Chingay Preview

Chingay Preview was on tonight! And to make it in time for the performance, I had to skip a lecture that I originally had this afternoon. And it also appears that something important was announced in that lecture (from the emails that I have been receiving from my class group), which means that I have more trouble and more things to catch up on =.=

But anyways, back to the topic. We were late when we arrived at JAS, even though we had originally planned to leave early, no thanks to a couple of people who suddenly decide to have lunch in school at 2pm when we're expected over at JAS at 3pm and some food is expected to be provided at around 4-5pm. Oh well.

The first thing that we did when we finally arrived was to get our makeup done. The preview and actual parade itself requires all performers to have full makeup, unlike the full dress rehearsal where we can make do with some with makeup. Following which, we changed into our costumes and assembled in the ballroom for some briefing and announcements, followed by a short final session of practice where everyone got a chance to practice at least once.

We left for the actual venue and arrived at around 6pm. We first went to take a walk around to look at the floats that are participating in this year's Chingay. We meaning me and my friends of course, and not the entire JAS contingent. After spending some time walking around, and talking and wasting time after that, we were called to the main stage for the Chingay parade to be part of the opening ceremony.

Being part of the opening ceremony means standing there, and basically, making noise and look happy and have fun. It's not really a bad thing, and is actually quite fun. But having to listen to the Malay(?) percussion group playing on their drums for such a long time as we wait and go through what is to be done is indeed a bit irritating. Not to mention that halfway through the preparations, we were told to exit the stage and were lead around the main building to a place where we have to go through metal detectors and get our belongings checked o.o

We were then lead to another room where we rested for a while - really a while, perhaps not more than 5 minutes, and were once again lead back onto the stage, to stand and wait again =.=

Our guest-of-honour arrived about 30 minutes later than the expected starting time of the parade, but what can be expected? He is after all, the guest-of-honour and we're all used to them being late. In case you don't know, the guest-of-honour of the night is our Prime Minister! Perhaps that's why we had to go through metal detectors and get our belongings checked since we're going to be able to get so close to him. Well, just a hunch =P

A pleasant, but rather noisy, in fact, deafening surprise today was that we actually had firecrackles on the preview day. And deafening they were. We were on the stage for the firecrackles the year before, and tonight, we were on the ground in front of the stage, but still, the firecrackles sounded a lot louder tonight. It was impossible to hear anything else other than the firecrackles after they went off and there was also this humming noise in the ears, almost like the upper limit for noise had been exceeded. Many of us ended up having to keep our hands on our ears to reduce the intensity of the noise and prevent our eardrums from bursting =x

Unfortunately, the parade itself tonight was actually quite badly done. Organisation was poor, and there was chaos along the route, with MCs saying the wrong things for the wrong performers, and music that was out-of-sync resulting in chaotic dances. We were also in pretty much a state of confusion as we went down the route, not knowing where were actually stages where we have to stop and perform, and where were just mere stop points where we have to wait for the groups in front to finish their performances and move on. Perhaps the rather noisy percussion group that happened to be right before us played a part too, with their drums drowning out the music from our float...

But, all in all, it was still a fun night, though tiring. There's still the actual parade left tomorrow night, so let's rest well and do our best tomorrow! There's also the post-parade celebration back at JAS for us to look forward to^^

ああああぁぁぁぁ、疲れた。。。本当に。今夜はチンゲイパレードがあった。

そして、パレードでいろいろなことがあった。詳しいことはもうすでに上の英語の部分に書いてあるので、ここはもうかけない。今の日本語のレベルも書きたくてもなかなか書けない。とにかく、カオスだった、パレードは。

それでは、今夜はもう休むだね。たっぷり休んで、寝て、明日の最後のパレードも精一杯やってやろう！

その後のこと（祝賀会）も楽しみにしてる～♪