Singapore Pavilion

15 minutes

2007-11-08T00:48:00.000+08:00

15 minutes to go before the end of this prestigious Exhibition ends...

We had a terrific and excellent time here... its such a great opportunity and contributed our part informing the international visitors about the art scene in Singaore.
Its been a BLAST!

time to pack up... see u guys back in Singapore!!!
its Shopping time !!! Muahahaha!

Signing off for the last and final time
...... ryf n debs!

the End is near...

2007-11-05T21:00:00.000+08:00

3 more days!!!!

Cass is arriving tomorrow afternoon... we cant wait !!
We will be leaving for Barcelona on the 15th.

4 days ago while cleaning the apartment, we stumbled upon a box full of lotuses. It was Jason's lotuses tucked away in the corner, we discovered there were 27pieces of Lotuses, and we put them up for sale! We were not informed that there were more lotuses in our apartment. And the lotuses were snapped up within two days. There was this couplme that bo]ought all 5 of the lotuses, must have wanted to recreate the smaller version of the chandelier.

Da wu's room is full of drawings and images that the table could no longer contain them. They spilled out to the floor and covered part of the room. He provided paper and drawing materials for visitors to draw/paint. The visitors were very excited and fond of contributing their artworks as part of the exhibition. But we are just wary as the visitors are allowed to keep their artworks, you would never know, if they took any of Da Wu's paintings. We kept checking the room to ensure that it does not happen.

The sonic dome has been a room full of treasures, where people leave their cameras, scarfs, hanphones behind. We had to constantly make rounds just to make sure that no one leaves anything behind. And they leave their mess as well, tissues and pieces of paper.

There was this perculiar writer from France who viewed Vincent's work and informed us that the penises from Vincent's sculptures were the same. We looked at him for a bit and then look at each other. We were just baffled. Why would anyone touch the penises of these sculptures, and what is he expecting, varyiing sizes? It was hilarious and we got a good laugh from that.

We are expecting more people nearing the end of the exhibition. So will write soon!
Have to clear the catalogues and the posters...

Vi di a'more
ryf n dubs.

Happy BIRDAY

2007-10-29T21:50:00.001+08:00

2 days without internet (sigh)
8 more working days!!! wohoo...
8 more days till cass and phil comes...
16 more days to start of Euro trip...
37 more days till we see Singapore once again...
37 more days till we have to get a real job!!

Busy busy week. thursday we went shopping, the whole day dedicated to shopping. We bought more stuff for ourselves this time. Went to Rialto, and mestre to do a full, all out shopping spree!! Went to look for debs bag in mestre, was cheaper tho, but the design that she wanted was not available (don't remind her about it)..We bought musical stage puppets, handcrafted in Italy, and it moves to the music. One of a kind... Cost us a bomb (don't ask us about it..). On friday was Andrea's birthday, so we bought him a praline chocolate cake on the way to the train station and asked the shop keeper to reserve it for us till we got back about 8pm.Went mestre to look for bags, was a lengthy walk, and by the time we reach, most shops were closed for LUNCH. Apparently, italians have their lunch from 1230 till 1530. guess too much pasta requires a lil nap afterwards. We took a break at this asian cafe, where we had HARD croissants and NICE hot chocolate. We were sure the croissants were kept for a week! lol. Afterwards we asked for directions to Corso Del Popolo. Thats the location where they had the bags. We took a pit-stop at one of the deparmental stores, the first shopping mall we stepped into in Venice. I bought a top hat. NICE. We then made our way to Del Popolo, and when we reach the bag shop, we went on a hunt for the bag. Saw a similar one but the like i mentioned, it was not the right design. We then headed for the indian fast food restaurant where we bought tons of food, to celebrate Andrea on his birthday. We hopped on the bus (for free as the bus driver didn't have any more tickets to spare)...yay. We speed-walked from the rail station to get the cake, bought for Andrea a small towel that he requested for and paced ourselves home.

He was coming after work to celebrate with us, and we have to prepare everything before that. We prepared food for quite abit, and sneaked a preview of the chicken satay that I prepared before we left (to soak up the marination). It wasn't the ideal Singaporean Satay, but Deb thought it tasted good! We started to heat up the food we got from the indian restaurant, swithed on the TV and awaited Andrea's arrival. Time went by............and I fell asleep. Then suddenly awoken by the loud annoying buzzer. Andrea was FINALLY here. He arrived and changed into his first bday prezzie, given from his frn, a pink gay shirt! (it's supposedly a vintage tee....) We handed him our present he requested for, but what he didn't know was that we had a whole string of surprised up our sleeeeeves. =)

The food was good, on top of that, Andrea had commented that he preferred the satay chicken better than the tikka chicken frm the restaurant! YAAAAYY!!! A success! By the end of the dinner, we were all stuffed! Andrea got comfy on the sofa bed to watch TV, while Deb and I prepared the bday cake surprise...For once, the failing heating system was a blessing in disguise. We used that as an excuse for me to secretly bring the cake out to the laundry area (which has a window that connects to the toilet) while Deb "had to pee". So we both met at the window and I handed her the cake. She planted the nice candles and lit them, I gave her the signal to come out, and as she came out, we dimmed the lights and did a rather horrible rendition of a 'Happy Birthday'. He looked surprised, and said, "oh my god" several times... lol.. After blowing out the candles, we gave him the 2nd birthday gift, nother towel, this time a lil bigger just in case he needs a bigger one. Its actually a rolled-up Singapore Flag. By this time he was flustered. Hes been wanting to get a Singapore Flag for a long time, since he misses home so much. We asked Khim to get it for us when she came down...shh.. Then after he cut the cake and we had a slice each, we gave him his last birthday gift. We actually didn't know what to get someone who has everything, so we settled on a Fossil wallet, since it looked quite worn out. The fossil wallet was special as it had his embossed initial. Its one of a kind. He seemed quite pleased as well... with his many "oh my gods" We promised him that that was the last of our gifts.

Afterwards we just spent the rest of the evening watching a DVD of Hot fuzz... Then he slept over at our place, where the next day he was treated to a hearty breakfeast of one pancake (he was late for work and had to go... not our fault). Thats it for thursday and o friday we just spend the day at home after work watching buncha movies on tvs, Italian and German.

Will update again, whats happening in the week... happy reading

.ryf n dubs

we love our tap water.. COLD

2007-10-24T22:56:00.000+08:00

Hello all...

We had a warm bath yesterday and the morning... FINALLY! and we had the heater / radiator fixed. its all controlled by one machine and max said that it was a temporary part that they replaced as they did not get exact part for the old model of the heater. And temporary it was. Just before we left, we tested the tap again, just to feel the warm relief of warm water once again, but to our dissapointment, THERE WAS NO HOT WATER... Sien...

WHY WHY WHY...

sigh...
well, on the plus side, Today is our favourite day. OFF day tomorrow. We are thinking of going to the curches/ museums, well maybe not museums, we'll wait for cass to come down to do tht. Thinking of going mestre to do a lil shopping. Buy deb's eastpak.

Talk soon.. off to a cold shower once again....

.ryf / dubs

Feeling chilly

2007-10-22T21:30:00.000+08:00

The apartment is in a state of chaos. Max the landloard has been delaying to fix the heater. So right now there is no hot water, no heater, and practically no gas to cook. According to him, the people responsible for the heater has been delaying the process as they are attending similar problems. He says that its common, as winter is nearing and only now then they check the heater / radiators. we've been microwaving hot water for more than a week. And its simply unbearable. The water is ICY cold. no kidding how cold it is, seems like its spring waters from the mountains. Khim bought lots of food, and we are just waiting for the gas to be fixed so that we could cook. Haiz...

The weekend breezed pretty fast, On friday we went out for dinner in a restaurant recommended by Khim. The risotto was great, loaded with seafood and it came in a huge pot, enough for 4 people. We had that on the side of lobster spaghetti, fish soup and a plate serving of mixed grilled fish. The portions were huge. It was amazingly filling. Then we skipped desert for coffee and chocolatte drinks. When we steped out of the resturant, it had already started to rain. Lucky me, i didnt bring any water -proof coats and unmbrella, i had to run all the way back home, frezzing my ass off. Deb walked w khim, they walk slower anyways...lol.

On thursday, we went to Padua, where we were amazed by Giotto's amazing Scrovegni Church. We are only allowed to spend 15minutes in the curch and make way for the next group of tourist as the entire building is equipped with humitdity control to preserve the beautiful frescos by the great Giotto. The church was simply amazing!! we were awed by the magnificient frescos and the superb technique on how he sectioned the various chapters of jeasus and mary's lives. The last judgement was even more breathtaking. its such a pity we were unable to take pictures.

Next we made our way to the 2nd oldest university in Italy. University of Pardua. Although the school is still active, when u enter the building, it still resonates the feel and essence of nostalgia of the past occupants. We spend some time at the university... it had a presence that is hard to describe. maybe its just me...i like old buildings.

Nxt we went to Porta Della Valle, an area covered with statues. It seemed that rich /important people at that time had their statues erected as a sign of status. It was an amazing sight, with names of the staues carved, to be imortalized for their future grandchildren to behold.

Soon after we headed to San Antonio Curch. It looks odinary from the outside, but once you step in. The walls and the ceilings were not filled with painting, but SUPER AMAZING marble sculptures. It literally had marble sculptures as ornaments throughout the entire church. the curch was believed to house the tomb of Saint. Anthony, and in the middle of the room, there seemed to be a relic. It was believed to be the tongue of Saint Anthony. A lil unbelieveable, but, the idea, i have to admit was kind of interesting.

Then we headed back to the train station to mestre where we were on a hunt for an eastpack shop. We reached there pretty late, around 7, and the shops close iin half hour, we rushed through the drizzling rain cold winds to reach our destination. When we cant seem to find the right street we decided to head back. OOh, we went to a Trudi store there, and tried finding for foofoo, when we enquired the owner about foof and its model, he replied that she was an old model, and the new shipment would come in a months time, for christmas. Maybe, its destiny. we wunt be able to find foof a mate. lol.

There was a surge of visitors to the plazzo on the weekend, with Da Wu conducting his performance. Nataliah, the ex intern was here with her boyfiend, Mahmood. She told us that we are so lucky to be in the plazzo. Its so much better compared to the location she was in 2 years ago. yeah lucky us! lol. There were a lot of participnts for the performance, kids especially were having a great time experimenting with chinese ink and also other dry medium. It was great to see people of all walks enjoying each others company doing art together.

Khim has left Venice for istanbul, Alan, has left for Paris and Rofan is leaving us in 2 days time. Soon we will be all alone once again... Till our good old friend cass comes in november. Cant wait till for our EUROtrip. wohoooo..

talk soon!
.ryf

Mixing it all in!

2007-10-17T22:01:00.000+08:00

Friday we went to our Ochestra performance at Chisea San Vidal.Its an amazing and truely breathtaking experience. The Ochestra was playing Antonio Vivaldi's pieces, four seasons and more. The group was exhilarating and the audience cheered in celebration. Rofan was unlucky tho, as she bought her tix at another place for that similar concerto, but her's was at another location, so at the last minute, she had to rush to the other place, on the other side of Venice... Poor gal,she had to rush in her long dress n leather boots. But she managed to make it in time for the second half of the concert.

On Saturday we had sandwich for dinner, Andrea brought us to a terrific sandwich place where they had the most variety of sandwiches in Venice. We were hooked on the salmon, shrimp and crabstick sandwich and also tacchinno (turkey) mayo mix. Incredible servings at only 1.5 Euros. Its located near to the Rialto Bridge. Truely amazing. We bought the sadwiches back and enountered something uneventful that we will ever forget in Venice...

On our way back, we went our normal route back to the apartment, and we passed this group of teen, smoking and drinking along the allies. We passed by them and made our way. Suddenly, there was a commotion at the back and when i turned, i saw Andrea being tripped by one of the teens. And the whole group were mocknig us. pulling their eyes down and slanting their eyes, while yelling out asians! asians! We cant believe that there are people here that discreminate other race. If without Asians and the surge of tourists, venice won't flourish. It reflects how these teens are being taught in school about racial discremination. it was utterly disgusting. Andrea was furious, and we was constantly jeered at as they walk pass. He was so furious that he called up his friend, an Italian and wanted to settle the problem. he felt that they were disrespectful. Meanwhile we were in our apartment having the sandwiches, watching spongebob,and was very worried for Andrea. But he came back 20 mins later, fine and a little better. Aparently his friend was so intimidating that he scared the bunch of 20 teens. Its very sad tht in this day and age, there is still race discremination around, and the education system is not doing anything to stop it.

After the entire ordeal, we had our dinner and left for soccer at Giardini. it was a long and chilly walk but a nice one. We wanted to run, but deb doesnt have track pants and are wearing jeans, so we walked there instead. We were just playing a simple passing game when a group of people swarmed into the football field. After the incident, we are a lil wary of the company at first, but they turned out to be a group of nice guys from the jewish community in the ghettos in Venice. They are here to contribute their services and teach to the jewish community here. It was more challenging playing agaiinst them, but exhausting.

Sunday, we went to a sushi restaurant (again on Andrea Expenses, but he insisted). Food was clearly overpriced and the ammount was little. Paid 105 Euros for a sushi boat and 2 side dishes. Sushis are much better and fresher in SG. YES back home in SG! With that price, we could've bought 10 boats. lol. We went back and Rofan bought desserts for us. 5 flavour Gelatos.
Got back to the apartment to play taiti (big two). And the forfit for the loser is to be drawn at their backs. This is so they will not know what is being drawn till end of the game. We had lots of ticklish fun of being drawn on. lol.. here are a few of the finalist. Andrea won the best drawn on contest!

Before we forgot and failed to mention, WE DO NOT HAVE HOT WATER since Saturday!!!! and gas at our apartment. It's ridiculos. Deb was showering halfway and suddenly there was a surge of cold water. and she jumped out of the tub! The cold water is not even funny, its crazy cold! We called the landlord, Max and he said that he will call the company, and till now we are waiting...its WEDNESDAY! What do we do instead, you might ask? We microwave water and transfer them to bottles of mineral water to shower. haiz... And we took turns to shower and fill up for each other. Believe me, it looks like we are on a water rationing program...lol.

Rofan has left Venice for Istanbul, and will be back only on the 20th. Alan is now here, and hes bunking with us. He'll be here for about 3-4 days before leaving for florence. And Khim wil be coming down to Venice this evening with Pratas and more spices for us. haha. aren't we pigs! lol.

Tomorrow is our OFF day. Favourite day of the week, and we will be going out of the city to Treviso and also Padova. Alan will tagg along as he suggested cycling at the mountainous alps at Treviso, that would be fun. Scaling the mountains in our winter wear, braving through the near winter climate. i think we are nuts. but.. lets live a li'l dangerously..

Till friday!
.ryf n debs

BUSY BUSY week

2007-10-14T18:41:00.000+08:00

Its been a hectic week sofar. a lot of things snowballed and we were preocupied with things.
We went to Arsenale on our day off, could u believe it! More art exhibitions...OUR OFF DAY and we viewed more ART?!! arsenale was very intense with a gallery space, the size of 2 football field. There are many othrs, but we actually were caught up at the souvenir shop for about 30minutes. very NICE tees, just that its expensive for A tee(23Euros). I found the artwork on the left execptionally strong, although it could serve to be quite disrespectful. Hmmn, there were nice works aroud, sculptural ones prove to be more spectacular than others.

This artist packaged her works within suitcases (deb's favourite). She packed a series of offices within comparmentalized sections in the suitcase. Its amazing, how she included large bulky items such as typewriters, to teacup sets. Although not for carrying around. But for display. Thought provoking how working spaces could be packaged and you can bring that workspace anywhere around. What defines a workspace anyway? There were plenty of Video installations and most of them are not as effective as i think they should be. Come to think of it Zul's Sonic dome is the ONLY sound installation sofar. There were'nt much interactive media works at all in Arsenale.

Theres Also another work that resembles Joseph Beuys, and Vincent. The trenchcoat, is painted white and emerged from it are swirls of lines that lead up to an intricate pattern of maps. cool...Another work that is interesting is of a video work of people confessing that they are going to die. From all ages toall walks of life, to races. Its interesting to see that pause in their eyes when they utter those word "i will die". They know they are going to die suddenly.
its inevitable.

Before Arsenale, we went to San Marco Bascilica. Finally we made it in after 1 month here. it was amazing...golden mosaics all within the domes. nicely done paintings with mosaics. The highlight of the bascilica is actually the 4 horses of san marco which we are unable to take pictures of. Cameras are restricted so we only took pictures off the balcony of the bascilica. Nice view of San Marco Square.

Another stop that we made was at San Zacaria Curch. its one of the church with many wonderful paintings.. one of which was Bernini's last n most magnificient paintings. everyone was just gathering there and slotting coins, waiting for the spotlight to illuminate he paintings...
Very Excuisite.

Ok to cut things short, and not be so like a loh soh grandma (according to deb). Other things that we did were attending an ochestra, played soccer with Andrea and a couple of jewish kids. Got into a rascist fight... all in the next episode.

Tune in..
ryf.deb

wonderfulest day every wednesday!

2007-10-10T23:12:00.000+08:00

Its been a long Tuesday and sofar Wednesday as well.. Thought that by expecting the fast to end this week, the week would digress faster…lol. Oh well. A lot has been happening, many people were here on Tuesday, as there were new cruise ships docked. The visitors have been delighted with the freshly, energized and newly pleasant smelling Sonic dome. While many others have been treated to the presence of Da Wu. Many liked his works ad complimented on his ability to portray the Asian culture. An Asian couple from Shanghai was amazed at how Vincent’s works are portraying a sort of deity. And asked if many actually prayed to the figure. Its good that visitors are making the connections themselves, in the attempt to understand the artwork, but its also a pity that most of them might have misconceptions and disillusions.

