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.