Phuket

I went on a company trip on 28 April to Phuket Thailand to work at one of the Summit. Though I have travelled to oversea to Thailand, Singapore and Indonesia before, this would be my first time flying on a plane. I took Air Asia and sat next to the window. I was excited at first but when the plane about to take off, I find myself freaking out. My fear of height was overwhelming, I hold on to my seat with all my strength as the plane boosted momentum to hit the skies. Nonetheless I managed it and then it was heaven. Cloud passing by and everything was beautiful.

My three day in the Summit was a mixture of being blur and pressured. Made a few mistakes here and there and being half as efficient as usual. But I was glad to be able to make it here and meet with all my clients I have talked to so many times via phone. They came from Thailand, Singapore, Pakistan, India, Korea, China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Mongolia, Middle East, virtually anywhere and everywhere in Asia. My fun was going out with them at night to drink and party - all mid age senior management of their organization and yet friendly and funny.

I stayed at the Crowne Plaza for event, a 5 star hotel and is perfectly beautiful. Cozy and big room and unlimited view to the sea and horizon.

I stayed on another two days in Phuket at the Lagoon Resort Hotel after the event ends. It was spent mainly on the beach on evenings. Shopping for gifts in the night and party on until late night. It was so hot that I have spent mornings and afternoon in the hotel.
One of the day I went out with one of my client who is the head of a prominent Bank in South Asia. I helped him to shop for gifts for his family and within 2 hours, two of us have no spare hands to carry anything else. He is a funny guy and very friendly for a CEO of huge financial house. We went for foot massages and eventually partied on through the night at the local famous gogo bars and bars(both flirting with girls, haha)...

I came back to Malaysia all drained and tired. KL seems so unfamiliar when I reached, though so near, Phuket and KL are both world of their own, a different dimension all together.
Overall an unforgetable experience, especially when I counted how much I have spent. Also, I should have taken more pictures...

World Cup

World Cup is back. It all started when DeutscheLande kicks off with Costa Rica last Friday and won 4-2.

Not a big soccer fan myself, just occasionally watch some on TV and read the results on Newspaper.

But happening every four years, I would never miss World Cup. Not for the game, but for the memories. If I would look for milestones of my life so far, I just have to think of things that I am doing during times of World Cup.

Four years back (Japan/Korea 2002) I was still doing my freelance Video and Graphic Design Job in Singapore. I remember watching almost single match at my friends house while rendering my videos.

Another Four years back (France 1998) I was in middle of my hostel orientation, first year in University. I was helping my Hall (Hostel) to build the orientation float(a big spider to be mounted on the truck).

Another Four years back (USA 1994). It was the year that Baggio misses his penalty shootout that cost Italy their Worldcup Title.(Still can remember the shot clearly, way high above the net). It was last year of Junior High School, last year I will be wearing school uniform with shorts (Seniors' uniforms are with long pants). It was also the year I took both government exam - PMR and the private exams - Unified Examinations for Junior High Schools. Both exams contains over 10 papers. And I wondered how I actually managed those times.

Another Four years back (Italy 1990). I was too young to remember anything. But I do remember I did watched the finals between Argentina and West Germany in Middle of the night...or did I?

NOW this year (Germany 2006). I was sitting in front of the computer typing this blog with France playing Switzerland live on TV. Many years later probably I will think back on this very day. The same day Korea won their first world cup match in Europe (beating Togo 2-1).

ROJAK!

It happened early January when I went to audition for a youth theatre "Oral Stage" (It's supposedly the phrase used to describe life stages when baby starts to speak by the way, nothing "ORAL" as you think) and I got the job as their Technical Director. As far back as I could remember, the last time I was involved in a play was about 5 years ago when I was still in the University. That last play I directed was a stage triller, the who killed who kind of S***. (Erhem...this shit is actually the product of 10 years accumulated scums since I started acting on stage :P... Ewww...Yucky!)

