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God is a Woman — Day 4

- Sheylara 21 Comments

Filming in KL — Day 4
Oct 9, 2008

KL (Malaysia) has so many beautiful grungy places. Although quite scary, they serve as exquisite backdrops for films and photoshoots.

I would love to go back to this place to do a fashion photoshoot.

Or maybe not.

It’s a big abandoned building with all kinds of crazy junk heaped around the compound. It’s like a rubbish warehouse.

And the mozzies had a field day when tourists came to visit.

The native mosquitoes rolled out the red carpet to welcome us.

Welcome! they cried, Please make yourselves at home while we drink your blood!

They huge, they’re enthusiastic and they’re hungry.

They’re also ninjas.

I swear.

Big as they are, you don’t feel them land on your skin. You don’t feel them feeding.

You’re minding your own business, looking around casually. And then you chance to glance at your arm, and there’s a teenage mutant ninja mozzie shaking salt and pepper on your hair follicles.

In alarm, you swing your arm violently to shake off the TMNM. But, with all the years of gruelling ninja training under its arthropodal belt, it is prepared for the assault.

It clings onto you with its hooks for feet, all the while laughing maniacally at the folly of homo sapiens. You consider thwapping it flat but you don’t want mozzie guts all over your arm.

So you scream at it.

“My blood is toxic and will kill you dead, you dumb shit!”

Miraculously, the mozzie flies off at that.

And then you realise that that’s only because it’s already had its fill. A pink welt develops instantly on your arm where the TMNM had last roosted.

And it’s itchy.

Beware of teenage mutant ninja mozzies.

We should have heeded the warning.

Luckily, I didn’t die of dengue fever after this encounter.

I wonder how the resident artists survived the TMNM attacks. They must have some kind of permit to stick around unmolested while they complete their artistic masterpieces.

We didn’t stay around for too long. Perhaps 40 minutes or so. I could feel my cells screaming in agony just being in this waste.

You might think that this building is in some remote no man’s land, 3,000 kilometres away from the nearest civillisation.

It’s not.

It’s just minutes away from civillisation. I don’t suppose the residents in neighbouring buildings take a leisurely walk to this dumpster every evening after dinner to dispose of their trash?

After doing our scenes in this building, we strolled over to another compound with even more abandoned buildings.

It was better this time. We didn’t have to enter any of the buildings. We shot everything outdoors.

And that’s the end of my shoot in KL!

We drove up to Penang on the same day. It was a nice journey that took us from daylight to nightfall. I can’t remember how many hours it was.

Along the way, Dean, who was at that time the driver, suddenly turned around and said to me, “You must take a photo of these buildings!!”

“Why?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” he said.

Nuts!

He’s always saying things for no reason. So, Kan took over the wheel and made him be the cameraman.

It kept him occupied for a good while.

Every time we went through a toll booth, he had to hold up the sensor unit for access because someone couldn’t be bothered to stick it to the windscreen.

And then we were in Penang!

My first impression of Penang:

*lol*

I didn’t know Penang is a resort city. It took us more than an hour to find our hotel because Kan was looking for a specific hotel and we were led on a wild goose chase by well-meaning locals. Finally, one savvy local told us that the hotel we wanted had already closed down.

DOH.

We settled for this small resort hotel called The Lone Pine Hotel which is, frankly, a bit creepy because of the name and the way the sign looks.

It brings to mind B-grade horror flicks where unsuspecting backpackers get eaten by giant mutant bugs while being raped by bored psychopaths.

Okay, it’s not that bad.

It’s a cosy resort with friendly service. It also has a nice pool, which is a redundant fact because I don’t swim.

I don’t like wearing swimsuits. =>

Alright, then. That’s all for today. More adventures in Penang next time!

God is a Woman — off the set

- Sheylara 11 Comments

Filming in KL

For the duration of our stay in KL, Maria and I stayed at Hotel Istana (just across the street from Dean’s apartment) while Kan bunked in with Dean.


View of our hotel from Dean’s rooftop.

Some nights, I would crash over at Dean’s apartment (just for a few hours) ostensibly to hang out with the guys, but in actuality to leech Dean’s Internet access.

On this particular night, while I was busy blogging and Kan was busy downloading the day’s work and preparing for the next day, Dean decided to serenade us.

He sang many songs for us but this is my favourite.

Superman (It’s Not Easy)

Kan helped me film this using my Nokia N82. I have a cameo appearance halfway in the video, looking very stressed because I had two blogs to write and about four billion e-mails and messages to reply.

Dean’s ability to sing and play the guitar in this manner is somewhat hilarious because you’d never expect it of him if you were to meet him. He’s always a clown, making people laugh and doing impromptu weird dances to entertain people.