A lady from Scotland engaged us in a very long conversation, how she visited Singapore and how she fell in love with the city. She ate, according to her ‘the forbidden fruit’ (durian I think…) and also bought an apron where it illustrated the many fines signs of Singapore. She went about how Singapore is much cleaner than China, and almost got caught in this debate with a Chinese Student from China. She was a bit biased, but I think that China, has its equal share of strengths, which she have overlooked. But she was very nice, Deb walked with her and introduced the artworks to her, and stayed in the dome for the entire duration of Zul’s piece. She’s very chatty. And when she left she gave Deb a pear which she got bought as a token of friendship. Also, she mentioned that next to the palazzo there is an Antonio Vivaldi orchestra she will be attending tonight. She said we must WATCH. In her own exact words, “its like you died and gone to heaven”. We made a trip down to check it out. Looks good. We book tickets for Friday’s performance. My very first ! I’m gleefully excited!

Theres also this guy who keeps coming to the palazzo and handing us pamphlets, of the New Religion. He a very religious guy who preaches about some new religion. Quite scary, but interesting at the same time. He’s pamphlets are amazingly vivid, full color and amazingly descriptive. Will take a pic when we have the time. According to him, he’ll come again someday to give us more pamphlets. Maybe this time we’ll take a pic with him and upload in the blog…lol.

On Tuesday we bought our shoes, and are well on way to keep fit… (we can only hope).
I bought an asics shoes, nice leather for only 39 Euros, but not really for running, but what the heck, it’s a NICE pair…lol. Deb bought herself a very nice Adidas pair, specially for running. So we will go for a run this weekend with Andrea and probably kick a few balls of soccer with his friends as well.. Time to stop eating and start exercising.

On the cooking side, we did some local delights, stir fried spinach, and also roti john… we know we know.. we have to indulge in the Venetian delights, but we are cooking mainly coz we want to save up for our trip to Rome. Besides, we have our basic intake of Calzone, Pizzas, wraps, Kebab, and many more… Maybe we are just typical Asians..haha. Oh well, whatever it is… FaStING will be over on Saturday, and we will be able to have lunch like everyone else. Rofan is coming this Thursday.

And the plan for our next day off? We are going to many places within Venice, churches and museums and bask in their magnificent glory. Will update when we get back,

In the meantime… enjoy the coming end of a working week! Wahoo…!

Love
.ryf / deb

The guilt trips

2007-10-08T22:10:00.000+08:00

And so...Ryf and I haven't exactly been feeling too well. First it was me, came down with a horrible sore throat and cough, then had a runny nose. And just when I was getting slightly better, poor Ryf got ill. He looked so miserable and maintained a strict diet for himself. He excluded all sorts of dairy products and cold drinks (i bet it was the 2 slices of Nutella sandwich that he ate the night before that got him all sick). To make things "better" we had stayed up a little later at night watching TV with Andrea and slept late, as a result, Ryf and I weren't able to wake up at 4am to have our breakfast (We had to eat before 5am due to the fast). However, Ryf did manage to tolerate not eating at all and being sick at the same time, I take my hat off to him! We had kebabs the for dinner.

A day later, we're all feeling much better. It had to be the healing powers of the kebab! it was a darn awesome kebab wrap!! One day, when we get another one, we'll be sure to document that magic moment! Along with the wonderful tasting kebab, came the mighty guilt trip with the relisation that: WE HAVEN'T EXERCISED IN THE LONGEST TIME!!! So we started hunting for some running shoes. They're pretty pricey i must say, but as for me, it's a pretty good timing that my trusty little beagle had chewed a huge hole in my running shoes at home. So time to buy new ones! Ryf's been having a tough time in deciding which pair to buy. Seems to me he prefers the women selection. =) (and he glares at me as i type this) Me on the other hand, have been a little too fusy over my choice plus i refuse to spend anything more than 60 Euros.

Both our parents have been really helpful (thanks to skype), they deliver useful recipes to us, in the fear that their poor chilren might starve. Ryf's mum taught him how to cook this absolutly delicious dish, Kentang Dadu Dadu, which is potatoes with minced meat. My mum gave me the recipe for doing up our own pancake mix (pancake mix very rare here, we found one that was 4 euros though). So off went to Billa again, with a list of things to get. We had checked some words up in a translation tool thing to make sure we knew what stuff was called in italian.

Last night, we were all set to prepare the pancake mix, with our consultant chef, Andrea. Until, he spoke.........instead of getting baking soda, we had bought YEAST instead. Anyway, we went ahead with it, and had pancakes this morning. How was it you ask? it was good....only a little hard, and tasted a little more like bread. oops.

OKay, leaving the food out, and talking more bout the important stuff, such as the Singapore Pavilion.... Da Wu was around yesterday (7th Oct, Sunday) and he did a performance. Many people were present for it. There was even this one lady who has been coming down here enquiring bout Da Wu's next performance. She was present for the performance. There was also another lady who told Da wu that his performance was in conjunction with her birthday and that she feels the people gathering for the performance, in a way was celebraing her birthday. Great response, many enjoyed having rice on the banana leaf. We bought a can of odour eliminator for Zul's dome. It smells a lot better now, no more smelly feet.

For this coming week some things that we are excited about. Rofan, our friend from ICA is coming on Thursday, shes bringing us more sardines and more instant curry powder....oh yea and also ryf's mum packed some kuih goodies coz he'll be spending hari raya here...Sadly... lol. Another thing is that fasting will be over this coming friday... so we can have lunch like normal people here do.

Ok, closing time...
debs / ryf

The pavillion drunk is BACK

2007-10-06T19:13:00.000+08:00

The pavilion drunk made his appearance at approx : 1310hrs. We are just observing his actions in the plazzo. Hes grinning to many people and looks very tipsy. We are just waiting for him to get in the dome and start drinking. then we call the security. Will update soon!

The moment we've been waiting for...

The pavilion drunk left at exactly : 1329hrs. He was asking us if he can charge his music at our desk. We told him to ask the security guard. He made his way to the guest book, and start to leave his comment. He spent 10mins doodling in the guest book. What a masterpiece it turned out. Someday it might be a valued drawing...u never know.

Anyhow, he was bobbing his head up and down while drawing in the book. Deb caught it on video but its too bad that we cant post a video on the blog. But we have a pic of the artwork.
Enjoy...

Lace it Up

2007-10-05T23:44:00.000+08:00

Friday. Workday
We have settled in for work today. Yesterday was a terrific day off with great weather and a fantastic trip away from bustling Venice….And yes, a wonderful late morning…lol.

Da Wu came by the apartment to collect the banana plants. He’s doing a performance on Sunday and he’s using the closing day to prep his works. His plants are mighty heavy carrying it from one point to another. Soon after we left for the Mexican Pavilion and Bill Viola’s Ocean Without a Shore, before heading out to Burano, Murano and Torcello. Our day plan is Packed!!. Ocean Without a shore is very arresting. True to Viola’s style, he uses the gaze to engage audience, this time in the theme of Death. 3 screens portraying different people each time emerging behind a water screen in synchronization, one after the other. Amazing, disturbing, arresting. The Mexican Pavilion was good as well. Very interactive, Favorites were the light-bulbs on the ceilings that pulse according to the visitor’s heartbeat. There were about 100+ bulbs recording about 100 visitor’s heart pulse. Another was using shadows to tune in frequency of the airwaves. So its like yr shadows generate the volume and amplitude and strength of the signal. Pretty cool.

We thought of making a 4 island hop. The Cemetery (we heard good things about the view in the cemetery ), Murano, Burano and Torcello. But we started out late, so we only managed to get to Burano, Murano and Torcello. Murano was ok… we visited a glass workshop were they were creating art sculptures. But the prices there were pretty steep for my Singaporean wallet, lol.. so we didn’t get anything at Murano. Steep prices manz! And we cant afford to pack them in our backpack, and lugg it all down to Berlin and Rome. We went Burano, and was greeted with many colorful houses. Seemed like a coloring book gone wrong, but the colors made the whole place more vibrant and exhilarating. We walked about for a bit and realized that most shops are the same. But most laces are handmade as illustrated by their grandmothers and mothers that they display prominently knitting those intricate laces. Quite a sight. We bought a few souvenir lace coasters (although it’s a lil redundant as lace absorbs moisture and lets it seep to the table.. but oh well…) Deb bought a glass pendant from Murano for her aunt. Very nice and outstanding colors, and best of all, hand made from Murano. We headed back to the vap for our next stop Torcello. We reached Torcello at around 6ish, and we walked in a bit and decided to head back. The journey to central Torcello is at least 15mins, plus all attractions. Museums and all probably close around 7 – 7.30. We decided to headback to Venezia, Didn’t go to the cemetery though as it was going to be quite dark for us to see anything.

We headed back for some food. We walked past the first shop and bought our Kebabs. It was Halal. Yea for that. We were near the Rialto, so we thought we stopped at Billa to get some groceries. Time check 7.55. We ate outside Billa, to avoid the closing time at 8.30. At about 8pm, we threw away the kebab wrappers and walked towards Billa. The staff there was infront of the entrance and prevented anyone from entering. BILLA IS CLOSED. Damnit… and here we were just outside eating our food… Bad luck.

Because of that we decided to make ourselves feel better and treat ourselves to some gelatos. Yummy. We then head down to Rialto where we decided to make full use of our half day ticket, and take the ferry down the canal. Quite a nice boat ride home.. Quite a nice day I might say…

But today, im coming down with slight flu. Must be the Gelatos! Lol. Been sniffling constantly till Deb calls me sniffles. Nothing much happened today. Theres this sweet old Italian lady that commented that the exhibits should have Italian explanations instead of the English ones, as the biennale is held in Venice, Italy, we should accommodate their local language. Good point I think…

Otherwise, its off to an early bed for me, and hopefully tomorrow is a better day.

Ciao Bella…
.ryf / debs

1. Goofing around while waiting for the ever so long VAP at Torcello
2. A night / grand canal view of the Plazzo where The Singapore Pavilion is Held. Plus the Acadamia bridge.
3. Colorful Houses in Burano.
4. Mexican Exhibit, each bulb resonates to each visitor's pulse
5. Mexican Exhibit, Shadows corrosponds to the selection and strength of radiowave freuqencies.
6. Our very own chocolate + banana crepe. (Made with tortilla wraps... and chocolate)

Currrrrryyyyy !!

2007-10-01T21:19:00.000+08:00

Blueuah….

We have Curry!!! Da Wu just arrived yesterday, with a couple of his friends, two from Germany and another from Singapore. He was so kind to have brought us curry powders and also some other spices… We can finally cook CURRY. That’s if I manage to get the ingredients right to cook a kickass curry. Da Wu arrived to install his works. Will update on that when its installed, but hearing from what he mentioned, it sounds pretty interesting.

Weekend swept by pretty fast, as there was a record high in the number of visitors on Sunday, a total of 654 people. Aside from that, it went quite fast because we met a fellow Singaporean, Andrea. He’s a 19 year old cook from Hotel Baur, and apprentice undergoing a course. He stays really close to us, 2mins away. Surprisingly he came to the Singapore Pavilion to meet fellow Singaporeans, so he looked us up, and chatted with us. He had weekends off, so he spent the Sunday with us at the booth. He’s good as he speaks Italian, and can understands questions and respond to them in Italian. On Saturday, he brought us to an Indian restaurant…. Real nice TANDOORI, and also Beryani. Quite a walk away, Ganish is located across the canal near the train station. The price is quite reasonable and the servings are reasonably large. We ordered quite a bit. Debs had a tandoori mix, I had the tandoori chicken, while Andrea had mutton beryani , samosas (which was gooooood) and also stuffed prata. How perfect can it be when our table overlooked the canal, so it’s a nice, warm and cosy setting. The meal was scrumptious, and for the first time since we came to Venice, we were FULL and satisfied, we can’t eat anymore. Very Good meal indeed. When we got up, we thought we were going to the counter to pay, but instead the owner bid farewell and goodbye to us Apparently, Andrea paid for dinner, and persisted that he didn’t want us to pay him back, but we passed him some money afterwards.

On Sunday, we decided to stay home and cook for dinner, so we invited Andrea for dinner. Pretty intimidating tho as we will be serving a cook, who is more proficient In his craft than both of us put together…lol. We made chicken, potato porcini pasta. And since we didn’t buy any pastas, we took the leftover pastas, that the previous interns had left and made a ROJAK chicken, potato, porcini pasta. Tasted awesome to me, and he said it was nice as well. He brought PSP, so we just basically hung out in the apartment.

Today he starts work again, and his schedule clashes with ours, so we can only meet him weekends. We’re glad, we met up with him, as its nice to meet fellow Singaporeans here in Venice. ITS VERY RARE…

…Today we will attempt to cook curry. …ATTEMPT ! (lol)

ryf / debs

1. Our friend, Andrea.

Smacked by an Italian

2007-09-28T22:23:00.000+08:00

Helohh…

All refreshed from our day off, a lil tired from the lack of sleep, but we made it to work on a wet Friday morning. We headed off to Verona yesterday, on a 2hour train ride there. Passed by many interesting landmarks. Overall, we had a blast away from Venice and work altogether. Time to stretch our legs and do some walking.

We dozed off couple of times in the train tho, bobbing our heads (sorry ryf…not deb) frantically sideways on other passengers. But train ride was rather comfortable and exciting. One mistake that we think every tourist makes is stopping at Verona Porta Vescovo, a stop just before Verona Porta Nuvo. We got out and made or way to the train station, wanting to buy a ticket when we observed, where are all the tourists?!! We checked our train tickets and it said Porta Nuvo. So we waited for the next train, Toilet at the stop was good tho! So it was kind worth it…I think. Lol.

We reached Verona, and decided to walk down to the Arena. We could recognize the place, as it was swarming with tourists. We were drawn to the Arena instantly. Also because, there was this dude dressed in Roman Uniform and ushering the people in. We took a video and a photograph of him and he came up to us and smack our bottoms. Deb thought it was cool that a Roman / Italian hottie smacked our butts…lol. The arena was “ok” lah… nothing spectacular as we expected it to be. There was a concert being held there at night, so they were testing the sound system there…Sound system was excellent. We climbed into the arena and there were loads of people inside. Mostly all tourists. And then it started to rain… it was freezing cold, and the wind kept blowing our umbrella shut.

Then we made our way down to Casa de’ Giulette, where the story of Romeo and Juliet unfolded. We sought to see the famous balcony where Romeo and Juliet meet. Again, we were welcomed with hordes of people. Think he school let the kids out early today. There was this broze sculpture of Juliet and people were taking pictures of her while touching her boobs. It was elieved to give those that touch them, good luck in their love life. Other than that, nothing spectacular with the balcony, I believe they have capitalized on the Juliet story to a point where it becomes very overrated. Although there were nice fridge magnets there…lol. Anyways, we made our way to Castelvecchio bridge, where this massive bridge spans across the Verona river. It looks amazing, like in a fairytale where castles and knights rule. Deb met with a puppy there which she found totally adorable.

We then started to head down to the train station, not wanting to miss the 6pm train. As we head back, we passed by this toy store selling Trudi stuffed toys. You see… I have this bunny toy foofoo, and hes a Trudi toy. And we decided when we embark on this journey in Italy to find a replica of foofoo, as Trudi toys are made in Italy. We wanted to get foof a female partner… yes..WE ARE CRAZY….In any case, we went In the store to find if theres anymore foofoos, but there was none. Although, the owner of the store informed us that there was another Trudi store back at the Arena, so guess what we went on a hunt for foofoos the remaining of the day. Haha. But sadly, even that store did not have foof’s model (.. foofs quite old actually…shh). So we headed off our 2hr journey back home…

Splendid day out of Venice, I might say. Its very refreshing actually … oh wells, here we are at our desk again. 2weeks have passed, and how fast time flies when ur having fun!

Ciao!
-ryfus / dubbs

1. Italian dude that smacked our butts
2. Introducing Foofoo.
3. Picture taken with Castelvecchio bridge at the background.
4. The famous balcony of Juliet
5. The Arena in Verona.

Scissors-Paper-Stoned !!??

2007-09-26T23:17:00.000+08:00

Heloooooo…

Its been a bad day sofar… been raining like crazy. And we started out our day storming the heavy rain to get to work. Darn Venetian buildings that have no sheltered walkways…lol. We got to work today soaking wet, and with wet shoes and socks!! And now all our toes feel like icicles..Brrr.. Also the morning was pretty slow, as there weren’t much people due to the rain.

Last night, after work, the both of us took a walk down to the Billa near to Rialto to stock up on our food supplies. It was a pretty nice stroll back, discovering new things each time. This time, we discovered the Venetian version of Daiso (the 1 Euro shop, though some stuff were 2 Euros). On the way back, we (although Ryf claims it was juz Deb) couldn’t resist the incredibly seducing Chocolate & Banana Crepes. We also made a quick stop by the café/bar near our apartment to grab a hot slice of mozzarella pizza (according to Ryf’s words, it was “ DAMN SHIOK”). However, when we got back to the apartment, Ryf seemed somewhat full. So we debated over who should eat the last bite of the ever so fattening pizza, and figured after awhile, arguing didn’t work. We decided to resort to the most civilized manner in solving disputes, (one of which I feel most countries should adopt to stop wars)……We “scissored-papered-stoned”. That, my friends, is how our day pretty much ended. (Ryf lost)

Nevertheless, it is after all a Wednesday, and tomorrow comes our day off! We shall again attempt our escape to Verona.

