(Ajumma- Are you crazy??????????????)-Hawaii International film festival

I was invited to the exclusive fundraiser event for the premiere of the short film Ajumma- Are you crazy??? by Brent Abne. I was really excited as my friend Tiffany was in the movie, she was one of the mean girls in the movie but she is truly a sweetheart:) The fundraiser went well, there was raffles to be won and they showed behind the scenes clips which was hillarious!!!!! This is the first time I have been to an event for the Hawaii film festival and I have to say...it was wayyyy better than expected.....I have to go for more screenings!!!

Before everyone came in, after the red carpet....there was this pretty painting, so we used it as a backdrop for our first pic of the night:)

Kendra and I kinda promised to be elegant and lady like...but once we went in...OMG...we saw the buffet line filled with Korean food!!!!!!so we kinda went crazy taking food and stuff.....sorry!

kendra's plate:)

The introduction of the crew and cast!!!

They even had a stall selling all the Ajumma souvenirs!!!so cool!

With Tiff and the main actor....he was really shy...which was endearing for a lead actor:-)

The autograph session!!Congrats Tiff and the whole Ajumma crew!!!

The three main Ajumma ladies...their roles were to be the crazy K-drama fans!!!!! seriously...this show is a must watch!!!! there is another screening on the 25th...its a comedy and it will definitely crack you up!!

All the credits and the promotion board.... as we were about to leave...but wait!!!

They gave us this cute lil door gifts...so we decided to be crazy fan girls and run back in to get the cast's autograph!! I know we were a lil/very embarrassed when we walked out coz everyone wanting an autograph actually bought stuff from the souvenir table!! but we were so happy with out lil fan poster....hehe

The two main male cast members..lucky them...the cast was mostly female!!

Our lil fan posters with the autographs!!!

Although we were overcome with embarrassment after being the giggly fan girls....we left with our heads held high?????? And of course...we will definitely try to watch the next screening of the movie(we kinda lost out on the preview as it was sold out). But both of us were really happy with all the autographs and small souvenirs we got that reminded us of our crazy days!!!!!!! Here is a link to the movie if you guys wanna check it out and support my friend Tiffany:)

http://www.ajummamovie.com/

They will be screening Talentime by Yasmin Ahmad here for the film festival and will definitely catch that!!! Malaysian pride!!!

HUggggiiezzzzzz.........Meiz

Ketupat day in Hawaii!

I know...what is Ketupat day?????Well...it is a belated celebration organized by the Indonesian society for "Hari Raya" and what the Indonesians call "Hari Lebaran". My friend Erenst was kind enough to invite my friends and I to enjoy this joyous and scrumption occasion with the Indonesian/Malaysian community. The best part was that there was a buffet of Malaysian, Indonesian and American food!!!!!!

Trust me, I was so excited to the days leading up to it annnnnddddd I heard there was Laksa!! *faint* So I invited Kendra, Lisa my friend from Canada( who is half Chinese Malaysian) and Gentaro to experience some southeast asian cuisine...hehe....

The host and part organizer of the event erenst!

They had a fried rice competition...there was even a Malaysian and a Thai entry! all of them taste really good but I looooveeeedddd the Thai mixed one!!!!

The Lakasa I have been craving for, ketupat and rendang!!!slurrrp!

Our picnic...okay..we were forced to seat outside in the hot sun because there was not enough space inside.....proves to you how popular southeast asian dishes can be!!

The view

With Mayco and Kendra...Let me tell you!! Mayco is Argentinian...and he can speak malay fluently!! kudos to you:)

Vanessa and Lisa

They celebrated two children's birthdays too!!!!and this lil boy was sooo excited to eat the cake!!!

So..he smashed his face into the cake after blowing it!!ehehe...sooooo addddoooraaablllee:)

Sorry it is sooo belated...but Happy Hari Raya to alll!!!!!!!

xoxo

Meiz

Soul saviour project

About two weeks ago, I was invited to the movies.....but guess what????? It was basically to support an independent film project called soul saviour which has been ongoing for 5 years now......AAANNNDDD...I was in it too:)eheheh....I was really excited as I will get to see myself on the big screen.....!!The other great thing was that I was styled by Jeanilou(my manager) and one of her staff Chastity, they are the greatest!!! Because everything fit me even the cocktail ring...trust me..it's hard to get me rings or bracelets because  I can never fit in them!

That night.... the theatre was sold out for the soul saviour film festival and the screening was for two hours on 9 short films. I really liked all the short films especially the one directed by Jeff Katz(creator of the soul saviour project) because it was about domestic violence, a cause which I am passionate about and it was based on a true story.

