Wednesday, November 10, 2010
For just over 2 incredible weeks in June, I went on tour with the Voices of Baha choir :) They're a choir made up of people from all over the world who get together basically to sing songs about peace, love and harmony. There are a million and one emotions that I could place on my trip to India this summer. The most memorable one being Happiness :)
It's a funny kind of thing leaving the country for the first time and being away from your family for a long period of time (yes, 2 weeks is long for me). It doesn't really hit you 'til it hits you, you know? I wasn't traveling alone, I had this wonderful lady named Ibu Yeoni (pronounced "Yuni") with me :)
Even though it was so great having her around, it's still different being away from your family :/
All of this just happened to hit me outside the terminal at the KL International Airport. My mum, my dad and my sister were there to see me and Ibu off and literally *just* as I was about to hand the attendants my ticket and boarding pass my brain goes like "Oh crap". So to force myself on, I kind of had to remember how much it cost to send me there, how much I actually wanted to go and how much I was looking forward to India. Ibu constantly chatting to me helped too :)
We were pretty early for our flight so there was a lot of sitting around waiting. At least the view was nice. We could see the planes coming in to stop at the terminal. It was kind of a relief to sit there and see the planes and be like "Okay, there's no turning back now so you just have to do it!"
The flight there was TERRIBLE. I seriously wish I'd brought some sleeping pills or something. I hadn't wanted to sleep because I wanted to be awake for my first long flight (5 hours) but I kind of regret it now :/ I think most of the plane (or at least my section of it) was full of this really huge family all flying back to India. Or at least that's what it seemed like to me :/ Cause everyone was talking to everyone in Hindi, walking up and down the aisles and changing seats. It was so confusing! And this lady sat next to me and she didn't speak English so she didn't understand when I asked her if she was flying with her family :/ This flight was also my first exposure to Ibu's chatterbox syndrome XD She would talk to anybody and everybody who would listen to her :) So the flight was really, really turbulent (we wound up being told to buckle our seat belts every few minutes) and really really noisy but the view of India coming in to the landing was *so* worth it.
Can you say Slumdog Millionaire? :D
Mumbai International Airport was a funny experience. There are slums riiiiiiiight next to the runways! Some of them were even ON the runways! Do I really need to comment on that? I was petrified for those people 0.0
When you land at the International Arrivals terminal, you have to walk and walk and walk and walk for aaaaaaaages (seriously - 10-15 minutes!) before you get to the baggage claim. Then there's the mulling through immigration, then it's another long walk before you get to the entrance. The great thing about the travel company they hired for the tour was that they really looked after us from the moment we land - right outside the entrance, they had people waiting with signs to take us to the hotel. The trip to the hotel alone was wonderful! You have to travel right across Mumbai to get to the hotel from the airport. The area around the airport was buzzing with taxis & autos going all over the place - all of them with "Horn Okay Please!" printed across their bumpers. It really had me laughing but our tour guide didn't get it XD We passed through the slums, the high-rise buildings, the old apartments made new and the mosque in the Bay of Mumbai.
The hotel we stayed at was the The Trident, Nariman Point, Mumbai. If you're wondering why "Nariman Point" sounds so familiar, it's because the Trident was one of the hotels involved in the Mumbai bombings - all of which took place around Nariman Point. The Trident wasn't hit that badly, but the hotel connected to it (the Oberoi) was hit terribly. In fact, most of the Oberoi had to be rebuilt. It's a beautiful hotel, but we weren't allowed to take pictures in it for security reasons. But imagine an all black & white marble lounge, with marble walls going up to the ceiling 3 floors above. All decorated with black & cream furniture - black armchairs & tables and right in the middle of the lounge, a bright red grand piano! It was the most beautiful combination of things I've ever seen in a room. And they have this amazing light feature, it's made up of fresh orchids forming a sphere to create a HUGE flower chandelier with the black marble staircase curling around it, it was just beautiful. That's not to say the Trident itself wasn't beautiful, though :)
The first day was spent kind of milling around my room, waiting for my room mate to arrive. I was meant to be sharing with Joanne LeBlanc, a lady from Canada. So I waited up until I couldn't wait anymore then decided to just go to sleep, hoping I'd wake up if she came in. I got to know my TV really well in the mean time lol
The next morning I woke up at 4am (3 hour time difference :/) to... no roommate. Which was confusing, cause she was supposed to have arrived the day before :/ I decided not to worry about it and go down for breakfast. I went to Ibu's room and got to know her roommate - Liz Hahn from Hawaii :)
We all had breakfast together, since we're all early risers (Ibu and I out of habit - time diff) then we headed to the lobby to register :)
It was a great way of getting everyone to kind of take a good look at all the people in the group. It was mostly made up of people over 40 but there were a few kids like me :) Ibu seemed to know everybody and anybody. I kind of took it on myself to photograph the occasion and test my camera :P
After registration, we all got together to walk to the practice area - the Mumbai National Center for Performing Arts. We went in through the back entrance so it seemed like a pretty small building. We were shown into an auditorium that was somewhat like Pentas 3 in KLPAC if anyone's been there. It was all done in black with those plastic chairs with metal legs. We all took seats and they began with prayers :) It's kind of nice how everything (practices, performances) started off with prayers. It calmed us down and got us centered before we began singing. Then we were divided into our parts and I happened to be sitting next to one of the amazing friends I met on this trip: Sahba Kashani :D
We got to work right away with practicing our parts. The speed at which we did things was crazy! Song after song after song came and I had to try my best to keep up :/ I think we did like 6-9 songs a day and 9 hours of singing per day so that's like 1 song per 1.5 hours or so :S It was intense, but gratifying - I really felt like I was kicking my vocal chords into shape XD
I remember going to bed pretty satisfied. Exhausted, but happy and satisfied :)
It's a funny kind of thing leaving the country for the first time and being away from your family for a long period of time (yes, 2 weeks is long for me). It doesn't really hit you 'til it hits you, you know? I wasn't traveling alone, I had this wonderful lady named Ibu Yeoni (pronounced "Yuni") with me :)
Even though it was so great having her around, it's still different being away from your family :/
All of this just happened to hit me outside the terminal at the KL International Airport. My mum, my dad and my sister were there to see me and Ibu off and literally *just* as I was about to hand the attendants my ticket and boarding pass my brain goes like "Oh crap". So to force myself on, I kind of had to remember how much it cost to send me there, how much I actually wanted to go and how much I was looking forward to India. Ibu constantly chatting to me helped too :)
We were pretty early for our flight so there was a lot of sitting around waiting. At least the view was nice. We could see the planes coming in to stop at the terminal. It was kind of a relief to sit there and see the planes and be like "Okay, there's no turning back now so you just have to do it!"