OH OH OH!!! Mr. Phils Skyped us today! We miss prata plaster! And laksa, and nasi lemak, and nasi padang, AND BBQ STINGRAY!!!…..the list could go on forever.

CHAO CHAO. =)
US.

PICK-ME-UP n MAKE-ME-HAPPY!!

2007-09-24T20:36:00.000+08:00

Hello!

Its been a hectic Sunday. Apparently, news ships have taken dock and there have been a swarm of people coming into the exhibit. Counted altogether 587 (refer to count sheet…haha). Many interesting people we have to say, theres one in particular, an art praticioner from Cyprus, Patricia Pitts. Born in the US, she chatted with us quite a bit. Being retired, she and her husband Bob, took a long cruise down various places, including Greece and Venice. She mentioned how she feels that artists are a lil more sensitive to the surroundings and materials and how they’re (artist) are always a step ahead. She told us about how she does ceramic paintings, and that she has two children whom she’s proud of, practicing art. She sounds so excited to have seen works form the Singapore Pavillion. She mentioned also that she would be stopping in Singapore sometime in January.

Other interesting happenings during work included our separate count sheet to count the number of people who trips as they enter the exhibition. Believe me, many people do not read notices. Although its quite an amusing sight, but we sympathize on those elderly ones. For Dawu’s works, several gave good feedbacks about how it reflects strongly the Asian culture, although but his banana leaves on the table are drying up. He’s coming down on 29th of September, to install more things I believe…oh yea and bringing us curry powder (I hope)….yey! Zul’s dome, is ever so meditative, many people were snoozing and rolling about in the dome. There was someone who even thought that the people rolling about were robots, which are part of the artwork, lol. Its very amusing, but the smell of the dome is getting a bit more unbearable, somehow it smells of bad fish, maybe it’s the smell of people’s feet..haha. But we aired the space when we close for the day, so its getting better… hopefully. There was also one occasion that the window to the balcony was opened, think someone actually opened it to take photos. It actually intrudes the artwork, so we are doing more frequent rounds around the space.

We have been busy cooking and conjuring up new recipes, although its been rather painful swallowing some of our experimental works. EXCRUCIATING… Lately we made Tiramisu, recipe from Aaron which is rum-free. Incredibly delicious, and FATTENING as well. Lol. While we were eating, Deb made a comment, which is shockingly true, since we didn’t bake the Tiramisu, it means we are actually eating RAW eggs. Ewww…. Well, on the brighter side, it didn’t taste of the raw eggs at all. (just FYI, we tried the Tiramisu about 4.30am this morning, when Ryf had to have his breakfast as he’s fasting).

We have discovered a cheaper way of indulging in gelato, Ryf made a trip down to Billa Supermarket and bought back this sinful tub of cacao gelato which was on a special offer 1.99 Euros!! But of course, the gelato at the Gelateria shops is nicer.

With the ice cream treats and sometimes a little chocolate chip cookie or two, we can now enjoy a nice little supper, sitting by the television watching cable TV. However, everything we watch is either news, weird bollywood stuff, occasionally happen to flip by what seems to be a low class sleazy channel…but among all, I must say that the only entertaining channel seems to be the cartoon channel….in GERMAN. We watched a Tim Allen movie, and they had dubbed his voice in German, it sounded sooooooo weird. Ryf fell asleep watching it. I decided to watch Pooh & Friends instead (it was still in German). So on the overall, We’ve both been watching a lot of German channels, cooking almost everyday and meeting all sorts of people and answer occasion weird questions.

Ciao!
Ryfus n Dubbus.

1. Tiramisu for Dummies. Instructional images
2. Count Sheet. (587 visitors on Sunday). record high!
3. The bridge of Sighs, reputedly named after the sighs of condemned prisoners
4. Statue of some dood on a horse at piazzetta St Marco (will get back to u on that..lol)1329
5. Very nice cosy, romantika Ristorante at St Marco Pier.

Wobbles Gobbles

2007-09-21T18:29:00.000+08:00

Hey Guys,

It’s the start of a new working day after our first official day off. (not that we do take unofficial day offs …but u know what I mean.lol ). Aaron, was leaving for London on Thursday morning, so we bid him farewell, and thanked him for his great hospitality and his cooking recipes, ESPECIALLY the tiramisu ! And also his excellent recommendations on the places he found interesting. Yesterday, we attempted to take a trip out to Verona and Padua, but we missed the 10:51 train and we had to wait for another hr to take the next 1. We decided that we rather spend that time, exploring Venice, as our 1st expedition. We went around ala’ Amazing race with our backpacks, tripods and cameras, and went on a hunt for all the other exhibitions / pavilions.

We came to the Thailand exhibition, and was kinda disappointed as it was closed at 11.30am. So we took a peek at the key holes in an attempt to see a brief view of the works. We then moved on to Slovenia, Estonia, FYR Macedonia, Australia, Luxemburg, Moldova, Iceland. We were impressed with the artworks from Patrick Mimran, from NY, with his giant sized images of parking spaces in NY. Its amazing to see that there are a lot of text there that serve to assist you, but it seems to confuse you more. When asked if the images are ‘Photoshopd’, the gallery sitter, said the artist claimed that its an original photograph, not retouched at all. The colors are brilliant. There was also this artist Susan from Australia, who did a video piece of the East Java (Havoc), and addresses the issues that they are facing with the mudslide. I did not realize the issue, until it was showcased. Its very sad to know that your neighboring country is in this dilemma, and also realize how fortunate we are to be living in a place such as Singapore.

We went walking and walking and walking, and we went took the time to shop around and marvel and drool at their amazing chocolate selection, as well as their giant pizzas, which are about 2euros/slice. There’s also this artist we discovered, a local delight from Venice himself, Livio De Marchi. He does remarkable works of everyday objects, from JUST wood!!! Works ranging from raincoats, underwear, dirty socks!!! Its simply breathtaking. We went to his workshop, but he was not working today. Deb would’ve loved to meet and probably learn a thing or two from the great artist.

Past few days working has been good, we met with many people, as usual, but one I particular surprised us. LITERALLY !! Theres these 2 arab looking guys, who came up to us to enquire bout the price / rates of the artworks, if say he was interested in buying the artwork. We told him we didn’t have the list of prices and that he could contact NAC or the artist directly to enquire in purchasing the artworks. So we were curious and asked him which piece he liked, and thought of buying. He flipped through the catalogue, macam (IKEA catalogue like tat ) and opened up to Zul’s page. He pointed out and said he wanted to buy the Sonic Dome. When asked if he’s for real, he said casually, yea… why not… (at this moment we were flabbergasted). The Dude is only in his early twenties, and he has the cash to buy a Sonic DOME…..!!!... Must be an oil tycoons son. Lol…

So its back to work for us. Enjoy the images…
-ryf / debs

images

1. Livio De Marchi' jacket
2. A bar, with BRAs as their ornamental decorations.
3. Home-made Ciabatta loaded with Turkey ham, chicken, egg, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese. A mouthful, even to describe…lol
4. Debb, immersed in a garden of GIANT FRUITS.
5. Panoramic picture of the sunset at Fondementa Zattere Ponte’ pier

A wet weather program

2007-09-19T18:58:00.000+08:00

Hey guys,

It’s been a wonderful almost 6 days in Venice. The weather is getting colder as the day pass. It has rained the past 3days. And you can see people running about seeking shelter, as there aren’t any covered walkways. Kind of an exciting sight to see people scampering around Campo Santo Stefano. We took our 1st walk in the rain yesterday, on the way to the supermacato. REALLY REALLY cold… brrrr… And all our clothes that we have put up 2 dry, needs yet another day, as the weather keeps pouring.

We have been having hot meals at home, cooking pastas, grilled fish, omelets with mushrooms, onions and potatoes, not forgetting OUR local delicacies which we miss so much, such as fried rice (thanks to mum for packing those instant sambals….lol). The dreadful thing is that, this is the month of rahmadan, and im fasting, so im waking up like 4am in the morning just to eat, and deb has graciously accompanied me in all of my meals and cooking them with me. It was pretty hard to get used to, but I think now we are slightly better at waking up. And the plus point is that we save money. Lol. We took some excellent pictures, and specially love the night shots, lugging around to different bridges and alleys with our tripod, camera and remote.

Seems that we are nearing to a week of our internship, and we have not gotten bored of it yet, seems that its going well… and work-wise, we try to occupy our time, doing rounds, and chatting up with interesting people. Its an excellent experience, interacting with an international audience. They have many things to say, view or even witness that we cannot even do in our lifetime. We met Josephine, a musician that frequents his trips from Venice to the greek islands via a cruise ships, enlightening audiences music from his saxophone. This Russian guy, whos visiting Venice, and insists that we visit Pardua, since its such a lovely place. And Erica Tan, who was from Singapore and now based in London, that thinks that the exhibition is a wonderful display of local talent. She came here 2x, one with her dad and showed him around.

There were also feedbacks from people, one about Jason’s chandelier’s 2000 lotuses. Hisayuki Amae, a graphic designer from Japan, commented that the lotuses that Jason is selling would probably be more effective if he created 2000 lotuses and crash them and another 2000 for sale, to emphasize the death and rebirth, if the work revolves around Buddhism. And few also loved the sonic dome where they feel the tremors and the bass of the sound that they are experiencing. Many have dozed off to its meditative sounds, and many couples were caught coupling under those romantic lights. Haha.

It’s a worthwhile experience and we both are enjoyn ourselves so far.
Tomorrow: day off, we’ll be heading to Verona and Pardua for a day out of the city and probably island hop around Murano, Burano.

Catch u soon!
Ciao!
-ryf n debs

The new interns signing in!

2007-09-15T18:54:00.000+08:00

Hey guys, its ryf and deb here.

Its our first solo working day, totally independent and on our OWN.

Its been great to be immersed in the gorgeous scenic and densely tourist-populated St Marco. It seems that people of all cultures emerge and share with one another, creating a whole unique experience, you’ll never know what language the next person u meet, might speak. It’s a whole different atmosphere, where streets are indulged with cafes that patrons are enjoying and savoring their meals while basking in the company of people they love. Alleys that u’ll never know where it will lead you, drawn by the flicker of lights to the beautiful but melancholic sounds of buskers playing the violin. The lovely and obedient dogs that Deb absolutely loves. Oh… and not forgetting the abundant gelatos available…and what a wonderful selection too! And what wonderful picturesque scenes unraveling that aptly suits the romantic ambience.

Having settled here for 3 days, we quickly got adjusted to the environment, and the food. Basically we would make frequent trips to the supermarket to buy groceries and cook them ourselves. Pretty good stuff. We went out for our first dining with previous interns, Aparna and Arron. Food was great, although, needs a lil adjusting to. A bit of a drawback is that we do not drink, so we are missing out on the finer side of being in Italy. Oh well, theres always the gelatos!!

Working wise, its pretty straightforward, but its been a blast meeting new people from all around the world. Its amazing how sign language is an internationally recognized language. Haha. Lots of feedback, and many bravos were given for the exhibited works. Its so good to have this response from an international audience, resonating encouraging feedbacks. Truly amazing.

Well done artists.

usurpation

2007-09-14T23:16:00.000+08:00

on wednesday the new interns, ryf and deb, arrived.
we've been overthrown!!

gracefully though...

today was their first day of work...
we showed them the ropes.
... and the view from the palazzo.

planning a big feast tonight.......siccilian sword fish with rigatoni.
...aaron is cooking.
i'm gonna bev it up...

and have crowned myself now the new pavilion drunk.

ciao venezia, till carnevale!

xxx

how sweet it is to be loved by you

2007-09-10T17:20:00.001+08:00

yah it worked!
so this was the opening boat event...
i wanted to put a pic of aaron up watching from our balcony in the palazzo but he said he'll just take it down...
he's a little shy.

there have been some pretty big names in the pav...
likke the director of the Ufuim Museum in Japan...
and someone wrote in the guestbook that she's a princess...
>translated< (she wrote in italian)
"i am a princess of the city castelo.
very beautiful.
a kiss for everyone.
helena the princess"

... not so sure about the authenticity of this one..

there's quite an intense influx right now of french students i think....
will be back shortly.

xxx

frozen fruit danger

2007-09-08T17:07:00.001+08:00

... that was aaron's last search on google.
he's a little ridic.

we are in our last week of working here in the pav!
... the time has gone by ridiculously quickly..

last sunday was the regatt a storica!
it was just spitting images of how one would cariciture Venice....
the colours, sounds, an d throngs of people just added such grandeur to the whole experience!
becuase we had to close early,
aaron, Dawu, and I managed to have the balcony to ourselves!
...looking out onto the grande canal... quite spectacular...
aaron and I like to call ourselves the king and queen of the palazzo.
... we are quite appalled we are going to be overthrown soon.

... anyway, back to the regatta,

there was a private party downstairs int he garden of the palazzo...
where during quiet moments of the race.. aaron and i would casually stroll downstairs,
and schmoooze our way towards the drinks... juice.
we waited for about an hour for the canapes...
they finally arrrived with prosseco and rossinis (like a bellini but with strawberries... i love them)
it was the grandest entrance made in that party.
people ruuushed towards them.
aaron and i may have over done it a bit... we ate about 50 canapes each.
you knnow how one gets carreied away with things....

so the regatta lasted about 4 hours.
first was the big procession
with all these amazing ornate gondalaz with teams of people in matching outfits rowing down the grand canal in unison,
other gondolas had the gondoleer and then a couple dressed in victorian dresses waving to the crowds like the queen of england. ..
and then there was the odd regualar gondola with overwieght toursits.

it was really quite a sight...

something is up witht he websuite and i cant' upload a picture!
will do i t as soon as poss.

xxx

Da Wu's Performance 03.09.07

2007-09-07T22:47:00.000+08:00

Portrait of a pizza, Da wu's arrival, Regata Storica and Film Festival

2007-09-01T20:38:00.001+08:00

This is what a bored intern does when confronted by the remnants of what was lunch a minute ago - tape it onto the glass window overlooking the courtyard of the palazzo and admire how the afternoon light filters through the patches of grease.

Yum.

Speaking of culinary pursuits, a recent discovery of soya-based gelato at Il Doge(modest selection inside the shop at Campo Santa Margherita) has got my asian lactose-intolerent bowels all revvvvved up with creamy delights of
Cioccolato al peperoncino, pistachio, and vanilla-riso... Rumour has it that an amazing gelateria has opened up at Mestre(mainland) and locals have proclaimed it the best ever. Address/Review to be confirmed upon pilgrimage.

Da Wu popped in yesterday after our initial surprise upon opening shop and discovering to our delight that a new performance in Little India has been added to the video loop, and other additions to the setup like banana trees arranged askew and an animation projection across the section of the floor where the steel cutout lies. It was great to finally meet the man behind the seminal 1980s artistic initiative The Artists Village, whose unassuming joviality belies his stature as a founding figure in Singaporean contemporary art practice. We had a discussion about his alma mater Goldsmiths College, where he had a classmate called Mark Wallinger, and critical dialogues/forums were recorded on tape and marked by tutors (instead of the now requisite essays/thesis). The same school today is plagued by encroaching institutionalisation and increasing student-teacher ratio, and it is hard not to romanticised its past glory.

Regata Storica, which is the annual gondolier race across the grand canal is on this sunday(first sunday of september). We are all psyched because
1)We get to close shop early (a cautionary measure by the Institute to prevent tourists from pilling into the balconies of the palazzo for a magnificent view of the race.
2)We get that magnificent view to ourselves! Some prosecco and good company... Perfecto!

Also, the end of the August heralds the start of the Venice Film Festival, where we, lowly interns, will attempt to wiggle our way into parties and openings in a bid to catch a glimpse of Woody's bald patch or Keira Knightley's bag of chicken bones. Wes Anderson is showing, and Taratino curating a Spaghetti Western retrospective... woohoo!

*Aparna is currently being interrogated by a flashy Dior-wrapped Argentinian who thinks this is the reception desk for palazzos in venezia 101, and that this little Indian girl is actually in the guise of a venetian real estate agent who can give house tours to other similar palazzos (in the same baroque interior style) at a very goot price! I have to rescue her.

très chic

2007-09-01T19:36:00.000+08:00

2007-08-27T21:13:00.000+08:00

so the pavilion drunk has taken his place again...
well... maybe he's redeemning himslef this time...
he;s brought a friend!
but his friend seemed pretty normal...
talking straight, walking straight...
the drunkard seemed to be.... giving him a tour i think??!
so wierd.

anyway.. THAT'S HIM!!
first time i saw him was outside hte palazzo.. thsi was the first time he was here with me.
he was fairly well behaved.. just drunken...
ubut not sleepiong everywherea dn bumping into things..
it was a bit tense when je wa s insde because i was expecting something to happen.. but it was all good.
and aaron i s off delivering the posters to the main land so it is just me!!
... am just a littttle sleepy so not much motr to comment on.,.
although the reason i'm so tired is becuase there's a communist party on now in venice...its wierd that they are coomunist!?!

anyway... will elaborate when i can open my eyes.xxx

House of Horrors

2007-08-25T23:04:00.000+08:00

best guests ever.

