city boy goes to the forest

Last Saturday, I agreed to join the Youth Orchestra’s outing activity.
We were to go to the forest reserve in Negeri Sembilan.

The journey took three hours; hence the conductor divided us into groups, and arranged games for us in the bus.

The first was a written quiz.
Each group was given a set of questions to be answered.
We were left with no source of info except internet access for those who have GPRS on their phone.

I frantically tried to call my friends back in Damansara, but too bad it was a Saturday morning- they are all still in bed.

We learned quite interesting stuff.
Do you know that the official language for Brazil is neither Spanish nor English?

It’s Portuguese.

And there was this question- who is the first prime minister of India.
One group answered- Indian.
Another group guessed- Samy Vellu.

Ha. Ha. Ha.

The second game is a verbal quiz.
The conductor shoots a question, the group answers.

The questions were of the same-
List down five German composers.
List down five French composers.
List down five Italian composers.

The only composer that I know is Tchaikovsky.
Oh, oh, and I also know an American composer named James Swearingen who writes school band songs.

Yeah, I need to read more about classical music.

So the games in the bus were sucky because my group felt disabled.


Finally we reached the place and went off the bus.
When we arrived there, this is the first thing that we saw.


A man made swimming pool that gets water from the stream.

We walked further inside and awaiting us were the food.
After the food, we were given a huge piece of drawing paper and one drawing board per person.

We were assigned to individually draw scenery out of the area, and marks will be given into groups.



Ah, finally something that I can do.
NOW WE’RE TALKING.

As I think and think and think of a right spot to draw,
And I sketch and sketch and sketch bit by bit,
Then I realized that drawing needs a LOT of patience.
I found myself hopping around looking at other people’s effort,
After each few minutes pressing my skills on the board.

Draw. Hop. Draw. Chat. Draw. Drink water. Draw.


Acting it like a pro.



Idea? Inspiration? Come on, come to me!!


We were lucky that the man who catered our food is also an art lecturer.
He gave us tips on drawing and he was the judge for the drawing competition.



"First you draw a circle, and then a square.."


After everyone was done, we ate our lunch.
After filling up our tummy,
All of them started to scream and jump into the stream.

I decided to sketch another drawing, hoping that my group can get extra marks from that.
And THEN I hopped into the stream like everybody else. Boy it was cold.



We're in the water! Come on, join us!



Splashing naughtily.



Oh uh. Teacher is angry with us.



We're sorry. We pray for our sins.


After drying ourselves,
The lecturer asked all of us to decide which drawings deserve to win.
I am so happy that both my drawings got first, but considered as a single participation since the artist is the same person. Too bad we couldn’t keep our masterpiece, since the lecturer wanted to keep them for his collection.

What can I do then? Mak snappy with my cam phone lah.



This is my first drawing. Focused on the tree roots and rocks.



This is the second one, sketched as I look up and see the tall trees.



This is the sketch of the art lecturer. Nice huh?



This is my favorite. It's our conductor's!
Not only that she's a musician, she can draw too!

After packing our things, we went to the lecturer’s house for tea.
And my, it is a nice house surrounded by nature. He also has pond with canoes at the backyard.


So breathtaking. Can I run in the field and sing like Beauty and the Beast?


Looks lovely in the inside too.

Finally, we went back to the city on the bus.
This blonde me managed to return home from the wilderness, in one piece.

the orchestra camp

Last week was another phase of my journey as a trumpet player.

I've entered the five days of music camp for the youth orchestra!
I was the eldest, mingling with these young musicians who are really skillful in their respective instruments.

I am happy that I am now even more adept towards people.
I've learned to give up my notion that I couldn't mix around with the youngsters- and I found myself fit really well with these musicians! It's just the matter of how I relate to them, seeing them within their potential.

The music camp is well organized.
We were being fed with sufficient food,
and also sufficient practice schedule.

In this whole music camp I've also gained the benefit out of the breakdowns I've got.

First story.

As a whole brass section, we received a good bashing by our tutor.

Literally, he said,
“You guys did not apply a single thing that we did yesterday.
This is a government project, and you have wasted the government's money.
Which means, you wasted my money because I also paid tax.
In this camp, do not expect the tutors to give you the “happy”.
Don't expect the camp itself to give you the “happy”.
You yourself have to create the “happy”, by checking your intonation with your friends,
by practicing the scores within your section.”

We were not playing at the best level that we could, and by that we didn't take the responsibility of gaining the maximum out of the camp. We expected the tutors and the camp itself to give us the benefit, but we did not take the initiative to take action and extract the skills by being proactive.

In other words, we were not hardworking enough.
In the midst of being triggered by what he said, and feeling bad about my progress,
I took it as a treasured advice as a trumpet player.
Find the “happy” myself instead of expecting it from people.

Second story.