He even clowns around with strangers, who often don’t get it because they don’t expect a perfect stranger to tease them.

It’s funny for us, though.

Too bad he lives in Malaysia. We’ll miss him!

Why all food tastes good in Malaysia

- Sheylara 20 Comments

No more negative talk! Today, I shall talk about Singapore’s favourite topic: FOOD!

Yeah! Doesn’t that make you happy? =)

When I was filming in KL, we didn’t always get to eat at popular food places. Because of our tight filming schedule, we had to eat at nearest available places.

But that’s alright because EVERYTHING TASTES GOOD IN MALAYSIA.

One night, I asked everyone, “How is it that you can walk into any random coffeeshop in Malaysia and order anything and it will taste better than its Singapore counterpart?”

I was talking about normal, everyday local favourites like chicken rice, roti prata, mee goreng, prawn noodles, ban mian, and so on.

Dean, our Malaysian host (cum actor cum camera assistant cum chauffeur cum gofer cum court jester), said, “The ingredients in Malaysia are fresher (since they’re all locally grown) so food tastes better.”

IS THAT TRUE??

I always thought that the quality of food is mainly dependent on the skill of the cook.

Divine mixed vegetables (above)!! I relegated the poor black pepper steak to the background (even though it was good, too) because the vegetables really killed me, being buttery and impossibly fragrant.

All the dishes pictured above are from a food centre two minutes’ walk away from Istana Hotel. We ordered about 10 dishes between us and they were all good.

(I think I’m going to be taxed for using the word “good” so often.)

I’m not saying that Singapore doesn’t have good food. I’m saying that Malaysia does not seem to have substandard food.

Or maybe I just need to visit Malaysia more often to get a more accurate sampling.

I took quite a bit of food photos while in KL, the first one being my squashed Gardenia bun.

I bought it at a petrol station during our drive up to KL and it got forgotten and squashed by my luggage.

Okay, that was a joke photo.

Here’s something I want to recommend. This coffeeshop in KL boasts bland-looking but very delicious dim sum.

Maybe Dean was right about the ingredients. The dim sum just tasted fresh.

Here are some pictorial clues where this place is. Sorry, I don’t know the full address.


The road sign says: Jalan Merak.

I love the free-flow sauces!

Did I mention I’m a sauce addict? Sometimes I eat more sauce than the main food itself.

Mix the garlic chilli with the sweet sauce. Heavenly!!

We also ate at Old Town White Coffee. (There’s an outlet in Singapore, at the newly renovated Big Splash, but I haven’t tried it so I don’t know if the quality is the same.)

I ordered the asam laksa. I had to, even though the other dishes were so tempting, becasue asam laksa is so hard to find in Singapore. And the ones I’ve found aren’t really worth the calories.

The curry noodles and nasi lemak are apparently killer, too.

This makes me want to visit the Singapore outlet!! Soon!!

I have a couple more food things to talk about but they belong to Ipoh and Penang so I shall save them for another day!

For now, please share your views. Does food generally taste better in Malaysia? If yes, why do you think that is?

God is a Woman — Day 3

- Sheylara 15 Comments

Filming in KL — Day 3
Oct 8, 2008

Today was like the climax of our trip, with all the heavy-duty scenes scheduled. Most of them I can’t talk about (or show pictures of) because they’re spoilers.

But I’ll talk about our bitch fight scene.

Maria and I had a fight scene in this dirty alley.

It was quite awesome. We did it so realistically that one Indian auntie actually ran up to us to try to break up our fight in the middle of a take.

Kan was really proud of us afterwards. He said, “That auntie paid you the highest compliment actors can receive.”

Here’s a before-fight photo of me:

Here’s an after-fight photo of me (my hair should be messier but then my hair could never get messed up naturally):

Close-up:

This is a real scratch I acquired during the fight. Not makeup.

But it wasn’t really bad. It has healed since.

The more jialat one is my middle finger.

Two weeks later, now, it still hurts when I touch it or flex my finger.

I heal slow. That’s why my favourite X-Men character is Wolverine. I really envy him. Plus Hugh Jackman is…

One word: Swoon.

I cannot resist men with long floppy hair!

I also collected about 15 or more scars and bruises, as well as lost a substantial bunch of hair, but I’d better not scare you with a montage of gory photos like one of those Chinese medicine roadshow posters.

Here’s just a mild example (photo of my right forearm, taken three days after the fight scene):

Anyway, that was quite fun. The fight scene, that is.

We went back to the rubbish dump later in the day. The rubbish pile had increased considerably after just one day.

