The first question Janet Pillai asks\nme when she sees me is: “Have you finished your folio yet?” Even now,\nshe is moving very fast around the music practice area of Universiti Sains\nMalaysia ABM-AMBRO, sternly asking the same of every young-ish looking person\n(and unsuspecting members of the press). “Haveyoufinishedyourfolioyet?\nHaveyoufinishedyourfolioyet? No, you’re doing it. Don’t do it here, do it over\nthere! Don’t use a pencil — use pens! Use crayons! Use colours!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Janet Pillai seems to be one heck of\na busy lady. It is not for nothing that she is declared an Amazing Malaysian by\nDiGi and nicknamed Madamme Heritage Heboh of Penang. When she is not running\naround teaching theatre at USM, she is running around conducting workshops like\nYoung Theatre Penang (for finding your child’s inner all-rounded performer) and\nAnak-anak Kota (for finding your child’s inner heritage conservationist). What\nshe is doing these few days (Mar 11- 15, 2006) is a little special. She has\nmeshed both programmes into one — teaching kids to do performances about\nheritage. But who on earth is paying for such meaningful projects? For Young\nTheatre Penang and Anak-anak Kota, Janet receives money from the State Cultural\nCouncil and the Penang Educational Consultative Council respectively. This time\nhowever, telco company DiGi is funding the workshops, the recruitment drive,\nthe subsequent performances, and even the flying of reporters into Penang\n(luckily for them, I’m just across the bridge).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I get the chance to steal some\ntime off Janet, one of the first things I wanted to know is: whutadilly about\nthe folios? Janet’s folios are determined not to be the average Malaysian\nschool kid’s folios — they are to comprise of collages, photographs,\ndrawings… basically retraining and teaching them how to think out of the box.\nThey’re kind of like homework, to gauge how much the students have learnt day\nby day, but unlike mathematics, you can’t just copy somebody else’s answers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The folios are about the Historical\nWalk these participants had done the day before. And in spite of the torturous\nheat wave that’s been plaguing Penang lately, they had done it on foot. Janet\nwanted the participants to “get used to the idea of working under the hot\nsun,” as this was a necessary part of her projects. But can they take it?\nSays 11-year old Teow Pei Sing: “Even though I felt tired and bored, I\nlearnt a lot… Ms. Ho [Sheau Fung, the visual arts facilitator] and I were\nextremely thirsty, so she bought two packets of drinks from the coffee shop one\nfor me and one for her. We got here at two, and went home at five. Wow, this\nwalk is so cool!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Madame “Heritage\nHeboh” of Penang programme is now in its Discovery phase (one of three\nphases in all DiGi’s Amazing Malaysians projects, the other two being\nImplementation and Showcase). This is when the participants are made aware of\nthe importance of the project they are about to embark on and also given the\nopportunity to pull out if they choose to. There are around 80 participants\nranging from Standard 5 to Form 6 in the respective workshops: music – \u201cJourney\nof Sound”; dance – “Gerak-gerak Borak-borak”; and visual arts – “Wayang\nBayang-bayang”. The facilitators are in the process of narrowing down the\nnumbers before proceeding with the three months of intensive workshops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is also nice to see that Janet\nhas not forgotten those who aren’t talented enough to make the cut during\nauditions by letting them be documenters. Boring as documenting sounds, the job\nis actually pretty cool, as Andrea (13, from St. George’s Girls School) and\nAndrea (16, from SMK Permatang Rawa) can testify. Working as documenters, the\nyoungsters pick up camera, video and other interesting skills, besides\nexperimenting with different ways of presenting the information collected —\nwhether in the form of posters, writing, or even puppets! “I can get\nfirst-hand experience of what journalism is like, which can help me decide my\ncareer options later!” enthused one of the Andreas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The majority of the participants\nbelong to the “Journey of Sound” group. The rest are spread between\n“Gerak-gerak Borak-borak”, with approximately 20 participants, and\n“Wayang Bayang-bayang”, which has the least – 15. Though ninety-nine\npercent of the project participants are from the arts stream, this doesn’t\nguarantee they know how to draw. Janet attributes this to many budding visual\nartists being lost to the science stream.