Mid year crisis? Not really..

In 7 days, I will be half way done with 2012. So far 2012 has been quite calm and smooth sailing for me. Last year was basically busy with production from March until Dec. So this period was a welcoming one.

With only Dead Man Cell Phone & Malaysian Girls(penangpac run), I basically spent most of my time in klpac & The Actors Studio watching my friends perform. The last 2 shows I watched were both in TAS- indicinelive! & Songs for a New World. Both were very well executed and it kinda make me envious of them.

Actually I auditioned for indicinelive! back in March but could not make it to the callback due to my commitment to DMCP. Bad timing, but hopefully I can get to do this next time.

Anyhow, I will be busy with the following starting July:

1. Dama Orchestra's Empress Wu The Musical- the show will be staged from 27 Sept till mid Oct at pentas 1, klpac.

2. SIBKL's Christmas musical Everworld- Sunday rehearsal started in June til Aug, In Sept there will 1 additional weekly rehearsal but I will probably be missing most of the rehearsals till I finish Empress Wu.

3. klpac's  Short+Sweet Festival- wifey & I are submitting our very first short musical. I won't be directly involved in the project but will probably try to find the time observe the rehearsal & give my inputs to the director.

Busy, busy, busy!!!!

Where do we go from here?

"Today is the beginning of a new era, the end of the Malaysian Girls pageant..."

How true it was for the cast on 15 January 2012. After spending 4 months together, it was time to say goodbye and move on to other things. So what has been happening since? Well, a few girls are getting themselves busy preparing for other shows!

BB(JJ Adams), Alexis(Tracy Starr), Anrie(Lin Lin), Sandee(Cassandra Lee), basically dived into another production. BB is currently rehearsing for "Boom" which will debut on 17 Feb, whille the other 3 are rehearsing for "Dead Man's Cell Phone", premiering  on 14 Mar, both at klpac. Interestingly, Sandee is also perparing for the restaging of "Shakespeare Demystified: The Merchant of Venice" at penangpac on 8 Mar. How she can rehearse for 2 plays at the same time is beyond me...

Amanda(Daphne Wong) was supposed to be in "Dead Man's Cell Phone" but somehow she dropped out - not sure what she's up to next but she was involved in "Relationship Status" which ended its run at selected TGV cinemas yesterday. If you didn't see it, it's your loss!

Freddy(Gucci Lim) has also started rehearsing for "Corporal PUNishment" as the director/writer. This should be a crazy show not to be missed. Who would want to miss Gucci Lim's first paid show as a director?

Tabitha(Serenity Billion) is probably taking a rest before starting her rehearsal for the restaging of "The Last Five Years" with Jon Chew, which should happen in June 2012. Probably the same for Aminda(Natasha B) has she has "Platform" slotted for May 2012. The same with Siti Farah(Jasmine Hibiscus), who will probably be involved in Kelvin Wong's last "Indicinelive!" in June/July.

Shiva(Rani) is in New York City auditioning for her Masters of Fine Arts. Hopefully I won't be seeing her soon. Character-wise, she was my favourite Malaysian Girl:)

Aliaa(Shakila Waheeda), the baby of the cast, is performing her umrah at the moment. Which means, I'll have to call her Hajjah Aliaa when I see her again. Hopefully she will be doing more shows and not stop here. She has much potential.

Pooja(Padma Padmavati) is in Singapore pursuing her studies and it will be a while before she steps onto stage again. Oh well, at least she is happy with her boyfriend there.

Aanantha(Ray Sanjay) is back on the airwaves with THR Raaga, Zoe(Sydney Belle) just came from Thailand celebrating her birthday, and Amelia(Charyse Devine) is probably preparing for Tapis Rouge Comedy Night : THE PLAYGROUND! which is happening on 31 Jan. Amelia was also the assistant director for "Relationship Status", by the way.

All 15 cast members accounted for... except yours truly(Bata Tan) & Mrs yours truly(Miss Lim). While I've started my new job as club manager in Gorgeous Fitness Bandar Puteri, she is in the process of handing over her job to her successor. However that doesn't mean we are not gonna be shaking our legs for 2012. More or less, we will be involved in Short + Sweet 2012, unless we have a paid production to do during the period of Sept./Oct. I sort of have 2 other projects in hand but I have not heard anything from the producer since we spoke in Dec 2011. Maybe I should give him a call....

