Its one of the biggest thing that has ever happened to me, an overseas trip with no parents. From the eighth to twenty-first of the month we went to this small village to do "community work". Concrete-fy the school field, clear the drain and built a wall. We only really participated in the first task, just taking out the soil. The locals did the rest in tenfold of our speed. Even the kids do them faster than us. I hate us, city spoilt brats.

We lived in a local's house which is about 10 footsteps away from the primary school, the place we spent half of our time in, playing with the primary school kids and teaching them English in the afternoon.

There are alot of getting used to in the village. Toilet facilities were one. Normal toilets were without cubicles, only knee-length walls separating one squat from the other. Yeah, there are ONLY squats. But since we're living in somebody's house, we were discounted from the humiliation of exposing one's butt while in the midst of a 'business'. I applaude myself for bathing in cold water for the 2 weeks and boy, does my skin and hair feels good. It's my first - doing a big one on a squat. Ok, too much infomation.

The locals don't bathe that often, they smell okay as the village air is fresh. Even sweat smells okay. I see the kids changing clothes only after three days (at least), nose-digging and farting are customary. I have gotten used to throwing my biodegrabable rubbish on the sidewalks, biting my tongue to prevent myself from asking where's the rubbish bin again.

The locals often ask, 'Are you bored ?' What's the difference between city and village? I will find myself ponder everytime I'm questioned. The city is full of rubbish. And the village is not. Rubbish - dead or alive - are abundance in the city. Rubbish in the stores, rubbish in morality etc.

I really love the village life. I'm thinking of ways to go back there...make a substantial living there. Maybe I could become a writer of some sorts or a musician, writing and making my music within the seclusion of the wilderness. Or I could open up an arts school teaching kids martial arts, dance, music etc, citing that there is no such facility available there or in the whole town. All the wasted talent! This could be my drive in life. But then again, someone else might have done it while I'm still struggling to perfect my craft. Ok, rid those eeevil thoughts.

My favourite part of the trip is, of course, the kids. Everyone who went there miss the kids like hell. No one has recovered from the jet-lag yet, even though we've touched down back home for exactly a week. They're sensible, strong, adorable, sincere, innocent, pure, honest, disciplined...I could sing praises for them forever. They are what true kids should be like. Jumping around, climbing trees, eating wild fruits plucked from trees, trekking up mountains...work those developing limbs! Don't just sit there and play with the latest PC/Xbox/PSP games, whine all day and get materialistic.

There's not one fat kid in the village. I witnessed a first one in the city and shouted, "Hey, a fat kid!" McDonalds', KFC and Pizza Hut were around the corner. Not accusing.

I spent the most of my time with the kids, developing great, close friendship with some of them. Its hard not to be close when you see each other 24/7 for 2 weeks, even with the fellow school mates who went on the trip with me. I even dreamt about them at night. Its inevitable. I'm deprived of dreaming materials. They are all I see in the day.

The kids are fascinated with our cameras and we lend our them our cameras to shoot their stuff. Alot of the pictures are really cute. Shot with child-like innocence. After the first five days, my camera was spoilt. Something fishy with the mechanics in there. Some kid might have dropped it.

We went climbing up a few mountains, going for house visits, a two days-one night students' home stay, walking for an hour to town, get soaked in refreshing spring water, catching a glimpse of a village funeral, a temple ceremony, alot of firecrackers, speeding helmet-free on a motorbike, shop like never before in the 2 cities, boarded the BRT, visited universities...

I felt a little closer to my roots. I know how I would look like if my grandfather hadn't sailed down from there to here half a century ago. 90% of the villagers bore the same first name as me. I noticed a couple of my fellow countrymen residing there. That's where I wanna be.

Forest Gump showed me the ‘gradual time machine’ thing could be pretty grand by itself, PHEW! Before you knew it - a dozen years had passed. A whole new set of emotion awaits you. Maybe that’s what film is all about, unleashing bottles and bottles of unknown emotion…the less dialogue there is, the more you can hear yourself think. And if a film sucked, you will hear yourself thinking very loud indeed: why am I watching this piece of shit?

Anyway, Across the Universe spans over a period of time as well. Evan Rachel Wood was just a high school student and by the end of the film, she’s working in New York. Ok, that doesn’t make sense. A better example would be the background of the story: Vietnam War, Hippies and the Revolution.

I love the, whatever lens they’re using; I get excited by these lenses I tell ya. It’s like what they use for Juno (love!) and a tat bit like Pushing Daisies (BIG love!). The way they introduce new characters and ideas are just intelligent: Songs, animation and dance. All songs were by The Beatles sung by the cast. Which made it impossible not to love this film.

I have just so much praise for the creative team. Even the dance sequences were so intricate. You can’t predict what’s to come next unlike most arty-farty films. They used polarized filter and Bono singing to I AM THE WALRUS to bring out the drugs used during the hippie period; naked Evan Rachel Wood and Jim Sturgess (areas strategically covered by their own entangled limbs) making out in the ocean/sea to bring out the ‘sex’ in that period.

And that brilliant STRAWBERRY FIELDS FOREVER masterpiece just blew me away. Strawberries nailed neatly in rows and columns on a canvas, their bloodlike juice oozing out and dancing towards gravity.
***
The other film, which got stuck in my computer halfway through, is one that makes someone as small hearted as me jealous.  The name’s Elephant and the movie is dead simple. So much so that it looks effortless. It just makes me feel bad about myself. “If it’s that simple, why can’t I have done it myself?” (Cue for another trashing topic on how my grades sucked last semester) Cannes 2003: Best Director and Palme D’or winner. Or perhaps this was the film that ignited the ‘simplicity craze’?

The story talks about this few teenagers in a school. One day a kid brought guns to school and started shooting everyone there. It just sets your mind running wild with imagination, doesn’t it?
The catch is portraying the different kids in their daily life, how their day started, what they did before they went to school, before the school shooting…much of it is real time-real stuff, which is cool. Similar in style is Shanghai Tang starring Andy Lau and the great, late Leslie Cheung (BIG love!).

There are a lot of dollies, just tracking the character, most of them for several minutes. And because of that, pretty much all of the scenes in the movie were done in a single shot. Ah. Perhaps that’s the beauty of it. The pattern, the consistency won the judges over.

Not to forget the cool audio. You could hear everyone’s voices in there, increasing or decreasing in volume depending on proximity. Talk about surround sound! The audio makes you feel as if you’re really there. It’s like everyone has lines – or was it really casual talk?
I started out dissing Elephant but after all the dissecting up there…I bended my attitude towards it. I have to see what the judges see in this film. Back to my movie-marathon!

8sep - 21 sep (anxi->shang qing->zao keng village)

the best 2 weeks of my life

i love village life

i love the moutains

i love the springs

i love the villagers