A streetcar named DESIRE

Looking at the title, I don’t know what this story is going to be about. What desire that the writer refers to? It’s just a short play by Tennessee Williams. As I finish my reading, I found out that it was an interesting play and after finish discussing this play in class I get to know the desire is refer to sexual desire. I like this play because it’s quite different from other three plays that we learned before. It’s something that not relate to king and its kingship or whatever that refers to king like the other three plays I have read. This play depicts the conflict between a fading Southern Belle from an old colonial family and the brash lower class family her sister has marry into.

I hate the character of Stanley in this play. I don’t like the way he treated his wife and other women as well. He doesn’t know how to respect woman and always use harsh words when talking. He simply shows how cruel a man can be and believe me man can be worst than animal. It’s scary to think of a man like Stanley who does not know how to treat woman the right way. After all, this is one of my favorite plays that I had learned throughout this semester =).

Whew~

Whew! What a relief….
I have done my simulated teaching on 27th March. Thank GOD because everything was going on just fine. I am the last person doing simulated teaching on that day. I am quite nervous at first but when I started, all the nervousness just flew away.
I decided to teach theme in Oedipus the king. I started the lesson by showing my students pictures of a wealthy man holding lots of cash and the other picture is a man who becomes a beggar. Then I asked them few questions regarding those two pictures. They were all really cooperative and had gave me good responses. After that, I proceed the lesson by going trough all the exercises and discussed the answer with my students.
I am satisfied with the way I deliver my lesson but I think there are still weaknesses here and there that I should prevail over. First, I think I should come out with more interesting exercises. My tutor also commented on my while-reading task because it is a little confusing. I also need to practice on reading aloud and slow down my speed of reading. After all, I think, I had done a great job. I think I can control the class well and my voice is also loud and clear. If I were to deliver the similar lesson again I think I should change a bit on my exercises to make it more interesting and I have to make sure that those exercises are helpful for my students.

Are you a klpac virgin?

I am proudly announced that I am no longer a klpac virgin. Hehe. On 7^th March me n my classmate went to klpac at Sentul to watch a play. I was so excited because it was my first experience watching theatre. I don’t know what to expect from it. As we enter ‘Pentas 2’ I am puzzled because there are only two actors in there, the hero and heroin. Only then I realize, the title of the show that day was ‘2somes: the secret love life of Ophelia’ and that’s why there are only two actors. It was my bad because I didn’t do any research days before. It was a great play for me but it’s quite hard to understand the play as they use classic English. I’m falling in love with the hero because of his voice. He has such a great and manly voice and I can’t help myself admiring it. Throughout the play I have to give my full attention because the setting is so simple with minimal props so we have to imagine and interpret what are the actors doing on the stage. The thing that I like about this play is that, I’m watching a modern Hamlet and Ophelia keeping in touch using all the modern technologies such as e mails and phones. Can you imagine Hamlet using laptop? Hehe.. It’s good for me seeing both of them expressing their love in such ways. Well, the play is worth watching and I also hope that I can go watch another play some other time.

Elizabeth, the golden age.

Great! That’s all I can say about that movie. I was unsatisfied at first because we have to wake up early in the morning just to watch a movie. But after watching this movie, it turns out the movie is so great that I can forgot all the uneasy feelings that I experience early in the morning.

The thing with this movie is its captivating and spectacular costumes and settings, also not forget to mention the actors, Cate Blanchett and the man I admired in the movie that I can’t take my eyes off him, Clive Owen's Walter Raleigh. Cate Blanchett has played a great role as a virgin Queen Elizabeth I. She is a very strong woman who ruled England without a man beside her. I don’t know if I can become as strong as her but she had proved that a woman could be as strong as that. She had inspired all women in the world throughout her character. As for Walter Raleigh, he becomes a man who charmed the Queen out of her heart and wits and dared to tell her not to act like a fool. And that makes me admired his charm.

Frankly speaking, I never like history but this movie is worth watching. It helps me understand history in a very enjoyable way and I also enjoy all the poetic lines in this movie. It’s a great movie and I you guys should watch it!

Tutorials

First day of tutorial, I don’t know what to expect from our tutor. Since I am no so into art and drama kind of person, I thought that I’m going to hate this class but when the class starts, it turns out that the class is fun. Some of my friend even got the opportunity to show off their talents in acting. They were chose to act in front of the class for three plays that we are going to learn on that day, which are ‘The Ring Doesn’t Fit, The Ring and Selfish Mr. Pederson’. Even we don’t have any special props, my friends still can act very well and as the audience, I really enjoy the show of the day.
There is also one play that I like entitled Bingo by Edward Bond. For this play, all of us have to take part as our tutor had divided us into groups of six. It is really unique for me because we have to perform by group and every group has their very own interpretation about the play and had presented it in totally different kind of version. Some interpret that the dialogue is between two writers, and some interpret that the dialogue in between a group of university students and lots more. This is really interesting as I never thought it could be so many version of this story. After the first day of drama tutorials, my perception towards drama tutorials has changed. Now I think I will love drama class. It is not that bad after all =)

I am nervous yet excited =)

I am always nervous when it comes to simulated teaching. I have seen few of my friends doing their teaching and now I have to prepare for my turn next week. Being in the last few groups doing the simulated teaching, it gives a lot of pressure because my friends had set the benchmark. Therefore, I have to give my best in order to compete with them. Furthermore, I have to find the fresh and new ideas that are different from what my friends had done. Looking on the bright side, being in the last group gives me a lot of time to do all the preparations needed. Besides that, I can still add or change my set induction and exercises based on Miss Kasthoori’s comments towards my friend’s teachings. The only thing I can do now is get prepared and pray that everything will go on just fine during my teachings.

Teiresias

Who is Teiresias? Why I bother to know about him? It is because we have to learn ‘Oedipus the king’ this semester, so I must know about him. As my lecturer asks me to find out who he really is, I start to google to find out more about him. Now I know that Teiresias appears in several stories and Greek tragedies. According to Wikipedia.com, he is the prophet of Zeus. I know that he is physically blind because I have read about him in ‘Oedipus the king’ but I never know that there are few version of stories behind his blindness. One of the versions said that he was blinded by the gods because he had revealed their secrets and another version said that he was blinded by Athena after he stumbled onto her bathing naked. What an important character he is, right? Before knowing who Teiresias is, I never thought that he is not just like other characters in Oedipus the king’. I never thought the important of Teiresias in Greek stories. But now, after discover about him, I know he is an important character in Greek’s story also in ‘Oedipus the king’.

Cinema or theatre?

If I were asked to choose between cinema and theatre, of course I will choose cinema without giving a second thought. Why? It is because whenever I think of theatre, the first things that come across my mind is, theatre is meant for old folks and for somebody who is from the upper class society. I know that nowadays, theatre is meant for all but teenagers like me don’t really like theatre maybe because it is a little bit costly compared to cinema.
The thing with cinema that I really like is, you can sit back and relax in front of the wide screen and having popcorns while watching movies. Furthermore, the sound system, the technologies that they have in the movies, always captured my interest. All of these are hard to find in theatre because normally, in theatre the props are limited.
Urm..Talking about cinema and theatre, what are the differences between these two, or they are just the same? The biggest difference that I can see is, in theatre, you can see the actor act live in front of you while in movies it is all pre recorded. Regardless of their differences, both theatre and cinema is to entertain us. I hope one day I can go watch theatre because it can helps me to see the different side of theatre and who knows that I might like it!