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An article in this week’s NOW! journal attracted my attention because it was about the dispute between different music types in Myanmar. The author has mentioned that her friends criticized her for liking more than one genre. I won’t recount what she has written and you can read for yourself at the end of this post. I tried to translate the article’s title in English so I know it’s a little awkward.
I like a lot of music genre, but I hardly listen to rock and punk music. When my siblings played Lay Phyu, Myo Gyi, Big Bag, etc, I just tuned myself out by listening to my mp3 player or going somewhere where the noise is lesser. Just because of the fact that I dislike those music doesn’t mean that I tell them to shut the music off like my father do when he’s annoyed with hip-hop. Sometimes though, there are songs by those bands that stuck with me, like that song ‘Cancer’ by Big Bag which used to kept playing in my mind all the times. Beside, it’s always better to release your stress with loud rock music when you are in a foul mood (like playing Antibiotic). I tried that with hip-hop and it didn’t work ‘cuz it made me more angry.
I have become unwilling to spend moneys on Myanmar albums, vcds, and dvds since I don’t know if they are worth buying anymore. I still haven’t buy Sai Sai’s dvd ‘cuz I didn’t want to spend 3000 kyats on it although I’ll be willing to spend the same amount on other kind of dvds with movies and dramas. They say the music industry is suffering from piracy so I try not to support pirated versions, but that doesn’t mean that I’m willing to buy the originals. Also, all those originals that we’ve bought over the past years are just standing on the shelves with dust since none of us have the time to listen nor watch them. If I had bought that Sai Sai’s dvd, I would probably only watch it for like 10 times and then there it will go on that shelf along with other dusty dvds and vcds. Even then, I’m planning to buy it at the end of the month.
Anyway, back to the topic, I agree with the author that if we really love music, we should have a broader view towards other music types. by giving respects those those who have created the music. Please do notice that I have used the verb ‘create’.
If you have no idea what I’ve just written above, just click on the images below and read.
In Asian pop culture, Korean pop is called Kpop, Japanese pop is called Jpop, and Chinese pop is called Cpop. So, one singer suggested that he wanted to create MPop in Myanmar.
When I first read that interview, the first thing that came to my mind was “Are we going to have to compete with Malaysia for that title?” because you know the domain url ‘.com.mm’ was the second choice ‘cuz ‘.com.my’ was taken by Malaysia. And how about Mongolia? Will the word ‘MPop’ really represent Myanmar or should it be ‘MMPop’?
Well, forget about the whole world, and forget even about Asia, this whole ‘MPop’ thing won’t work well here unless it means copying off music and choreography from other Kpop, Jpop, and Cpop artists. Well, excuse me for being a pessimistic person, but my support for the music industry has been severely damaged over the past years. If a song becomes a hit in the country, it’s probably due to the creative works of the original music composer from the western and Asian countries. If I bought or downloaded a new album, you know what I do first? I listen to all the songs and try to recognize the originals. Most of the times, I just try to see how many Korean songs have been copied. Sometimes though in cases like Chan Chan’s “Yone Kyi Taw A Chit’, which is copied from Ayaka’s “I Believe”, if it sounds so good, you can forgive them for singing copy songs. We really need more people singing ballads in here. I love those sad Korean ballads by Lee Soo Young, Baek Ji Young, HowL, etc. And also, we need mid tempo music like SG Wannabe, V.O.S, SeeYa, etc here also. I just hope I can hear those kind of music without anyone copying them from Asian pop music.
Another thing I’m quite unsatisfied about is that a singer on my top celebrities hate list was chosen to represent our country. I can’t understand how such a person who copied songs by Celine Dion, Shakira, Evanescence and even Enrique got chosen while there are other talented singers to choose from.
By the way, do you know that we have our own Wonder Boys in our country? If you haven’t, you have to check out this boyband whose name starts with ‘A’. I won’t mention why I named them Wonder Boys ‘cuz I’m too embarrassed to write about it in English, but that video was pretty wacky and hilarious. If you dislike ‘A’, you might want to skip ‘E E’ and ‘S S’. Although I haven’t listen to ‘S S’ before, I watched her in a documentary on MRTV and saw her singing and dancing to ‘Nobody’. At least she was singing in Korean instead of singing it in Myanmar, but I am afraid to listen to her album. As for ‘E E’, I bought his first vcd just out of curiosity and it was really intolerable.
As for me, I’m pretty content with Kpop. There are so many songs to listen to, ranging from normal kpop, hip-hop, r&b, rock ballad, electronic, indies, etc. At the moment, I am pretty interested in ‘You’re Beautiful’ OST, A.N. Jell, F.T Island, and C.N Blue. When you hear songs like those in ‘You’re Beautiful’ drama, you forget all about Myanmar music. (Which is why I still haven’t write that review for City FM’s 7th Anniversary VCD although I’ve been meaning to.)
It’s been nearly three months since I saw my friends and classmates from UFL. So I had been looking forward to the gathering which was held yesterday, on Kayin New Year Day. I’ve also created a group in Facebook for our class to stay in touch with each other.
I am not a early bird and I always sleep late in the mornings. So as usual, I was late when I left home. I decided to take a taxi when I couldn’t get on the bus and I was afraid that I would arrive late. When will I ever learn? As expected in most meetings I’ve attended, I was the first to arrive. Some of my classmates arrived around the appointed time, but aside from Ma SZO & SWM, none of my friends showed up. I know that KYW couldn’t come and she had called me, but I assumed that other friends would have come. I even burned a DVD for a friend since she likes Jonas Brothers and there was a performance that she might like. Also, I wanted to talk to another friend to borrow an English Speaking book from her.
