山歌好比春江水 - A Traditional Folk Song from Guilin, China

This song, 山歌好比春江水, is a traditional folk song from Guilin, China, popularised by the legendary Liu Sanjie 刘三姐, she is my parents', especially my mother's favourite folk song (Chinese literal translation = mountain song) singer.

Hubby and I are in Guilin now since last week, loving the place (this is a scheduled post but I am very sure we are loving the place)! Will edit this post anyway, so stay tuned.

EDIT: after our trip I think it's best if I leave this post mostly untouched as I need more than one post to describe the wonderful experience we had in Guilin, China!

Oh, the performance in the video above took place in the USA, noticed the orchestra are largely non-Chinese or even East Asians?

I just cannot fathom how someone of Chinese descent, with Chinese ancestry, just because they are staying out of China (due to migration in the first, second, third, fourth or even fifth generation) - they seem to treat that part of themselves as filthy or unspeakable. I don't speak for the rest of the world. I'm only speaking for the Chinese people (out of China) as I am one myself, a third generation on my dad's side and fourth generation on my mom's side.

The Westerners are learning Chinese language and arts/culture and here we are denying our own birthright? I am NOT talking about material rights or political rights, keep them out of this.

I am talking about language and culture. I don't have formal Chinese language education but I strive to learn to read and write the intricate language myself. It is hard, trust me, as I think and even dream in English. Oh well, who am I to judge these people? I am just voicing out my thoughts.

If you cannot love who you are born as, how can you be proud of what you have done so far, because everything you do in life will be trying to cover up who you are born as, so how can you truly be at peace with yourself?

Yup a good quote there: "When everything you do in life is to hide who you r born as, how can you truly be at peace if you deny yourself?" ~suetiong

Just in case you are curious of Liu Sanjie, here's the classic movie in HD:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EieWPBDipJY&feature=related

Mother in Dreams (Heaven) - Song

Uudamu.

This Mongolian kid is amazing! He was only 12 when he joined China got talent and he made it to the final round and came third!

Mother in Dreams (Heaven) is his signature song - remembering his late mother (and father) who passed away in a road accident.

I feel so touched I feel like hugging him!

His name is Uudam or in Chinese is called Uudamu 乌达木

Here is a more uplifting song after the initial clips with the sad song in the background:



Many criticisms by supposedly narrow-minded people has been thrown at this kid just because he is a Mongolian, and to this, I agree with the top commenter of one of the videos:

"The ugly wrong doing of adults and/or organizations reflects Uudam's the high valuable character: simple, original, and natural. Millions of people watched his excellent performance and so many experts were on the stage to eye witnessed his great presentation. How can the black cloud cover the bright moon? "Real gold does (sic: is) not afraid of fire" and Uudam should make those people ashamed of themselves. They still owe Uudam an apology!" ~Liyuksum

Tell Me Why - Amazing Voices from Two Boys from China

I am like OMG!

The boys are barely 9 and 11 or maybe 12 in his video. Amazing, amazing talent from China!

I mean, every country has talents like this, so this is more in awe rather than being sour grape, so please no flaming! Youtube commenters can be very vicious at times.

Shut up and enjoy the music! *peace*

Popera - Classical Cross-Over Singers

I found this gem of a duet of two talented South Koreans (one is American Korean):



The conductor can really sing!!! However, I am more wowed by the lady, American-born Rose Jang, daughter of a National Seoul University graduated who then pursued his doctorate at Princeton University and finally settled down with his family in the USA. Quote from her biography:

"Princeton-born Rose Jang is an acclaimed award-winning Korean-American pop opera artist who is well-known for singing operatic arias, musical and classic pop songs."

A very private person online, I cannot get much personal information in English about American born Rose Jang, but I gathered if she was 30 in 2009, (as quoted in one news report), then she must have been born in 1979. That's all I gathered. The rest are polished background info easily found online.

I love her voice and her whole persona. I noted that in 2011 in an interview in Korea (most recent video I could find online) - she has put on quite a bit of weight, more like water retention on her face and arms. Her voice is still splendid nonetheless.

The other classical cross-over singer I like is Hayley Westenra. She's in her 20s now and has been singing since she was a little girl, then blossomed into a wonderful teen with a big voice.

I hope Rose Jang and the New Zealander Hayley can perform a duet some day, or maybe Rose may attempt a cover of Nella Fantasia or the English version with lyrics penned by Hayley herself - Whispers in a Dream as embedded below:

It is only viewable on desktop/laptop but not on mobile.


There are many more talented ladies (and even little girls) in this genre. Usually they dislike it when you refer to their genre as poppera or popera (pop+opera), so classical cross-over it is!

If you haven't checked out this genre before, search for these two names on youtube, and there are scores of many more like Sarah Brightman, Katherine Jenkins, Celtic Women, and oh, the ever so adorable Jackie Evancho (- there are many more you just need to discover them as it will do no good to list them out one by one!

Happy listening!

Fairytale - By Enya

I love this song by Enya! The song really complements the video from LOTR as well!

I am totally obsessed with the Fairytale by Enya. Oh yeah. Enjoy the hauntingly beautiful melody (I love that it is lyric-less) that really makes you imagine you are in an enchanted forest and living the fairytale.

Have an enchanted weekend everyone!!!

Only Time - a reflection on life

The video of the ever beautiful Enya singing "Only Time" - still so soothing to the soul after all these years.

Hurt - takes time to heal.

Crop - takes time to yield.

Painful memories - takes time to forget.

Skill - takes time to be acquired.

Elation - takes time to sink in.

Habit - takes time to form.

Will be humans make it in the end?

Only time will tell.

p/s - just attended my husband's godpapa's funeral today - he is also my father-in-laws' eldest and only brother so it was a close relationship. Makes you think and reflect on the frail human life.

