The Eternal Beauty (of the Himalayas) - Yang Jima (央吉玛)

I've had just enough time to...   be amazed by the songs of the Tibetan Highlands

Taken as the sun rises over the Himalayas

Adam Lambert gaped in amazement and a smile spread across his face as he listened to her sing. When she finished, he clapped “Beautiful, it was so angelic. You’re so grounded in energy, focused. It was beautiful. I love it.”

Turning the white hills to gold

They heard the bells on her before they saw her. When invited to sing, she sat cross-legged on the floor and imbued the room with the ring of tiny cymbals tied to her fingers. With her first note, she transported them to a strange land far away in a language they have not heard before. She was unlike any they have ever auditioned.

Illuminating its beauty and majesty

When asked about the meaning of the song, in a gentle voice she said – “The summits of the mountains are white, covered with snow. When the golden sun comes out, it shines upon the mountains turning the white into gold. And the people look at this and pray. Pray that this beauty will last forever. That is why the song is called – The Eternal Beauty.”

Yang Jima (央吉玛) sings The Eternal Beauty 

While the valley sleeps peacefully below...

Her name is Yang Jima (央吉玛 yangjima), a member of the Chinese ethnic minority tribe – Menba, that lives in Tibet in a region straddling the Himalayas. She was auditioning for the 2013 Chinese Idol. Taught to sing by her grandmother, she aspired to bring the songs of her native lands to the world. In the next round, together with 3 others from different ethnic groups (You Yunfu of Hui, Ah Lai of Kazakhstan, Hu Sileng of Mongolia), they formed the “Tribal Group” each bringing their distinctive ethnic flavour and gave the most fantastic performance ever by a group in an Idol competition. Listen to them singing Coco Lee's "Thinking of You 365 days" 想你的365天 and be amazed how they take a modern song and enriched it with tribal flavor.

p.s.: Go to Youtube and see if they all made it to the finals.

The "Tribal Group" singing their hearts out in Chinese Idol 2013

This is the song of the highlands

Help KLPac, The Arts Need Help too – Part II

I've had just enough time to...   be pierced in the heart.

 A place to be creative...

I was asked by an artist friend just a week ago “Art… Luxury or Necessity?” I do not know the correct answer so I gave a personal one - “One thing I find in many of my travels - poverty and wealth never have any correlation to happiness. If anything there is a bias of happiness towards poverty ironically. To the rich, art is more often a luxury. They can do without it. And if they do enjoy it, it ranges from entertainment to passion. To the poor, after the essential of survival and if they enjoy art, it is quite often a need. A need to lift themselves off the depressing life they live and gave them hope and fulfillment. Like happiness, there really is no correlation but a bias and intensity.” I concluded by saying, that I hope I was making some sense. We could expand the term ‘poor’ from beyond ‘materially poor’ to ‘culturally, emotionally and spiritually poor’ and we can then understand how an organization like KLpac touches the lives of so many of us. It enriches the lives of the 'rich 'and transforms the lives of the 'poor'.

A place to chill out...

I personally think that KLpac is modest when they declare “while KLpac has served the general public, it impacted 3 groups – artistes/arts group, youth and the under-privileged”. Nurturing, developing, and providing the avenue for growth for the first group. Exposing, stirring interest and expanding the horizon of the second group.  Reaching out, touching them and giving hope for the third group. All these KLpac had done and is doing.

A place to get the rhythm...

However, KLpac may have impacted the general public more than it gave itself credit for. Many years ago in the early days, I asked a local singer, songwriter friend – “what is so different about performing arts?” It seems so, ‘inefficient’ (they could put it in DVD, couldn’t they?). I could not remember the exact words he said but some words stuck like – ‘communicating with the audience’, ‘closeness’, ‘touches you like no other medium’, before he went into the really bloody stuff like – ‘tearing out your heart and chewing it raw!’. That was when I said – ‘Enough!’ and dismissed him as those artsy-fartsy type. Chewing my heart. Imagine!

A place to have fun...

Then I went for this performance. And this beautiful lady sang till the tears rolled down her cheek. Those couldn’t be real tears could they? Not when she got to do the same thing again for another 5 nights! Then she stabbed me right in the heart from where she stood 10 meters away. I felt a piercing pain in my chest and a chill ran up my neck to the side of my face. Why are my eyes welling up? 