All together, 12 people came to the meeting. Initially, I was hoping that we would go somewhere else like maybe Kandawgyi Park and chat with each other. We did get to chat, but it was mostly about school and the upcoming dinner that we are planning. We also talked about convocation. I wasn’t planning to attend it, but now I have to in order to get my diploma. I need it to apply for master degree and I don’t want to wait another year to receive it. Yeah, it sucks. I made the mistake for applying for not attending when I applied to get my diploma for ELTM. The clerk only told me about the waiting list after I had applied for it. Darn it, now I have to wait until the end of 2011 to get my diploma.
Lately, I’m into watching drama movies and mostly I rent them from American Center since it’s difficult to find them on the street stalls unless I buy the DVD-9 versions. But I only want to watch them once and so, AC suits my purpose. I have a 3000 kyats card that allows me 12 slots, in which I can rent 2 dvds per week. This week, I’ve decided to come out of watching American series to find time for myself and so, I rented drama movies instead.
I’ve heard of The Queen for a long time, but I never got the chance to watch it until now. It’s quite interesting because it tells the story of her and the prime minister during the week of Princess Diana’s death. To tell the truth, I don’t remember much about that event. I only remember watching the funeral on TV. I didn’t really know much about her and I only felt sorry for Prince Williams because he was cute. Well, I was only 13 at that time. It was only a few years later that I read about the event in some magazines, but even then, I only regarded those translated articles as a person attempting to make money in retelling events that had happened in the past. One of the reason why I didn’t have any concern for Britain was due to the fact that my knowledge about the country was taken from the Myanmar history textbooks. I only knew what I had been taught and I didn’t bother to know more.
Oh well, at least I’m now learning more from Microsoft Encarta, a software I use quite often to expand my knowledge. You might suggest that I should just surf the net, but I don’t use the internet all the time so Encarta suits my purpose most of the times.
Last Saturday, I went to the Naypyitaw Cinema with my sister to see “2012″. We barely made it on time since ‘someone’ was late as usual. So instead of getting 1200 kyats tickets, we had to buy 1400 kyats tickets. It’s actually not bad, and we got to sit in the B row near the couple seats in the back rows. I don’t know about the lower deck, but most of the seats in the upper deck were nearly full.
The movie was great, but I was too angry to enjoy it fully. I’ll tell you why. First of all, the guy next to me kept sipping his cola or something. I kept glancing at him to check whether he was chewing betel nuts (I absolutely can’t stand the smell of betel nuts), but thankfully he’s not although I can smell it in the air. Or maybe it was the smell of sunflower seeds. It’s just the morning show so it shouldn’t have smelt that bad. (Why can’t they use air fresheners like Thanmada Cinema did during the opening night of the Korean Film Festival last year?) The kid in front of me kept making noises like dropping things on the floor. A few aisles away, I can hear a kid talking and a baby crying occasionally. When the actions scenes are not showing, people started talking to each other. They don’t even bother to whisper at all. It especially annoyed me when the actors in the film are whispering ‘cuz I couldn’t hear them at all.
It isn’t the first time that I have been in these kind of situations so they didn’t bother as much the couple sitting on the front row corner. The girl really pissed me off because she started playing her mp4 player while in the middle of the movie. Instead of using a headphone, she increased the volume from the built-in speaker and kept showing the videos to her boyfriend while commenting about it. While I was silently cursing them, they left suddenly so I was really relieved, but to my dismay, they came back, with the girl still playing that damn mp4 player all the way she walked to her seat. She didn’t stop playing it until the movie was nearly ending. My sister and I couldn’t contain our anger and I was amazed that people sitting next to them didn’t say anything to them. There was no one around to report to them and I swear if they were sitting straight in front of me, I would have say something to them or at least kick their seats, pretending to look it like accidents. Even at home, I prefer to watch movies when no one is around, to escape constant interruptions and having to explain the plot to my mother. Sometimes, I would even pause the movie while my family is talking so that they will take a hint, but instead they get pissed at me for insulting them. Since I’m such a picky person, I hate going to the cinemas although I like to watch the latest films in the theaters.
When we came out of the cinema, I was so shocked to see so many people waiting outside. I have never seen the theater this crowded before. I’ve seen pictures of crowds waiting in line to watch popular Myanmar movies, but not a foreign movie. But then again, it’s a catastrophe movie so everyone is interested. The last time I was at the cinema, I watched “Public Enemies” and it was really peaceful. The seats were mostly empty and people didn’t talk that much.
Later, while sitting on the bus, I tried to remember the movie but all I could think about was that mp4 girl. I didn’t get to hear the dialogues clearly due to that stupid mp4 player, kid’s chattering, baby’s wailing, and whisperings or should I say chit-chatting. And then, there are those who couldn’t keep their mouth shut while they are watching, like “OMG, he’s going to die.”, “What will they do?”, etc. I guess I’ll have to wait for the DVD release to watch it again.
We especially chose to watch at 10:00 am in the morning to avoid the crowd, but I guess it’s difficult to avoid them when the film is so popular. Next time, I’m thinking of going to the movies on the weekdays, but it would be late when we get home if we watch at 6:30 pm and I don’t want to go alone at other times.
FYI, mp4 player is like an ipod, but much cheaper. You can listen to music, watch videos, take pictures, view photos, etc. It has built in speakers. I even have one, but I have never played it with speakers in public. JXD is the most popular brand in here which is imported from China.
Now back to the movie, I’ve been thinking. If the world is really going to end in 2012, which is better: drowning in water or falling into the volcano? I much prefer drowning although dying is quicker in the volcano. One thing for sure, I don’t want to live in California.
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