PORCELAIN RESTORERS!

they walked into the first room, Jason's DHARMA...
and i think both went white.

they proposed restoring the piece... said it would take them just over 2 years. Maybe Jason would be piqued into bringing the project to its next conceptual phase?

Photos from the last week

2007-08-25T20:23:00.000+08:00

Scene from San Zaccaria: big ass cruise ship blocking out the entire isola di san giorgio maggiore

Happy Campers

Intern Bhangra

2007-08-11T03:57:00.000+08:00

xxx tara

tales of the unknown

2007-08-10T17:56:00.000+08:00

11:57am

so today aaron has gone to mestre (the mainland) to deliver posters.... and i am in the pav alone!

quick update...

- sound dome is less smelly.
thank diffusion.

- an older, charismatic italian man came up to me the other day and got me to explain Vincent's piece to him... IN ITALIAN!
i think i sounded like i had verbal constipation.
it was tough... but i think i managed to get his thinking juices flowing.

he left with a look of intrgue and a slight head tilt.

so i havne't really been to many other pavillions....
it's quite ba d really.
cos i've been to the MExican one twice!
and am plnanning to go again...
it has got to be one of the most amazing palazzo's a s well as really top quality work.

the artist works with sensors and technology and creates beautiful images, concepts and works of art.
his work made me smile, gasp, think, cry, and left me speechless.
it's real biennale quality.
compared to his work... most of the work in giardini looked amateur (to me).
and it has deflated my longing to expllore it in more depth.... but i know i really should...

i also wen t to the Taiwanese pavilion -
really cool concepts. it was called "atopia"
about a worl with no boundaries .. a "non -place"... globalization.

you enter the space and are immediately launched into this crazy, surreal, technicoloured world with strange noises and objects...
it's quite consuming.

i've taken some photos... and will put them up soon... i think aaron knows how to sort that out.

right... i need to attend to my palazzo now.

tenderness over the counter

2007-08-08T21:58:00.000+08:00

"Would you like another catalogue?", I proffered.
"No thank you, thats fine, we are together."

Post-Venice Internship

2007-08-06T19:26:00.001+08:00

Peace restored

2007-08-04T19:44:00.000+08:00

The sonic dome was starting to smell from the collective sweat dripping off the backs of daytrippers seeking respite from the afternoon sun, so we had to air the room out for a couple of hours. This morning, as we opened up the pavilion, a lady came out with bites all over her legs and kindly informed us that all hell has broken loose... But of course! The windows in that room opens out to a canal, and opportunistic venetian mozzies must have slipped in, laid low, in wait for the juicy ones. Aparna raced out to get some Baygon(odourless of course) and that should do the trick. No complains thus far.

Update: An ecstatic Chilean lady just emerged from the dome, proclaiming it 'spectacular'.

I am guessing the mozzies must have migrated to the reception.

the handover

2007-07-31T17:58:00.000+08:00

salute from Aaron and Aparna finally in venice.!

sorry for the delay in blogging but trying to think of ways to equal tara's brilliant posts just led to procrastination..

so,
tara is still here in venice... just living and loving.
joel has gone with his mum and sister to milan before returning to Singapore.

it is our 3rd official day working at the pavilion without Tara or Joel.
the handover was all smooth:
-we've met the pavilion drunk... who after being kicked out has lost his title of "Pavillion drunk" to just plain "Drunk"
-we've been introduced to the best pizza in town
-we've survived a Venetian storm
-we've stayed out till sunrise
so all the most important things have been taken care of.
-... and we've learned all the stuff to do in pavillion.

in all seriousness though, i feel a real sense of pride and empowerment working here and representing this art.
People have come out of the exhibition thanking Aaron and I for the cathartic experience...
one girl came out of the exhibition with her hand on her heart and wrote in the guestbook that the exhibition was a "pseudo-spiritual experience".
An artist, originally from Vietnam, living here in Venice absolutely fell in love with Jason's chandelier and bought one of his lotuses... then came back the next day and bought 8 more!
She said his work reminds him of a poem (she put in the guestbook) and hopes to meet him one day...

it's 12:44pm - the pavillion gets all hectic at lunch time!
there's a great mix of people: Venetians, other Italians, French, Germans, English, Americans, Korean tourists (the kind that take photos with and of everything), artists, families, the inspired, the uninspired, the sleazes ...

and just now, a massive group with an artist who previously exhibited work here in the palazzo and a girl who last year, went to the same art school as me !

crazy...
this place is tiny.

lucid delirium

2007-07-11T20:21:00.001+08:00

Here is Vincent Leow's work Andy's Wonderland.

Here is a shot of the man-hawk in his zinc enclosure. Surrounded by the flourescent light-bulbs thats used pretty extensively in Singapore (the lights reminds me of my traumatic primary school days and being smacked for stealing my belligerent teachers' pink chalk for more productive functions-coloring in my shoes).

The second room consists of photographs of Vincent's dog, Andy Warholy. The room is called Holy Lounge, and it is in essence a homage to his pet. Vincent has elevated the status of his dog- making Andy almost human, a human with power, like a Venetian Doge. With his $18,000 chair, lush rug below it, professional pictures on the wall and a cigar in the ashtray. A parody of human beings ostentatious behavior maybe? A play on the concept of DOGmatism?

Here is Andy in the glass house. Leering up at the chandelier. With a massive erection, that is
quite hard to ignore.

I love this picture. Its of Andy in his padded cell.
Still grinning. Physically enraptured with his domain despite the collar than binds him and the suffocating rooms that he exists in. A bit of social commentary here on our blind adherence to the institutions that run us maybe?

Lastly, Andy is 'laid to rest' in a cemetery. He is surrounded by hair. Signifying the shedding of Andy's fur due to his death. For some reason, I was convinced that the hair collected around the statue was pubic hair, and went as far as to informing a few visitors that Vincent had collected real human pubic hair for this exhibit. I could have sworn someone told me that. I was told later on by Lindy (the curator) that i was VERY wrong, and it was just normal hair collected at a hairdressers.

Siddhartha Gautama

2007-07-11T19:56:00.000+08:00

Jason Lim, Just Dharma.
This is the Chandelier smashed on the floor. The Chandelier was meant to represent Dharma, the way of higher truths or order in Human life. The smashing of it symbolized the breaking of that order, iconoclasm in certain religions, and the death of hope.

To the right is Jason's other work, Light Weight. A collection of abandoned and discarded Daoist statues, reflecting the shadow of the Murano chandelier on the top of it.

This piece is a feast for the eyes and also adds a huge dose of Singaporean flavor. It questions whether these religious figures that used to have some 'weight' due to their religious significance in others homes or temples- are now 'light' or worthless due to their eventual abandonment. Hence the title, 'light weight'.

Da Wu's Performance: 1

2007-07-11T19:18:00.000+08:00

AIGHT. Here is somethings to quench your visual appetite.

To the left is a shot of rice on a banana leaf-which Da Wu later ingested.

Here is Da Wu's hand holding a tight little ball of rice. Ready for consumption.

Da Wu is just too cool.

He has been living with us for the past few weeks now. His exhibit is a constantly evolving piece.. or correct me if im wrong, time-based art. Da Wu will be doing a few performances throughout the Biennale, until its finish in November. He is now in London, editing a video, which will be added to the exhibit. Joel and I are feeling a bit lost without him furiously drawing in our living room, providing us with killer coffee's and fresh fruit (which is the sum total of my nutritional intake).

Here is Da Wu performing on the top of his alter. It is ridiculous how healthy and strong he is.

As I said before, the response to both of his performances (the pictures of the second performance will be added at a later date) have been really positive. The sad thing about the Biennale, is the lack of contact the visitor has with the artist after the opening. Recently, most of the visitors are tourists with no prior knowledge of contemporary art or what the Biennale is all about. So meeting and seeing Da Wu performing helped with their understanding of what contemporary art is was all about. And most importantly, the essence of his work.

belladonna's and fresh produce

2007-07-11T18:52:00.001+08:00

I will post a few dozen pictures at some point. My incompetence extends to not being able to open zip files. So the next time Joel brings his computer to the Pavilion, i will blog from his computer- which are loaded with the images of Da Wu's performance.

The only thing I have managed to get from Joel is this. Big, red, genetically modified tomatoes.

2 Euro's for a Kilo. Bargain.

I think he took this picture from his ramblings around the Rialto Market- Which is right off the maassive and ornate Rialto Bridge. The market is basically a wet market selling fruits, vegetables and dead animals. It's also a lot cheaper than the CO-OP, which i have been frequenting. It's only open in the mornings, which is quite a drag, seeing as waking up during my off-days have proven to be quite a task.

Another amusing thing about the mornings (at the apartment) is our neighbors.
I think the husband is an opera singer, so at around eight the building is shaking with him bellowing out some intense operatic tunes. The novelty factor of it is wearing thin. I have a feeling that his 2 year old daughter is considering a career in the music industry. That little imp hits notes I have never heard from a human being. I think they chuck her in the bedroom right above mine- during her regular morning tantrums. This just worsens the screaming situation..and my mood.

blow down babylon

2007-07-09T21:00:00.000+08:00

I have been pretty bad at updating.

But I have a solid defense. The Internet has been behaving rather erratically for the past week, so a lot of what I have written has been lost due to the death of the connection.

And partially due to my incompetence with computers.

Vincent's work, Andy's Wonderland, has been getting a lot of compliments. I met a few Central St Martin students who loved the aspect of walking from room to room and seeing Andy (the sculpture of the mythological hybrid man-dog, dog-man) in a state of unvaried bliss, despite the change of surroundings. With Vincent's work, each room brings something new, despite the unchanging Andy armed with his maniacal grin. An art teacher from a school in Chicago found it a beautiful example of the progression of thought through time. Another person called his work, biblical. The idea of never truly being free in life, and even in death, is something the resonates with me. Andy's almost sado-masochistic collar is a testament to the idea of being under some sort continuous control, or subversion. Vincent's work really reminds me of Plato's Allegory of the Cave. Plato theorized that humans were chained in a cave, looking at shadows on the wall made by their captors moving puppets- in short, Andy's bliss is an example of his indulgence and complacency to this false reality. He is happy despite the numerous cages (padded room, glass house, cemetery) which he is in- and is probably not aware of the 'institutions' that bind him.

Da Wu has been doing a few performances. One yesterday, and another the day before. On the first day, he sat by his round table and eat rice off a banana leaf. And on the second day, he offered a meal of rice on a banana leaf to about ten of the visitors. Da Wu called it 'a meeting with the artist'. And talked to the visitors about the mythology of the banana plant, which has been a strong part of his art for the past few years and one of the prevalent themes in his work for this pavilion. It was a relaxed and informal meeting that lasted over an hour. There was a great vibe in the room. One of the visitors pointed out that Da Wu's exhibit seemed like a beautiful mix of the masculine, cold massive steel sculptures with the feminine, soft video of the hand rolling the rice off the banana leaf and the paintings of body parts on the wall. This warmth was extended further when the room was crammed up with people participating in the performance, sharing ideas, and learning about Da Wu's interpretation of his work.

Oh, and two composers, one from the states and one from Italy, have commented on Zai's composition, which is synchronized to the video installation. They really loved it. One of the composers went on to call it an ' inspiring synaesthetic experience'.

Managed to get a bit of traveling under my belt. Went to the mainland a couple of days ago and saw the old town of Padua, Padova to the Italians. It's easy to forget how much stuff there is to see in Venice and around when there is an equal amount of contemporary art exhibits floating around. But, as of late, I have really been making a point to see some of the great masters of the artistic endeavor (aha). There is just the most amazing collection of Tintoretto paintings at the Scuola di San Rocco. He was commissioned to do around 30 massive paintings for that building, this task took up most of his later life. And the Friari church right next door, holds two of the most magnificent frescoes by Titian, The Assumption of the Virgin and the Pesaro altarpiece. I'm going to sound like such a gimp saying this, by the assumption of the virgin gave me goosebumps. I even bought a postcard of it to send to my old art history teacher.

yes im ridiculous.

In Padua, I managed to see Giotto's 'revolutionary' frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel. I also managed to see a bunch of Donatello's sculptures in St Anthony Basilica, and some pretty nasty relics of St Anthony's Jaw and tongue. My mum is a Roman Catholic, so this would have totally been up her alley, seeing as this church is quite an important pilgrimage destination for catholics. The church was pretty amazing, the interior is a mix of different periods, so one chapel would be filled with Byzantine frescoes and relics , whilst another was purely dedicated to grand baroque monuments.

Ah the longer I stay here, the more I never want to leave! Not only are the Venetians the warmest of people. They are also such culturally sound individuals, with a deep understanding of society, history, and cultures other than their own (partially due to the 15 million tourists that come into the city every year). Every street, building and church in Venice has a story. It's overwhelming yet magical- I want to know it all.. and the three weeks I have left is just not enough.

fantasma

2007-07-02T18:26:00.000+08:00

Its confirmed

He is Zul's biggest fan. The pavilion drunk came back.

This time he did a rather stealth mission- minus the backpack..but armed with a bottle of something.

Being the alert and vigilant creature that I am known to be. I noticed his entry..due to the particularly elaborate pair of sunglasses he chose to wear for that afternoon.

By the time I got security, and Joel, who was in the loo, the guy had already managed to take his shoes off..and was about to take a swig from his bottle- in the dome. Quite hilarious.. and a tad bit dramatic seeing as he continued to insist on his rights to enjoy the exhibit.

Joel told him quite bluntly.. that he smelt..and was drunk. And we finally managed to get him out.

The unfortunate thing is that 'smelly man' (a name we have come to affectionately call him by) permanently resides in the campo by the Palazzo. Its become quite a regular thing in the morning for him to either call me beautiful girl... or yell out an Italian obscenity when I choose to ignore him. The waiters at one of the cafe's have my back though. They tell him off in my defense. Chivalry is definitely not dead around these parts.

Aiya..look at this mini drama that has unfolded all because of Zul's sound dome!

Perks of the Civil Service

2007-06-27T17:25:00.000+08:00

Response to the Pavilion has been immense.

The Guest book is filled with just the most lovely comments, and some very random sketches.

We also waiting in anticipation for Da Wu's performance art piece with his metal chairs and banana tree trunks.

The massive posters outside the Palazzo, with the Singapore emblem has been a bit of a smash. I have had a couple of requests for a poster. The editor for the times, who came to visit yesterday, praised the subtlety of it, and how it held aspects of all the art being exhibited.

I think my favorite comment from the guest book would be ' Big up the Singapore Massive!! Supercali Represent!!.'

And here are a few others:

'so beautiful and interesting and inciting the viewer to understand what the artist is getting across. This was one of my best experiences of the whole Biennale!'

' Is the best pavilion of the Venice Biennale, everything is usually the same for me, however,in this exhibit, each does it and each contains a new world to be opened. Thank you. '

' Beautiful and thought with LOVE!!!"

' One of the most affecting exhibits of contemporary art I have ever seen. Thank you, artists, Thank you!'

' Beautiful exhibition, beyond cutting edge, but with class.'

'Erotic, moving, tragic!.'

'Spontaneous, very intriguing to the eyes. Full of suprises!! Worth seeing and talking to others about. You are all very good!.'

It's great being at the receiving end of things.

non capisca

2007-06-25T23:33:00.000+08:00

The card bowl of the pavilion is filled with the most brilliant contacts.

An editor from Time magazine

a few dozen artists/curators

lots of gallery owners

and a very very fet.. fit man.. who i plan to steal the card of- for purely decorative purposes.

My Italian has been developing pretty superbly as of late. However, I seem to get a mental block with the guy who runs the cafe downstairs. He keeps giving me little glasses of wine during my lunch break..sadly all our conversations are bordering on the stale..due to my sudden loss of all foreign language capabilities. Bit of a conundrum im in.

Marco.. the security guard has offered to take us to the mainland for a bit of an Italian shake-down...a club basically. The only club I have been to in Venice was this tiny place called piccolo-mondo. It is about the size of an average kitchen. The drinks are ridiculously over-priced. And the music is Hip Hop from my high school days (which wasn't too long ago come to think of it). There are also lots of aged Italian Casanova's with questionable dance moves and gaggle's of american girls who gyrate to each others frequent yells of 'hell yeah'. Pretty banging.

Would definitely recommend it..with the help of a bottle of rum.. or something of equal potency.

The Pavilion is always a bit dead on a monday. We get a few artsy ones. And a lot of lost looking tourists.

In a fit of boredom.. Joel has devoured an entire loaf of bread...oh.. and half a bottle of nutella.

Closing time.. must be off..

Hay Cosas Que Pasan Mas Veces Que Todo El Tiempo

2007-06-24T22:27:00.000+08:00

Absolutely loving the Mexican pavilion.

Well the building it is housed in really does it for me. Its in a Medieval Palazzo, absolutely stunning. When I have the time, I'll collect some pictures of the place. (To the right is a picture from the artists website of one of the installations from the Biennale which he showcased in Mexico.)

Plus the Mexcian pavilion party, which included a load of tequila and cerveza was not that bad either.

Here is a picture of it.. and of a few mates bobbing/lurching around the dance floor.

They had a Mexican DJ/visual artist who played a pretty awesome mix of electro house, topped off with a lot of wicked mexican percussion beats.

Rafael Lozano-Hemmer is a bit of a legend. He has managed to use robotics, computerized sensors and video installations to really connect the viewer with the art.

