Mr. Sanguine's Home

Some very long overdue snaps from a pre New Year's Eve costume party. Cowboys & Aliens was the theme and I was glad most who came made the effort to be in costume.


Interesting use of a baby bib from Ikea.



One of the few DIY costumes of the night, a crazed cardboard robot with a carrot stick for a nose/mouth.



Ling, protector of the Blue Planet.



Isn't that the prettiest gaylien you've seen today?



Another baby bib alien on the prowl.



Mars, the Red Planet and Toxic Avenger sidekick.



Our Tequila mama.



Chinese dudes do not look good in cowboy hats.



That's a lobster suit in case you're wondering.



Didn't know the Silver Convention was back in town.



Tequila mama, hard at work dispensing her awful concoction.



Almost lost her hair there.



Call me... yeah right.



Wouldn't want to wake up next to this one in the morning.



Cross species erotica in full swing.

Labels: Events, Friends

The kids at Eton House were putting on a Christmas musical. Here's a behind the scenes look during the full rehersal a couple of days before the big production opened.



Applying makeup to more than 120 young talents was no easy task for the teachers, and not a quiet one either.



Getting ready for her teenage years.



Looking quite a few years beyond his five after missing a shave.



Not missing a day of preschool while waiting for the rehersal to begin.



This little one couldn't help showing off her new pink costume whenever the camera was trained on her.



Looking like a nomadic tribe, the young shepherds prepare to take to the stage.



A sudden case of backstage jitters.



View from stage left.



The lively choir doing its thing.



An attentive audience during the second act.



All in all, an impressive production considering the young ages of the kids involved. A professional stage lighting and sound crew added to the polished touch and not one line was forgotten by any of the talents.

Labels: Events, Kids

If you ever look at my iPod play chart at the bottom of the sidebar, you'd quite often find U2 amongst the playlist. I've been a fan for as long as I can remember and when the opportunity to catch them on their Vertigo tour Down Under came up, I jumped on it immediately. Made a short holiday out of it, Adelaide isn't a place one can spend too much time in. The crowd was surprisingly tame, perhaps due to the fact that quite a number of people around us were strung out on weed. The puff of smoke you see in the image is probably someone blowing out a cloud of happy smoke.



Kanye West was the opening act which we were fortunate enough to miss due to the rather late arrival of my cousin who was holding our tickets. Apparently we didn't miss much, guess I'm just not into the hip hop, r & b, whatever he was playing.



A RAAF P-3C Orion graced the occasion with an impromptu fly by. The aviation buff in me had to take a snap of it though the compact camera I was restricted to using did not really do it justice. I think only myself and 10 others in the crowd of 60,000 noticed when it started flashing its landing lights when directly overhead. This concert was a historic event for Adelaide, apparently it's the largest ever held in South Australia.



The cascading backdrop which dominated the stage was approximately 100 feet high and about 120 feet wide. The 12,000 individual LED spheres reproduce moving images and were a sight to behold, especially when up close, it could literally turn any venue into a city of blinding lights.



I'm not exactly a regular concert goer, my last rock concert I attended was Richard Marx (that was a strange time in my life, don't ask) at the National Stadium back in the 1980s! Was a little apprehensive about our choice of tickets but it worked out pretty good in the end. We had opted for the general admission tickets which let us stand anywhere in the field of the stadium and we ended up only about 50 feet or so from the extended stage, not bad for getting in after the concert started! Here's Bono and The Edge doing their thing.



I thought the Coexist logo was cleverly done, let's see if peace ambassador Bono gets anywhere with it. Interestingly enough, there's some controversy surrounding the use of the symbol.



Like I mentioned earlier, I could only sneak in a compact camera which I had purchased specially for the trip. I wasn't real familiar with the use of it but decided to go ahead and do some short video clips with it. I honestly didn't have any high expectations of the results but was pleasantly surprised when I reviewed the clips. Anyways, this is a short compilation of my experience at the show, please excuse the shaky hands, unlevel horizon and freaky panning, I'm no James Cameron. I spent about 2 hours editing it so the least you could do is hit the play button! Mrs Sanguine can be heard mouthing off the words to With or Without You, the last segment of the clip. I think the new beat the band played destroyed what is probably my favorite U2 song. Enjoy...

Labels: Events, Music, Travel

Singapore Dance Theatre's Ballet Under the Stars was tonight's excuse for an evening of wine and home-cooked goodies with the pals.




The girls went a little overboard with the food, bringing too much of everything - hotdogs, pasta, potato salad, dip and desserts – and the lithe bodies of the prancing dancers on stage did little to stem our gorging. There's a little Martha Stewart in them all, but V displayed the true flair of an Asian domestic goddess when she whipped out her 1-litre pump bottle of hand sanitiser.




This latest instalment of the company's outdoor dance event features New Choreographic Works as it's theme, and we thought the cast did an excellent job. Even the little kids stopped their copycat twirling to watch.






Dying Swan, choreographed by Thierry Malandain, was our favourite dance. Ballerinas Zhou Lin and Sakura Shimizu, playing the second and third swans, made the strongest impression on Mrs Sanguine and I. They were a study in power and grace.






This latest ballet by the Lion City troupe is more than an excuse to go out picnicking. There will be three more performances from July 28 to 30 and if they dance then as well as they did tonight, they'll make every bit of your S$18 ticket money well spent.

Labels: Art, Events

I do have to apologise for neglecting the blog for so long. It's inexcusable but I am having a very busy month with loads of exciting things going on in my life. The past few weeks have been consumed by preparations for an upcoming exhibition of my images from the Calcutta Rescue photo documentary. It's been an eye opening experience working on my first solo exhibition, being involved in the entire preparation and execution process has been a challenging but rewarding experience. Been learning a great deal about what it takes to set up a show. We'll see how it goes through as it only opens next week when Month of Photography '06 kicks off. If you'll like to visit, click on the MoP graphic for more information. I'm showing under the Out of Focus segment.


I hope to be more regular with the updates on the blog once this period is over. Still got the pictures from my European trip in April to put up, even the wife hasn't seen them!

Labels: Events