poland 17-27 may.

it was a good trip, an eye-opener, and a good break from life in sg. imagine, no internet, no hp for 10 days ( since internet is ex there and so is roaming charges ).

a few interesting events:

17-18 may: spent travelling. plane from sg to paris ( abt 12-13 hrs ), then transit in paris before leaving for warsaw in another plane ( 2 hrs flight ), then coach to sopot ( abt 4hrs +++ bcos of jam ), the town where the choir festival is held. the most interesting part of travelling was the coach ride.

spent the time looking at the vast greenery around, and yes there was real forests! not the kind like bukit timah hill, but really real forest, with no street lamps and dusty roads. and farms. yes there were real cows grazing on the field! there was a lunch/toilet stop. it was so much colder there! cold and dry wind. we were all peering at the menu, which was entirely in polish. our ordering was very very funny, using hand signals, and finger pointing. drank coke out of some ancient-looking bottle that i only saw it before in the movies.

after that, was more greenery and farmlands, fields, cows, wild flowers, and blue skies. and then, comes the JAM. jams on single-lane roads are really...terrible. literally stuck. so the bus was stuck for hours and we were all bored, not to mention needing to go to the toilet ( at least for someone ). so that someone went to the fields to pee. and the rest of us took out cameras to take scandalous photos/videos. muahaha. the rest of us just got off the bus, and right in the middle of the road, we sang, with the cold wind blowing at us. we became a tourist attraction for the locals! very amusing. and a very unique experience.

finally, we reached the hostel. had dinner cooked by the host, and off to our rooms. i shared with jq. quite nice room, with an attached toilet ( only one set of keys tho so we had to enter and leave tgt ). the first thing i did was to wash the kettle! the inside was coated with rust ( yes the tap water is milky and rusty ) so after scrubbing for a long time, out comes a clean kettle to boil water. tapwater's so dirty i had to boil water for brushing teeth! =x and double boil for drinking.

not the comfy hotel life eh.

next up came the bath. i bathed after jq, and there was no more hot water left in the tank! so at 5 deg cel, i have to bathe in cold water. =x instead, i used the kettle, boil water, and since i didnt have a bucket, i had to boil half a kettle of water, mix cold water, then pour water out from the kettle over my head. try repeating this many times to bathe. =x

next was the "not so comfy" bed. ha. and terrible jet lag. time difference was 6 hrs so .. go figure.

19 may mon.

besides rehersals, was sightseeing at gdansk with a tour guide.

interesting things are the food! breakfast was so good that i loved it. the food is so fresh, esp the butter and jam and home-made bread. yummy. and the icecream at gdansk. the height of the icecream was so much longer than the cone! wahhhh. yum. at first i didnt wanna take icecream in the cold weather, but eventually, gave in to temptation. it was very very very good! the soups are also very good too.

20 may tues.

our first performance day. went to a school for cultural exchange, cum performances. what struck me was the immense hospitality of the people there. they served us with food ( very good food might i add ) and bring us around on a school tour, arrange for accomodation for us ( since it will be too late to get back to our hostel in the evening ) performed with the school children, at a church after mass for the public. i cant believe that many people there have never went to a concert because they cannot afford it, and this is the 1st time they are hearing music. standing ovation was pretty cool.

next comes garden party, with polish sausages! another yummy food. beer and volka at poland is good and cheap too, plus warm in this cold weather. i personally like the volka better. esp when i was freezing at the garden party. after that was partying with the polish people. ( i think the guys went wild with the young polish girls haha )

21 may wed

morning at the beach, by the baltic sea. sand was soft, sea water's cold, and lots of sand flies. the best part was the scenery. (too bad im not pro enough to capture good photos of the scenery)

after going back for rehersal, it was off to shopping at a mega mall ( not interesting, since i only shopped for unique snacks/biscuits/cookies )

22 may thurs

opening ceremony of the festival muntus cantat sopot. i think we were very cam whore haha. kept waving here and there. and the europeans are so curious about these black-haired asians that they kept taking photos of us. open air performance by the jetty. took many photos too.