One of the installations consisted of a hundred incandescent lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling. You are then meant to hold a sensor which reads your heartbeat. Apon releasing the sensor..all the lightbulbs din.. and the first lightbulb directly in front of you starts to glow to your recorded heartbeat.. then the second person holds the sensor. The process sis repeated and your heartbeat moves on to the second lightbulb..and the second persons heartbeat appears on the first light bulb. I hope this all makes sense.

What you then realize is that your are standing in a room filled with a 100 different people's heartbeats, glowing at their own individual paces. It is wondrous.

When I heard about the pavilion. I dismissed it as a pseudo theme-park..something gadgety and 'cool' rather than holding any depth- similar to The Millenium Dome in London. Rafael manages to humanize technology..so that it is not something that only a mechanical engineer or technician would understand or appreciate.

In another room..one is able to pick up different radio frequencies ranging from taxi dispatch networks, wireless phones, short-wave radio's..etc.. with their shadow. So the larger your shadow is ..the louder the sound...and the smaller your shadow is.. the softer the sound.

Many people won't consider this Art. But as I said before.. Contemporary Art really has no limits. Yes, there is a fair amount of rubbish being produced.. However, it is always amazing to stumble apon something unique, which leaves you buzzing and thinking after.

As to the Singapore Pavilion.. no complaints yet. I do get the occasional ratty tourist complaining about the lack of loo roll. But that's about it really.

Shades of Light

2007-06-24T20:22:00.000+08:00

It has to be said. Joel is a far superior picture taker than I am.

This one is pretty wicked. Its the reflection of Palazzo Ducale on the water. Palazzo Ducale can be found in Piazza San Marco, and was the seat of the government of Venice for centuries, and the home of the Doge (the elected ruler of Venice).

From what I can remember from past art history classes. The palace is known to be a superb example of Venetian Gothic architecture. Gothic architecture in Italy definitely has its own special twist if you compare it to the quite stoic yet monumental examples of gothic architecture in England and France. Italian Gothic is incredibly camp. It looks more like a glorified christmas cake, rather than the typical austere moody facade of Gothic churches found in the rest of Europe. And on a very silly note.. i love how Palazzo Ducale exterior is pink. I think thats due to a mixing of white limestone and pink marble. The Palazzo touches a chord in me.. must be due to some failed childhood fantasy of living in a pink palace. I think the closest i got to that was painting some cardboard boxes neon pink, to house my growing collection of Barbie's.

Moving on...for trivia sakes, Palazzo Ducale also holds the world's largest painting done on canvas by Tintoretto, titled Paradise. Big-it-Up.

The next picture is of an abandoned Venetian apartment Joel stumbled upon during a morning walk.

Don't really know the history of this one.

Could do with new paint

Maybe.. a new wall.

a few people. And a table. Carpets?

And whilst I am at it..it would be the perfect place to house some dismembered lifestock by Damien Hirst.

Or maybe Pete Doherty, cracked out in the corner.

Now that would be a interesting installation.

have a dip

2007-06-23T21:21:00.001+08:00

Here are some BRILLIANT pictures taken by yours truly. me.

The blurred and over-exposed bits.. were ALL done on purpose.

Ah, here is quite a beautiful composition of Sophie And Gigi's behinds walking down the steps of the Palazzo (palace). They are probably the two most resourceful and vigilant interns the National Arts Council have ever come by.

To their left.. looking very dashing, is Luca. Luca is the Venice agent. So if anything goes wrong, we call him. Luca has been pretty stressed for the past week or so. But I did catch him in Campo Santa Margerita..two nights ago..clutching a big birra.. with a bigger smile on his face.

To the right is Tara T (not me). Manager in the Visual Arts Department at the NAC. And to her right is.. the man.. the legend.. Joel. Joel..BTW.. has a really wicked collection of smart shirts.

Notice the elegant baroque interiors.. countered by the gothic exteriors of the Palazzo. The Design of the building is a bit of a mix of different era's.. centuries.. but it all works. Pretty marvelously.

Here is a picture of Jason Lim (in the dark blue).. a few hours after the official opening.. feeling pretty chuffed about his smashed chandelier.

The visuals which were captured on tape.. and is now being played on repeat on four different t.v. screens in the room.. are pretty intense.

Forgive the bad photography.

I just wanted to provide a few pictures to give those interested a feel of what the Singaporean Pavilion was all about.

2007-06-23T20:50:00.001+08:00

to the left is a nifty picture by Joel Yuen.. of two little men furiously paddling away on a gondola.

Note: his brilliant use of sepia toned color effects.

I love how the normal mode of public transport in Venice is by Vaporetto.. which is essentially a big boat. It is quite fun.. and there are many panic attacks to be had on this not so cheap mode of transport.

Its going to be very strange having to come back to the real world. I haven't seen a car, bicycle or motorbike in about three weeks.

Due to the very bad reception.. the only TV show available is BBC world and sometimes (if lucky) some dodgy pay for porn channel. I don't usually watch that much tv.. let alone the news. Newspaper's or my MAC background.. which contains an RSS feed of the New York Times headlines.. are the only things that keep me updated with the jiggle of our planet. Nevertheless, I was shocked after watching the news. It is ridiculous how impartiality is blatantly ignored on broadcasted news channels.

So.. I have given up on BBC world.. and have found amusement through Italian radio-stations.

Quite a funny thing happened today. Da Wu tried to toast bread in the micro-wave. ( our flat lacks lots of basic amenities.. so we have been improvising.. for survival). Well as it turns out.. the bread started to burn. He got soo nervous about it.. and just left the charred bread in the microwave.
The flat is smelling a bit funky these days.

Wine for Openings

2007-06-22T20:25:00.000+08:00

Here is a mega quick update on the things happening in this floating city..

the pavilion drunk.. got thrown out a few days ago. He ended up passing out in Zul's Sound Dome. The main issue was that he was starting to stink up the room... It was all a bit ridiculous.

The massive posters for the Singapore Pavilion have FINALLY been put up around the building. We were getting lots of complaints from sweaty art enthusiasts who couldn't find the pavilion. Hopefully, that will subside.

Id like everyone to know that I have fully ignored my wheat and dairy allergy- and have made it my birthright to ingest as much pasta, pizza, cheese and gelato, that i can get my hands on. Im turning into a heifer. The prospect of an Italian lover is looking pretty.. slim.

Also.. I dont really know what to do with the Bulgarian Wine. There is about two boxes of wine the Bulgarian Pavilion gave to the Singapore Pavilion. It is actually part of the Bulgarian art work ' Wine for Openings'.. the artist grew his own grapes in his own vineyard, stepped on it, bottled it, and gave it out to everyone. Its a bit like Manzoni, where he canned his feces and sold it off to some museums (really amusing seeing as some of the cans exploded due to festering gases). Well the wine is tamer version of that. Unfortunately, despite all his hard work (we assume), the wine is pretty rancid. Tastes like vinegar. No one wants it. Might just chuck it into the grand canal.

into the deep

2007-06-17T17:32:00.000+08:00

Soo.. its been a pretty hectic week.
The Singapore Pavilion averages 300 visitors per day.. which is brilliant yet stressful.
I find myself running around and trying to stop people from picking up pieces of broken porcelain from Jason's chandelier. It is absolutely ridiculous. And there is also the odd idiot who tries to jump around in the sound dome.

Oh and we also have the token pavilion drunk. I plan to learn his name at some-point.. but he has proven to be the most devoted of all the visitors. His morning itinerary goes like this.. a twenty minute survey of the exhibit.. and a 15 minute wash in the bathrooms. Can't bare to kick him out.. I think he genuinely loves the space. And the free toilet facilities.

Joel Smoel.. partner in crime and marvelioso docent is away today.. showing The minister for health, SMS Balaji around the Arsenale.

I had my play date with the minister, his wife and a few MICA girls yesterday. It was rather exhausting. Mr Balaji is a machine. He insisted on seeing all 30 pavilions at the Giardini. Was very impressed by his stamina.. and slightly overwhelmed from just too much visual stimulation- fried the surviving braincells not already taken by the chianti.

The Giardini is a funny place. The ground is covered with gravel and many of the Pavilions look like Mausoleums. Bordering on ostentatious...well not nearly as bad as the massive Cruise Liners docked on the Grand Canal a few yards away. However, the area is cool, lined with stunning trees and generally quite green. Some of the Pavilions were built when the Biennale first started in the 19th Century, and others were built more recently. Each one tries to echo the character of the individual country. Hungary with its almost Byzantine like exterior.. and Israel tucked right next to the American Pavilion.

The International Herald Tribune reviewed this years Biennale as subtle bordering on bland. Seeing as I don't have any past experiences with the VBiennale to cross reference with. I am going to make my own review of the Giardini experience.

The Italian Pavilion, which was curated by Robert Storr was interesting. Interesting in the sense that it was a brilliant introduction to few dozen artists I had never been exposed to. However, some bits of the exhibit seemed more like an Art Gallery rather than a curated show for an Arts Festival. All in all a tad bit lifeless. But I guess that is one of the underlying factors to the Venice Biennale, a platform for artists to garner more buyers...which sort of tarnishes the altruistic reasons to this exhibition..but at the end of the day.. an artists has to eat.. especially the good ones.

Robert Storr's theme of, 'think with the senses and feel with the mind' was a bit weak-in my personal opinion. I understand what he wanted to get at.. the union of the mind and body through using art as a catalyst. Nevertheless, I fully enjoyed most of what I saw- As individual pieces rather than journey through a story made by the curator. Some of the video's sort of threw me off.. but i did love Tabaimo's piece which showed these giant hands filling up a dolls house- then scratching the walls away due to some insatiable itch..showing some sort of human body within the 'bones' of this house.

I was blown away by Sigmar Polke.. and this is not due to all the hype surrounding his work... I genuinely loved how his all his pieces have this dark, moody metallic sheen to it. The methodology involved to get that effect is absolutely fascinating. Like an alchemist, Polke experimented by mixing numerous metals and chemicals just for the color produced by the oxidization of the metals on the canvas. In regards to the paintings in the Pavilion, he was partial to using arsenic to bring out the colors in them. Just too wicked for words.

I was disappointed by Louise Bourgeois painting. I am a big fan of her sculptures.... but this particular painting which, consisted of a tight group of individual squares of canvas filled with criss-crossing blue lines.. with two random figures placed in the middle - stirred nothing in me.

Sol Le Witt's two works were detailed and beautiful.. as was this artist I can't remember the name of.. who is from the Congo. Damn.. will get back on that one.

As to the French pavilion.. I had a blast in it. Growing up with a mother who works in the profession of empowering and healing women (she is a obstetrician) I have always been attracted to things promoting the feminist ideal (spice girls.. loved it.. the female eunuch.. just bought the book). The echibit was based on reactions of a 100 different women to a break-up letter that Sophie Calle (the artists) received.. it was brilliant. The exhibit consisted of videos of the reactions.. or drafts of the newly interpreted letter hung on the wall. There was an Indian Carnatic dancer, a crossword setter who re-worded it, a parrot that eat it, a marks woman who shot it.. a therapist.. a judge.. and the list continues. It was all pretty amusing- and received a ton of giggles. The exhibit has the potentiality of making a few men uncomfortable..but it was in essence a celebration of diversity and individuality (and maybe a undisguised 'screw you' to the man who broke up with Calle). I don't think the Singaporean delegation were too impressed- which is understandable. The range of Contemporary Art is pretty much limitless.. and it takes a lot of imagination and 'lubing' of the logical mind to fully appreciate the impact or meaning to whatever is presented.

David Altmejd work for the Canadian Pavilion was like walking into a surrealistic lucid dream. Distorted yet fantastic glittering birds, shards of mirror, mushroom, bears, man-beasts..gold.. trees..bizarre contraptions.. and a mix of dreamy colors rising from the floor (i think the medium for that was plasticine) was a complete visual treat. Altmejd was trying to convey the disjointedness and artificiality of society, through his installation. Gothic-esque and brilliant. The Dali enthusiast in me was pleased.

The British Pavilion and German Pavilion.. in a word.. was shit. It was apparent that tracy emin did no work for the British Pavilion. It was a retrospective of her older works.. smacked in the space. Her stylishly nailed bundle of sticks was the only vaguely interesting thing in there. The rest of her works looked like kiddy sketches of naughty body parts... and the usual self-obsessed blabber of the various injustices she had faced in her life. Nothing new and as usual-incredibly uninspiring. As for the German pavilion.. Isa Genzken exhibit called Oil.. based on the future of petrodollars.. was vague and pretty random. With nooses hanging from the ceilings..gremlin like things with space masks.. and a collection of random suitcases. It was hard to grasp what she was trying to convey.

The Russian Pavilion.. was WICKED. One of my favorites. It was all based on media and technology.. and its adverse effect on us. The Animated- Film of a bunch of half naked teenagers prodding each other with knives was nothing special..maybe a bit weird and nonsensical. Nevertheless, it was one of the only pavilions where the curatorial theme echoed throughout all the works.

Romania's pavilion was also impressive.. they obviously didn't spend much money on it (seeing as it was called Low-Budget Monuments).. but there was this Moody Eastern European gravitas to the works, which appealed to me. The Polish Pavilion was cleverly done. It was this de-constructed framework of a building within the building of the pavilion.

I haven't seen Arsenale yet.. but I would not rate the Biennale as bland. Contemporary Art is The New World to me.. and a lot of what I have seen has been pretty fresh and out-there. Its exciting yet the only thing sagging is the feeling that one is strolling through an art gallery instead of a pavilion. Don't they have other events like Art Basel to appease the itchy buyer?

Ok enough with this pavilion blabber.

The coolest thing of this week was Da Wu making my hand a part of his installation. He has recorded me rolling rice off a banana leaf. You can't see my face in the video.. however the chipped neon pink nail-polish (and the brown hand..i guess) is a big give away.

magnifico!!

2007-06-13T23:47:00.000+08:00

The first week in Venice has been nothing but exciting. I have always held the notion that Venice was a just small cluster of islands..sprinkled with canals, homely Italian restaurants and just a handful of ornate buildings where one could take a lazy gondola ride through. Well, as it turns out, Venice is a cluster of rather big islands filled with thousands of the most beautiful and ornate buildings you would ever see, immense yachts floating around the Grand canal, a few hundred Gondola's blasting out accordion music from built in sound systems..and most importantly the biggest art exhibition in the world going on for its 52nd time, The Venice Biennale. Boom. It was quite overwhelming- to say the least. I am interning in paradise for the lovers of the aesthetic. Who could ask for anything better?

Arriving at Palazzo Franchetti was a bit of a mission.. seeing as I am the quintessential Singaporean-where walking long distances is a massive task. Nevertheless, the walk was well worth the moans (and a sprained ankle) seeing as the Palazzo turned out to be absolutely magnificent.

Palazzo Franchetti is a 15th century building situated next to the Accademia Bridge, that is quite a popular area in Venice. This is due to being one of the few bridges linking the popular area of San Marco to a neighbouring island . Palazzo Franchetti immediately jumps out at you, due to its quiet yellow facade, beautifully maintained private garden, ornate metal gates, and gothic stone venetian lions looking down at you from the second floor. As you enter the building, one is immediatly blown away by the stunning Baroque interiors, corinthien columns inlaid with peach colored marble, grand marble staircases, immense windows looking over the grand canal and delicate pastel colored fresco's on the ceilings.

It would be hard to get bored of this place.. no..what i meant was.. palace.

What impressed me the most (and i am not saying this since they are technically my bosses) is how Lindy (the curator) and the artists integrated their works with the details of the palazzo. The exhibition space in the Palazzo is basically ten rooms with deep red colored walls. Each room, except for Zul's Sound Dome, contained chandeliers. A visitor commented to me a few days ago, that an inferior artists work would be overpowered by the ornateness of the palazzo. However, this was not the case, for the ideaologies and beauty of the art was accentuate by the Palazzo. It was a brilliant fusion, which left a lot of people impressed.

The Pavilion launch was extremely exciting. Before the launch, one could cut the tension with a knife. Nevertheless, it turned out to be an absolute success, thanks to lots of Prosecco..great works.. and some symbolic iconoclasm. Jason's chandelier, Just Dharma, which symbolized the Buddhist ideals of hope- and the subsequent loss of it, through the smashing of it during the pavilion opening- really got the party started. It was a powerful introduction to what the exhibition held. All very dramatic and fabulous.

On the whole, the response to the art work has been amazing. I don't think many people expect the art coming out of Singapore to hold much weight (for reasons i would never know!).. and despite their presumptions..a lot of the visitors come out amazed and impressed. Its a great feeling to see, especially when I am Singaporean, and have seen the steps leading up the Biennale due to a previous internship in the National Arts Council. This newly developed patriotism, which is odd for my flaming liberal tendencies, showed itself a couple of days ago. A woman got annoyed by the fact that she could not receive a catalogue (through no fault of our own..Italian customs wont let it through), so she declared Singapore 'Inefficient'. Man oh man, that really elicited quite the response from me.

Manning the pavilion has been a really insightful experience. For instance, a long discussion I had with an English visitor, who related the entire exhibit to a principle from Aristotle, in regards to existence.

Joel, my intern partner in crime, and prodigious photographer, has really enjoyed the docent aspect to the internship. Taking gaggle's of school girls around the exhibit for a thorough explanation of the works.

Ah well..

Seeing as I am currently lacking a few cerebral capabilities due to an excessive amount of coffee, ciggerettes and nocciola gelato.. i should take the responsible step and stop writing.

Till tomorrow...
the city calls!

Last words

2005-11-06T16:22:00.000+08:00

Good bye, thanks for the tranquility, the art, the freedom and the gelato.

