WAWAS! - Credits and Epilogue

--Advisory: This is a Very Long Post.--

At the end of every great undertaking, there are always people to thank. I thank these people here for the photos: Aidil, Hadis, Haddad, and Jeff ("Thank God you guys took the correct photos!" ;)

Full albums are available from sangsingapurba.multiply.com. Some of the photos were taken from our blog (sangsingapurba.blogspot.com). Whoever took those photos, thanks!

Here are some photos I had selected that did not make it into the main text:

The Wawas team with the people of Stor Teater and DBP in the first row, the people who helped us greatly in making it Happen. Encik Harun is second from left, and Cikgu Hasnah is in center. The rest I don't know. Thanks guys!


Myself with my grandparents, parents, granduncle etc. after the second performance, with the legendary Yusnor Ef thrown in for good measure. My parents and grandparents came all the way from Johor to watch Wawas! I cannot thank them enough for supporting us. (And I think stage makeup looks horrendous in normal lighting!)


Deep in concentration, making music. Except for Adillah. ("Thank God!")

And finally, in a moment of folly, the pièce de résistance!

Below is a video of the New Year Fireworks. It is 9 minutes long!! Courtesy of womad (which is Haddad).




Unfortunately we left behind the WAWAS poster in Stor Teater! It was in a storage space under the audience seating platforms. A souvenir to the good people of Stor Teater, I suppose it will be.

Sang Singa Purba has gone on to other things. We will have a production called PN08, coming in late 2008. It is still in its nascent stages, though.

There has been talk of staging WAWAS! in singapore, but no news has been heard about it so far (PN08 is the primary issue on our radar). Nonetheless, it is still a possibility!


Wangsa SSP has been formed! SSP's dance section finally has an official name and logo, with the motto "Tarikan Kayanganmu". (Dunno how to translate, but it has an ethereal quality about it.) (Pardon the bad quality of the image. It was the least I could find. It's supposed to be on an all-white background.)

Just recently the preliminary orientations have been completed for the new cubs who are entering SSP this year. Some promising talents, no doubt, of which we may discover more during the coming SSP Orientation camp.

Muzikarama 2008 coming up!

And that's all. Stay tuned!

WAWAS! - "Thank God We Are Safely in Singapore!"

--19 of 19--

We are now at Woodlands Checkpoint, Singapore, waiting in line for Customs checks. Due to the impossibly large size of my accordion bag, I cannot go through the self-service passport check line (it's more fun scanning your passport yourself, what with the thumbprints and gates).

Imagine my horror earlier when I got off the bus and saw my accordion bag deposited upside-down on the road beside the bus! It had fallen out of the luggage compartment when the uncle opened it, I gather. It was nobody's fault; the uncle was already on the other side when it fell, attending to the luggage compartments there (I suppose). I was the first person off the bus. No serious damage was done, just a dented grille, which would require some knocking inside with a hammer. What a souvenir to bring back home after 9 days in KL!

After heaving our bags through Customs, we go through the corridors to the taxi stand. Before that, we bade farewell to some of us who would follow the bus to Beach Road, going home by themselves.

There was a bunch of keys hanging from a road sign by the taxi stand. Whatever were they for? Hadis put forward a lot of absurd suggestions, the most implausible being that they were for some rich driver who owns all the cars parked on this road--just take one and go! We never knew the real explanation for them.

Soon, Aidil's parents came in a van, helping to send home those of us who lived near his area. Our props go into it as well. One by one we left, in our respective vehicles, until only a handful of us remained. My parents came, my accordion bag and luggage was somehow fitted into the boot of our car, and we said goodbyes to whoever was left of the SSP WAWAS! contingent waiting by the roadside. "Send our regards to your parents!"

And so we departed.

"Thank God we are back home!"

WAWAS! - "Tooooo the Lion City!" and Reminiscences

--18 of 19--

And now it was finally time to make our way to the bus stop and board our bus. Laden with our bags and our shopping, we crossed a bridge to the other side of the road where a simple bus was waiting. We had great expectations, but this would do. At least the bus had 3 seats per row, a benchmark of quality.