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eventually we arrive at the Cheah\nKongsi where Penang’s budding young artists (or what is left of them) are\nlistening to a lecture on the artistic elements of Penang architecture by David\nYeo. The children seem very quiet, as if attending lessons at school. They come\nalive later during fieldwork as they walk down the street to the Khoo Kongsi —\nto admire the fine architecture, or rather, to learn to admire the fine\narchitecture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Visual art facilitator Ho Sheau Fung\nexplains that the students are going to recreate one of the stories on the\npanels (either Yang Xiang Wrestling The\nTiger To Save His Father<\/em> or Wang\nXiang Lying On Ice For Carp<\/em>, both from The\n24 Paragons of Filial Piety<\/em>) in the form of wayang kulit and perform it\nduring the Discovery Launch on Wed Mar 15. “We’re not going to do the\ntraditional Ramayana sort of wayang kulit… that takes a lot of time and skill\nand it’s very hard to master. What we’re going to do is a simplified form…\nutilising Chinese, Indian, Muslim, European and contemporary influences,”\nsays David. “The result at the end of these three months should be\nsomething fresh, different.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n For 14 year-old Mun Hoe from SMJK\nChung Ling Penang, the Madame “Heritage Heboh” project gives him a\nbetter perspective of Penang heritage compared to the week-long Anak-anak Kota\nproject he had participated in previously. “I didn\u2019t get to learn the\nstories behind the artwork then, it was more of visiting heritage sites and\ndrawing what we saw there, learning the technical aspects. This is more fun,\nand I think it will help me a lot in my sejarah homework.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Use your imagination<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n I get back to Penang island the next\nday (Tuesday). The “Journey of Sound” children at USM had gone off\nthe day before to “collect sounds” at Market Street and are now\nsupposed to do a group composition by replicating the sounds, noises and\nsnippets of conversation they had collected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I manage to grab hold of music\nfacilliator Dr. Tan Sooi Beng. Dr. Tan is a music lecturer in USM and like\nDavid, has been working together with Janet for close to 20 years. Watching the\nparticipants run around to the deafening shouts and screams, I can’t help but\nnotice the infectious energy radiating about the building. Heck, I want to join\nin and start screaming as well. “They have a lot of energy,” agrees\nDr. Tan with a smile. “Music gives them a sense of confidence.” When\ntalking to the press later, Janet stresses that music is an alternative tool\nfor expression, just as art can be a tool for education, to stimulate\ncreativity and learning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr. Tan prefers the phrase The Music of Sound<\/em> to The Sound of Music<\/em>. “Music is all\naround us, and we are going to teach them how to make music using the elements\nof music from our environment.” Instead of musical instruments, the\nparticipants are taught to make music with everyday utensils, and then to\ndevelop an ear for interesting but hardly noticeable sounds from everyday life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A sense of rhythm is essential for\nthe music participants. Soon, I find myself watching a young girl struggling to\nreplicate the rhythm of monetary exchange among traders by jiggling coins in a\nMilo tin … and getting rather frustrated. Dr. Tan is on hand of course,\ncoaxing the girl to “use your imagination”. No success. Keep on\ntrying. Eventually, the coins are abandoned in favour of reproducing\nflour-making sounds through role play — with the children pretending to be\nrice, machine, as well as the flour squealing with laughter while exiting the\nmachine. Elsewhere, little groups of young people are making music out of\nspoons and forks, broken senduk, Milo tins. The disorganised din had me\nsomewhat worried — at the rate things are going, how will they be able to put\ntogether a show by tomorrow evening?<\/p>\n\n\n\n You’re just dancing?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, at the Actors’ Studio\nGreenhall with the “Gerak-gerak Borak-borak” gang, two groups of\nyoung dancers are attempting to choreograph their pieces for the launch, but I\nam not able to make out what they were doing. One group in particular seems to\ntake the floor for a drum. The funky beat is very cool and contemporary, but\nthe dance appears more MTV than a roti canai-teh tarik dance. At least that is\nwhat they are supposed to be doing. Twelve year-old Amirul, who appears to be a\nmost natural drummer, doesn’t care: “I boleh menari seperti sotong dan\nsaya suka menari seperti itu lagi.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Janet is very busy with the other team: “Spin on your butts! Then Up! Bounce up! Nonono, not like this… That’s not spinning…” These young people had visited the famous Goddess of Mercy temple the day before. Now they have to convert the sights and sounds of the temple into dance. I can’t understand the spinning on butts, so I asked them. This is what they say: “You know, it’s like when you start a dance you can’t just start dancing, you need some sort of introduction.” So it doesn’t mean anything in particular? “No.” But what are you trying to do through your dance? Are you telling a story? “Nope.