Written by: Ricky Chia
Lantern Festival is hosted in
celebration of the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival, which is one of the major
holidays and festivals to be celebrated on the Chinese calendar. It is
typically a night filled with candle lights and music, with families gathering
under the full moon, gazing upon the stars, with the elders telling a story
about the legend of Chang Er and the children listening intently. The
atmosphere of this time of the year would cause some of the students currently
residing in Subang Jaya for their studies, far away from home, become homesick
and making them feel poignant.
That
was one of the main reasons why we hosted this event on the 5th of
October 2012, to make them and everyone else experience the enjoyment of being
around loved ones and people that appreciate the festival. We think that everyone
should have the experience or relive the experience of celebrating the
Mid-Autumn Festival.
Another reason we hosted this event
is for the 1 Taylor’s Community – BARIO project, which is a charity project to
construct hostels and to increase the chances of orphans in Sarawak to enter
primary school. All of the profits gained from the sales of tickets were
donated to this project and hopefully this would brighten the future of those
orphans. In addition, we had also set up booths in front of LT1 to sell food
that are typically eaten during the Mid-Autumn Festival such as mooncakes, tang
yuan, and herbal jelly to further enhance the students’ experience with the
event and to make further profits. We would also like to thank Overseas for
sponsoring the mooncakes for the day and Yeo’s for sponsoring the packet drinks.
Two other blogshops, Sparkles Fly in The Sky and Egg2 Yolk, also
joined in their effort for this project, donating part of their profit from the
sales of their products to the BARIO project.
The itinerary of the day was as
follows:
Time
|
Activity
|
12pm-2pm
|
Candle making
|
2pm-4.30pm
|
Break
|
4.30pm-5pm
|
Paper lilies making
|
5pm-6pm
|
Mini games
|
6pm-7pm
|
Dinner
|
7pm-8pm
|
Performance
|
8pm-9pm
|
Celebration
|
During the candle making session,
the participants were divided into several groups and were allocated different
time slots to accommodate all of them. Four separate stoves were set up so four
separate teams could make candles simultaneously. The participants used vinegar
and shredded soap to make the candles. Although majority of the participants
failed to make a proper candle, most of them had fun and enjoyed the process in
the end.
After the long break, the event
moved onto the Experimental Theatre at Level 2. Although few participants
turned up for the paper lily making activity, only a fraction of those who
signed up, the activity still went on. It involved making paper lilies that
could be the base of their candles if it were let to float in the lake, to
create an effect as if the paper lilies were glowing in the darkness. The paper
lilies were made from different coloured papers which were cut into squares
that can be folded into the shape of a lily.
During the mini games, the
participants were divided into 4 groups and a total of two games were played
instead of 3 due to time constraint. In the first game, the participants had to
face their back towards a faraway bucket filled with ice and candy, where their
team members needed to guide them towards the bucket in order to take the
candy. The first team to gather 5 green, 5 purple and 5 pink candies from the
bucket wins. However, the catch was that there was another 15 white candies
inside the bucket along with the other 15, and each participant was only
allowed 5 tries, where during each try, participants could only take one candy
out of the bucket. It was a challenging game but nonetheless, many of the
participants enjoyed themselves and some even found the cold water soothing
from the scorching heat of the afternoon. On top of that, the participants were
allowed to eat the candy as soon as they finish gathering the candy from the
bucket, which was a little prize in itself from completing this mini game.
The second game played for that day
is a game called “Chain of Charades” where the members of a team would stand together in a line, and the first
person was given something to act out - for example, “James Bond doing Gangnam
Style”, to the next person. The second person will then need to act out what
the first person acted out to the third person. The person standing at the back
will then have to guess what the phrase is. The groups came out one by one with
the other three groups being the audience. Needless to say, laughter from
everyone echoed across the small Experiment Theatre where the game was held.
Even though there was no prize given out for the teams that successfully
guessed the correct answer, everybody had a good time and a good laugh together.
After the mini games ended, it was
dinner time which consisted of fried rice, vegetables and fried chicken and
packet drinks sponsored by Yeo’s. While the participants took a break and had
their dinner, the event helpers then prepared for the much awaited
performances, which were provided by our Taylor’s University Music Club,
Chinese Society Club and the Bioscience Club as well.
The performance started off with the
Music Club, performing two Chinese songs for our audience. The second act for
the night was a number performed by a member of the Chinese Society Club, a
very popular pop song, “Call Me Maybe” originally performed by Carly Rae
Jepsen. While the performance was ongoing with the audience joining in the fun
of singing along to the melody, they had no idea what was in store for them. After
the emcee came out to introduce the second act, a mysterious man came out dressed
in a hoodie, shushed the emcee and chased the emcee off the spotlight just to
put a radio on the floor.
Then
he pressed the play button.
A
resounding “Para-para Sakura” by Aaron Kwok came out from the system speakers.
Pumped
up by this suddenly change of events, the crowd went crazy and a tremendous
round of applause roared from the crowd along with whistles and screams from
our lovely ladies in the audience for the night. Five students from the
Bioscience Club then performed the dance number and heated up the atmosphere for
the night.
After their dance number, while they
were celebrating, the emcee who was annoyed by their interruption and their dancing
of something so “old-schooled”, the emcee came out and mocked them of living in
the wrong generation, and ordered the people backstage to start something a
little more 21st-century-ish. Something more recent, more happening
and something more.. Korean.
“Gangnam Style” by the
internationally renowned singer PSY started playing off the speakers of the
Experimental Theatre. The crowd created a roar of applause once again
accompanied with screams and whistles. Just when you think the crowd was
already loud enough, when the emcee asked his “girls” to come out from
backstage, the roars went even louder than before (although most of the voices
that contributed to this were from the males)!
The
girls then started out with the dance, and completely - in the urban slang -
owned the guys with their performance of the “Gangnam Style”!
Not to be trumped by the girls, the
guy dancers soon joined in the dance with them.
The atmosphere instantaneously went
through the roof! The crowd simply couldn’t contain their excitement and joined
in singing to the melody of the pop song that had swept through the entire
world. Even after the dance ended, the crowd chanted “Encore! Encore!”, wanting
more. Happy that the crowd enjoyed their performance so much, the dance crew
danced once more for the crowd, much to their delight. Some lecturers were also
dragged out to join the dance and in particular, the Dean of the School of
Biosciences joined in the fun as well. How sporting!
After
the heated atmosphere of the dance, the crowd was serenaded with two songs by
two members of the Chinese society, singing “Sunday Morning” and “This Love”
from Maroon 5.
But the dance crew from just now
didn’t want the atmosphere to die down, so they asked the crowd whether they
wanted another encore after the songs and danced yet another time for the
entertainment of the crowd and the performance timeslot ended with a bang.
Once
the performance ended, mooncakes and dessert as well as lanterns were
distributed to the crowd. Everyone gathered at the lakeside to end the night in
a traditional way of the Mid-Autumn Festival - sitting under the stars and
playing lanterns in the darkness, enjoying mooncakes.
I believe this event was enjoyed not
just by the participants, but the organizers of the event as well. Looking at
the satisfied faces of the people that enjoyed the event at a home away from
home, and looking at new bonds being formed and old bonds strengthened, and to
add on the fact that this was a charity event had caused the organizers to feel
warmth within them as well. This event was considered a success despite the
lack of experience in organizing such events and the lack of time. We will
definitely provide you with another event like this next year that will be
bigger and better! Look out for it!
Peace!