Rapunzel, Rapunzel, Let down your hair! - Disney Princesses in DisneyWorld, Orlando, Florida, USA

My first 'encounter' with Rapunzel was during our first visit to Magic Kingdom in Disney World, Orlando, Florida, USA - not exactly the real Rapunzel, but a little girl with Rapunzel's long blonde hair in the pix above.

The costume and the wig are just so cute!!!

My favourite song in Rapunzel is the Healing Incantation:


And here are the pix of the 'real' Rapunzel:

She's a pretty one isn't she? And the little girl in pink is wearing the Sleeping Beauty (Princess Aurora)'s costume.

This is one pretty short blogpost as well for Monday blues...

Have a magical week ahead!!!

Ariel, the Princess Mermaid - Disney World, Orlando, Florida, USA

The little mermaid gained her name Ariel in the Disney cartoon of a Princess Mermaid, who is the daughter of Triton, the King of the Sea.

She is a typical case of those who will not settle for your fate given to you at birth, she does not feel she belong to the sea, she long to be walking on the ground like humans do.

Here is the part where she is longing to be walking instead of swimming and getting wet all day long:



The video was taken during the Little Mermaid show at Disney World, Orlando, Florida, USA, the show was named Meet the Little Mermaid or something, and we thought it was similar to the photography session the "Meet the Princesses" but then we discovered it took place in a theatre, so it was a show after all. The red-haired princess is pretty, though, the pix at the top cannot do her justice hence I took videos of her as the video is slightly clearer than pix.

DEAL WITH THE DEVIL SEA WITCH
So she made a deal with the sea witch to help her turn her tail into human feet, but in return, she had to 'give' her voice to Ursula. Oh, did I mention Little Mermaid is infatuated with the Prince she once saved from shipwreck? I say infatuated cos it was only after that the feelings turned into love, :-) At least by my definition.

This is my most fav part (my own video on youtube) - Shameless Plug - do subscribe to me on youtube if you may. Thank you!

The part where Ariel sings for one last time before she turned human, and lost her voice to Ursula, the evil sea witch, as part of the bargain to turn her fish tail to human feet.



As per my previous blog entry on Snow White and Sleeping Beauty here I love to sing "a a ah, a a ah" to Disney Princess cartoons, in lyric-less tunes when I was a little girl (still love those tunes even now!).

The Little Mermaid show at Disney World, Orlando, Florida, was cute! Ariel 'sitting' down most of the time on the coral reefs, then they let the screen do the story telling to summarise the whole cartoon. Makes me feel like I wanna be a little girl again in order to be fully immersed in the magic of Disney!!!

In my previous blog post on Disney Princess dresses for little girls, I left out this pix of Ariel's costume!

http://suesanctuary.blogspot.com/2012/07/disney-princesses-little-girls-dresses.html

Beauty and the Beast - Disney World, Orlando, Florida, USA

The pix above was taken during our second day in Disney World, Orlando, Florida, on March 25, 2012 at EPCOT. I will be blogging all about EPCOT in a single blog post and the Flora Festival that was going on when we were there... soon, I have mentioned it will take me many many blog posts to fully 'capture' our experience in Disney World. :-)

Beauty and the Beast - Belle isn't exactly a princess until she fell in love with the Beast, and broke his curse and he turned back into a Prince and they got married and lived happily ever after. Of course, in every fairy tale, there is an antagonist/villain, in this case, it is Gaston, the ever conceited man who wished to marry Belle just because she is the fairest maiden in that locality and he felt that her beauty matches his handsomeness, whatever it is he called it.

Anyway, I love her gorgeous golden ball gown! Which in the Beauty and the Beast Musical/Show at Disney World, Orlando, at one of the four theme parks, Disney Hollywood Studios (former MGM) - she only wore it for about two minutes in the last scene. The rest of the play, Belle wore her normal garb, grey and sometimes with a black hooded coat when she is in the outdoor scenes.

Here goes.

Out of the three princesses who were 'waiting' for the people in the one-hour-long-line to reach them and snap pix with them, Belle (Beauty) was the only one who got down on the floor to talk to the little ones, the other two in that 10 minutes we were in the 'chamber', preferred to either stand or sit on the stools provided. And she is the most authentic looking among the three princesses! Check out my blogpost on: Do you believe in the green dragon? Under July 2012 blogposts

Don't you love her gorgeous dress, the ruffles and oh, the rich golden yellow colour, I love her dress the most, I don't have a particular fav Disney princess, just fav points about each one of them.

Anyway, enough about the signing autograph Belle - let's see the pix from the show - this will be a long LONG LONG pictorial blog post. I was snapping away every other second during the show at the open air amphitheare (with shade).

40+ pix ahead (snapshots from the Beauty and the Beast show at Disney World, Orlando, Florida)

Before the start of the show - seated behind us, we can clearly hear a little boy kept asking his mommy, is it time yet? Is it time yet? is it time yet? Are they starting soon? Are they starting now? Until finally she said okay, now there are 10 more seconds, and exasperated, she counted down from "10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 there", and at that exact second she said 'there', the screen/curtain were drawn and the announcer spoke.

Talk about exact timing! The mother whoopped in joy and said, THERE! Mommy's watch is timed according to Disney time, down to the exact second! I let out a loud chuckle and hubby turned around and gave the mom a thumbs up and she laughed. lol

And the curtains were drawn again and we walked out from the amphitheatre.

It was worth the arrive-half-hour-earlier wait - we arrived half an hour before the show started and we could only manage to get an aisle seat (no obstruction, yes!!!), but towards the top of the theatre.

If I have a child/children in the future, I will definitely bring them to watch this amazing show!!!