It is a good to be involve in theatre again, really makes me feel young and doing what I enjoyed most as a past time. This group of young rascal running the theatre actually did a splendid job (Originally I thought they were much older and more amateur in plays, AHEM...I turned out to be the oldest person in the lot :P). They turned out to be very good, writing wonderful scripts and attracting almost full house in most of the 6 runs.

My job started March, sitting in on the rehearsals, familiarizing the scripts, selecting the right songs for each title opening, training up my sound crew on paper work, planning my lights designs...PHEW...It did breaks me into pieces, hard core pressure. Work in rehearsals after WORKing in the OFFICE. REALLY KILLS...Thank god I have survived... A bit of brain damage though...may be permanent...haha

The show ran from april 13-april 16 at Kuala Lumpur Performing Arts Centre (KLPAC), six runs in total. The bump in date was on the 12 April. It was the nightmare before "Christmas". I started my day by arriving at the theatre at 8 am on 12 April with my Santa's little helper - Q and JO (both of whom I thanked so much for their giving support).
Started rigging up the lights and sound systems. The rig which suppose to end at noon continued until 1pm. Then came my focussing session which sees me standing consistently on stage for the next 11 hours on stage, focussing all my 84 lights. It was not until everything is done, I felt the pain and ache all over my body. THERE IS just not enough time....SOB SOB...
As expected the focussing did not meet my demands and just have to make do.

Next day eight again I was down at the theatre. This time programming all 140 cues and thank god by 4pm everything was done (with much unsatisfactory to myself, sigh).

Well thank god, the outcome was not as bad as I thought, seems like my skills may be off but the "idea" is there...haha...

I must thank all the wonderful people who I have worked with (especially the directors K and P, the Stage Managers L and E, My technical crew Q, JO, J, A and SY and all the casts and crews). I was given another chance to present myself, as an artist, to use my creativity to create a wonderful piece of art. It's been a great two months.

Self satisfactory 100%!

The Oral Stage Website: http://theoralstage.blogspot.com

LONG TIME NO BLOG

Hmmm... It's been a long long time since I blogged...Not that nothing has happened (in fact a lot of great exciting things happened) Not that I cannot find time...I guess I was just plain lazy...
Anyways I will need to put down all the exciting things that happened to me for the past few months in the next few days...instead of having all of them going down the memory lane....:P

Memoirs

"Every step I have taken has been to bring myself closer to you..."

My blog is increasingly becoming a movie review site. Mmm... perfect results of a movie fanatic.

Last Friday I went to watch Memoirs of a Geisha, the much disputed film, with the Chinese and Japanese shunning it due to cultural and historical reasons. The Japanese accused the film maker to be insulting Japanese Culture, the depiction of Geishas is untrue and they took it negatively.

On the other hand, the Chinese criticised the three chinese female cast as traitors of their own country by portraying their historical enemy, the Japanese.

Mmm...a simple movie with an innocent storyline, I can't understand why these people have to take advantage of it to express selfish, irresponsible comments.

Before I step into the cinema, I was anticipating for a meaningful show with ummm... boring parts. Considering it was already midnight, I might need to focus really hard to understand the essence.

Surprisingly throughout the movie, I was not bored for a single moment. The show was smoothly arranged, well directed and easy to follow.

I must praise the three female chinese casts on their splendid acting especially Gong Li and Zhangzhiyi.

My gain from the movie is about Faith. Sayuri lived a life with no choises it seems. She was sold and forced to be a geisha. She was forced to be a slave to the "Mother" after she failed to escape. But she held on to a faith, a dream: to be with the Chairman. This faith brought her choises she could never dream of, and a purpose. As she says, "Every step I have taken has been to bring myself closer to you..."

Life is a dream, all memories chained together in a strange way. Somethings we remember clearly and some do not. Sometimes when I looked back, I have not recognized the paths that I have taken. But where I stand now is a result of my previous choise.

Am I straying further and further away from my destination? Is every step I take brings me closer to where I wanna be?

Eventhough I enjoy the show in overall, but I am still very much disgusted with the love of the Chairman and Sayuri. Not that their huge gap in age, but the idea of the 30-40 year old chairman falling in love at first sight with a 9 year old girl. Perverted old man!