The flight there was TERRIBLE. I seriously wish I'd brought some sleeping pills or something. I hadn't wanted to sleep because I wanted to be awake for my first long flight (5 hours) but I kind of regret it now :/ I think most of the plane (or at least my section of it) was full of this really huge family all flying back to India. Or at least that's what it seemed like to me :/ Cause everyone was talking to everyone in Hindi, walking up and down the aisles and changing seats. It was so confusing! And this lady sat next to me and she didn't speak English so she didn't understand when I asked her if she was flying with her family :/ This flight was also my first exposure to Ibu's chatterbox syndrome XD She would talk to anybody and everybody who would listen to her :) So the flight was really, really turbulent (we wound up being told to buckle our seat belts every few minutes) and really really noisy but the view of India coming in to the landing was *so* worth it.
Can you say Slumdog Millionaire? :D
Mumbai International Airport was a funny experience. There are slums riiiiiiiight next to the runways! Some of them were even ON the runways! Do I really need to comment on that? I was petrified for those people 0.0
When you land at the International Arrivals terminal, you have to walk and walk and walk and walk for aaaaaaaages (seriously - 10-15 minutes!) before you get to the baggage claim. Then there's the mulling through immigration, then it's another long walk before you get to the entrance. The great thing about the travel company they hired for the tour was that they really looked after us from the moment we land - right outside the entrance, they had people waiting with signs to take us to the hotel. The trip to the hotel alone was wonderful! You have to travel right across Mumbai to get to the hotel from the airport. The area around the airport was buzzing with taxis & autos going all over the place - all of them with "Horn Okay Please!" printed across their bumpers. It really had me laughing but our tour guide didn't get it XD We passed through the slums, the high-rise buildings, the old apartments made new and the mosque in the Bay of Mumbai.
The hotel we stayed at was the The Trident, Nariman Point, Mumbai. If you're wondering why "Nariman Point" sounds so familiar, it's because the Trident was one of the hotels involved in the Mumbai bombings - all of which took place around Nariman Point. The Trident wasn't hit that badly, but the hotel connected to it (the Oberoi) was hit terribly. In fact, most of the Oberoi had to be rebuilt. It's a beautiful hotel, but we weren't allowed to take pictures in it for security reasons. But imagine an all black & white marble lounge, with marble walls going up to the ceiling 3 floors above. All decorated with black & cream furniture - black armchairs & tables and right in the middle of the lounge, a bright red grand piano! It was the most beautiful combination of things I've ever seen in a room. And they have this amazing light feature, it's made up of fresh orchids forming a sphere to create a HUGE flower chandelier with the black marble staircase curling around it, it was just beautiful. That's not to say the Trident itself wasn't beautiful, though :)
The first day was spent kind of milling around my room, waiting for my room mate to arrive. I was meant to be sharing with Joanne LeBlanc, a lady from Canada. So I waited up until I couldn't wait anymore then decided to just go to sleep, hoping I'd wake up if she came in. I got to know my TV really well in the mean time lol
The next morning I woke up at 4am (3 hour time difference :/) to... no roommate. Which was confusing, cause she was supposed to have arrived the day before :/ I decided not to worry about it and go down for breakfast. I went to Ibu's room and got to know her roommate - Liz Hahn from Hawaii :)
We all had breakfast together, since we're all early risers (Ibu and I out of habit - time diff) then we headed to the lobby to register :)
It was a great way of getting everyone to kind of take a good look at all the people in the group. It was mostly made up of people over 40 but there were a few kids like me :) Ibu seemed to know everybody and anybody. I kind of took it on myself to photograph the occasion and test my camera :P
After registration, we all got together to walk to the practice area - the Mumbai National Center for Performing Arts. We went in through the back entrance so it seemed like a pretty small building. We were shown into an auditorium that was somewhat like Pentas 3 in KLPAC if anyone's been there. It was all done in black with those plastic chairs with metal legs. We all took seats and they began with prayers :) It's kind of nice how everything (practices, performances) started off with prayers. It calmed us down and got us centered before we began singing. Then we were divided into our parts and I happened to be sitting next to one of the amazing friends I met on this trip: Sahba Kashani :D
We got to work right away with practicing our parts. The speed at which we did things was crazy! Song after song after song came and I had to try my best to keep up :/ I think we did like 6-9 songs a day and 9 hours of singing per day so that's like 1 song per 1.5 hours or so :S It was intense, but gratifying - I really felt like I was kicking my vocal chords into shape XD
I remember going to bed pretty satisfied. Exhausted, but happy and satisfied :)
ally.j.belle 8:09 AM.
