Halloween

31st October 2007, Greenhall. About 20 costumed party-goers were spotted enjoying themselves during a potluck party here. The party was organised by a group of Penang cosplayers, and started at 8.00pm. It was more of a disorganised gathering of the weird and wonderful rather than a proper party... we even forgot to give out the prizes for best costume (male & female) and the best Halloween costume!

Nonetheless, we enjoyed ourselves and before midnight, everyone went home happy and stuffed (there was a ton of leftovers)... perhaps we should do this more often?

During the party, we had a vampire, a female commando, a Naruto cosplayer, a mummy, a walking, talking flower, a gypsy, several devils, a mental patient, and a "white reaper". "Lady Death" had also made her debut appearance.

The "white reaper" about to be reaped... Thanks again to Sinister for the pics!

Gui Wa

Gui Wa was the second performance in October. It was staged on October 19th to 21st at Greenhall. It was to my surprise that the production managed to attain full house for all its shows! Congratulations to DB Garden!

Basically, the show was divided into 2 parts. The first was a dance-drama called simply "Ghost" - Gui Wa. DB Garden managed to put on a visual extravaganza with some awesome costumes and visual & lighting effects. The sound engineering was also impressive. Although the show was in Chinese, Gui Wa transcended the language barrier with it stunning visuals. The twin girl ghosts reminded me of some macabre Japanese anime characters...

The second part of the show was a parody of a talk show called "Red Underwear". Four guys slug (and strut) it out in various, colourful costumes depicting several characters in different scenes. This side-splitting comedy entertained with both eccentric words and actions that drove the crowd to tears of joy!

It was a hectic but nonetheless enjoyable 3 days of horror and laughter, and luckily our friend Sinister was around to capture the moments with his trusty camera! Thanks for the pics, mate!

Liederabend - Evening of Songs

This was my first experience with the German Lieder. I must say I'm very impressed and really enjoyed the performance. Although my German had rusted down to the core, I managed to enjoy Kok-Ting's excellent piano performance and the voices of the tenor and three lovely sopranos. His powerpoint presentation in the background was a great help to newcomers like myself. It explained briefly what the present song was about, and who wrote it.

In "Written Word", songs by Mozart, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Franz, Beethoven, Wolf, Liszt, and Wagner were presented by sopranos Evelyn Toh, Tan Sin Sim & Chia Yee Yean and tenor Kee Loi Seng. We were lucky to be graced by the presence of Dr. Volker Wolf, the Director of the Goethe Institut-Malaysia. He graciously provided us with some information concerning the German Liederabend prior to the performance. The performance itself was punctuated by Kok-Ting's precise and concise narrations, with regards to the song that they were about to perform. (I must apologize for the video/audio quality, apparently, my camera phone was unable to capture the powerful voice of the soprano, Ms Tan Sin Sim!)


For the second day, "Letters" was presented by tenor Tan Wei Han and soprano Chia Yee Yean. "Letters" was actually about the personal communication between Robert and Clara Schumann. I never knew that even letters between two people could become the object of wonderful song and music!

I truly enjoyed my two days of Liderabend, and I hope that Kok-Ting will bring this great art back to Penang soon!