There was this sectional practice and the two leading trumpeters were absent.
I was left with another junior trumpet.
There were a few series of high As, and I failed to played them well.
Instead, I was blowing funny squeaks and boy I was embarrassed.

When I looked back into that, I feel a bit better- I failed not because I was not confident.
No matter that it was scary being left alone to play it out, I still do it.
I think it's okay for me to feel personally bad when I failed to play my notes,
and still work hard for my progress.
And I now need to play for at least two hours per day to get myself improved more and more.

Third story.

At the final rehearsal just before the concert,
I was scolded by the principle trumpeter who is years younger than me.
Literally he said,

“Your sound volume is overpowering mine.
I can always top up your volume but this is classical music.
So who is the principle player, you or me?”

Conventionally, I will automatically say that this person is being rude.
But when I see the core of it, it was me who at fault.
I did a mistake of being too loud, and I can now restore that- I learned to apologize.


All in all,
the real concert was good.
The brass section was well balanced,
especially the trumpet.

I really valued this experience.

I have learned last week, with very costly price.

There was this time when I suddenly decided to write an email to my close friends.

The email appeared like a declaration of my plans on my budget.
And then my friends gave me advice, but I coldly declined them.

It went ugly and all of us got upset.

What my friends told me are true and I do silently follow their advice. Ironically, out in the open I was so into making myself right and making them wrong, and I continue on annoying, hurting and offending them.

I stopped and looked back on what I have done.
Apparently, my action on sending an email to everyone has no good intention in it-
It was nothing better than a complain, and in between the lines I was actually asking people to shut up on talking about the things that I do with my money.

And how bad was I to have that intention towards my very own friends, who actually cared about me! Asking friends to shut up- what kind of friend am I?

No wonder that although how much I put pretty words in it, eventually the email lead to an ugly ending which impacted my relationship with my friends.

In future, when I speak, I should see what's my core motive of doing it.
Do I want to use my voice to construct, or destruct?

To friends,
If you read this, I owe you an apology.
I've tried to lighten things up, but maybe that was a bad decision.
I am aware that you all are still angry with me, I am sorry.
May these few coming quiet months will teach me to value friendship even more.
Love.

why bother?

Occasionally people question me on some decisions that I have taken based on my faith.

True, I maybe gay, and I openly disagree with some conservative rules, but accept this fact- I am still a Moslem.

If I am imperfect at executing certain rules given by the book, it doesn’t mean that I am now eligible to toss away the whole book from my life.

All beings are created to serve to God.
You can look at it as a burden, but you can accept it like you accept life.
It doesn’t mean that you have to be pious; but it's about how you live your life.

So why bother trying?
Because your deeds are counted even at a minute atomic scale.
Because even the smallest action taken can make a difference.
One split second can save you from a fatal accident.
One small contact of metal can cause an explosion.
One small crack can cause the whole plane to fail.

Naturally we can easily give up on actions that seem to feel difficult, although we know that the actions are meant to build our character and make things better in the long run.

Let us learn to appreciate it when people are trying.
Judging when they fail just won’t make any good.

accidents and accidentals

Yesterday, Friday night, me and my two friends were heading home from a club. It had just rained and the road was slippery.

One huge SUV seemed to have rolled a few times and landed at the side of the road, the windscreen was shattered and a lot of broken parts of the vehicle was all over the place. There were police and ambulance at the scene.

After a few minutes driving, we saw another small car upside down, and again there were a lot of people helping.

And as I biked home from my friend's house, I saw another car, already skidded and made a huge billboard go down.

It's quite disturbing to see three freak accidents for just one night.

Anyway.

Remember the audition that I attended last week?
I went for the orchestra rehearsal today.
Feels different- the notes were not that much, not as frequent as solo or wind orchestra pieces,
but they are no less difficult.
The key signature is a bit weird and sometimes trumpets will have to transpose.
The rests are like 20 or 30 bars, and you'll get confused on where to start playing and sometimes there are no cues to enter.

But nevertheless, it's fun!

myself

As I go through more experience in relating myself to people, I have learnt a few things.

These are the three characteristics that people refer me as, and I admit there is truth in it-

I am easily influenced, sensitive and I think too much.

And these three beings are actually related to each other.

I can now use my character so as to bring benefit to myself and the rest. But at other times, I can be aware to stop using them if they won’t make things any better.

It’s so easy, when you know yourself more.

On the other hand, I am also a person who has a sharp tongue.
I rarely use it, but if I do, it stops me from retaining peace between myself and the rest, when I simply say things with no intention of making things better.

Rather than fight fire with fire, it’s better to deal fire with water- it doesn’t matter whether you are right or wrong in the situation. Both contradicting opinions have its own truth, in fact.

If I want to prove a point, I should listen and understand the other person’s world first.
There's no point of me bellowing at the other person, only to prove that I’m right, because the relationship itself is at stake. Well, I can still snap at people- but you know, that'll give another impact that I might don't want.