Also, this weekend we'll be going to a closed audition for "Paper Crane", another Joe Hasham musical. While I am not particularly jumping with joy to do another Joe Hasham musical(dah basi!), I would, however, be excited if I can play a lead role for a change. It would be even better if we both can play the lead roles:)

Year 2011 has been great for both of us and hopefully 2012 will be even more interesting as we step out of our comfort zones and make some changes.

Oh, to those who are surprised, shocked, disappointed or upset that I am now working with the competitor, I only have this message for you:

 

The best pizzas....

... can be found on the island of Bali.

Man, I think I wanna go to Bali again!

Oh You Didn't Know?

If you haven't heard, let me officially announced that I have tendered my resignation as Group Exercise Manager from Fitness First. My last day of work is end of Dec 2011. 

Why?

In short, FF & I can no longer fulfill each other's needs and expectations....  kinda like what happens when a couple decide to break up, isn't it?

So what do I want?

If you have been following my blog, it is quite obvious that I'm very much into doing stage performances nowadays and I have been rather unhappy over the last one year. So, it is the best decision for both myself and the GX team.

What's next?

Well, there's a bit of uncertainty at the moment about what I will be doing but suffice to say I will be leaving Fitness First at the end of the year. My current project "Malaysian Girls" will start its run from 10 - 30 Dec 2011 in klpace before heading to Penang for 6 shows from 10 - 15 Jan 2012. However, I am doubling as assistant stage manager for the production, I will be heading back to my hometown 1 week earlier for bump-in.

With that, I leave you with another video clip of our media preview. For information on our shows, please click here:)

Finally...

After doing this for the last 2 years, wifey and I will be working together in the same production!

What will it be? Will tell later, but suffice to know that this production will involve the Who's Who of klpac and a bunch of great performers!

Stay tuned for more:)

Wasted Saturday night & Sunday morning

Last night, when I was about to go to bed, I found out that the door of my bedroom was locked. After trying to open it with the key, I realized at the lock was spoilt. It was already 12am I tried to dismantle the lock. After much sweaty effort, I eventually managed to get both sides of the knob off, but the lock was still stuck there. I was still locked out... By then, it was already 1am.

So I decided to shower and slept on the couch.

Woke up the next morning and went shopping for new door lock- had to do it in the morning because afternoon I have rehearsal at klpac. So missed church. Went to Puchong shop opposite IOI Mall but it was closed- last time bought a reasonably cheap on over there. So, had to patah balik to Central Old Klang Road. Bought 1 cheap one(for the guest room as the door knob was loose already) and another expensive one for my room.

I thought I could install them when I got back home... only to realize that I got the wrong size! And so, I went back to the shop to exchange for the right size. For the size I wanted, the cheap one did not have that variation, so had to pay more for another expensive one.

By the time I reached home, I knew I was going to be late for my 2pm rehearsal. Immediately SMSed director to informed him and I quickly install my room's lock. Once done, I had another quick shower and rushed to klpac.

Finally installed the guest room's lock after returning from klpac.... *sigh*

4 months on...

Wow... haven't blogged for ages!

Well, probably have to thank my iPhone & Twitter for that. Nowadays anything I think of I will just twit instead. It takes so much time to go to the computer, log in to blogger before I can speak my mind:)

Anyhow, life has been pretty interesting lately. I have finished my show "Adam:The Musical" in June and will be doing another one end of Nov. This time, however, will be different because:

1) Practice time is only 2 months
2) Show is running for 10 days only
3) I am one of the principals
4) I am doing comedy for a change

Actually I auditioned for 2 shows and had to pull out of one. Not quite pulling out, since the director of the 2nd show was still deciding whether to cast me or not. Basically I had to inform him that I would take up the first offer instead of waiting for him.

