For those non-fans of dance, beware the long posts on So You Think You Can Dance Malaysia that will be invading this space! The photos taken by Vino were so pretty, I just couldn't resist putting them up. Too bad videos aren't available though.
Last Thursday night, the four of us: Mei Cher, Vino, Su Cheng and I attended the SYTYCD Malaysia Top 18 show and I felt so high, I hadn't realised I'd forgotten how good that high feels =)
From L-R: Guest judge Linda Jasmine, permanent judges Judimar Hernandez and Pat Ibrahim I dare say that Malaysia has the prettiest female judges amongst the SYTYCD shows all over the world! I love Mia Michaels and Kelley Abbey but let's face it, how pretty are Judimar and Linda! Brightest and sweetest smiles in the room!
We missed the group performance choreographed by Yannus Sufandi and Marcus, major sadness! Somehow 8TV has decided this year to record the group performance half an hour before the live show begins, to make more time for the dancers to change costumes, I guess. The couple routines kick-started with Belalang and Jda's contemporary to Drops of Jupiter by Train. Great song but wasn't really wowed by the dance here.
Raymond and Jojo then followed up with a cheeky Broadway routine, they certainly had the facial expressions to pull it off. It makes for interesting shots.
Sad to say, I just wasn't feeling anything from Sly and Zef's Afro Cuban contemporary. I've never heard of such a genre! Goes to show that you learn something new from SYTYCD every time! :P
Napi and Sim's lyrical jazz routine choreographed by Manuela Oliveira totally got me however! The judges agreed with me that it was the best performance at that juncture of the night!
How could Sim not be my favourite female dancer of the group when all her emotions are pratically leaping from her movements and facial expressions! She slided, extended and reached, I was seriously captivated!
Ray and CC spiced things up with their mambo. CC is arguably the sexiest female on the dance floor this season. Ok, actually there is no argument, she is the sexiest one out there, hands down and their mambo was no less fierce and sexy hot.
A dance genre unique to our country is the Malaysian contemporary (which encompasses a lot of things really, e.g. silat). Fai and Zen tried their best but fumbled on a lift and on some supposed to be in unison bits.
Chee Wei and Sam actually picked hip hop but the choreography looked more like lyrical hip hop to me. Judges' verdicts for them were not so kind.
Hong and Sarah tackled Malaysian contemporary too. A little bit of bird inspired movements here. Somehow it just didn't seem like a particularly memorable routine as Simon Cowell would say.
Black and Farah gave us the perfect ending with their hip hop salsa routine! They were such fire on stage with perfect staccato movements when needed, comical expressions and their salsa steps were executed oh-so-smoothly. Evidently a crowd pleaser, the decibel range of the audience screams must have been five times louder than usual! I was busy yelling too haha.
Which leads me to my favourite male dancer of the season - Black! He's got the whole package and his personality carries off so well on TV. Humorous all the time and never failing to deliver good performances, two thumbs up plus eight more fingers! =)
It was an unlucky night for Zen and Fai as a couple, both of them were eliminated together. That means no new partnerings next week!
Introducing the Top 16 dancers of SYTYCD Malaysia Season 2! Such fun!
Who has the time to make insane short trips during a busy semester? Well, I certainly do when it comes to Singapore haha. This time, my trip to Malacca is courtesy of our Popular Culture lecturer. We were sent on a mission over the weekend to terrorise many many unsuspecting backpackers!
Jolene, Kok Hao, Yau Phang and Lilean amusing themselves with random shots while waiting for the bus to depart (RM9.40 one way). Our group consists of 6 people excluding Yau Phang (it seems he is destined never to be in the same group as us), that's just too bad.
Pretty 'Singing in the Rain' feel. Once we had checked into the budget hostel - Ringo's Foyer (RM12 per night), we immediately headed off to Jonker's Street, which is sort of like a huge pasar malam. It rained super heavily so we ducked into a supposedly famous restaurant and ate a late dinner. It was the first time ever that night I saw a guy who was so excited over buying accessories (i.e. Yau Phang).
We had fun fiddling with the guitars at Ringo's Foyer. Our host, Uncle Raymond was very friendly and he brought us to sample the best ais kacang and chendol in Malacca (dare I say it's the best I've ever eaten in my life!)
Our trip included lots of good food (which I have no pictures of) and many conversations with random backpackers from Hungary, Czech Republic, Spain, England, France and USA. That's David from Czech teaching Claudia a few tips in handling an SLR camera.
Female backpackers were quite elusive in our hunt so you can imagine our euphoria when we spotted Cecile and Julie (backpackers from Paris) after 3 hours of walking aimlessly in the hot sun. Gosh, I love how random the bottles of water are placed on the table.
Just a random shot of Claudia, Kok Hao, Phooi Fong and me celebrating the completion of our assignment! Guess which one is my hand if you can! Haha.
3 other groups were working on the same assignment in Malacca that same weekend so I got to hang out with Yau Phang, Ley Lynn and Belinda among many others. Though we were at a bar, I didn't get drunk, I did play pool though and it was truly awesome!
Uncle Raymond was so nice to us, I decided to leave him a gift. Check out the before and after photo of his book shelf above =)
The bunch of us having a blast in Malacca.