23 may fri

competition in the folk category, plus concert at night, and some sightseeing at sopot.

24 may sat

competition in the sacred category, and a final performance/party/prize presentation at the forest opera.

the forest opera is interesting. it is really right in the middle of the forest! it took us 30 mins to get there by foot ( no bus/train ). imagine trekking in the forest in concert attire and heels. killer. but it feels really good to go to such a place, especially to perform there. of course its freezing cold, but well.

results turned out pretty good. then comes the party. food was fine, tho queue was horrendous because of the sheer number of choirs there. drank honey volka and its good! so good that i bought a bottle back home. got a tad bit high and went to dance. whee. was a good partying night. cabbed back from the forest.

25 may sun

peformance at a mass. then went to forest opera again for another party. the last night was spent at jen's room, which was the largest room among all of us ( it was like an old-fashioned penthouse suite with a fireplace ) and played games til late at night.

26 may mon

breakfast was a funny affair with zhimin kena-ing the forfeit from last night's games. shall not elaborate too much. ha.

after that was farewell to poland and off to the coach back to warsaw, then to paris, and then back to sg on tues. ( the flight was turbulent and terrible )

i will miss ....

being this close with this bunch of people, my roommate jq, my "food experimenting" partner jen, that ever-interesting guys, drunk zm, funky aa, tracy, my unofficial roommate cum room crasher (haha) the girls, the guys, the crazy stunts, the smu jumps in public, the funny polish words that we say in a non-polish way, the laid back life there, the lack of distractions, the warm hospitality of the polish people.

i finally found my performance high in poland.

i will not miss ...

the dry air ( even my earlobes cracked from the dry air! )
the drastic temperature change between day and night
the milky and rusty water
the lack of free toilets ( its 2 bucks for a toilet trip! or a 30 min queue for a free toilet at macs with only 1 cubicle )

its a great trip, and a great choir festival.
but still, im happy to be back at home.

(:

(photos later! ive been cam-whoring so much i didnt take much photos of my own haha )

choir concert tdy. was quite a day.

im glad that concert's over, tho it was a tad bit short. wine reception was pretty tho, with the right amount of fluff. i think that the price of the tickets was abit too high, but hey, its fundraising for poland, and im not that rich, so im not complaining.

after performing for afew choir concerts, im still searching for that "performance high" that i experienced with every band performance. all i felt was like, normal, maybe that bit of nervousness, but just, normal. unlike last time when i would keep checking and double checking all my band attire ( even my collar and hair ribbons ).

i hope poland will change all that. my bank acc is growing a big hole that i hope my internship pay will attempt to fill it later.

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previously, i misplaced a pink pencil that i recently bought. ok i eventually found it afew weeks later at one of my student's house. now i misplaced a calculator after class with that same student! and i just changed new batteries for it. talk about deja vu. (my calculator better be there )

i like zhimin's pro active attitude towards choir.

and yes, i dislike certain policies, especially things like forcing tickets on us, and "threatening" us with less or no subsidy if we do not sell tickets. or that "why didnt you come for practice" face when choir is 4 times a week and not everyone is that free with no other commitments just because its summer.

stayed back to do the choir backdrop tdy. everyone was supposed to stay back, so i did, although i would rather go home for lunch. then people started having stuff on, like what mother's day lunch and all those not very impt stuff. lack of manpower, things go unfinished.

how efficient. when these are simple things, such as art and craft.

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3 weeks of holidays have passed.

ive never felt so tired.

octet during choir tdy. of course i'll be picked. the seniors wouldnt pick themselves right. and with jen and sylvia not around, nobody to shield me.

i felt like an animal on display.

press play: tape start to run.

opps, something wrong with the tape. stop, rewind, play.

all talk. all plain talk.

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thankfully i started taking bus. no need for small talk when walking to the mrt station. no need to endure a long train journey standing and squeezing plus feeling like i shouldnt go grab a seat when ppl ard me dont have a seat.

just sit down, and sleep. bliss.

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departing for poland soon.