There were complications as to the arrangement of luggage in the bottom compartment, but we managed to settle it in good time. I sat in the second row along with Zalinah and Haddad. We bade goodbye to Encik Harun and Cikgu (she studies here) and the bus glided into traffic. We were on our way home!


I had time to scribble a few sentences in my black book until dusk set upon us, rendering me unable to see. We shared tidbits, drinks and even ice-cream!--from Zalinah, and we three in the second row passed it among ourselves, making sure the bus driver did not see, because as far as we knew, only mineral water was allowed in the bus. By tacit consent, it was made sure no one behind us saw either, else the ice-cream would finish in a blink.

Some two hours later we reached a resting point. Within it was a tidbit supermarket, filled to the brim with crackers, cuttlefish, fish snacks, drink, and sweets! Its sole purpose was to provide customers with tidbits, and tidbits only, so no detergent or diapers here. Most were sold in gigantic packs. No such thing as "take a little bit" here. You take all or you take none.

After toilet breaks, burgers, drinks and tidbits, we were off again.

I remember some of the things we did which I did not have space for in this chronicle. Call this an Appendix if you will!

Let's see what we have here. I recall with some amusement the "Thank God!" affair with Adillah, when she was spotted in her room speaking on the phone, with a photo of her boyfriend in front of her, on which was written the words "Thank God I found you!" She was playfully reminded of it to no end!

We had the rare opportunity of playing a gamelan set in the middle of our rehearsals, thanks to Encik Harun, who granted us permission to do so. It was located in the foyer of the Dewan Bahasa and Pustaka itself, right in front of the hall doors.

Then there was Jeff, who burst out into laughter in the middle of his prayers at a comment made by Didi. He recovered and resumed. Suddenly he dropped out of his prayers *again*! Seeing as we were watching a video of the second performance on Haddad's laptop, he simply could not concentrate on his prayers!

There were also spoonerisms reported, concerning Mai and Jad (short form for Jihad). They were mispronounced as Mad and Jai.

WAWAS! - The Last Day (And Last-Minute Shopping at Times Square)

--17 of 19--

To cut a long story short, at around noon we had uprooted ourselves, packed everything, cleared the bathrooms, and went downstairs to Stor Teater to get the props we had left there. We didn't know what to do with the fruits that Cikgu had given us some days ago (Foods To Preserve Your Voice, I presume) so we arranged them neatly on the dressing table along with some tidbits as a token of appreciation for the Mama Indias who had been so helpful throughout our stay.

Downstairs Didi realized he hadn't taken a photo of himself with the Wisma Puspanita sign beside the road, and so there we were in the middle of the road (in the road divider at the turn) snapping pictures. He also made amends with me over the row we had yesterday, good man.

With Stor Teater duly emptied, we set off for Times Square. (I do not remember where we had breakfast, or even if we had any breakfast at all.)

We reached Times Square in disjointed groups. I daresay it was because some bags were so heavy they impeded the walk of their owners. I was one of the first to reach there, because this damned accordion bag is killing me! It is always an exhaustive prospect to carry my accordion over long distances. Haddad volunteered to take care of our bags and encouraged us to find some lunch for ourselves. The rest were beginning to arrive by now.

After a spot of window shopping and scouting for prices (too expensive), I went back down to the bags, saw some of us eating McDonald's, enquired as to its origins, and went off to search for it on the fifth floor. Jihad, Mai and Haddad were already there, standing in the queue.

The indoor roller coaster there defied description! Loops and turns wound their way all around the pillars of the mall. I heard that Jeff, Hadis, Zana and Asmida had plans to ride on it. (I do not know if they eventually did.)

After lunch there was *more* window shopping, this time for clothes and accessories. Shamil selected a pair of skinny jeans, a very interesting decision on his part, and I chose a blue cap. The rest of us, when we met up downstairs, had purchased many kinds of things like jackets, shoes, bags and other accoutrements.

I sneaked off to the reputed location of a prop shop, on the 5th floor, courtesy of a tip-off by Haddad, who had passed it earlier. There were severed hands, legs, heads, and several different kinds of masks, but none were up to my expectations, so I abandoned the shop.

