Spring 2015 - Day 42
Blogging, more blogging. But actually, a lot less blogging than yesterday until the evening. Probably because I had three classes.
In photojournalism we learned about lighting and about how to take a panning shot. A panning shot is when the background is all blurred but the subject is in perfect focus.
When it comes to lighting you are supposed to use triangle lighting. Your subject should be backlit and then there should be two lights in front of them at approximately a 45 degree angle. One lights the front and the other eliminates shadows created by the first light.
Our job is to take both a creative lighting shot and a panning shot while we are in Singapore.
I mixed media we started working on a project where we are to make a sketch of an icon we saw while in Vietnam. Then we have to scan our sketch into the computer and print out a bunch of copies of it in different sizes. I don't know what we will be doing with it after that.
In the evening we had cultural and logistical pre-port for Singapore. We will only be in Singapore for two days so it wasn't in-depth as it has been.
Singapore is a city-state. It is a very small area made up of over 60 island and is located at the bottom of the Malay Peninsula.
The name comes from two Malay words. Singa, meaning lion and Pura, meaning city. So the name literally means lion city. It was named this way because a prince thought he saw a lion roaming around. He was wrong, it was a tiger, but the name stuck.
The country is known as a "fine" country. Both because it is perfectly nice there and because they love to hand out fines. You can be fined for chewing gum, for jay-walking, not wearing a seatbelt in a cab, or for littering. Littering is 1000 dollars. Jay-walking will set you back 50. Even more harsh is their drug policy. If caught with drugs or with drugs in your system you will be put to death, usually by firing squad, and usually within about a week. The mandatory death penalty also applies to murder and firearms offenses. They have the highest execution rate in the world relative to their population. They don't mess around.
Besides the brutal legal system, Singapore is a pretty awesome place. They are a huge melting pot. The majority of people are Chinese while foreigners make up 30% of the population and they have a large number of ex-patriots. They have a low birth rate by choice because it is very expensive to raise a child there.
Their official and symbolic language is Malay but their official first language is English. They also incorporate a fair amount of Mandarin. Because of this many people speak Singlish, a word created from Singapore and English. Singlish contains Malay, Madeline, and English combined together.
We will be in Singapore during the first two days of the Chinese New Year, the year of the sheep! New Years Eve was this evening, everybody is probably out celebrating and we are missing it. Tomorrow, when we are there, is a day traditionally spent with family so a lot of stores are expected to be closed and public transportation may be less. This New Years is particularly special because it lands on the same day as the 50th anniversary of Singaporean Independence. Pretty exciting.
Some interesting things we learned about celebrating the new year are that most people clean their houses thoroughly right before the new year because it is auspicious but they don't clean it on new years day because that is bad luck. They primarily use the color red in their decorations because it is an auspicious color. It is also inauspicious to have a bodily part cut on new years day so many do not get haircuts or manicures then. Finally, the new years eve feast is the traditional reunion feast when all family members come together to celebrate.
When it comes to logistical things about our time in Singapore, there will be no postage service. Such a bummer!! I really wanted to send postcards. I have my fingers crossed that there will be postage service on the ship in Burma.
Our passports are going to be distributed in the Union but it will be a leisurely process so we can get them whenever and get off the ship whenever. It also should only take about 30 minutes to clear the ship so we will have full day in the city. We will have to go through face to face immigration every time we get on or off the ship. But this will occur in the terminal.
Thankfully, they fixed the issue with my passport so I shouldn't be flagged anymore.
Our two days in Singapore will be spend visiting the zoo and then out celebrating the new year. Hopefully I come back with some pretty good stories.
Happy New Year everyone!!
