The Days of Restless and Youthful

Zouk, Art Room, Helloween, 2000.

Where have all the cowboys gone? When the blossoming skin of dilapidated heart in grand stature, connected eyes finding reason to escape the rusted cage of the monotone. We are all slayers of the new breath, new apostles and new buildings. The island where it was and when it was, we are now in a cyclone of polyester truth. Missing the sparks of a good conversation with companions and as choice does not seem to beckon the misery and mystery of life, we surrender ourselves to the redevelopment, a constant redevelopment of motion and emotion.

Irregular shape keeping its transformation as steady as the metal pedestal finding its character. We are all creatures of the sanitized.

Bumiputra Cina:

Here is what I am busy with at the moment...




Bumiputra Cina : A Chinese Child of the Soil

Written by Verena Tay
Directed by Noor Effendy Ibrahim
Performed by Verena Tay, Shahril Wahid and Rizman Putra

Venue: The Substation Theatre, 45 Armenian Street
Dates & Time: Thu 14 to Sat 16 May 2009, 8pm
Ticket Price: $15 (adult) & $10 (concessions for NSF and students) from The Substation Box Office
(Open Mon-Fri, 2pm - 8pm; Tel: 63377800)

Bumiputra Cina is a process-based performance collaboration between writer and performer Verena Tay, and interdisciplinary artist Noor Effendy Ibrahim, that explores the conflicted sense of belonging and identity of a contemporary Chinese Singaporean woman coming to terms with the fast-changing landscape that she grew up in. The text and physical theatre performance investigates issues of home, generations, family, growth, marriage, longing, desire, and what it means to be ‘bumiputra’ or ‘prince of the soil’. Bumiputra Cina travels through time-space, looking at the idea of rootedness and connections from the perspectives of the ever-present land, a Chinese coolie, the life and death of war hero Lt Adnan Saidi, vignettes of contemporary life and cyberspace chats. Come journey with us and discover for yourself what it means to be ‘bumiputra’…

Performed in English, Malay and Hokkien. English surtitles provided.

Supported by the National Arts Council, Hong Leong Foundation, The Substation and Teater Ekamatra.