SNGS Chinese Drama Performance-启航

13 MRT stations, a bus ride and a taxi ride. That’s what Xue Zheng, Zi Kang, Zhi Hao and I went through to go for a drama performance by St. Nicholas Girls’ School. It was held at Ulu Pandan CC, the place we went to for a CIP activity in term 1. It gives me the impression that it is one of the better CCs in Singapore, the hall where they staged the play was quite well furnished with decent facilities. Though Zhi Hao said that the drama centre in our school is much better.

“迷宫”. That’s the theme for this year’s performance. The scripts evolved around the struggles youngsters face in life and some other heavy topics. The scripts were not excellent, I would say, but it is good for pieces written by students. What did well was compensating for the inadequacy of their plays by playing with the presentation. This is a viable way to improve the overall performance-going experience, but maybe they could try to polish the stories a little to make it even better.

I did not like the stories very much, apart from 溺网 and 1537964444(correct number?). There is a distinct tang of influence by Mediacorp serial dramas, which I dislike. Too dramatic and bold. 杨老师 said he observed such a trend among secondary schools to compensate for the less full content by presenting the play in a loud and attention-catching way. Once upon a time, it worked. But far too many times of seeing these type of performance makes it stale. Noticed something interesting in here. I was reading the newspaper one day in the last week when I noticed an article about the launch of two CK fragances. It is said that these fragances are marketed at the group of youngsters nowadays that are physically bold but emotionally fragile. These group of people are dubbed “technosexuals”, funny name… But the significance is that plays that concentrate excessively heavily on the acting rather than allowing a balance between the literature aspect and performance aspect may appeal to these so called technosexuals. Something like a “mask” (which one of the short segments mentioned, maybe in a gesture of acknowledgement).

But 溺网 was a rather new thing. The content is very relevant to us as youths. Thats a nice one.
X1537964444 has got a very in depth theme behind it. The evaluation by the society of a person’s actions. The idea about 屈原 and P仔 was very suitable but putting them in an experiment sort of makes the main point go out of focus. Anyway, that is just a personal feeling.

All in all, I could not say the play was excellent, it was rather good for a student-led production. It is the product of many long days and late nights on the SNGS girls’ part. I am sure, if the plot was not so overtly dramatic, many of us would enjoy it more. Still, appropriate acknowledgement to the people involved in the play. Strive hard and improve!

HCI Openhouse

Whew… Helped out at the school openhouse today. Went to the Black Box at 9pm to meet Shi Jia (correct spelling???) and he told us that our main purpose for today is to advertise 华岗剧坊 to the visitors. And hopefully if these people do manage to get themselves admitted into Hwa Chong, Chinese Drama will be a choice for them. There were only 2 Sec 3s, me and a handful of Sec 1s helping out today because the rest of them are at Ulu Pandan CC for SYF. I think we were trying to get our honours to go with the Gold that is already guranteed for us.

At around 10.30. A family of 3 came in. All of us were already geared up and ready to wax lyrical about 华岗剧坊 when their guide pointed aroung the Black Box and led them out again. That was a comical sight, us with big smiles on our faces while they just looked around and went out. Hahaha. According to Shi Jia, last year’s openhouse was more successful when we were at Kah Kee Hall. Maybe SALT centre is not as accessible.

There were not many visitors there today so we decided to just sit there and wait. In the end, we only presented to 5 or 6 groups of people. Most of them looked like the kind who do not have much passion for the Chinese language but most were fascinated by the weapon props we used for past perfomances. I even discovered a way to grab the visitors’ attention by making a sound with the 刀 with a gentle blade. The group of visitors that left the deepest impression on me is the Indian family who had a good time taking photos posing with our props and the traditional Chinese headgear from the English Drama Club.

At around 1pm. A girl from the college section came to request that we leave the area early to facilitate Chinese dance practice. We agreed. And we decided to start packing up. Most of the props are out by 2 leaving only a wooden stall used in a previous play. The Chinese dance people were already there when we tried to move the stall out of the way. Suddenly, the male dance instructor asked us to “take whatever we need to take and dissapear”. He was rather rude. Well, that surprised me quite a bit.

In summary (as I do not have the energy or motivation to write any further), the Openhouse today was rather fun and meaningful. Hope to contribute more to 华岗剧坊 in the future.