Punk'd by a Visitor

2005-10-31T13:14:00.000+08:00

Someone made the Merlion disappear from the Singapore Pavilion today.

I was busy showing this couple where the Merlion was in Singapore via the Internet (they were going to Singapore next week), and the next time I looked, the statuette of the Merlion had disappeared.

Ahh! I had a little surprise, and started looking around for it. Keeping a look-out for, er, suspicious-looking Italians at the same time.

Nothing. Oh boy.

Then this couple came back into the Information room, beaming. "He wanted to make Mike disappear," the lady said, laughing. The guy, deservedly proud of himself, put the Merlion back on the table. "Yeah, make Mike disappear from here."

So I told him he was evil, laughed out of relief, and gave the couple two beers. For their efforts in making me panic over a Merlion, and for getting into the spirit of Halloween. Trick for a Treat, muahahaha.

Punk'd by the Clock

2005-10-30T14:59:00.000+08:00

Because of this temperate concept called Daylight Savings, we opened the pavilion at 9 am today.

Past noon, I got tired of reading Oliver Twist (besides, I have to ration the number of pages read a day), and decided it was time to stare at the laptop. It asked if I wanted to adjust the time for daylight savings. I wondered how the computer knew it was in Europe. Then it dawned on me.

AHH!! We screamed when we found out, and hurried to check our dearest resource, the Internet. Daylight Savings ended at 3 am early this morning in Central Europe. That means the clock should be turned back an hour to 2 am.

No wonder Arsenale was so quiet and devoid of people when we came to the pavilion.

One unexpected, extra hour in a day is great when you're rushing to meet a deadline, but not when you find out you woke up an hour early on a cold, foggy day to go to work. Discounting the fact that our work isn't really work, and that we like Venice. Things could be worse, like, er, spending an hour outside the pavilion wrestling with the key, trying to unlock the pavilion with it. Hypothetically speaking.

Word of the Day

2005-10-26T17:35:00.000+08:00

Un-cutify : When the dirty finger or toenails of a person undo the effect of his/ her good looks.

Example of Usage

A: That guy was quite cute huh.

B: Please, he's got dirty fingernails. That totally un-cutifies him, ok?!

Sweet Love

2005-10-24T13:24:00.000+08:00

Sigitas smooched his girlfriend in the courtyard today.

He was working diligently before and after that.

We sneaked peeks from the information room and smiled to ourselves.

Marathon di Venezia

2005-10-23T13:08:00.000+08:00

The winner's time was 2:09; I think he's from Qatar. Second and third place went to Italians. The female winner's was 2:28; she had a full head of dreadlocks.

The marathoners had to run from a town near Padova to Riva dei Sette Martiri, between Arsenale and Giardini. Imagine, Padova! It's a 40-minute train ride away. If more people were marathoners and if we didn't get grossed out by others' sweat, we would save lots of fuel, wouldn't we?

Just looking at their robust calves and hamstrings makes me feel like running again when I get back. My huff-puff run, however, will be painfully slow.

Random Sobering Thoughts

2005-10-22T15:21:00.000+08:00

I visited the South-American exhibition yesterday, and loved the works by the Columbian artists, Oscar Munoz and Juan Manuel Echavarria. Echavarria's video piece was very heartfelt, and I felt it made the point about art as an essential and natural outlet for people during hard times, and how art can be political without being preachy. I felt a little more informed, about people and about Columbia, after watching his video. Munoz's work was magical, it appeared to have been video-edited, only it hadn't.

The rest of the day was spent manoevering my way back to the apartment. Which brings me to my next point, that tourism makes people jaded. Not the tourists, because it's always an experience being in a different country and seeing something new. It's those serving the tourists.

Bored gondola rowers and stall-owners at San Marco. They all looked jaded, like they had seen and dealt with all kinds of people and their less desirable human qualities.

Tourism's a massive, complicated creature. It lets many people make a living, it lets visitors take away a piece of the place, it creates memories, but that's the thing with professions where you have to smile constantly and sell your wares -- professions where you depend a little too much on others. You get jaded by the superficial exchanges, and the sheer number of people you encounter every day.

But perhaps I'm just seeing one dimension of these people. Perhaps I don't see them with their friends and families, and I don't see them chilling out and being tourists themselves. Perhaps we all have to do some things we don't like, in order to earn the means to do things we like. Perhaps some things come in packages and not detachable parts.

Dogs, CC and an Old Lady

2005-10-17T20:27:00.000+08:00

There. CC has been complaining that I have all but droppped off the surface of this earth when it comes to blogging. So here is my contribtion of the week. :)

1. The gorgeous puppy that CC blogged about earlier.
2. Pigeons at S. Marco. CC's most hated things here. haha.
3. There's CC in the pavilion, with the dear old lady who came in one morning wanting to understand the work. She spoke italian, some french, some german and minimal English. We spoke English, minimal Italian, minimal French ( CC) no german. But she wanted to know about the work so bad! She kept trying to understand, and we kept trying to explain. The other girl is german, a visitor also, trying to be our translator. I finally ran to Arsenale, one of the main sites of the Biennale and got one of the staff at the entrance to write down what i wanted to say in Italian. The old woman left.. she said she was tired.. but all smiles as she could finally sort of understand our art.
4. A stretch of my fav waterfront in the evening. This part is in front of the vaporetti stop. Its just 2 streets ( kinda) outside our home. Sigh. This will be the part of venice i miss most when i finally have to leave to go home.
5. The Arsenale bridge we have to cross to get to work and back. Isnt it Lovely!

Dogs

2005-10-15T16:10:00.000+08:00

We encountered the most loveable and unloveable dogs today.

In the morning, I was tapping on the laptop when this black Gordon setter puppy ran in and came to me like I was its best friend. Aww.

We followed it out when the owner called for it. Seita was four-months-old, and still discovering things everyday. The woman and her son were from Roma, and their friend was a local. You know how parents act stricter or more lenient with their kids when other people are around? Well the woman reprimanded it, when it ran out of the pavilion for a while. "Seita! Abbiamo qui!" But everyone loved Seita, who kept wagging its tail and leaping up to play with us.

Then in the afternoon, someone tied three white toy dogs to the grape plant and disappeared. Most annoying dogs ever! They kept barking shrilly and loudly and didn't let anyone get too near them, not that anyone was tempted to. I was going to call the owner a moron for treating the pavilion like a dog-sitting area, but maybe he isn't so silly after all. If I had dogs like that - Wait. I would never keep dogs like that.

At the time of writing, the silly dogs were still barking their heads off at anyone who came within 3 metres of them. Grrr.

Snapshots

2005-10-09T14:45:00.000+08:00

Colourful lingerie belonging to one of the pavilion's neighbours. One of our visitors pointed at them and asked, "Are they part of the exhibition?"

Our most regular visitor at the pavilion. He comes in almost every day to rest his legs and smoke a cigarette. He begs for money outside the pavilion.

Most Boring Party Ever

2005-10-09T14:25:00.000+08:00

Venice is devoid of nightlife of the pounding music sort.

Yesterday, Kermin went to the Northern Ireland pavilion and they happened to have a party later that night to cap off a week of N. Irish artists having performances all around Venice. The party, dubbed "The Big Party" (it should have been The "Big" Party), was at a bar in Dorsoduro. We got invites and decided to go. The invites said 10pm, we got there at 10.30 and turns out the party starts at only midnight.

So at first we were the only few people in the bar and the only Asians and that attracts stares. After a few minutes, more people started arriving; but the bar was so small and the music so unhappening and we were so bored. The DJ was playing sixties tunes when we went in!

The other people also just mingled with the friends they came with, and so there were awkward-looking people all around, plus a few old farts too.

Midnight, and the unplugged session by two N. Irish musicians began. Still boring.

Perhaps it wasn't so much that the party was dull. Perhaps it was the dismal absence of free alcohol. Who throws a party at a bar without free alcohol? We bought a few beers between us, and stuffed ourselves silly with peanuts and tortilla chips, which we haven't seen in any supermarket in Venice.

We decided the night wasn't going to get better, and beat a quick exit.

Sigitas saves the day!

2005-10-05T14:40:00.000+08:00

Monday was a bleak and rainy day. It rained so heavily and was so windy that we had to drink 2 cups of Milo each in order not to freeze in the pavilion. And then the toilets flooded. Gah!

We darted next door, ponchos flapping, to put up "Out of Order *Do Not Use* - Chiuso -" signs on both toilets. And test-flushed the toilets today, after the break yesterday. The water levels were still disturbingly high.

Then Sigitas breezed into the pavilion with a friend/ colleague in tow, and we told him dramatically, "Sigitas, the toilets died!"

Of course he didn't understand what we were saying, so Ker Min led him to the toilets and pointed. And he looked troubled and scratched his head, saying he would call Paivi. Minutes later, however, he came in to tell us he had switched on the "motor" and now the toilets were working again. The motor was one of the many power switches by the toilets that we had never touched, labeled "Presi Servici".

Now we know. And so we laughed, feeling like complete bimbos, while Sigitas smiled and looked like he was glad things were well again.

Gelato

2005-10-02T22:17:00.000+08:00

The peril we face: gelato you can't get enough of

Weather

2005-10-02T21:32:00.000+08:00

A sure sign that Venice is getting colder: The information room is actually warmer than outside, with the unforgiving wind. Many people came into the pavilion today with trenchcoats or windbreakers zipped all the way up. And quite a few have pretty shawl/scarves wrapped warmly around the neck. Even the men do it. I might get one too, just so I can look like everyone else - and because I'm cold.

I wonder what will happen to the gelaterias around Venice. (We have a favourite gelato guy whose shop is on Via Garibaldi, a bridge away from the pavilion. He's hardly ever open, but when he is, he greets everyone with a booming "Ciao! Prego?".) Will they close shop, or do Italians have their ice-cream all year round?

Story of a Pigeon

2005-09-28T13:53:00.000+08:00

A black and ugly pigeon crept into the information room and lost its way for a moment.

It tried to fly out but banged into one of the glass panels in the door. Bam. I felt a little sympathetic, but also a little smug. Pigeons have no concept of personal space. They fly just inches over your head, and take flight at the very moment you cross its path.

The pigeon crept about for a while, trying to walk off the pain from the collision. And eventually found its way out.

A Day in Our Lives

2005-09-23T19:43:00.000+08:00

:nkm:

Lull

2005-09-23T13:45:00.000+08:00

Venice doesn't seem to be as crowded as a couple of weeks ago. I think it's the break between summer and autumn where not as many people travel?

This morning a Chinese couple came in to ask where the nearest supermarket was. We only knew of Billa in Lido and in Canareggio, so I asked what she was looking for.

She became slightly abashed and said, "Uh, ha ha, wo zhao nu xing yong de dong xi."

One of us had a sanitary napkin, so we gave it to her.

Great service huh? And if our grasp of Chinese was better, we could have explained the Merlion and the work to her companion, who lingered in the information booth while she used the bathroom. Oh, the shame!

Young and Old, Big and Small

2005-09-22T16:00:00.000+08:00

I've noticed that it's the older crowd who appreciate the pavilion more. They take the time to talk to us and find out more, and they find the toilets absolutely charming, fabulous and useful, of course. One lady told us her ex-husband was called Mike, and Mike was a great guy but... well.

The younger visitors (around Ker Min's and my age) are probably more self-conscious and impatient, so they come in, look around, take a catalogue and go. A few days ago, there was a group of 10 to 15 college-age students talking, smoking and laughing in the courtyard, and for a moment, the pavilion felt like part of a university. Very merry.

A couple of visitors today said they liked the pavilion a lot, especially after the onslaught of Arsenale. My sentiments exactly.

I was at Arsenale yesterday, and I did enjoy a few of the works, such as the mud hippo, the chandelier of o.b. tampons, the typewriter interactive space and the Russian video of "little" people running around and fornicating (hey, there was a rationale behind their piece). But the art got overwhelming after a couple of hours and when I stepped out into the sun, my eyes started watering. It was a relief to go back to the airy and chill pavilion.

PS. Sorry I missed your call, Tzay Chuen

2005-09-17T18:39:00.000+08:00

1. lunch in the pavilion. 2. Omeed, the grey hound from Vienna who visited 2 days running. 3. A view from a street leading to my home. 4. sunset, over venice from S. Elena on a long walk home.

Some snippets of the day:

1. The landlord is pruning ALL our grapes today. Darnnit. He says its necessary if not the vines will break because it will be too heavy otherwise. I don't know whether to believe him or not.
"Sono una parte della mostra di singapore!!"

2. For some reason, people keep thinking that the septic tank is our exhibition. Its starting to be amusing to see how art lovers cross the courtyard in a determined stride, pass our open door and head right to the big black septic tank; then backtrack and look curiously into our little office.
"La mostra sono lo spazio fuori; i bagni equesta stanza"

3. Its cold today already. There's a light chill swirling in invisble currents inside the pavilion. Its heralds the start of work for us, and mourns the absence of F and N!

Venice is beautiful in its somber grey veil, fog covering the tops of the basilicas and the making everything seem more elegant than it really is in the presence of the summer tourists.

:nkm:

Visitors

2005-09-17T13:48:00.000+08:00

Update: Visitor count hasn't surpassed the 10,000 mark yet. We mis-clicked the counter. The number stands at 9,546. 454 to go. But who's counting, right?

1. Homo erectus

Some have said the Merlion, when viewed from the back, resembles a phallus. Well, yesterday afternoon, a curly-haired traveller took a breather at our Pavilion. He was lying down, taking a nap, hands behind head, head on backpack.

And he was having a hard-on.

Visitors were coming and going and nobody seemed affected by it, though I heard one couple say, ".... erecto..." The traveller woke up after a while, sat quietly for 5 to 10 minutes, then went off.

Nataliah said later that we should have hit him with the Mike catalogue and said, "No erections at the Singapore Pavilion!"

2. CBD Chatter

A lady and her friend just came by the pavilion, and she was flipping through the Mike catalogue and explaining how the Merlion statue is in the CBD of Singapore. Naturally we asked if she was from Singapore, and she said yes.

I get this huge grin when I meet a rare fellow countryman in a foreign land.

goodbye goodbye

2005-09-16T18:28:00.000+08:00

View from top! If you can't find the Singapore pavilion in Calle Della Tana, 2126, look at this map!

10.000

2005-09-12T22:06:00.000+08:00

News1: Our visitorship for the pavilion has reached 10.000 today - September 12! Ottimo!

News2: We had a very silent, yet important visitor today. An ambassador of a not-to-be-named country to Singapore came, drop his card and left.

News3: The 2 new interns, Kermin and Chai Chin arrived and they're here to stay!

News4: Singapore party went well on Sept 11!

News5: NZ party hits Venice on Sept 14!

News6: I got invited to the history of the Biennale at the Guggenheim! Time to do my schmozzing!

News7: The cleaner finally came to clean the house!

at the film festival

2005-09-10T00:08:00.000+08:00

Very Lady Vendetta wannabe ...

It's an Asian thingy

And here's the original superstar ... Won Bin? Kim Chi? hmmm ... who? the real lady of vengeance

F.Venice

landscape

2005-09-08T22:51:00.000+08:00

our laundry contribution to the venetian landscape

HEY ALL ITS ME!!!

2005-09-07T23:07:00.000+08:00

hihihi, sorry for cross posting. if u dun wanna see me typing rubbish here again, better change the password haha...

Nah, just to tell all u who know me, i just set up my new blog!
http://iakeijatchicago.blogspot.com

i cant make my blog as exciting as what fariz did to this, but nevertheless come visit!!!

iakeijiekai
alumni of the association of singapore pavilion interns june - july

happenings

2005-09-01T19:38:00.000+08:00

happening 1:

I was molested yesterday by this Italian woman with hairy blonde armpits. It was quite a picture, which amazed me. She thought that I was Tzay Chuen and I just played along, because she kept going on and on and asked me to visit her in Napoli, etc. She commented that I'm handsome and asked if Singaporeans are generally good looking people. Hmm ... Before she went off, she PINCHED my cheeks and kept telling me her name. Grrr ... I felt so violated! Too much!! Especially the hairy armpits! :S

happening 2:

Some important and not-to-be-named person came to the pavilion today. He is nice and seemed pleased with the pavilion.*bingo*

happening 3:

An old man came by and gave me 10 Euros for the catalogue and poster. It would be nice, but YES, NAC people who are reading this, I didn't take the money and repeated myself again, that the catalogues are free! :) Certo! Tutto gratis! C'est gratuit! Free! Percuma! Tidak ada kena bayaran! Mian Fei!

Alora ... highlights from yesterday's opening party of OPEN 2005!

Cocktail reception at the ***** Hungarian Palace Hotel with dressybusy people all dressed up for the Opening of the Film Festival showing Tsui Hark's, Seven Swords

Pavilion people - Great Britain and Ireland and friends from Manchester

Me, Cleo-petra and Cutey Chris

Steve (Aust Pav), Emily (NZ Pav), Belliana (Aust Pav), Simone (NZ Pav), Amal (Aust)

With the superwoman of the biennale - Paivi de Grandis :)

Post Blue Moon party

another letter...

2005-08-31T17:14:00.000+08:00

I came in to the pavilion yesterday to check e-mails from June over the visit, and instead, the guy next door was trying to tell me something. He told me to open the pavilion door and *voila* there's a letter left under the door. Another letter??!? Grrr ... read on ...

-----------------------------------------------
Hello,

I'm the woman with the red hair, which talked to you on Monday in the afternoon - you thought, I was together with the man, do you remember?

