Cleaning my Bookshelves & Discovering Wonders

Time flies so fast. Its the last month of 2016 and next month, we'll be heralding Chinese New Year in end of January and 2017 in a few weeks time. 

Since I'm so free at home, today I decided to clean my bookshelves and organize it according to genres preferably. Wow just cleaning and tidying up 2 rows of bookshelves took me a few hours. Well, this is because I also took some time to browse through some of the books and deciding whether to recycle or give to others. 

Frankly speaking, cleaning my bedroom and bookshelves can be very therapeutic. In the process of clearing my bookshelves, I found many 'treasures' like beautiful bookmarks, magazines that I forgot about it. I'm thankful I have so many wonderful books and things. Its like counting my blessing. 

So hey if you are free, do take time to clean and organize your room or bookshelves. Sometimes you might find that you have so many things after shelving them in a corner for so long. Hmm, I think I also better stop buying new books and make sure I finish reading the books I brought first. 

 Wow, really delighted to find Fortune magazine with Warren Buffett on cover. I'm going to reread later.

 Organising my exercise A4 books. I have so many that I really should stop buying new.

 Mr Lee Kuan Yew is my idol so I brought a lot of his books. I already finished reading One Man's View of the World. Going to start My Lifelong Challenge.

 I have so many stationery that I should really stop buying more.

明天32新摇 XinYao Concert 2014

So glad I went to the 明天32 新摇 XinYao concert at Star Vista today. XinYao 新摇 means Singapore Chinese Folk songs composed,wrote and sang by Singaporeans. Xinyao was inspired by Taiwanese college students who penned and composed Chinese folk songs in the 70s. 

I enjoyed the four hours concert thoroughly and I got to know good songs I never heard before. By the way, this is my first Xinyao concert. I love the beautiful and heartwarming Chinese lyrics with melodious music that resonate with me. The songs are so inspiring and heartwarming. 

National Junior College organised the first song-writing competition in 1981 thus sparking off 新摇 XinYao. The most well-known XinYao composer and singer is Liang Wen Foo who penned and composed many popular songs sang by himself, Singaporeans, Taiwanese and Hong Kongers. Liang Wen Foo is acknowledged by many as the principal of XinYao.

Sadly I did not get to see him in the afternoon concert. I heard that that he would attend the evening concert as he had to conduct lesson in the afternoon. Well at least I got to attend the afternoon concert as the evening concert at 7.30pm with 5000 seats was sold out. Due to popular demand, the organizer added the afternoon 2pm concert. 

Though I was born in 1981, I got to know Xinyao songs from local Chinese dramas theme songs like 青春一二三 and national day parade songs like 年轻的心 young heart。I also like the song 细水长流 by Liang Wen Foo. I'm only aware of Xinyao concert after watching the Reunion concert also organised by 弹唱人( Tang Chan Ren ), who promoted the 明天32新摇. This year Chinese newspapers like XinMin evening also promote the concert.

From this concert, I realised that there are many talented Singaporeans composers, lyricist, and singers. We should support Singapore music. Perhaps there should be a documentary and a CD compilation of great Xinyao musics like 细水长流,   我們這一班 (Our Class), 年轻的心 (Young Heart),关怀方式,你的倒影,一步一步來 and 排排坐,. Package the above songs into a beautiful album and I will definitely buy. Maybe for next year Singapore 50th birthday, release the Xinyao album with the above and other awesome Xinyao songs. How about reviving song-writing competition for secondary or junior college students in Singapore? It's also a great way to promote Speak Mandarin campaign and the beauty of Chinese language. Really love the poetic lyrics penned by fellow Singaporeans. 

My favorite segments of the concert:
1) Current students from primary to secondary school performed Xinyao songs.
2) Huang XiuLing, channel 8 newscaster sang with her elder sister.
3) Jimmy Ye finally performed after more than a decade hiatus. 
4) Humorous LiFeiHui. 
5) Eric Moo and all the singers sang 年轻的心 (Young Heart).

Hopefully next year there be at least two concerts with all the Xinyao singers performing since next year is also Singapore's 50th birthday. 

Finale at 32 新摇 XinYao 2014 concert

This concert is organised by Tang Chan Ren 弹唱人

青春123

年轻的心 Young heart

  我們這一班 by 顏黎明 Yan Li Min Our Class is a song about a mischievous class

梁文福- 细水长流

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