Pesta Ang Pao UMS 2009

Pesta Ang Pao (新春联欢晚会) is an annual event in Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS). This event normally will be held before Chinese New Year. This is an event which is held to celebrate the coming of Chinese New Year with all the students in UMS of all races. Pesta Ang Pao UMS 2009 was held on 17 January 2009 in UMS Chancellor Hall.

The event starts at 7:00p.m. and ended around 11.00p.m. The moment I arrive in Chancellor Hall, there’s already a lot of student waiting to enter the hall.

Before entering the hall, there is also an exhibition outside the hall. Here is the Sabah King Of Tea performing how to make a good tea. Well, I don’t really interested in tea so did not look for detail. However, making tea is one of the Chinese cultures.

There are lots of performances in Pesta Ang Pao UMS 2009. These event are such as singing the theme song of Pesta Ang Pao UMS, Moden Dance, Lion Dance, Chinese Opera, Mongolia Dance, Koir, Chinese Orchestra, Chinese KungFu(), Che Ling, Drangon Dance, Chang Shan Dance and many more.Among all the performance, there is two of them which I wanted to share with all my readers. Two of these performances are the one I enjoy the most throughout the Event.

The first performance which I enjoy is Che Ling (扯铃) or call diabolo in english. This performance is performed by the student from SJK (C) Shan Tao Kota Kinabalu. Diabolo is a traditional Chinese game which generated long time ago. It is one of the kids game. Diabolo is a juggling prop consisting of a spool which is whirled and tossed on a string tied to two sticks held one in each hand. By doing lots of training, many unbelievable trick can be done by this simple juggling game. I never play this before but it seems not hard to do the simple move.

Second performance which I enjoy it Bian Lian (变脸) or Changing Face. This is what I call one of the Chinese Magic Trick. Since the reign of the Qing Dynasty Emporor, QianLong (乾隆) about 300 years ago, this performance already exists. The face changing (变脸) is a culture of Chinese Sichuan Opera. The performer can change the Sichuan Mask in magically quick succession. They change their painted mask by flourish their arms and twist their heads. Enjoy the video below. The performer really did very well and I still wondering how he changes his mask without using hand.

Besides those two performances, Lion Dance, Dragon Dance, Chinese Orchestra from Sekolah Tinggi Kota Kinabalu and Choir team from SJK (C) Chung Hwa Likas are also very interesting. However, I don’t manage to the photo due to the lighting condition in the hall which not allows my camera to take quality pictures. It is too dark and I’m sitting quite far from the stage.

Overall the event was not as interesting as I though although the performance was interesting. I still feel that there are still lots of improvement can be done. The organizers should try to introduce the background of the performance and also our Chinese culture rather than making some cold joke before each performance was started. However their effort to entertain the audience is there although their jokes really cold till we hardly open our mouth to laugh. Hopefully Pesta Ang Pao 2010 will have more improvement.