Anyway, Great show worth 2 hours and 15 minutes of my time.

Official Movie Site: http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/memoirsofageisha/

Dreamcar

Recently a lot of people asked me what is my dreamcar, well here it is, at least for now:
Nissan Fairlady 350Z
-3.5-liter V6 engine
-6-speed manual transmission

A totally beautiful car, with a reasonable pricetag
On-The-Road Price (Peninsular Malaysia) RM 571,875.74
(Private Registration inclusive of 1 Year Road Tax RM 4,386.00, 1 Year Comprehensive Insurance Premium RM 14,640.50 with a sum insured of RM 551,000.00 and Ownership Claim Fee RM 50)

Interested, just have to knock your head out and grab it, will cost around 12K a month for 7 years if take up full financing+insurance and roadtax. very affordable. :)

Consider a 2002 version second hand at around 250K

View the gallery and details at http://www.nissan.com.my/vehicles/coming/350z.html

An Evening with MPO

Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra, I always wanted to attend their concert but never did.

Well, opportunities came by when CC 'jiou' me and RT to accompany her.
Excited as we are, after getting coats from their counter(apparently everyone have to wear coats, quite redundant 'cause everyone's taking them off once inside), we sat down at the first circle, a bit far and high up (how come so high and far cost more than others below?).
The evening started with pieces from the Latin American, orchestra with the latinian twist. Very enjoyable with me enjoying most pieces. After the 20 minutes break, we back to hear the Waltz which I find quite boring except one piece. Not too much to comment about as I am very amateur about orchestra and stuffs but overall a very enjoyable 2 hours. The arrangement and music is great but some how I expected more and felt the impact was lacking.

RS in Gleneagles

Fortunate RS is recovering well in "Hotel" Gleneagles.

One of the biggest events occuring over the turn of the year: RS had a head on collision with a car at Jalan Ampang on 29 December around 1130pm. Her bike was totally wasted, her right wrist was shattered and her right thigh broken. wasSounds serious but she is actually quite fine, well at least she can still joke about it. Some passer-by hailed a taxi and sent her immediately to Hospital Besar Kuala Lumpur. She is not so fortunate being conscious, grieving in agony all the way to the hospital.
My involvement in the event occurs on the morning of 30 December, 8 hours after her accident. I received a call at 7:40am from the Hospital, awaken from my sleep, still hanging over from the bottle of wine and loads of beer I drank last night.

Nurse: "Ini Cik Calvin Pang?"
Me:" HUh....nak cari siapa ni...apa hal?" (Still dreamy and angry)
Nurse:"Ini dari Hospital...

The nurse apparently still call me cik even after hearing my manly voice. By the time I reached the semi critical ward in the hospital, it's already 8:45am due to the jam. RS was asleep and the nurse say that they could not contact her dad since last night. RS refused to go into operations and waiting for her dad to arrive from Penang. So I called her dad, found out that he will only be arriving at 2pm in the afternoon. I asked for his consent for the operations and immediately arrange RS to go operations.

KL Hospital has one of the rudest staff, RS was forced to take multiple X-rays because they mixed up with the X-rays. The way they handled the patients are not proffessional and rude. I am surprised to find their motto is to provide the best to the patients. But I guess I can't blame them but there are certainly rooms (or planets) for improvement.

RS underwent operations in KL hospital and got transfered to Gleneagles on 30th night. She had fever and limbs swollen on 31st and was in a lot of pain. She was injected with Morphin to numb her pain causing her to stay semi conscious. Hopefully the worst is over. By today, 2nd of January, she felt better and remained active the whole day. She will undergo another operations on Wednesday to insert in rods and metals to her limbs. It will probably take her a month or two to fully recover. Do drop her a visit. Just ask me and I will tell you the location.
Please do not buy any food! She is already well fed by us...Your visit will be just fine...though she asked for a new laptop, a tv and stuffs...haha

The bright side is: She is fortunate to "walk away" from the accident and hey it is New Year!