You came through such an experience transformed, humbled. And some of the words made sense for the first time. You have been touched. It is like a high. You went back seeking it again and again. You do not find it often but that does not stop you from looking and I believe it makes you if not a better person, a more sensitive and caring one.

A place of dreaming...

Oh! For that sublime, exquisite moment when your tender pulsating heart was torn from your rib-cages setting all your senses afire! 

Oops! I am going to have that term thrown back at me if I am not careful. It is the dream of every artist to be able to touch you this way. That is when the sublime moment is shared between the artist and the audience. What is more meaningful than to feel life with the sharpness of a razor’s blade? KLpac is the place where moment like this happened. For that reason alone, its fire should never be extinguished...

A place to keep our balance...

A place for the young and matured...

A place for the child and woman in us...

A place of magic...

A place to learn...

A place to participate...

A place to ponder...

A place of movements...

A place to reach out...

A place of sharing...

But I’ve not mentioned the one reason, which I do not have a photo which can do it justice.

It is – A PLACE OF LOVE!

Help KLPac, The Arts Need Help too – Part I

I've had just enough time to...   find a place where Arts survive and thrive

A place to make music...

KLpac need your help. KLpac (Kuala Lumpur Performing Arts Center) is a “not-for-profit organization dedicated to nurture, practices of traditional and contemporary Malaysian Performing Arts”. It is now fighting for survival. Although it produces more than half of Malaysia’s performing arts show in the country, it receives zero funding from foundations and government. No. That is not a typo error – it is 0% while most of such organizations in other countries will receive a significant portion of their funding from their government and institutions. To make matters worse, the 2007 Economic crisis hit it hard and it lost 75% of its corporate sponsors from 12 to only 3. 

A place to dance...

With the rising costs as well as putting up a larger number of shows – from 66 in 2006 to 188 in 2011, is it any wonder that there is a gap between expenses and the revenues it generates? It is now in debt to the tune of RM1.3 million. It is only the belief and passion of volunteers and artists who donated their time and money that kept it going for so long – 7 long years. That is dedication for you. And they are not passively waiting for their own demise but taking matters into their own hand with the same belief, passion and dedication that has kept them going over the years. They are not giving up without a fight.

A place to sing...

KLpac is staging a fundraising act this Dec 22 to Dec 23. Buy a ticket and be entertained in the process with a show of comedy (laugh in the face of danger and worry), dance and music. Or make a donation, your money is going to good use.

A place of laughters...

But if you ask me, why I’m supporting KLpac personally, I think I can do better with the images I took in the KLpac Open House in 2009 than words. The founding members conceived KLpac with this vision “A space to dream, to nurture and to realise, a space to laugh and a space to cry, a space to educate and a space to create”. For me, it is a place –

A place to feel...

A place of passion...

A place of transformation...

A place to dress up...

A place of reflection...

A place to fall in line...

A place to let go...

Watch out for Part II where I will give you more reasons why you should support KLpac and share with you the lives they touched. And of course, more photos!

Jailed For Their Songs

I've had just enough time to...   sing my songs in jail

Taken of the jailed song birds while walking in the street of Surabaya, Indonesia.

They were jailed for their songs

Their sins were they sing too sweetly

Where is the crime in that?

You asked.

You asked the wrong question.

_______

By a lonely prison wall,

I heard a young man calling

Nothing matters, Mary, when you're free

Against the famine and the Crown,

I rebelled, they cut me down.

Now you must raise our child with dignity.

Low lie the fields of Athenry

Where once we watched the small free birds fly

Our love was on the wing, we had dreams and songs to sing

It's so lonely 'round the fields of Athenry.

Dropkick Murphys - Fields of Athenry

We Will Always Love You - Whitney Houston.

I've have had just enough time to...   sadly see the passing of a Superstar.

Taken of this morning's sad headline - we will miss you.

In the night sky

Some stars shine brighter than others

But you shone, the brightest of all.

In the vast distance between us

In the deep silence, all I hear –

Are the songs you sang…

_______

I hope life treats you kind 
And I hope you have all you've dreamed of. 
And I wish to you, joy and happiness. 
But above all this, I wish you love. 
And I will always love you. 
I will always love you. 


- Whitney Houston