\u00a0We’re just taking the people’s movements we saw at the temple and then we just put them together to make a dance lah!” So that’s what you’re doing? You’re just dancing? *Unanimous nodding of heads*<\/p>\n\n\n\n “At the moment we are not doing\nin-depth teaching just yet,” explains Janet. “They are supposed to\nobserve the behaviour of people at the temple and put it together with the\nrhythm and beat. In the future, we will train them how to develop a viewpoint\non the things they see and express that opinion through their dance.”\nJanet believes that all forms of theatre must have a function, to get people,\nboth audience and performers, to reflect on their lives. “Take the Taoist\npraying at the temple for instance. They can dance that in such a way to make\nthe audience question themselves: ‘Who\nare we praying to? Why are we praying?’… All theatre must have a\nfunction.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am a firm believer in the power of youth. Despite having sat through just-plain\u00ad-awful inter-school drama competitions, I am lucky to have seen enough magical performances by young people to confirm my belief in them. Apparently, Janet Pillai and DiGi believe in them too, as emphasised by the PR personnel: “the DiGi’s Amazing Malaysians project is targeted at children in particular. Who will continue to fight for the arts, who will carry on the conservation work?” The purpose of the DiGi’s Amazing Malaysians project was to educate the future generation of young Malaysians about their roots and culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the past, Digi’s dual mission of heritage awareness and children outreach used to merge in a one day affair. That quickly proved too little time for either. According to the press release: “When DiGi evolved its CSR [Corporate Social Responsibility] programme from the one-day culture workshops it held under the DiGi Yellow Mobile banner to the three-month Amazing Malaysians project, one contributing reason was to be able to ensure the projects create lasting change in the participants and, hopefully, even in the communities they come from.” Janet, who has earned the love of children across Malaysia, some of whom have grown up and gone on to take up careers in the creative line, is certainly a no-brainer choice. The other Amazing Malaysians this year are Bishan Singh (The Champion of Pahang’s Lake Chini); Eddin Khoo (The Shadow Player of Kelantan); Rashid Esa (The Woodcraft Warrior of Selangor); and Laurence Loh (The Heritage Architect of Kedah). Each of them have to design a project in their field involving up to 100 children. Last year’s Amazing Malaysians and their prot\u00e9g\u00e9s had so far staged an evening of Melanau dance and music in Sarawak, a lion dance and 24 drums performance in Johor, rebuilt a 100-year-old kampong house in Terengganu, and created a wetlands garden and resource centre in Perak.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What a journey!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The evening starts off on an\noptimistic note as screams and peals of laughter catch my ear as I arrive at\nSMK Convent Light Street for the Discovery Launch. The participants are\ngathered in one of the courtyards and cooking up a fuss over their Penang-style\ncooking. “I think the Char Kuey Teow and Hokkien Mee are trying their best\nto be Char Kuey Teow and Hokkien Mee,” comments Chee Pok Jin, the Chief\nMarketing Officer for DiGi. “The rest are rather bland.” Whether or\nnot the food is edible is hardly the point, more importantly, the participants\nare changing… Some previously quiet, introverted youngsters are more open and\nconfident than before, and Pei Sing from the “Wayang Bayang-bayang”\ngroup who complained that he could not understand Malay is now best friends\nwith Hamizal. Maybe the Malaysian government should think of recruiting Janet\nPillai and her crew to be national service trainers!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Showtime began when the “Wayang\nBayang-bayang” group station themselves behind a white screen to present\ntheir take on Yang Xiang Wrestling The\nTiger To Save His Father<\/em>. The students had warned me beforehand that\n“our puppets are not that good” — I beg to differ. The fluidity of\nthe presentation is slightly affected as the participants have difficulty\ncontrolling the puppets, but it is an entertaining show nonetheless. As is\ntypical of student sketches, the dialogue is rather contrived at some parts and\nthere is a liberal dose of slapstick (especially when the tiger grabbed Yang\nXiang’s father and jiggled about the screen roaring). Yet somehow, these kids\nmanage to engage the audience and carry them along the waves of the story with\nthe help of an open-air stage, cardboard puppets, and a na\u00efve but refreshing\nsense of humour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then