Anyway, what I want to say is, that - to be honest at the first moment I wasn't very attracted by the work of Lim Tzay Cheun. You offered me the book and I hesitated, because I'd have to carry much stuff anyway. Perhaps because you talked so enthusiastically about Lim to the other man, I decided to pick it up. When I read it in the evening, I understood what he wants to say and I was very dascinated by the workds of him. I'm sure, that he is a very interesting artist!

You said to me, that the Golden Lion goes to the German Pavillon. I am a german guy so I won't disclaim about it, but if I would have to decide it, I would give the Lion to Lim Tzay Chuen.

Thank you for given me the book and best wishes to the artist and the curator.

Anja
P.S. I really would appreciate, if you could give me the internet adress for further informations about Lim (and - if you have any other artists in your country, that are as exiting as him - I would like these names also). My E-mail: anjaxxxxxx@web.de Thank you!
-------------------------------------------
mio dio!! I teared slightly after reading the letter! I can't believe that I've impacted her appreciation for Singapore art so much!! That's really sweet of her to come back and leave a note for us! Sweet!! I feel so accomplished! :)

F.Venice

fphoto of the day

2005-08-30T17:47:00.000+08:00

compliments from www.isoidiots.com. Catherine and David from UK :)

F.Venice

weather OGGY!

2005-08-28T18:34:00.000+08:00

weather report from Venice OGGY!

It is raining. It has been raining since Saturday, 2220hrs GMT+1
It is now Sunday, 1237hrs GMT+1

You Belong in New York City

You're an energetic, ambitious woman.
And only NYC is fast enough for you.
Maybe you'll set yourself up with a killer career
Or simply take in all the city has to offer
What City Do You Belong in? Take This Quiz :-)
Find the Love of Your Life (and More Love Quizzes) at Your New Romance.

roma

2005-08-27T18:12:00.000+08:00

nostalgic draaaama ahead ...

I arrived on July 21 to Rome Fumicino Airport after a long 21 hour flight from Singapore via Dubai and Milan. How interesting can that get? I was really tired, despite the wonderful service on board the plane + the food that we're getting. I did 2 days in Roma and I think I covered most of the sites around. No hurry for me to finish everything since I will be back in Roma for work next year. Things are indeed expensive in Roma, but comparing to the other European cities, it is still cheaper than Paris. Weather was scorching hot then and indeed when we arrived in Venice, there was a terrible heat wave. Weather is still awry now in Venice. It has been raining since the day Xing and JK left. Wierd summer!

It seems fast that one month has passed, although the process of going through the last month has been so slow. 3 more weeks to go, and I will be back in sucky Singapore.
21 more days ...
Some photos around ...

F.Venice

parties galore!

2005-08-26T23:54:00.000+08:00

I did some area cleaning today! *yay* it was a bit messy around, but still manageable. I just didn't have anything to do, so I thought that I should get some sweat by doing some area cleaning (very military terms eh). Pruned the grapevines and ensured that they are well tangled and all. Toilets are still down, or we're just keeping it down. I hope that the grapes will be ready before we leave in September. Yes Xing, if you're nice, we might send some over to LA!

The blog also got a bit of a revamped. I managed to slot in the html codes accordingly. At first, the whole site was down and all the entries disappeared. I went, "Oh SHIT!" ... but more doodling and tweedling around and finally *BINGO* I manage to figure out the Java codes. Thanks Alan and Yen! So, those around, please leave your comments behind and we can now monitor the traffic too.

Further draama unfolds this morning when the beggar in Draaama 1 and his wife were bickering/arguing/fighting with another guy outside our pavilion. Apparently, this new guy on the block stole his previous begging spot and the couple are making a whole lot of din over it. It was a whole 1/2 hour of shouting in god-knows-whatever-language! Draaama I say, and finally I saw some sisters in the morning. They came out slowly from the mental asylum near our pavilion. Slowly, the truth starts to unfold here in Venice. Simone from NZ pavilion says that there are 4 other mental asylum here in Venice and it's normal. The island asylum? I wish I had taken a photo of naked streaker! Isn't he cold? hehe

On another note, we were invited to the Welsh pavilion party! It was nice, finally going to Guidecca; the island. The same old people were there and it's just nice to have all of us around again. The New Zealand party was great. Very simple and classy I would say. Then went to the German pavilion party. There wasn't an official invitation, but it's just through word of mouth. Great too! Met more of the interns from the other pavilions and we're all in the same boat. There's nothing that we could do at night, other than hang out together. So, that was that and there's the Belgium party tonight over at their apartment! It's going to be nice, seeing all the other people again!

Photos from the previous parties!! :)
With Tessa and friend from New Zealand Party

With Phynella from Great Britain Pavilion

With Ignatio and Paloma from Moroccan Pavilion

With Emily (NZ Pavilion) and Peter from Germany on post Campo S.Marg

Cheerios! F.Venice

cyborg MIKE

2005-08-26T20:45:00.000+08:00

draaama

2005-08-25T16:41:00.000+08:00

Draaama No 1:
There is this guy outside who begs for money and he's really smart I would say. He strategically positions himself outside the biennale grounds, knowing that there's a large influx of tourists/biennale visitors around. The drama unfolds when I saw him, sitting next to his wife, looking really pathetic while his wifes puts out her hands asking for money somewhere else. A beggar tag-team duo? More draama when I saw him and his wife shopping at Billa - the local supermarket, yesterday. In his wife's basket was some tenderloin steak and quite a fair amount of groceries. To think I pitied him and wanted to make an extra portion of my breakfast each day. Draaama.

Draaama No 2:
There was a naked man, fully unclothed = naked man near the Arsenale ticket office. He was shouting and screaming outside a door. I thought he got locked out while taking a shower or something along a prankster around. What if he comes into the pavilion and decided to seek shelter in our toilets? I called for the Arsenale people, just to make sure that they're aware of things outside and then .... *jang-jaNG-JANG* ...

Draaama No 3:
Apparently, there's an asylum or some kind of a refuge near the Arsenale ticket office. No wonder we've been getting some crazy people around. The Arsenale stuff told me that there are some nuns who will hand out some food to these people, thus explains the influx of wierd people around.Speaking of wierd people, this concludes the existence of the quasimodo-wierdo guy who came to "attack" Nat a few weeks ago.So, everything is normal here in Venice actually. You just don't know the source of the happenings, until weeks later.

F.Venice

We have reached 7000 visitors!!!

2005-08-24T22:42:00.000+08:00

Nat

singapore shite

2005-08-20T20:05:00.000+08:00

we received our first hate mail from the neighbours yesterday. Creepy! and we thought that it was the old woman who complained when Xing slammed the door, but it turned out to be another neighbour - 2516 woman. (xing - I don't think it was your fault and the slamming door. I think it is more of the neighbours and the slamming gate! Freakazoid! I am so pissed with them, and wonder how does JK tolerated their nonsense). Apparently, she blamed us for throwing a box of rubbish in front of her house. Hello? We're not even home yesterday and we don't drink a whole box of beer, for goodness sake! Grrr ... she was so rude and wrote a small note to us in scribbly Italian and pushed it under our door. Freakozoid!

and today, someone pasted their event sticker in front of our toilets. More left their exhibition brochures under the grapvines. Some people are just darf! We should ban people from having the liberty to use the toilets. Who say that anyone can use the toilets in the first place. Very shameless people. And the worst bit is that they will give me the look, like as if I'm cutting their toilet queue, when what I wanted to do was to check if the toilets are clean and the supplies replenished. KNNBCCB! Don't they realise that this is an exhibition space for the Singapore pavilion and Mr Asian here, belongs in this space?? Grrr ...

a whole bunch of francolites came over this morning and insisted on the French explaination. I greeted them with hello and they replied back, Bonjour! Don't they realise that English is our language here in Singapore? I am so pissed with the day so far. Very gerrruum. Oh well ... I will be strong and shall wait for the green light from NAC to ban people from using the toilets.

F.Venice

i love NAC!

2005-08-19T23:26:00.000+08:00

una regazza,
ciao bella;
29 more days,
venetian memories always.

while the sun is scorching,
i am still working;
italians are still on holiday,
Finally, the power adapter came today!

ciao! ciao!

i'm baaack! (with a vengence) Thank you NAC :)

5555!!

2005-08-13T23:54:00.000+08:00

No!! It's not the group 5566!! But we've reached our five thousand five hundred and fifty fifth visitor in the pavilion! YAY!!

there's our visitor number 5555!

C'est geniale!

2005-08-12T21:53:00.000+08:00

My French is non-existent, but oui! D'accordo! Finally some thinking visitors today!

Nat

Role-playing

2005-08-12T19:32:00.000+08:00

On Wednesday we found ourselves in the role of the Venice Tourist Information Point.

I've considered investing into a little funny leprechaun green or dowdy brown "official's" hat to live up to that role. Perhaps a blue and white stripey shirt with a bowtie? No, that's too MacDonalds. Or maybe I should go for the Groucho Marx look - complete with the big nose, ticklish moustache and round glasses?

No matter how much I'm looking forward to fostering the Groucho Marx look for the day-time this summer, I see I'm a little to late.

Peccato!!! (Shame!!)

Perche (because) today we've taken a step forward.

But I can't make up my mind. Is being a tourist information office a rank higher than being the following bureau?

I leave it to the reader to decide.

Today we've become the Lost and Found Office.

It was quiet for most of the morning, until 11.15am when a French lady walked in and asked if we had by any chance found her old Nokia in the toilets yesterday afternoon.

Then an Italian woman told us that she had left her camera on the Pavilion grounds yesterday.

10 minutes later I received a call from Francesca from Arte Communcations to ask if we come across a camera. No, unfortunately we haven't was reply.

Then two Japanese girls came in to ask if we had seen a coat and a white beach hat. I happily handed over the brown-tinged white beach hat over.

BUT........

We're still the Tourism Board of Venice. A bunch of middle-aged Dutch tourists came in, oops sorry, that's not the word, it was more like they barged or tumbled in. And they didn't care in the least about the exhibit. They asked me if I was Venetian. I said no, but yet they did not seem to believe me. So they pressed and asked for the local Venetian party spots. I said I'm not sure as I'm not a local, but you could try Campo Santa Margherita - it has a lot of good bars, street performers and restaurants. Our dear visitors responded by dumping the map on Mike! (I should have told them they were committing sacrilege) and wanted exact directions. They kept asking again if I knew the party spots (I know, maybe I do look like I should know, but instead I repeated that I wasn't even Italian.) They looked sceptical. I tried to explain to them that we provide information solely for the Singapore Pavilion, and that they could try the Information booth at Arsenale for such information perhaps. But they didn't understand.

BUT...

Some wonderful visitors came in just a few minutes ago. People who were asking and wanted to know what this exhibit was about. They were open to ideas, and not just merely open to consume for consumption's sake...but who were willing to digest a little of the immaterial ie. thought!!!!!!

Nat

I Spy

2005-08-12T17:13:00.000+08:00

A girl wearing the omnipresent red "ArtLover" t-shirt, the characteristic unofficial uniform of Biennale employees, is sitting on the grey bench outside in "our" courtyard.

And she's smoking a cigarette.

Like the rest of "them", she's probably unaware that the interns can spy on her from the other side of the darkened windows.

I'm not being a girl scout.

Naaaaah, really, I would never tell on our visitors.

But anyway, as I was saying....

Like the rest of "them" - that is, of the Singapore Pavilion visitors - I would say that about 95% of the people that enter and roam around these three spaces immediately assume and stick by the assumption that the space provided by the Singapore Pavilion is merely a place to do the following activities:

1) "Oh, look, a place to relieve the call of nature! Quick, steal some toilet-paper!"
2) collect a "souvenier" from the exhibit, ie. not unlike the situation where tourists to Greece often try to "take" home materials or statues from ancient buildings. Here, instead, we've come to the conclusion that in someone's cheap ignorant attempt to collect a souvenier, the ladies tap handle broke.
3) "Finally, a picnic spot!" and visitors gleefully flock to the benches in the courtyard
4) "Who needs a hostel in the daytime? We can just sleep on the benches in the toilets! Yay!"
5) Breast-feeding area
6) have animated arguments with their spouses in the courtyard as they presume no one is looking
7) Criticise the helpful interns for not being able to provide maps or detailed information about the other parts of the Biennale
8) Certain visitors randomly exercise nationalistic tendencies by criticising the interns for not being able to communicate in the language of the visitor's choice - although this office speaks English, Italian, French, Czech, Malay, some Mandarin, some German and some Russian, it is obviously still not adequate. We have thought of resolving this problem by putting up a sign outside that stipulates the languages spoken here.

Example 1

For about the 20th time, someone walked in with a huffy-puffy attitude.

Visitor: "Bon-jourrrrr!"

Nat: "Buongiorno! Hello!"

Visitor: "Parlez-vous francais?"

Nat: "Oh no, sorry. But I do speak Italian."

Visitor: (incredulously) "You don't speak French????"

Nat: "No. I'm afraid I don't. Could I perhaps explain to you in English or Italian?"

Visitor: "Oh. (long pause) You don't speak French. Hm."

Pause with the visitor ho-humming.

Nat: (still patient and forever smiling) "Well, I do speak Italian, Czech, Malay, some German, some Russian, any of these, whichever you would like...! :) "

Visitor: "No, no, fine. English will have to do then."

And the visitor spoke perfect English!

Oh well. A study in social interaction, I reiterate to myself. And in fact, there is a quite a glimpse in to the social reality of fragmentation between different nations and the active enforcement of their languages.....I mean, it's an art exhibition! People should just chill out and have fun, enjoy the different cultures and their interpretations of art especially at the country pavilions! I think that next time I will offer such visitors a Tiger beer. A summer drink to chill out to!

Conclusion

Anyway, back to my initial point. People walk in and out, and based on the comments I happen to hear from visitors, they have been fooled! In the sense, that - is this part of what is supposed to happen at the exhibit? I mean, people don't seem to be thinking much or at all about the space judging on their comments. They're just happy to have a nice toilet and a drinking fountain outside. But in some sense, it surprises me. People are here to attend an international art exhibition, and although they see and pass the sign outside the main entrance that clearly says Singapore Pavilion, and this including the sign in the courtyard and the unusual toilets seem to escape them. They stumble into information room demanding information on the clubbing scene in Venice, where to buy vaporetto tickets and so on....and I feel like saying "We seem ridiculous to you that we don't have the information that you want, but really! Don't you see, the joke is on you!" They've paid their money for the Biennale, and if there is nothing material to see or to grasp or twist or break, there is truly nothing for such visitors.

Sigh.

Nat

Nat's day

2005-08-10T18:45:00.000+08:00

A typical day at the Singapore Pavilion looks like this:

Visitors stumble clumsily around the little black glass door in the courtyard which has an "Information" sign perched above it. Some peer through the dark windows on either side of the door to find out what to expect before they walk in. Others bob forwards and backwards, not unlike some type of strange ritualistic dance (if only we could discard the huge cameras, waterbottles and guidebooks for a few leaves to make a hula dancers outfit), hesitantly wondering if they should take their next step back into the safety and sunlight of the courtyard or if they should attempt communication with the people at the long grey table inside.

Others walk in, tackling the situation head on and demand "Okay, where's Mike?" A little bit too assertive, or perhaps a yonk to aggressive you might think, but I have to say that there are days when I prefer this attitude to the smirk of the so-called common people. Common people, I say, not because they are really such, but as you will see:

SCENARIO 1

A man doing the strange bobbing dance ritual at the entrance to our Information room. He walks in and asks:

Visitor 1: "Where is the exhibit?"

Nat: "Hi there, the Singapore Pavilion, or rather the exhibit are these three spaces - this information room here, the bathrooms and the courtyard outside."

Visitor 1: "Yup, uh-huh, so like, uh, where's the exhibit?"

I follow on with another explanation. The man looks at the black walls, then turns to take a deliberate 10-second look at me, and a smirk rips across his face.

"Ah riiiight, thank you. Bye!!"

Nevertheless, I find it amusing and interesting to watch the reactions of visitors. For me, it is a survey of human behaviour and reactions to expectations of common things......

SCENARIO 2

A couple walks in, and it looks like they have a mission, as they walk quickly towards the steps at the back of the information room, looking ready to tear down the door at the top of the stairs to find the artist's work.

Fariz or myself briefly explain the lay-out of the Singapore Pavilion.

"Oh, so you two are the exhibit?" they ask, unable to hide their disappointment.

"Well, in fact, all of us in this room are part of and ARE the exhibit, in some way or another. Perhaps you could consider yourself a part of the work at this moment."

"OOOHHhhhhhhhhhhh.........", and they continue to look at the black walls, walk around the table, and search for the artists work, as though they half-expect to see it floating in mid-air.

Sigh.

SCENARIO 3

Visitor 3: "Could we please have a map of the Biennale?"

SCENARIO 4

Visitor 4: "Tell me, do you have adresses of good restaurants around here?"

I wish I did, I think to myself. I'd love to know where I can find hearty Venetian cooking at reasonable prices. But instead, I tell our visitor the bad news.

Nat: "I'm sorry, but we are the information point for the Singapore Pavilion. You might be able to get some information from the people at the Arsenale."

Visitor 4:"Yeah, right, uh-huh....so you really don't have the guide to the best restaurants around this area?"

I wonder, hm, perhaps my English no so good, right?

But on the other hand, there are so many people who demand some sort of explanation and will not leave until you have satisfied their curiosity. They stand with arms folded across their chest, some leaning with their hand placed on the table and tapping their fingers impatiently on the cool grey surface.

