Saturday, January 30, 2010
here is my bit about the Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus!
i watched it with haneef in a huff yesterday, and our front row seats proved too hardcore for the groggy trippy brilliance of visual spectacle that is the ingenuity of Tim Bellows. the plot is a little muddled at certain points, but that flaw was swept under the carpet by the astounding imaginative worlds that spin out through the mirror, and also by the quirky shady characters of Valentina and Tony(Heath and Depp mostly). the abstract surrealist concepts that Tim portrays through his visuals are dark and haunting: broken shards of mirror, sprawling fields with perpetual ladders stretching to the clouds, black languid oxford-esque meanders that licks up to become a serpent... these are the stuff that i've always been drawing. these are the stuff of my dreams.
"Nothing is permanent. Not even death."
-Depp as Tony
Friday, January 29, 2010
the people keeping me from driving my head into a wall right now are haneef, sheena, yi jun, wei ren, whom i spend most of my school hours with, and also sara, thiong ho, all my other classmates, and anne marie, whom i dearly miss.
i need to meet with you more often than what we're achieving now, anne!
i opened my heart and realised only now that it had been closed the whole of last year. throughout the stages of my life, i have been dependent on only one person at a time, almost never more than that. in secondary school i had ling yu, in jc1 i had anne marie, and needed no one else. it dawned on me this year that i have very pleasant people in my life, and my classmates are actually pretty pleasurable to be with. i hope this will be a blessed year for everyone :)
it's a little late(thank god we're still in January), but i finally have some new year resolutions!
1. be a kinder person
2. become socially adequate
3. ex(c)el in floorball and be valuable to the team
4. celebrate all my friends' 18th birthdays (sorry palmer..)
5. attempt all tutorials on my own
6. eat only when necessary/hungry
7. be skinny
8. cab to school not more than twice a week
9. manage anger
10. ALL As for 'A' levels
ONZ CHERYL
Give the go-ahead for your heart
to strip naked. The trees
are covered with flowers,
while you vision white petals
flying out of you like
blowing blizzard down the playground,
down a field where weed-flowers
are the tiny palms of hands. You
see their faces that say, "We
are pictures of the sun for no one
but you. Our fathers and mothers
are a single motet, scored
for trillion voices. Come and sing,
be rich. Come, go exactly
half the distance to madness. Touch
our fragrant lips.
-- Tim Bellows
Wednesday, January 06, 2010
This post was written on the 6th of jan but had not been published till now(26-01-2010)
***
First and foremost: Happy Belated Birthday Ms Poon!!! :)
*
i am back from BeiJing!
i havent caught up with my sleep and there are other things to do, but this is a wonderful tale to tell.
After flipping books and having a grasp of BeiJing's places of interest (mainly of historical significance),
it only occurred to me when we were taking off that BeiJing is an urban city.
the flight was thus spent agonizing over how BeiJing is like, and that thoroughly exhausted my imagination.
we arrived at the airport, a massive building with jaw-dropping architecture only thinkably achievable by mad Chinese men (who are also responsible for other insanely massive constructions since ancient times, such as the Great Wall and the Forbidden City/ the Imperial Palace) . we learn later on that everything in China is three times its construct in our minds.
the first day was mundane; checking in to our hotel, which is really quite terrible, but in a prime location amidst old hutongs(which have been pleasantly converted into eateries) within walking distance to the heartlands and the subway. Shopping for additional winter clothing in wholesale centres, heated bargaining- grabbed scolded chased by tenacious teenage shop tenders... Our trip had not yet begun, but we were cold and happy; caught in the glitzy glamour of winter, and being in a country whose currency is five times lower than ours.
Days afterwards, we repeatedly stood witness to China's ancient history, centuries old buildings coexisting with modern skyscrapers and shopping malls in perfect harmony. The Forbbiden City and its perfect symmetry, the vast concrete square of Tian'an men with people huddled in a tight semi-circle to watch the elaborate flag-lowering ceremony, the weather-beaten Great Wall of China snaking delicately and tiresomely atop the blades of mountains endless... all the time we were dumbfounded, staring mouth agape frowning: how in the world--- who on earth would even think to build constructs of such staggering, mindblowing proportions? Their magnificence and grandeur is undoubtably awe-inspiring, scenic against fierce terrains like men's brave (and desperate) attempt to leave a mark on the untamed wilderness. it renders us feeling humbled, frail and nerve-jitteringly small. it also forced me to make a contrast with Singapore's history, and our shallow history is precisely why i have trouble feeling rooted to this place.................
***
ha ha ok. yep it's incomplete.. the day i returned from Bei Jing i had the intention to blog up a storm but there were too many smells and sights, revelations kept knocking on the glass windowpanes demanding an audience. there is still food, skiing, walking on frozen lakes FLIGHT DELAYED 4.5 HOURS etc to talk about but the days meant to continue writing this dragged on and on and we're already entering February. it seemed too late.. so there. :)
