Day 7

Another long day for a Sunday. Started the day in Chengsan, followed by guest performing with PCO in Boon Lay in the afternoon, and later flying over to Mountbatten for rehearsals with DingYi Youth in the evening. Didn’t even feel tired until I was on the train home, it all just came crashing down.

One thing I wanted to highlight is how during the performance in the afternoon with PCO, while we were playing the set of Singapore Patriotic songs, the audience were all in smiles, children were dancing and singing along while the adults had this sense of nostalgia and pride on their face.

This moment really made me pause and wondered how there’s this strong sense of nationalism in Singaporeans. Sure I here them complain about the country and government all the time, but really, as a Malaysian, and growing up back home, I rarely see people swaying and being moved by our country’s patriotic anthems. Sure there were a few good ones like “KeranaMu Malaysia” (For You Malaysia) and “Jalur Gemilang” (Flag anthem) and the kid in me to always sing along with my best friends back in primary school and secondary school. The songs really had great meaning and not to mention a great tune to sing along to, not to mention march to. It was filled with hope and a great sense of wanting the country to move even forward.

Maybe that’s it, maybe that’s how it felt for the Singaporeans to be listening to the anthems we were playing for the afternoon. Maybe it just so happen that Singapore’s use of NDP songs really touched people’s heart, or either that the songs are really damn nice la!