WAWAS! - Concerning Our Sleeping Habits

--16 of 19--

There is nothing much to say at this point. Once we were safely in our bunks we did the usual routine of either bathe/slack/or sleep, which we had been doing for the past seven nights. It was a completely open affair, everyone mingling about, an open-door policy. I made sure the mosquito coil, which was usually placed at the foot of my bed, was placed outside. Yesterday I had awoken with a tremendous cough in the middle of the night, and it was suspected that the smoke from the mosquito coil was the culprit. Hoping that tomorrow (our last day, our departure day!) would go well, I left my friends to their own devices and went to bed.

Dawn broke the next morning. A lot of us were firmly settled in our beds. Usual air of somnolence. Some of us were already up and running, most were still snoozing. Our sole agenda for the day was to go home, nothing else. We can do anything we want before that, but at 6.30pm, the bus leaves.

At this point I would like to bring to your attention the idiosyncrasies of our sleeping habits. During the night some days ago, we all could not sleep owing to the presence of Aizat's melodious snoring. Imagine our surprise when suddenly in the middle of this snoring came the mumbled words "air stewardess...". We greatly wonder what it was that made him say that! A very memorable dream, perhaps?

Shamil also. He was scratching up and down when suddenly he did the "pull to heart" action in our Intro. A novel way of rehearsing!

In waking up we also have our habits. Nizal, upon rousing him out of sleep, would start! Then he will slowly fall back to sleep. Wake him up a second time and he would start! again, then fall back to sleep. He is not one of those who are easy to awake, it seems.

Hadis is another matter altogether. He would wake up, look around with an extremely puffy face from sleep, then go back to sleep. Again he would awake, and look around sleepily. How would you know he was awake? Well, he would start to dance. (To the rousing music from Jihad's speakers.) Well *now* he's awake!

As for me, I have been sighted sleeping with my arms crossed in a professional manner. Very interesting!

WAWAS! - "What? The LRT Station is Closed?!"

--15 of 19--


We sat in a corner away from the drizzle, wondering what to do next. There was some talk of getting a foot massage at the nearest reflexologist. Zalinah, Aizat, Sarah and Nadiah, among others, were fine with that idea--but at this time? It was past twelve; no doubt there would be plenty of late night reflexologists in Bukit Bintang, but the whole idea seemed somewhat far-fetched. But they were determined to go, so we wished them a good journey, and off they went.

The rest of us were still left with no subsequent course of action.

Minor commotion over a cockroach in our midst. It came from the bushes behind the fountain. Nearly everyone shifted to the other side, quite unsettled.

The Foot Massage Group reported to us the closure of KLCC LRT Station. I thought it still had an hour of service? The Group had hailed a taxi to get to their reflexologist. Impossible, Malaysian transport is! We at KLCC decided to take taxis as well.

The new woman in the MRT is terrible! She switches accents mid-sentence and enunciates letters much too clearly! The "Going to Johor Bahru?" announcement in the Woodlands area is particularly hair-raising. It appears to be an imitation of the old woman, but she says it much too suggestively, in my view. Why "Doors Are Closing" when she could very well say "Doors Closing"? (Maybe I should blame the scriptwriter for that.) The announcement at Jurong East when the North-South train pulls into the station is also particularly long-winded. But to her credit, her "Yew Tee" is quite good, can make it. However I much prefer the old woman.

Continue.

We were discussing possible locations for taxi-hailing. Walking along a back road leading away from the LRT station, Jihad and Hadis hailed every taxi in our path, but they either quoted extravagant fares or didn't know the way to Wisma Puspanita. We were getting quite tired. I was especially concerned over Didi with his injured knee. He was quite irritable earlier, entering into a minor row with me over transport. Having no luck getting a taxi along this back road, we trudged solemnly further down.

At long last, we reached a main road, and a taxi stand. A series of explosions were heard. I thought for a moment that it was some sort of terrorist attack! (I was feeling quite morbid.) We never did find out their origin.

A few unsuccessful hailings later, I was ensconced in a taxi along with Suhaila and Aidil. The journey was uneventful.