For comparison, this was taken on Oct 7:

Oct 8 (from roughly the same angle):

It wasn’t drizzling today, so the smell was stronger than the day before and there were more flies and rats around (yech).

Nevertheless, cast and crew (which consisted of only five people) doggedly pressed on.

At the end of the day, we rewarded ourselves with bananas for dinner.

You know how eateries in Malaysia have plates of bananas sitting around for the taking?

Okay we didn’t really have bananas for dinner. We just ate some while waiting for our real food to arrive.

DEAN ATE FIVE BANANAS. DON’T ASK ME HOW.

He said, “I love bananas.”

He’s such a weird person!

I will do a separate post on food in KL another day!

God is a Woman — Day 2

- Sheylara 10 Comments

For the record, I’m now back in Singapore, so don’t get confused when I talk about my Malaysia filming trip.

Filming in KL — Day 2
Oct 7, 2008

I was able to sleep an extra hour today, waking up at 6 am. The best sleep you could ever have is when you’re so exhausted that nothing short of a banshee wail could wake you.

The first scene of the day was shot in my room. It was a scene between me and Dean.

Dean is quite an awesome fellow, really. Not only is he our male lead actor, he also doubles up as camera assistant, tour guide, chauffeur, gofer and court jester. (I’m serious about the last one.)

He took this photo for me:

Not bad, huh?

Dean is the kind of person you can’t help making funny faces at.

We were travelling in the car at one point when he said to me, “You must talk about me in your blog today.”

“Okay,” I said. “What do you want me to say about you?”

“That I’m super handsome, charming, irresistable, talented, charismastic, funny, intelligent…”

Kan (our director) cut in at this point: “You really want her to say all that?”

“Yes! Why not!” said Dean with a serious face. “We must be very transparent.”

And then Maria hit him on the head with a cushion.

Dean cried out, “OHHHHHHHH NOOOOOOOOOOOO!! You just ruined my feng shui for the day!”

“What?” we said in unison.

Gesticulating wildly, at times with his hands dangerously off the wheel, he cried, “I have already set my hair today for good feng shui and you just ruined it!!! Now I have to go back to the feng shui master again to reset my hair!”

Kan then threatened to kill his character off in the film if he continued being a nutcase, so we managed to arrive at our intended destination without any further incident.

This photo was taken in an actual casting house in KL, where models go to get in line to be slaughtered.

Well, at least, that’s what I feel like each time I go for a casting.

Fortunately, today’s casting session wasn’t real.

Here’s Kan setting up a shot in the props room while I wait outside:

Nash posing with a bicycle:

Actually, he wasn’t posing. That was part of the scene.

After the casting house, we went to a Chinese temple.

It’s such a big temple that there’s even a food court in the basement.

There are also stalls selling I dunno souvenirs or religious artefacts.

There’s even a marriage registration counter.

While Kan set up for the next shot, the rest of us enjoyed the silly antics of Dean and Nash.

I told you he doubled as our court jester.

I tried to blog but it was very hard to, with crazy people beside me doing crazy things.

See what I mean?

After our temple scenes, we went back to Dean’s apartment in the heart of KL, where he has a rooftop garden.

Okay, it’s not exactly a garden. It’s just a rooftop area with a little bit of greenery around the edges. But the view is nice.

I thought it was a nice place to camwhore, so I did that while the rest were shooting stuff that didn’t require me.

Now comes the interesting location.

This place can be found about two minute’s walk from our hotel (Hotel Istana), and maybe just a litte more from KLCC.

It was fortunately drizzling at the time we went there, so there weren’t too many flies and rats and it wasn’t too smelly.

Dean says this dumping ground has been like this like, forever. The level of rubbish goes up and down over time but it never disappears. Apparently, the authorities do come to clear it once in a long while, but for some reason they don’t clear everything at once, so it piles up again.

And yes, there are people living in the buildings surrounding the rubbish pile.

On the first day of our shoot, Kan told me and Maria that we would have to wade into the rubbish pile for one of our scenes.

We believed him.

Since it was drizzling, I took out my umbrella to protect the camera. (I was the only one who remembered to bring an umbrella. Although, actually, it wasn’t so much of remembering as the fact that I always have an umbrella in my bag, anyway.)

Guess who had to hold my cute little pink umbrella? Hehe.

Last stop for the day.

Kan found this hawker who sells, among other things, char kway teow and bak kut teh. He set up his camera at the stall without a word and started filming this uncle cooking.

The uncle didn’t even flinch. Cool.

When he was done (I mean Kan), he thanked the uncle, shook his hand and gave him RM20 as a token of appreciation.

I thought that went pretty well!

Stay tuned for Day 3!