If I had waited for the second show and if I got the role, I would probably be playing Joseph(of the new testament) and acting with people like Juwita Suwito and Liang. Instead, I have chosen to do a comedy directed by Mr Potato. Hope the other show does well when it opens in December - the music is fantastic!

Seriously, he is Mr Potato

We've been meeting up once a week for the last 3 weeks to do some mental exercise and have not really done much of the script reading yet. Some of the people involved are fasting. So, practice will pick up pace once Raya is over.

Shall write more about this when the day approaches! But if you know my boss(es), please don't tell her/them about this, ok?

Shhh....

The Bali experience

Bali is definitely one of the best destination for a good time. One of the things we did was of course surfing.

Catching the wave

The theory session conducted right before we hit the waves was quite helpful, but when I made my first few attempts, the results have been far from ideal.

Falling on my butt

Yes, collision can happen while surfing too


Wife also fell face first a couple of times


After numerous attempts, eventually we did get to surf successfully.


"Look ma... NO HANDS!"

Come to think of it, the fun was actually tumbling in our attempts.


Besides surfing, we also did some touristy stuff and visited a couple of places.

at the temple

Waterfall

The temple at Tanah Lot

Dinner at Tanah Lot

Sunset at Tanah Lot

We also did our own free and easy holidays on the motorbike. From this experience, I've learnt that I should always bring my driving license while going on holidays in a foreign country so I could feel at ease riding a rent bike without worrying about the police.

Even though by law we must wear helmets, we just followed the locals


At the hotel pool side

Taking a leak

The Bali Bombing Memorial Monument


The main street of Kuta

Overall, I find Balinese among the friendliest people I've ever met.

The orginal natives were so not so friendly, unfortunately

I enjoyed myself there and I wouldn't mind going for a second trip.



Thank you Bali for a wonderful honeymoon!

Signing my life away...

No that's not my ride for the wedding. Just a bus my sister saw on the way to my wedding.

Anyway, back to mine. Actually I did my signing on 20 Mar 2009, one day before my wedding ceremony. As our church pastor is not a registrar, we had to go to a nearby church to do the signing instead.

So I took the day off on Friday and went to the church in Desa Melawati with my family and Leslie, my best man who arrived the night before from Singapore.

The Looi entourage having lunch in Batu Caves

Don't I look cute?

Waiting for the bride

Leslie and me

We had to wait outside for a while because wife-to-be went to have a quick lunch with her aunt.

In the church office with my nephew Daryl and sister Hilda

We had to wait for the pastor- probably having his lunch too- so I decide to play with the video cam.

When I grow up, I wanna be a director

Introducing the school debating representatives

Finally the pastor came and explained to both us the implications of putting our signatures on the papers in front of us. After that, came the most important part of the ceremony.

There wasn't any oath ceremony as we would be having our church wedding the next day, we would say our vow then.

Pastor explaining to us where to sign our lives away

Why am I smiling? Coz I got one heck of a deal

Her turn


With any marriage registration, there must be 2 witnesses. The church advised to get our parents as witness, I believe, as a sign of parental blessings. As my mom lives in Penang and I'm staying with OCD, I asked him to be my witness instead.

Believe it or not, he couldn't sleep the night before....

Why is he smiling? Coz he doesn't have to worry about his brother dirtying his condo anymore!

Father-in-law completes the marriage certificate

After that, the pastor officially congrats us as Mr & Mrs Looi.


The senior Mrs Looi giving the new Mrs Looi a hug

(L-R)Daryl Looi, Karynn Looi, Alex Looi a.k.a. OCD,

Tan Chong Keng, Hilda Looi, Alvin Looi

It's been more than a month and last Sunday our pastor asked if we're back from the moon.

The answer?

Still half-way there:)

我们都是一家人

(L-R)nephews Leroy & Daryl, OCD, Mom, me, Karynn, future sis-in-law, future mother & father-in-law, eldest bro Eric

The main cast for the wedding, minus sister, sister-in-law and niece.

Life as a musical

Have you ever come out of a musical wishing that your life could be like one?

The Sound of Music

One moment you're talking normally, the next moment you burst out in songs?

West Side Story


Marry Poppins

Better still, the people around you start to dance together as if you've all been practising the moves for the last 3 months?

