Bon Odori!

Ohayou-gozaimasu! and incase you're reading this at a different time, Konnichiwa, Konbanwa and Oyasuminasai.

The Bon Odori Festival was a blast! Creatively held at the Matsushita Sports Centre, the event consisted of 3 dance performances by the crew and 3 "guest" dance performance, had a wide array of Japanese food and beverages available for purchase and of course, who can forget, the Bon Odori fans, a small but important element in the celebration. The event started at 1700 hours but me and Eng arrived at 2010 hours when they were having the final dance performance by both the crew and guests, and I gotta tell ya, it's a splendidly coordinated mess! We danced to a 4 traditional tunes we haven't even heard of before but everyone got the hang of the moves by the first minute. It was strangely, in a trance definition dictionary, "addictive" and just plain fun. All of the dance performances were accompanied by the bass-thumping 'taiko performance drumming' and of course the kimono, yukata (cotton kimonos), and hopi coat (short coats styled like a kimono top) dressed dancers, who were very talented by the way. Other decorations or accessories included castinets, straw hats, cotton towels and the paper fans. Here's a short definition of the Bon Odori Festival :-

日本に複数の従来のダンスがあるが、最も有名な、共通のダンスの1 つは日本語の"糖菓Odori" と呼ばれる糖菓のダンスである。糖菓の祝祭の人々のダンスの糖菓のダンス。糖菓の祝祭はあらゆる夏あらゆる都市のあらゆる地区の、保持される。

糖菓は祖先の精神を歓迎し、精神のための告別式の保持を意味する。あらゆる年8 月糖菓週があり、糖菓は約1 週間続ける。糖菓の間に、時々家族の親類全員は集め、彼らの祖先のための告別式を保持し、そして懐かしそうな気分でいることを楽しむ。この従来は中国の仏教から来る。

糖菓の祝祭は近い開けスペースの糖菓週にの間に、および人々のギャザーか公園、および従来の日本音楽のダンス保持される。音楽は祖先の精神を歓迎する幸せな音楽のべきで人々にあり幸せの、神秘的、および歓迎する気分を作る義務が。さらに、糖菓のダンスは夜に祖先の精神は夜にもどって来る日本の人々が信じるので保持されるべきである。

日本の技術は百年に成長したが、日本の人々は決して従来の中心を忘れていないし、起こる糖菓の祝祭および糖菓はあらゆる夏を踊る。日本の人々はこの従来を 、彼らの祖先の精神を尊重し続ける。

Which I think translates to..

There are several traditional dances in Japan, but the one of the most famous and common dance is Bon dance, which is called "Bon Odori" in Japanese. People dance Bon Dance in the Bon Festival. The Bon Festival is held every summer, in every district in every city.

Bon means welcoming ancestors' souls and holding a memorial service for the souls. There is a Bon week in August every year, and Bon continues for about a week. During Bon, sometimes all relatives of family gather and hold a memorial service for their ancestors, and enjoy being in a reminiscent mood. This traditional comes from Buddhism in China.

The Bon Festival is held during in Bon week, and people gathers at the near open-space or the parks, and dance with traditional Japanese music. The music should be happy music to welcome the ancestor's souls, and people have a duty to make a happy, mysterious, and welcoming mood. Moreover, the Bon Dance should be held in the night because Japanese people believe that ancestors' souls come back in the night.

The technology in Japan has developed in a hundred years, but Japanese people have never forgotten the traditional heart, and taking place Bon Festival and Bon Dance every summer. Japanese people will continue to venerate this traditional, and to respect the soul of their ancestors.

The atmosphere at Matsushita Sports Centre potrayed a warm night with lanterns fitted and decoratively concentrated towards the center where the 'Yagura' or stage was placed at, around this stage is where the guests perform their dance following the dancers on the stage. On the stage were the 4 'taiko' drums in the center and around it where the dancers, the stage looks a little bit like a Japanese-element decorated boxing ring.

Sushi, Sashimi, Japanese Noodles (Udon, etc), Japanese deserts (ice creams, dorayaki, etc) and traditional Japanese beverages (Macha Tea, Zen Tea) were only the tip of the iceberg, there was too many stalls and too many people for me to get a closer view on what was on sale, but you can bet there was a myriad of Japanese foodstuff available on sale, from Hokkaido corn to Temaki, you just can't get bored! Though most of the stalls ran out of stock by the time we arrived, one obvious fact this year is that most of them understocked and under-estimated the crowd figures as almost every stall sold out of everything! If you have been to the 2004 Bon Odori Festival, most of them overstocked and had to let go of the foodstuff at more than 70% below tag price at the end of the festival to get rid of any remaining stocks and cover their costs.