"So tell us, who's Mike?"

Some look bewildered, some dissapointed, some amused, some tickled by the idea, some stay on in the pavilion and have a Tiger beer, which has at times inspired them with new theories for Mike. Some leave interesting comments in our guestbook. Others meanwhile (and I still can't decide if its because Mike has inspired an artistic streak in them, or if they are unable to express their reactions in words or if they are simply illiterate) draw....small Mikes, big red roaring Mikes...waves.....dragons...cats...flowers....

But today, was the funniest day of all. About 99% of the people who came to see the exhibit today have asked for information about the city, the Biennale, food and transportation, where to buy tickets for the Biennale, if we sold tickets for the Biennale......

Top 5 Mike comments

2005-08-08T19:52:00.001+08:00

Visitors' reactive scribblings in the guestbook...

Today's top 5 are:

1) Mike could even mate with the San Marco lion!
It would be interesting to the result... :)

2) Mike: Sorry you couldn't
come here with me.
I met someone else.
Screw you.
Carolyn

P.S. This toilet here is
perfect for you. No toilet
paper. You deserve that.

3) Dear Tzay Chuen.
U still can't
have my girl.

Much love,
Teke

4) FINE, THE TRANSPORT OF
AN IDEA
in FULL PURENESS

I hope you'll bring
Mike without break not break, not break....
Moni hoped you'll find Maria in Vienna.

Wolfgang

5) FLUSH MIKE - BRING THE LOO
TO MUNSTER.

Nat

Impression Pavilion

2005-08-07T23:42:00.000+08:00

This is the place i dwelled for the past 2 months
a dark place
a black space

The table
The objects
The laptop
The wires

Its lunchtime. I took out my lunchbox. Rice with tuna again.
Eyes looked at me.
People walked in and out.
I continued eating...

OGGY! OGGY!

2005-08-06T23:01:00.000+08:00

OGGY, 6 AUGOSTO 2005!

Weather is ok here. Not so hot, although the sun is out, but the Venetians around have told me that it will get hotter next week or so, till the end of the month. We shall wait and see.

I opened the pavilion today, a felt a bit excited for work. I was armed with the laptop and then my lunch, as well as my tote bag. Got into the pavilion, and swtiched on all the lights, checked the toilets to see if the stocks are still there and *BHAM* a whole horde of German tourists with their guide came into the pavilion. Mind you, I left the pavilion door half opened and they managed pushed their way in. The tour guide saw me and insisted for an explaination of the work. WTF?!

I brought them to the information room; showed them the merlion, showed some gestures and they were like ... ooohhh ... ahhhh. I bet they don't really understand me, but I tried my best and gave time for the guide to translate to them. At least, they were really excited over the toilets and as usual, were amazed. That was about 30 visitors at 10.02am this morning. What a shocker!

The visitors to the pavilion can be quite intimidating and demanding sometimes. On some occasion, they would insist for me to explain to them in Italian. Hello? Where's Nat on the days you need her. Then again, I've learnt enough Italian to give them a gist of the exhibition - directing them to the 3 areas of the pavilion. The French were worst. Die DIE also, they want me to explain to them in French. I must say that my friench has improved, but you know hor, is it just impossible for them to speak to/understand me in English. The whole world doesn't revolve around them whor! You come here; our Singapore pavilion and you people respect us ok? Lidat, how many languagues do we have to learn in order to please them hor? Lidat lor! If I do Singlish to them, lagi best! I bet they'll be very intrigued by the language. I was already accomodating and thank their lucky stars that we're equipped with a 3rd langauge. Speaking of 3rd language, the Chinese will come in sheepishly and walk out without saying anything. So, it wasn't possible to do Mandarin. No Malays/Indons coming in either. Pfftt!!

I went to the Thai Pavilion yesterday. Very Zen buddhist, very tranquil and very good karma and very good use of the site. I could feel the tranquility of the work and the whole Thai culture just felt so apt. They had two artists - one living and another who just passed away recently, paying hommage to him. Me and my khangkeng (thai fisherman pants) and my orachun (thai god) t-shirt, happily went in and greeted the guy in Thai, or whatever Thai that I could remember from the 12 weeks intensive class. He then asked me, if I'm Thai! Heh! I could be, if I want to. Oh well, didn't talk much with him, cos he looks a bit dodgy. Left and headed off to P.le Roma, hoping to get a day trip to Treviso on Tuesday.

Things have been quite slow here in the pavilion. I guess the tourist crowd is dying. Nat and I were hoping for some nice people to chill out with. I met Cecile, an Australian from Sydney who's on a travelling scholarship. She's studying architecture and was cool. I should be flying often to Sydney, so Cecile, here I come.

Other than that, it has been quite routine. We're getting the fans! The money is approved and we're waiting for the money from Paivi. On the otherhand, the NAC laptop is down. Bummer!! There was no light on the adapter. Dang!! I knew it would come sooner or later. Xing was already complaining and warning us about the almost defunct lappy. I was so bored, until Nataliah came over and lent me her lappy, which I am typing this entry right now. I hope NAC will reply soon, for I was already considering of shipping my laptop over from Singapore. The bro is checking on the frieght rates first. I will if it's less than $100? Hmm .. we shall see.

Loads of Venetian Vaporettos
F.Venice

Back in Spore

2005-08-05T10:59:00.000+08:00

Got back for almost 2 days already
I'm still not adjusted back yet
I should be happy to be back
I thought i will be
But something inside me felt a sense of loss
I feel like a nomad
Traveling from place to place
2 weeks later im leaving again...

Perhaps my sense of attachment to a single place is already numb
Perhaps I am still on a journey of discovery
Perhaps I still want to move

The memories of Venice still lingers
It is a very different feeling
I do not miss venice
But I feel that I am beginning a phase of life where places are platforms
I shift from one to another constantly
I look back at each place
I think about the experience
I think about the people

But I still move on...

~jiekai~

happenings

2005-08-04T19:12:00.000+08:00

And so, JK left early in the morning for the airport. I helped him with his trolley bag all the way to the vaporetto station and I could see him grimacing carrying the bags. It was strange to be out in Venice at 7am, cos I've never gotten up so early before. And the streets were filled with dog poo and pigeon poo, creating an aweful smell altogether. I went back and slept for the next few hours.

Xing was up and ready to get to the airport. We chatted and in the end, she left. She left the apartment without her phone and I ended up running after her, while she was draggy her trolley to the vaporetto station. The MTV music played on and we got so draaama. I walked her to the station and it started to drizzle. I guess Venezia is sad that both of them are leaving. At least it wasn't a scorching hot afternoon to start off with.

So, off I went to Giardini and the surrounding pavilions. Some of the exhibitions were great and indeed inspirational, but others were utterly strange. I will write on more of them, but I guess I'll give it a more performative angle of the biennale versus JK's artistic view. And I will do that when less visitors are around, although I must add that I like the stuff from KOREA! I could see some resemblance with the video that I did for Pop Culture & Performance class last semester.

-------
On another note, it has been quiet without Xing and JK. The house is finally cleaned and so is my room. I managed to cook rice and it turned out really good. I miss rice all of a sudden and i can't be on a pasta diet for 2 months yeah? Other than that, I thought of this idea of cooking dinner for 2 portions and save half for the next day's lunch. Great huh? So I had rice, curry devil's vege with fries last night and swapped the fries with cheese omelette for the lunch instead.

Feeling great and working out good! My french is improving and I told the visitors more about Singapore in French! Chouette! Oui ... a bientot mes amis!

Do you know?!

2005-08-01T23:14:00.000+08:00

After meeting so many visitors around, I have learnt quite a great deal of things from them.

1) Do you know that in German, the name George is pronounced as GAY-YORG?

2) Do you know that Mike is pronounced as MICK in French?

3) Do you know that Dutch and Deutsch language is almost similar?

4) In Italian Fashion, they like to reveal what they wear under. Also, wearing WHITE - pants, skirts, berms, shorts is IDEAL with a contrasting coloured underwear to it. Best still if they're thongs and will peak out a bit. I wouldn't really say that they're walking exhibitionists, but I guess it is sexy. So tomorrow, I shall head out to Padova and buy my white pants.

5) JK and Xing are leaving for Singapore tomorrow!! They're doing good and am sending JK to the airport tomorrow. Bye bye :) (Afternote: Xing and JK left on a drizzley Tuesday).

6) Italian doors do not close properly and it takes a key to lock the door.

7) Vaporetto (or we what is known as ferryboats in Singapore) rides cost S$10 to get around the island. Imagine paying $10 for an MRT ride?

8) Public water coolers or taps are available everywhere in Italy.

9) Dogs in Venice are pretty tamed unlike the hungry ferocious ones in Singapore. They'll just raom around the streets on their own and get lost, and then find their owners. Cats on the other hand, are fat and fury.

F.Venice

and the heat wave continues

2005-07-31T19:49:00.000+08:00

OGGI (pron. ORGY) - 31 Luglio 2005
min: 21 °C (so NOT true) max: 30 °C (more like 35 °C)

Nat and I finally moved from the cosy Hotel Giardinetto to the hot and stuff apartment OGGI. The air is stale there and we're waiting to get the fans. We can't open the windows too much cos the mosquitoes kept flying in and we will see JK swatting the mosquitoes with his mighty hands. Well, at least we are now closer to the pavilion and shuttling back and forth would be easier. Just cross two bridges and voila, we're home.

The pavilion has been receiving many interesting people so far. People were mainly amazed by the toilet and also after some assistance by us. Nat did most of the work with the Italian-speaking tourists and now she's speaking Czech! She's amazing. I would just stand back and stare with my smattering/smittering CMI French (despite 2 years learning it).

I've made a few contacts so far and probably, I smell a family homestay too (in no order of importance).
1) Funny crazy media students from Roma who stays in the Rainbow House

2) Fashion instructor from Montpellier, France who has links with La Salle Singapore
3) Italian scientists who used to work in KKH Singapore and is back in Milan, Italy
4) Film Maker Ralph from Wien, Austria
5) George (Pron. GAY-ORG), the German product designer working in Taipei

6) Dutch artist and writer who helped themselves to a TIGER

and more to come :) I can't wait to pay them a visit if time permits after the biennale.

-----------------
On another note, I am going to the other islands of Venice; Isola di Murano e Isola di Burano OGGI. The weather is hot for now, so I shall wait till the sun sets a bit. HOOOOOT!

Will share more of the islands when I'm back. Planning to do the fried rice today, after 3 days of mee goreng and maggi for the past few days. I've just mailed back home, asking mama how to make curry puffs. I think they'll be really HOT and will sell well. Let us all wait and see .... W A I T ...

My Singapore Mee Goreng on Day 1

The Rubber Nasi Goreng on Day 2
----------------
Afternote:
The islands were kindda dead during the weekend and had nothing to offer. While Murano is known for their Murano glasses, Burano on the other hand are known for the fancy lacework and the colourful houses. It took me almost 2 hours to get to the islands from Venice and I was totally exhausted thereafter.

Houses on the island of Burano
The Lacy Shop in Burano
Murano glass beads
The island hopping boy

F. Venezia

the day we landed in Venice

2005-07-29T23:17:00.000+08:00

We could be the next poster boy/girl for the Biennale
And so, JK (not Rowling) and Xing are going to leave the biennale next week. The two new interns - Nat and Fariz are here to save the day for the next two months before we will be rescued by the next group of interns.

Well, it has been good so far. We have been orientated around the Singapore pavilion, been given the lowdown on the special glitches of the place, also been given a special maze tours of the alleys and shortcuts (especially to BILLA), and soon, we'll have the housewarming party.
Daily shuttle from Lido to Arsenale
It has been a week since we last arrived in Venice. I flew from Singapore to Roma and spent 2 days there with the hot afternoon siestas and made arrangements with Nat to meet on the train in Firenze to Venezia.

1) Daily Schedule ...

Nat and I will meet for breakfast each day where we will have the usual stuff. It was great at first and very *wawa* with all the presentation and the variety. After 1 week of the same ol' stuff, it is a bit stale and instead, I smuggle the bread rolls and nutella for lunch and give the excess to JK and Xing.

Thereafter, we will head to the pavilion from Lido and make our presence felt. While Nat does some of the explaination in Italian, I do my bit in French. It has been fun in meeting all the people around and the visitors, on top of the arte communications.

2) Happenings so far ...

Happening 1: Nothing much happened so far. There was my day out to Lido beach during the off day -Tuesday. It was just HOT everywhere. Not just temperature HOT but the sun was just scorching. I guess I was still jet lagged from all the travelling that I woke up just for breakfast and then continued sleeping again till about 5. Grabbed the Banana Boat Tanning Oil SPF 4, the hotel towel, my tote bag and some cash and to the beach I went. The people were rather shameless and flaunt their assets away, I would say. Guys were flashing their hot red trunks and their super short shorts when I expected them to be clad in their boardshorts like those in Australia and America. *dang* to think I shoved aside my acid green trunks for the plain black ones. Grr ... It wasn't a nice beach anyway and from the stuff I heard, there's quite a huge spillover from Marghera.
Outcome: Spilly Pollution and an almost happy tanned boy

Shots from Lido

Happening 2: Nat and I went to Marghera and Mestre. At first I was a bit excited, especially so when Nat mentions that Marghera has a hypermarket and loads of shopping. Hypermarket? Isn't Billa already an excitable market? Billa is the answer for local grocery shopping and NTUC or Shop 'n' Save but a bigger hypermarket? In the end, Marghera and Mestre turned out to be a damper and the heat wave added on to the stress of travelling out of Venice. Grrr ...
Outcome: Disappointment and thank god for the hotel air-conditioner

Nat almost lost in Marghera after a day of police station-ing

Happening 3: I was googling on the night life here in Venice and it turned out that there was nothing within the island but instead, on the mainland of Marghera, Mestre and Padova. Feeling a bit excited since the entrance for under 26 y/o will be free, I geared myself for the Gay Club in Marghera to catch a bit of drag queen show. They're always hilarious and after exploring the drag scene in South East Asia for my thesis paper, I wonder what to expect in this almost barren performance space. Of which, it was a sheer disappointment and a waste of time, other than seeing the pathetic male stripper playing with his red cloth and trying really hard to eroticise the performance with a combination of bad/almost unheard music.
Outcome: Tired and sick with bad sorethroat and unbearable headache

Oh well, I think that covers almost a lot for the happenings of the week. More to come, albeit the heatwave here. That should be a great subject to post about. Despite the unbearable lightness of being = the SUN, tourists still swarm this island of Venice, yearning for more and spending the touristico dollars or I should say Euros.

F.Venezia

Xing

2005-07-29T04:48:00.000+08:00

I wish I understood those old women of the streets. Where do they disappear to, when gondoliers and crowds ease into the night? Under bridges? Around the station? Do they have a house somewhere? Seems impossible, unless it’s on the mainland, and that would mean money for public transport. So much of the time, there we go, the edges of our shoes grazing the riff-raff of the street. Bits of us flaking off, tags from new clothes, maybe, ice cream sticks, pushing up against the fringe on a mat. Do they have bent backs because they beg, or the other way round? If I knelt everyday that would happen to me. It’s too jarring to think about the younger ones who look about thirty. It’s nothing like LA- not the numbers or the intensity of it. But that’s partly because in Venice it isn’t an almost-culture, with areas practically designated for uneasy projections of confidence. Here the tourists blaze the trails, even street cleaners, toilet cleaners, are alive, and pulsate knowingly, ‘Ciao, come stai, va bene!’ We don’t see, there are pick-pockets to guard against and merchants fobbing off factory-made Leprechaun gold, making us pay more euros for their pizza. Where do curved sticks go, we don’t know, tourists never know. But take Mother Theresa and come up with a dirt-stained version, a bad odour, put her in a corner, bend her back more, even more, to 90 degrees. Not at the waist, but at her backbone, at mid-back. Little gaudy cards, the Virgin Mary. I have to say, passing by makes me stand straighter, like a proper old stick-in-the-mud, I’m sure. And think about it, if you’re staring at the ground, how do you move? How do you look up?

__l
I

And I buy tubes of sun block, and fuss over them. Almost makes me laugh.

Something awful happened, when I was walking down a long, very narrow alleyway, the fondamenta just a strip, way off, in the distance before me, between two jumbly houses. Daytime, cool and dark in the alley but at the opening far ahead, the light emptily happy, like a day in childhood watching an old show on the tv, and beyond, invisible but shining, the sea. Then, something appeared from one side of it, at that place way off, like a screen, a character in slow motion, at mid-level too low and short for a normal person, and not a child, because it was bent horizontally, and the horizontal part moved onto the screen first. And this is why I could hardly feel sad- because it was just like a cartoon.

I could never say I understand. Could feel, but never say, but feel. Aren’t I an old woman too? Will I be the same person when I’m earning, or rich? Will I do the right thing, contribute in waves that look correct to experienced philanthropists, channel my sources all to the ‘right’ causes?

That said, I don’t want to leave Venice- yet. I love this place too much, and other parts, too. One day I’ll come back.

Romeo n Juliet

2005-07-16T22:05:00.000+08:00

Juliet's house

It is the dreams of every girl to be a Juliet...

Is Romeo coming up for me? (The photographer is waiting downstairs for me *SNAP*)...

The marks of millions of love sick individuals who visited this "shrine of love"

Tomb of Juliet

Verona

2005-07-16T21:45:00.000+08:00

Photos from jiekai :-p enjoy...