Pang Khee Teik, writer, photographer, program director\nat The Annexe, and former editor of Kakiseni takes time out from his decadent\nlife to give us Kakisenians some friendly advice, pass on some birthday\ngreetings, and talk about the ‘do’ this coming weekend at The Annexe. Caution,\nreading ahead means you risk exposure to extreme Pang-isms, talk of cruising\nmens toilets, and pressure to buy me a birthday present. You have been warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
~<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tell us\nabout your life post-Kakiseni.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n No more weekly deadlines!<\/p>\n\n\n\n But then again, now every week I have to meet with\nfolks dying to exhibit their artworks or use one of our galleries for their\ndiabolical agenda; after that I have to\nplan those upcoming programs, coordinate closure to previous ones; call up\npeople to beg them to come for our events, call up the media — \nespecially Kakiseni — and beg them to plug us; every other week, I have\nto meet the Central Market management and justify the diabolical agenda to them\nsince they are practically subsidizing our activities; oh, and I still have to\nsend out a weekly email…<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sigh, I miss Kathy Rowland harassing me Thursday\nmidnight about the editorials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The job\nsounds terrible. How’d you get it? Who did you sleep with?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2006, I took part in Marion D’Cruz’s experimental\nworkshop Choreography for\nNon-Choreographers<\/em>, which resulted in a performance at the lorong between\nCentral Market and the then Annexe. It was gratifying to get people to dance\nsuggestively to Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” outside KL’s cruisiest\nmale toilet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Anyway, after that, I posted a poll on Kakiseni asking\npeople to vote for what else they might like to see at Central Market,\nincluding, a drag queen Beauty Pageant and a cruising workshop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As for who I slept with – darling, everybody<\/em> I have ever slept with has\nhelped get me this far in life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\ncould say something to the Kakiseni staff that they would actually listen to,\nwhat would it be?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Make the kakiblog more prominent lah. Also, young\npeople from around Malaysia are expressing themselves in blogs great and small\nand inane. Link up with them!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lastly, turn your phone off on Thursdays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you met\na boggart of the Harry Potter kind, what form would it take?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n My younger self.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There’s\nquite a lot happening on the May 3rd<\/sup> & 4th<\/sup> weekend.\nHow did you guys know my birthday’s on that Saturday?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Facebook, of course. We figured that if there was one\nperson in KL whom everybody would want to buy artworks for as birthday\npresents, it would have to be you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Was the\ncollision of events planned?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We planned it to appear like a collision of events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collision 1: The Dong Tai Du (Attitude Movement) gig\nwanted to organize this crazy 20-indie-music-acts-from-Chinese-language-background-shebang\non Labour Day (it’s the socialist streak in them). I persuaded them to hold it\nin conjunction with the art bazaar so that we can steal their crowd.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collision 2: Joe Kidd had also booked Sunday for a Tribute\nTo Rock Kangkang Part 2. Yes, the first Tribute was so kangkang they couldn’t\nwait to let their balls hang out again!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collision 3: Then Amir Muhammad called to say he\nwanted an Alternative Book Fair in May, and it was a no-brainer that we were\nmeant to be together! And gosh, did this cat drag in some strange fish, like a\nKakiseni book launch … but also many other launches of books about religion,\nBersih, and aweks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collision 4: The World Press Freedom Day actually\nhappens that weekend, and I was excited about the prospect of seducing our\ninnocent passerbys with the gorgeous people from the Centre for Independent\nJournalism. CIJ thinks the next step after the last elections is Media Laws\nReform Toward an Ethical Media, of which they don’t think is wishful thinking\nanymore. So they are holding a forum for\nthe two topics on Sat and Sun 12.30pm respectively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Collision 5: Meanwhile, the Malaysian Academic Idol Dr\nFarish Noor gives a talk titled “The Lost Tribes of Malaysia: The\nConstruction of ‘Race’ in Colonial Malaya and Its Enduring Traces Today”.\nHow to resist that? It’s everybody’s wet dream to be deconstructed by Farish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Which is\nyour favorite?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n My favourite? Your birthday party, of course!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Also, I have arranged to give a few free lots to some\nNGOs, including WAO and Empower Malaysia, to give them opportunities to\ninteract with the public as well as artists. Another one of them is Food Not\nBombs, which feed the homeless on Sundays. Well, I have given a performance art\nidea to them called Burst My Bubbles. Basically, they will get people to wear\nbubble wraps, and invite the public to donate money for opportunities to burst\nthe bubbles on the wearer. But before that, the wearer must write down a bubble\nthat needs bursting, for example, “Malaysia is heading towards a\ndemocracy”, or “We have racial harmony” or “Arts will save\nus.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Who, or\nwhat, inspires you?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Toni Kasim, whose inspiration knows no bounds. Please\nget well Toni!<\/p>\n\n\n\n What’s the\nworst thing that could happen at Arts For Grabs?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Crowd control nightmare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What\nadvice do you have for people planning to lepak at The Annexe during my\nbirthday weekend?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Buy more presents for Yasmin, fellas! If you don’t\nlike her, make her wear the bubble wrap and burst her bubbles!<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is\nthe local arts’ best kept secret?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n That it exists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Which hero\nare you coming to the 6th<\/sup> Annual Boh Cameronian Arts Awards as?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The Malaysian voter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What is\nyour one and only weakness?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n My mortality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What’s the\nmost productive thing you can do in 60 seconds?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Stare at something utterly meaningless, and yet strangely pretty, that I have stumbled upon on some street corner somewhere and enjoy our both being unproductively there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n ~ <\/p>\n\n\n\n First Published: 02.05.2008 on Kakiseni <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pang Khee Teik, writer, photographer, program director at The Annexe, and former editor of Kakiseni takes time out from his decadent life to give us Kakisenians some friendly advice, pass on some birthday greetings, and talk about the ‘do’ this coming weekend at The Annexe. Caution, reading ahead means you risk exposure to extreme Pang-isms, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"iawp_total_views":7,"footnotes":""},"categories":[34,3558,3541,3537,3539],"tags":[3645,2844,3668,228,3669,3621,722],"language":[7523],"writer":[7638],"class_list":["post-27262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-interview","category-literature","category-music-2","category-visual-arts","tag-arts-for-grab","tag-centre-for-independent-journalism","tag-farish-noor","tag-interview","tag-joe-kidd","tag-pang-khee-teik","tag-the-annexe-gallery","language-english","writer-yasmin-zetti-martin"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27262"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27262\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39243,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27262\/revisions\/39243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27262"},{"taxonomy":"language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/language?post=27262"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/writer?post=27262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}