Well, it was pretty stuffed at MSC, and the lines for the food were so long that it was a big turnoff, so I had to deal with Sushi King's remaining 4 pack Ebiko's (for a whopping 10 bucks and that's not in Yen folks) and two of the Chocolate Makana Ice Cream puffs (sorta like ice cream in waffles), but I guess it's a good deal as they were selling it 6 bucks a pop and I got one for 4 bucks nyeh heh heh! It was great too, I can't believe Japanese people get to enjoy it everyday for a low low price of 64.99 @ 65JPY (2.20MYR) :( Well I met a couple of friends and not-friends. First arrived I was of course looking for the basketballs Adrian and Edmond but then ran into seniors Chong Yan, Dhayalan and Yi En at the field around the Yagura and was forced into dancing the first dance but of course by the second dance we we're actually enjoying it and being open about ramming into others for making a mistake :D , darn there's too many eye poling half cuts and skirts there, fortunately for some of them, their face makes them a big turn off LOL, goes to show the face counts too heh heh! yeah well during the first dance me and Eng were blur, so we ran into a lot of weird people, apparently girls are supposed to whack guys who run into them during the dance (luckily we looked too innocent to be hit by a paper fan lol). So after the 4 dances, we went looking for food, and then ran into Yen Song (lol) and Siow Yen which had a very nice Ah Lian hair color transplant and continued to be found by Yen Ling, Stephanie (sorry la, at school you're the best looking one, but I think at Bon Odori you're in 238th place haha) and Mok and finally ran into Adrian's brother, Adrian and found Adrian standing by the Sushi King stall. Well we went nowhere after that, went here and went there, tried some of Eng's beer, danced like an ass in the middle of the food plateau, indulging apien hahahaha no but seriously folks, it's everywhere. Overall, it was fun and I really liked the dance a lot! hope to do it again next year at Bon Odori Festival 2006 :)

In other news, I have passed my CDL (Ujian Kompeten @ Undang-Undang) test which I took at a Rilek in Klang on Friday with a mere bottleneck score of 42/50 (42 required to pass). Unfortunately this one guy from the same driving school who also took the test failed ringing in 73% (84% to pass), but I have to admit, it's not easy controlling one of their cubs at at riding circuit, especially the Meniti test where you go on this 50 meter stretch of concrete and stay on it for a minimum of 7 seconds, I fell off immediately after going on it due to not be able to engage in balancing the motorcycle and got failed on the spot, but of course that was just a trial. I did the emergency braking tests alright, but I forgot that I needed to put my left leg down first after completely stopping. Was nervous I guess, need to get a motorcycle to practice after I get my license. Interestingly, one participant actually accelerated too much and went off a curb, head hit a signboard and landed with the motorcycle riding her and walked back to the briefing area smiling and laughing like she went through a run-off-the-mill accidental motorcycle malfunction conflict. Nervous to take the trial test, I am. Lessons start next week at the institute, wish me luck!

Interact Club Of SMKSSAAS's International Understanding Day has been postponed yet again to September because the seniors couldn't deal with the catering and say we may not be able to keep up with the performances that we need to do. Damn, if they wanted us to keep up, they should have said it in May where we would have time to prepare, instead what do they do? Say we may not be able to make it. Bah, good also you're going to NS, can minus your points a bit. Oh yes! the Incoming Board Of Directors have been announced, here are the posts and respective directors :-

Interact Club of SMKSSAAS Incoming Board Of Directors 2005/2006

President
Leong Yeu Song

Vice President
Nur Syaheera

Secretary
Jaya Rekha

Assistant Secretary/Editor
Hawa Alima

Treasurer
Eng Yi Hong

Finance Director
Choo Dzu Yi

I.U. Director
Adrian Yong

Club Service Director
Izzat Afandi Azmi

Community Service Director
Anisa

Sergeant At Arms
Thilairaja

Bah! I'm not surprised that Syera became the Vice, and awe became Asst. Secretary, nor am I surprised that Jaya became Secretary, but what the hell do I have to be the club service director? Like I'm that good at coordinating club service activities, and I have to do another freaking notice board! As if the PKBM(L) notice board experience wasn't bad enough, Pn. Hasni opens the floodgates of hell pointing to me and I have to suffer from it, and nobody wants to help me! awe and syera, I know you guys need to help me, so don't bother thinking of excuses. In the wise words of a Malaysian, 'malas sial...'.

Say, speaking of which, awe, you never told me amal is your sister lol, I kinda thought you guys looked the same anyway, and furthermore your height also almost the same heh heh heh, the two monkeys are 'most probably' having fun in Langkawi, life just got boring with them missing, well for Yi Hong at least, right syaheera? =)

Ah that's all, I got add maths to do, Pn. Noraini's going to kill me if I don't complete this statistics and index + logarithm homework by Monday.

Moushiwake-gozaimasen