As for my scene, the funniest thing happened, I think my part with my co-star and good friend Naomi was for 3 minutes.....but I thought it would come out later towards the end....so....I stepped out for abit to get drinks and stuff.....and.........I basically missed myself!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Knock on my head!!!!These kinds of situations always happens to me sadly:(

Anyways, here are some pics.....still raw to the whole photography thing so I didn't get to take the important pictures such as of the front of the theatre and speeches and stuff!!! Sorry guys....You will just have to make do with these pics.

Naomi and I in our outfits:)

With Jeff the creator of the project! Congratulations!

Jeanilou and Kyle!! sweethearts!!!

It was a fun fun night anyhow.....and the project was supported by the Domestic Violence Action center. Sales of tickets managed to raise a good amount of money for them. Thank you to all that supported the project and donated:)

xoxo

Meiz

Fame! Be inspired!

After 5 days of feeling sick with the flu, I manage to drag myself out of the house to watch the movie Fame! This was just the right get well movie as it was soooo inspiring and as I love the performing arts; it was everything I had hoped for and better! It was musical, lyrical and just fantastic. I did not know what to expect because I have watched the musical on stage and it was good but the movie, with a new and rising young cast, took the production of Fame to another level!

You know.... that movie got my creative juices thinking.... although I am in academia, I still love dancing and singing, my favorite past times ever!!!! I believe that it is something I am passionate about ever since I was young, training professionally to sing, dance all sorts of styles but never pursued it as a career because of what society tells me to do: "studies come first, dancing, singing, acting are just a past time(something you do for fun but not take seriously) and cannot bring you anywhere"???!!???

As I have come to realize and have actually been thinking more and more about it, as long as someone out there believes in you and gives you that lucky break, you can succeed in that ruthless industry called 'entertainment". I was talking to my friend yesterday after the movie, and she said she feels that she is pretty good at everything be it in academics or being creative but she is not great/talented at something, therefore not passionate about something.

That shouldn't be the case, even if we were not born to sing or to play the piano, dance ballet, etc., we should still feel passionate about something because we love doing it and it makes us happy! The question ultimately is" what makes you happy?" Is it playing the drums, writing, sitting by the beach and meditating???? Well..... I have so many thoughts on this and just by watching Fame, I have come to realize, do not just do what society wants you to do, do something that you love, feel strongly about and embrace it with passion! I know this may sound naive, but while you are still young or even older, sometimes a career change doing something you feel happy doing might just bring you success or happiness in many ways. And if you fail, at least you can say " At least I tried" rather than hankering for the "if only" or "I should have".

"Nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion.” (Hebbel)

xoxo
Meiz

Gartley Hall shut down!

Hey Hey,

I have not blogged for days because I was basically busy packing and moving boxes(heavy ones filled with data, files, folders even a PC!!!) from Gartley Hall to my apartment.....Gartley Hall is where I work in the undergraduate advising office in the basement and also my lab is located there. I mean I knew that the basement was nasty as the air quality down there is always damp which always irritates my nose and it is basically stuffy but I never knew that it was thhaaattt bad...the faculty and the psychology department has been trying to get it renovated for years now but the legislature, University had no money and always put us on the back burner!!!!

Can you imagine how frustrating it was to get an email from the graduate chair to evacuate Gartley hall immediately, we were given one to two days to move everything out and the worst part was we did not have places to move it too....so all these stuff was moved into our apartments or cars or whoever had another office, they moved it there. And....let me tell you the best part..I fell sick on the day that we had to move out....can you imagine..down with the sudden onset of the flu???!!??? I felt bad communicating with all the faculty members and student as I had watery eyes and was sniffling..but I can't help it..I was sorta in charge of the adviusing office, so I had to move the stuff!!

It was such big news that it came up in newspapers and even the daily news on tv here. Here is a picture of Gartley Hall from the Honolulu advertiser:

Gartley Hall in all its glory...its 88 years old!

And...they ask me to take a picture of me looking at the structure..I was running around and the photographer asked me to help out..I am glad I did as I finally got to see how bad our building was:(

Here is a link to the newspaper article:

http://www.starbulletin.com/news/20090930_Structurally_unsound.html

Although I grumble about moving and everything, I guess its better to be safe than never, it was so unstable that they had to put these support beams for it to hold and we were still in the building..thank goodness someone found something!!!!Have a good weekend guys..well I will be nursing a flu.....aarrghh!

Xoxo

Meiz