Grease
Hmmm... maybe my life could be one too?

*hint* *hint*

Wedding #3 in 3 weeks

Seems like people just like to get married at the end of the year- I've attended 3 weddings in as many weeks. The last one was last Saturday in Penang. This one I was involved as one of the "heng tais" and also the MC for the wedding dinner.

The person getting married was Danny Chen, my church buddy whom I've known half of my life. In fact, I got to know him a couple of months before his whole family came to Penang Christian Centre- we were classmates in 1991.

Anyhow, had to wake up early on Sat morning and be at his place by 6.45am. Had a bit of breakfast and somehow we only went to pick up the bride Su Yin around 8.15am.

The entourage getting ready to leave house

The groom

The best man, Leslie, who's getting married in Sept 2009

This is Willie, also Best Man, and the groom's brother.



Four of us are quite close and Willie is the only one who's still single. He lamented that by the end of 2009, all his friends would all be married.... poor boy!

(anyone out there interested to help him? He's quite good with computers and has Australian PR status.)

2 best men means 2 vehicles

As Penang is a small place, we reached Gelugor from Tanjung Bungah in around 20 mins. It was drizzling a bit by the time we reach the bride's place.

As usual, the heng tais have to help the groom to overcome a few challenges from the bride's "SISTAS" before we could get the bride....

Disposable undies with alphabets...
Apparently we're supposed to spell the name of a place in Sarawak where the bride studied

Fortunately Danny knew the place and that one was done.

Groom had to sort out which are the bride's stuff

Overall the challenges were quite easy- in fact, Leslie managed to get one of the sistas to open the front door with an ang pow containing merely 99 SEN!!!!

Now that's value for money!!! Sista, next time remember to check the content first!!!!

Anyhow, the last obstacle was the door of the bedroom, We tried to push in but were blocked by the 2 bridesmaids.

"OK, heng tais... Do your thing..."

So the groom decided to take a nap....

"ZZZZZZZ..... I do... ZZZZZZZ


... while the heng tais did the dirty job and pushed....

"KEEP IT OPEN!!!! WHATEVER YOU DO, DON'T LET HER CLOSE THE DOOR!!

...and pushed....

"AIYAK! MY HAND IS STUCK!!!!"

... and pushed...

"NOW MY FOOT IS STUCK!! DON'T CLOSE THE DOOR!!

.... still pushing...

"ARRRRRRHHHHHH,....

Unfortunately for us, we all forgot to take off our socks so the ground was too slippery for us to force our way in. At the end, the best men had to give their ang pows before the door was finally opened....


"Why your heng tais all so lembik wan?"

After much commotion, finally the task was accomplished.

Next stop: CHURCH!!!

Church ceremony was a simple one with about 100 people attending the ceremony.

Gracie(on the left) was the one who took the 99 sen ang pow and opened the front entrance for us


(from L-R)Rev. Isaac Chan, Danny, Wille and Leslie

Here comes the bride

Waiting for the moment to make their vows

Forgot to mention that beside the heng tai and the MC thingy, I was also asked by Danny to be one of the witnesses for their marriage certificates.

Putting my signature on the certificates

Willie sang a song while we were signing the certificates

After the exchange of vows, the signing of the certificates....

Ladies and gentlemen... Mr & Mrs Danny Chen

Leslie and the future Mrs Yim

photoshoot with the couple
The good ol' funny shot

Dinner was held at City Bayview Hotel. There were 46 tables - he invited quite a lot of church people actually.

Nonya and Ah Beng

Strike a pose!

Overall dinner was a nice time of catching up with old church friends. Our table was actually outside the hall and so we could basically talk about anything and laughed as loud as we could. No one near us- except maybe the other table which was outside the main hall with us.

I enjoyed hosting the dinner as I know about half of those invited. It's good to be able to be part of Danny's wedding and I look forward to hosting Leslie's in September. But first, priority is my own....

3 couples with 2 single guys

Congratulations again Danny & Su Yin.... may you have a beautiful & blissful marriage, "white hair till old" and "every year one expensive son"!!