the agile dancers charm the\naudience with their graceful adaptation of their sightseeing experience at the\nKuan Yin temple. Their mesmerising, seductive movements — selling joss sticks,\npraying, fortune sticks, mediums in a trance — are all improvised upon and\nsewn together in a tapestry of liquid whirls and glides. (No butt-spinning, by\nthe way.) I am amazed to see that the rattling of the fortune sticks is\nactually reproduced by hands clapping very fast! One dancer in particular, Ong\nHuey Huey from Methodist Boy’s School, catches my eye. “I combined what I\nsaw with some Siamese influences, using my own experiences from praying in\nSiamese temples. They [the facilitators] told us to imagine, and add in some\nideas of our own, so I did that because I’m half-Siamese.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The roti canai-teh tarik crew is next,\nand soon the audience is bobbing along to the funky beats (this time on Milo\ntin drums). Who woulda thought tossing roti canai was so cool! Energy levels\nare on an all time high and this group of young performers is evidently the\naudience favourite. Between them, the two groups of dancers have managed to\ncapture some vivid images of modern-day Penang, and not just touristy Cuti-cuti\nMalaysia stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The final performance of the night\nis an ensemble piece by the music group, who proceeds to take the audience on a\n“Journey of Sound” around Penang. And what a journey! Probably worth\na dozen Manglish-speaking tour guides put together. The variety of sounds\nreplicated is astounding and I gasped and tried (but failed) to identify the\n“instruments” as we travelled aurally to the Kuan Yin temple, an\nold-fashioned kopitiam, a spice factory. To think that I was just wondering how\nthey were going to even put up a half-decent performance the day before!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now all there is left to do is three more months of workshopping. All these creativity and energy will climax on July 15 in a street festival called Heritage Heboh. The children (after today, only about 60 are chosen\/remain) will be performing in Little India, and then inside the Teochew Association, then along Pitt Street and finally at Khoo Kongsi. Janet Pillai’s biggest concern, however, are not the youngsters. She wants audiences: “We want to get inner-city residents out of their house and out of their TV habits — to come out to the streets and watch what they are not normally used to.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n ~~~ <\/p>\n\n\n\n First Published: 30.03.2006 on Kakiseni <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The first question Janet Pillai asks me when she sees me is: “Have you finished your folio yet?” Even now, she is moving very fast around the music practice area of Universiti Sains Malaysia ABM-AMBRO, sternly asking the same of every young-ish looking person (and unsuspecting members of the press). “Haveyoufinishedyourfolioyet? Haveyoufinishedyourfolioyet? No, you’re doing […]<\/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":3,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7760,7758,7781,7770,7763,7778,7764,7762,7766],"tags":[922,844,4449,4446,4457,591,4058,636,501,234,4458,639,4061,4448,2762,845,4455,4447,780,3909,4456,4451,4454,4445,40,506,4452,4450,4453,3175,46,2099,2098,3604,2841],"language":[7785],"writer":[7976],"class_list":["post-27930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-seni-bina","category-artikel","category-seni","category-budaya","category-tarian","category-perayaan","category-muzik","category-teater","category-seni-visual","tag-anak-anak-kota","tag-arts","tag-bishan-singh","tag-cheah-kongsi","tag-chee-pok-jin","tag-children","tag-corporate-social-responsibility-csr","tag-csr","tag-culture","tag-dance","tag-david-yeo","tag-digi","tag-digis-amazing-malaysians","tag-dr-tan-sooi-beng","tag-eddin-khoo","tag-heritage","tag-heritage-heboh","tag-ho-sheau-fung","tag-janet-pillai","tag-khoo-kongsi","tag-kuan-yin-temple","tag-laurence-loh","tag-little-india","tag-madamme-heritage-heboh-of-penang","tag-music","tag-penang","tag-pitt-street","tag-rashid-esa","tag-teochew-association","tag-the-actors-studio-greenhall","tag-theatre","tag-universiti-sains-malaysia","tag-usm","tag-visual-arts","tag-young-theatre-penang","language-inggeris","writer-jerome-kugan-ms"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27930","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=27930"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27930\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39045,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27930\/revisions\/39045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27930"},{"taxonomy":"language","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/language?post=27930"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/myartmemoryproject.com\/ms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/writer?post=27930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}