Monday, March 26, 2007
At the risk of sounding overly indulgent/excited, DiaS'pura 2007 was a runaway raging rippling success! (!!!!!!)
I feel a little displaced now, something like what one feels after a particularly big dance performance (like Rapture 2006, whoo boy), but this one felt a little more special. For one, it was an actual EVENT, like a true blue thing that people CAME for, some flying 7 hours from the West Coast, others taking a 9 hour train ride from North Carolina for. It was an EVENT that people sat down for, listened to, engaged in, gained insights from, made friends and networks through... an actual impact in the lives of 150+ people (not counting the musical), and not just a mere performance that one receives the cursory "oh you were so good!" before the flowers wither and life goes back to normal.
Differences: that I was really heavily involved in the behind-the-scenes work for once, none of that emcee/dj/dance crap I did back in jc, yet I didnt feel the need to prove anything for once. I love the Club Sg Exco. Wait lemme repeat that: I LOVE the Club Sg Exco. Grew to look forward to those weekly meetings at Chestnut 709 (my future home!) that went late into the night because we usually ended up gossiping/bitching amidst the discussions on budget, logo, topics, themes, etcetc. I must say that I truly admire everyone of them: Who else can find the time to send 10,000 emails a day to prospective sponsors, school facilities personnel, coordinate flight details for Speakers... and still have time to maintain good grades?
We had feedback that the event itself was "professional" and "well-organized", which really heartened us, given that we pulled off with 6 people something which would normally have taken 20 people to execute. (In Links 2000, 6 people handled like one committee). And honestly I think we only pulled it off because my fellow members are just. so. frickin. zai.
The event itself was enjoyable:
Lunch with the speakers at the Wharton Executive Education Centre was less formal and stiff than I had imagined it to be. It was my fortune (or misfortune) to get to sit next to Ambassador Chan, who surprisingly gave some useful nuggets of advice on education and indirectly convinced me that the College is the way to go. She mentioned that which school you're from doesnt matter at all, unless its brought up by some cursory remark when you have absolutely nothing else to talk about. She says that she evaluates people by the way they speak, the way they argue logically and think critically. Does my background mean anything if I dont perform and speak well on a job? No. Concurrently, if I can engage people I'm speaking to, or if I can come up with creative ideas, does it matter that I chose not to attend business school? No. Is there really a need to rush to get an MBA if I cant add any value to it? No. Will I ever get to learn about social psychology, network theory and art history ever in my life again? Probably not.
Anyway, I digress. (Forgive me, I am very passionate about the "Liberal arts, not Wharton" debate). After an initial scare 10 minutes into the event that the room was only half full, everything went smoothly when the room suddenly filled around 20 minutes after 2. (haiyuh, these Singaporeans ah, always late). Ambassador Chan's speech was a little scaled to sound like gah-men propaganda, but she did have some interesting perspectives. I suppose as a diplomat and a government representative she didnt have much of a choice, but her speech did serve as useful fodder for arguments later on, as shown by how many of the later speakers insisted on quoting/challenging her viewpoints. Oh I do love alternate perspectives that I'd never thought about!
2nd panel entitled "Pursuing Your Passion" was heartening, and provided concrete justification for why people do what they do, and not the usual "i dont follow the crowd" crap. Lessons learnt: People should pursue their passions not because they want to champion individualism, but because in the end, its what makes them happy. And its only when people are happy that they can have good relationships with others. And honestly, that's what we all want in life. I was especially proud to raise my hand when the question "How many of you are actually studying what you're studying because you WANT to study it?" Not many people did. Score another one for a liberal arts education!
Francis Seow's speech on Social Expression was mainly a history lesson on how the media has been manipulated for political agendas in the past. Having read his book, his ideas were not new to me: mainly about the darker side of politics in Singapore, though I could tell many in the audience had probably never heard of these concrete examples before. I truly admired his formal and crisp English when he spoke to us, as if he was addressing Parliament. His anecdotes were well received given that his stories were both juicy and thought-provoking.
One point that irritated me: a response from an audience member when we had to limit the Q&A to just 1 question, given that we had 45 mins left for 1 more panel of 3 other speakers, and given his nature to repeat himself in his stories. Yet one audience member had the audacity to suggest that we were "censoring" his speech because of its controversial nature. As Terence puts it, "Would the exco have put in all that effort to invite speakers, raise money from external sources, coordinate the logistics between hotel-school admin-sponsor-other universities, and then deliberately censor our second keynote speaker at our own event?" Obviously not. We knew about his topic from the start, and we wanted to provide a truly refreshing viewpoint from someone who tells it like it is. We don't necessarily agree with whatever he said, but it pisses me off to think that we, as progressive, concerned college students would be accused of censoring, like any cowardly old generation-er, blindly forced to follow the rules of higher authority.
The last panel about filmmaking was of a little less interest to me, since I had long decided that dance will always be my medium (i will probably never have the patience to carefully construct a scene), but it did provide some insight into the struggles of the Singapore film industry. It featured, of course, a bunch of star-studded panelists: Colin Goh (Singapore Dreaming, Talking Cock), Djinn (Perth), and a lesser-known Li-Anne Huang but with a film (Singapore Girl) that was every bit as good as her celebrity panelists. I must state that Djinn is by far one of the more enjoyable people I've spoken to recently. He doesn't look his age, and he certainly doesn't talk like it either. Sort of reminds me of some of my dad's joker friends.
Anyway, I have come to the end of the Speaker Series portion of DiaS'pura, and I realize how long this post is, and that most readers have probably given up reading this whole block of text by now. If you are still here with me, stay tuned for my next post about Sing, City: The Musical, and a few comments about our crazy afterparty :)
he rocked the party at 9:39 PM |
