Anggara

Pearly: First of all, I’d like to apologise to all readers for the SUPER late posting of this article. There was a major technical problem while I was uploading the photos, and I thought I’d hold off on posting the article entirely until I could fix it…but I still can’t so the photos are without captions. I really am very very sorry, and I hope you all enjoy reading this, late though it be! Will post more photos, and fix up the remaining ones as soon as I figure out how to fix the problem!

As part of the organizing committee for Malaysia Night 2009, I’m sorry to say I may just be a leeetttle bit biased when writing this article. After all, when you’re there first-hand to witness how weeks of sleepless nights, endless rehearsals, meticulous planning and various diseases (yes, diseases!) boil down to this one special night, it’s more than a little difficult to not feel proud of it. I was, unfortunately, unable to actually watch Malaysia Night, having had to be onstage throughout almost the entire production, but what I can write about here is the thrilling experience of being part of the event. So here goes…  

Saturday, 12 September 2009

5.30pm After a full day of rehearsing and practicing, everyone was caught up in a frenzy of excitement when it was suddenly heard from somewhere outside that ‘There are GUESTS arriving! Guests!’, upon which we all hastened to get ready in double time. I personally hadn’t really felt that much of nerves up until that point, but when I was finally dressed up in my cheongsam (for emcee-ing) and was looking around watching everyone else get their make-up done, it finally hit me: IT’S TIME. Gulp.

6.00pm The crowd truly arrived in full force (Later, we found out that we actually sold 180+ tickets, more than our initial target of 160. Yay!), which is of course really good in retrospect, but at that point in time when I peeked out the curtains and saw how many people there were, I felt quite a bit of a shiver rush down my spine. I pointed this out to Edward (my co-emcee) and his only response was to walk away from the curtains and start repeating his script lines to himself, over and over and over again.

 6.15pm And so it began, with the grand entrance of the Hall Master, Associate Professor Dr. Ho Yew Kee and his family. All traces or nerves I initially had soon disappeared under the warm response of the crowd, and it was all smooth sailing from the singing of the Malaysian National Song ‘Negaraku’, to the speeches by the Hall Master and Kenneth (Malaysia Night Committee 2009 Chairman) to the officiation ceremony, which involved the Hall Master pasting on the ‘Enter’ key to this year’s logo, ‘Malaysia. my’.

We decided to start things off this year with our own rendition of ‘Here In My Home’, a song performed by multiple Malaysian artistes to showcase their love for Malaysia, as our essential underlying theme this year is Home, and how we treasure it. Given the very VERY diverse range of voices onstage, I was extremely relieved when it turned out sounding pretty good. More importantly though, were the messages of goodwill we had written beforehand and displayed for the audience whilst singing the song, which we hope served to convey our love for our country, no matter where we are.

Then, of course, there was dinner. The chorus of ‘Food, Food, FOOD!’ from both the audience and backstage was a lot louder than initially expected. A LOT louder. I guess everyone must have been really, really hungry. Again, I am unable to comment on the food as I didn’t get to eat any of it, but I heard it was pretty good, and I do hope everyone was satisfied!

7.30pm While things must have seemed pretty quiet onstage from the audience’s point of view (especially as I’m sure everyone must have been much too busy queuing for food than paying attention to closed curtains), the actual fact was that the torrent of activity going on behind the scenes could only be described by one word: MAD. Everyone was changing and memorizing lines and touching up make-up, so much so that no one gave a second thought to food at all, as I later found out. Occasional peeks out the curtains saw things going well with the audience’s food (Note: THANK YOU SO MUCH to all the seniors who helped us out with the food! You guys rock!), but our personal sustenance was a very low priority on the list that day.

Sanity behind stage seemd to be at an all-time low too. 

8.00pm Showtime! The night’s performances were kicked off with a drama written by yours truly, telling the story about a young Malaysian girl named Julie who’s lived in the United States all her life. Bad financial circumstances result in her having to come back to Malaysia, where she initially feels lost, but is gradually reintroduced to the beauty and culture of her homeland by her childhood friend, Ramli. That’s the basic gist of the story, and it was really fun inserting the various cultural elements like the Malay, Chinese and Indian dances, as well as the market scenes into it. The whole point of the drama was to introduce Malaysian culture as a culture with not only aesthetic and entertainment value, but to try to portray a unity and flow between the different facets, and I do hope that this was brought across appropriately!

Nevertheless, I was incredibly proud of the entire cast, all of which very clearly put their best foot forward for the show. Even though my heart was pounding non-stop through the entire drama, I had a wonderful time as soon as I realized things were actually going very smoothly. The audience’s reaction was perfect every time, laughing at the right moments and noticing all the correct minute details. After the drama, we went straight into a fashion show, as part of a performance for the Malay wedding scene. Andy and Wen Yan looked simply adorable on the bersanding seats, all ready to get married! It seemed to me that although it involved the least acting or even moving, this scene had Andy the most nervous of all, even more so than the market scene!

9.00pm The drama ended on a high note, with Xing Ying’s pride and joy, the mass dance. Her long hours of choreographing and planning apparently did pay off really well, judging by the happy, amused faces I saw in the audience during the dance. Even our dear Hall Master was grinning ear to ear.

Just mere performances from us would not be enough for Malaysia Night 2009, so it was our pride and honour to invite our dear Malaysian seniors from Malaysia Night 2008 back onstage with us to perform last year’s theme song, Identiti along with us. It was just our small way of thanking them for all that they have done for us, for making us feel so welcome in KEVII Hall and really making us feel at home. It was a touching scene, and I do believe I caught a not-so-dry eye or two.

Next up was the showcasing of the various talents in Malaysia Night 2009. We had Juin Shiong and Su Yi perform a beautiful song each on the piano, but I do believe that the crowd-stealer was their duet on Jay Chou’s Secret. Then out came Xing Ying and Kenneth to sing Gemilang, literally translated as Excellence, a song popularized by the first Malaysian Idol, Jaclyn Victor, which carries elements of striving to be the best one can be and being capable of achieving anything. (Note: I am to clarify that it was NOT a love song. Repeat, NOT a love song.)

9.30pm So the night went on, with a hearty and hale games session. The game emcees were expecting to have to do quite a bit of work in pulling people onstage for the bamboo dance, air bandung and lompat tali (rope-skipping), but we were all pleasantly surprised when we had a surplus of volunteers! Watching from backstage, it was fun to see not only the volunteers get to have fun, but those watching from amongst the audience be highly amused as well. The air bandung game got a bit messy, with a few spills and contestants having to drink from punctured straws, but it was quite a hit nonetheless. The star of the lompat tali though, was Hui Ning, who proved herself quite the professional as she traversed height after height of rope effortlessly.

All too soon, it was time for the lucky draw, and then a final round of mass dance. As we then went down from the stage to mingle with the crowd and say our thank-yous and good-byes, it was good to sense a general feeling of satisfaction and good feedback! Thank you everyone for coming and supporting this year’s Malaysia Night. We had a blast, and certainly hope you did too!