Carollers

It's been a while since the last post... This was meant to have been be posted after our last trip up to KL, during Christmas '05. But the photos were taken in my sister's camera and I've only managed to get them during this CNY trip up. So here they are, carollers from the church in Serdang Bahru (they have retained this name although the town is now called Seri Kembangan), who were invited to come to our house on Christmas eve by my parents. My parents had invited quite a lot of our relatives and friends for a buffet dinner they cooked for that evening. Unfortunately it rained heavily before the hour, so we didn't have everyone present. We were the first house the carollers came to. They had I think 5 more houses to go to after ours.

I was touched that the small village we grew up in, where everyone was a Hakka in the initial years, has managed to carved out a place for a Christian community of young and old folks. Many of these have now become close friends of the family and some make it a point to come by our house after church on Sundays to play chess with my father. (Our house is about 250m away from the church.) The church itself has just celebrated its 50th anniversary a few years back. It was started in 1952 as soon as the "new village" itself was formed. (A "new village" is essentially a barb-wired interned community to fenced in ALL chinese for being potential Communist sympathisers. China had fallen to the Communist just 3 years before that.)

According to the records from the church, the village had a population of 15,000 then. Today, who knows? Quite possibly 150,000 at least. The church has remained small, reaching to about 200 or 300 persons at most. Most of the early converts would have been seen as betrayers of their culture, western-loving weaklings. The first missionaries were a couple of women; one Ursula Kohler from Switzerland, and one Irene Neville from Australia. (Both were qualified nurses with the Red Cross.) When the present church building was constructed in 1964, villagers threw stones at the windows and vandalised the baptismal pool 3 times. But the church is totally indigenous now. Everything is conducted in either Mandarin or Hakka. The only thing western, if one seeks to look at the world as east and west, are consigned to the history books, from where I dug the names of the nurses up from. (And if you believe in Judgement Day, like I do, you may also believe that the names of these 2 nurses will be remembered then.)

Amongst this small enclave then, I'm always heartened whenever I see them utilising what little gift they have for their faith; a violinist, a pianist, music teachers, etc. The last Sunday, the preacher used powerpoint from his notebook for the sermon. They are a small community but they make do. They have been quietly raising funds for a new meeting hall for several years now. They are optimistic about the future.

Chup

MINI showroom at Leng Kee Rd
(Photographs by Andy Wee Fotografie)

This was supposed to have been an article that I was going to put out for "iSh" magazine. Unfortunately, "iSh" has decided to use their in-house writer to do the piece and since the press-kit and images were given to them by MINI, they just about have all they need to work on. Except that I know the designer and have formulated an "angle" to this story so it's a waste that I won't be able to do it. Then again, there's this blog, so here are some random thoughts on the MINI showroom...

It's universal. That's what an architect envies about an interior designer. There's no need for an interior to be contextual, or be of a time, or place, or culture. It can be ruthlessly rootless, and entice one to a world that is totally of its own. It creates its own sun, its own gravity and its own
realm. The MINI on the glass floor is for real. It was driven to that spot on the glass. The MINI hung on the wall is a life-size vacuous model. Gravity is defied but the interior designer is not liable for structural failure. And notice that all the photos are night shots. That's when the artificial lights are best captured. The interior design product is a nocturnal world. And if it isn't night, well, the black floors and ceiling will help allude to it...

I'm reminded of Mussorgsky's Picture at an Exhibition and the notion of the museum as a shopping mall... Here, there are neon-lit picture frames. The counters and the shelves are outlined in with garish frames. They come in various sizes, but none of them are tilted or off-balanced. There are all a variation on a theme. A MINI here, a MINI there, a MINI everywhere, all accentuated with a strobe light and a frame. You can view the MINIs from the top, the bottom and the sides. And then there are mini MINIs toy cars for sale behind the glass boxes. In short, the shop is opened and everything here is packaged for sale.

Chup

Be careful the next time you want to walk naked in your house!

Today's Straits Times featured an article about a 29-year-old-man who is charged for being naked in his flat. Why? Neighbours complained about him to the police. So he is hence charged for causing disturbance to his neighbours.

Under the Singapore new amended laws, it is actually illegal for one to be naked in the privacy of his/her own home. He can potentially be punished with a fine of S$2,000 and 3 months jail term for each charge. I learn something new today!

What has happened to this world? We can't even be naked in our own home anymore. Luckily it has been raining these 2 weeks.

..... the one who has been staying at home the whole Saturday!

Latest images

Here are more images from the Chinese perspectivist of my design in Qingdao. As I post this, I've just watched a documentary on I.M. Pei. For a long period of time, I was fascinated by his work, as well as the fact that he was able to make it big in the States; this oriental gentleman, son of a banker father and poet/calligrapher mother. I've consciously studied and applied his works in some of my designs; most so in the bus stop I did outside his local Gateway buildings (columns clad in curved granite- you won't get that anymore with today's budget control...) and the Teo Ann Huay Kuan in Geylang. But I've forgotten about all that, until I see the main entrance design for Qingdao in this perspective, with its curved granite steps, and the slight play of geometry, and its the Dallas Meyerson Hall feeling again. The curved steps are deliberatedly off-centre so that it relates to the geometry inside the entrance. The red ceiling and wall is my nod to Chinese tradition. It's a design tendency that seeps out sub-consciously, from things you've absorbed long ago. I.M. Pei is never particularly trendy amongs students of architecture, who see him as this old foggy from another era, but I love his work and am happy to admit it. His are functional, urbane, well-designed and well-executed buildings hugely popular with the public.
As for the images of the office, the first is the office of the director; the second is a modified view, with 1 wall removed so that one can see how the deputy director's room (foreground) relate to lounge area.
Chup

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2006!!!!