I was lucky enough to be sponsored a seat for the Kota Kinabalu Cultural Extravaganza Show at UMS, and not just any ordinary seat, it was front row VVIP seats some more, courtesy of my aunt. It made all the difference to flash a RM200 ticket! Seven of us went, from L to R: grandma, Suzy, Sandra, Angeline, Aunt Jasmine and Emery Teeta..
The show opened with a medley of Malaysian Cultural dance, the Pangkulian Nabuluh, Ramatuo Rahaling and Igal-igal...
The international presentation started off with the Scottish dancers wearing sweat-shirts, checkered shirts and matching socks...
This group from Poland. It's difficult to imagine our dear JP2 doing the dance in costumes like this...
The Irish dancers with their big springy hair...
The Spanish Castanuelas, very sensual indeed... this couple did the tango I think, and another, the Salsa...
The flamenco...
A short break from international performances, presenting our Sabah's very own Adam with his pilak-pilak dancers...
The a gig from The City Shufflers -- I don't usually have good things to say about shufflers, I think they're very invasive people (in bars and pubs they always do the shuffle a foot too near to you, total annoyance), complete wannabes with not much things to do in life other than to shuffle real fast, wear out their soles and help a little bit in the local shoes industry.
But I have to say I was completely impressed with their performance that night, and completely taken over... Way to go City Shufflers (I may not like you in pubs and bars, but you guys rock on stage!)
These people are pretending to be spring-wound robots or string puppets or something like that...
But I have to say I was completely impressed with their performance that night, and completely taken over... Way to go City Shufflers (I may not like you in pubs and bars, but you guys rock on stage!)
These people are pretending to be spring-wound robots or string puppets or something like that...
And this guy was cool, he did the standing on one hand thing...
...and was turning around and around...
...and then he dropped to his head and still went round and round...
...with no sign of stopping he kept on going round, and then up to his hands again and did the stand still... totally cool...
Everyone was doing it, the Capoeira style stand-on-hand stance...
With his friends cheering him on...
Next a song from Marsha (also our very own) and Ajai.
The show continued with the Ukrainian Mazeppa acrobatic dancers doing somewhat a traditional form of street dance we just saw the City Shufflers did. They also had the dance-on-hand thingy, but their's wasn't so much a dance but like a "try to out-do me" show of acrobats.
The Maori War dancers Kahurangi started with a more sensual dance...
Then they did a dance, that supposedly helped them with their mosquito problems...
Another center of attention was this voluptuous guy doing some sleek sexy moves...
And of course, what's a Maori without his eyes terbeliak and friendly tongue sticking out...
The Safari Cats from Kenya...
I think the best international performance for the night was by Brasilian VIVA Brasil.
The Capoeira done in slowmo... nice...
And the favourite from the group, the Drums that looked like over-sized condensed milk-cans.
The finale by our local group, presenting kids in traditional costumes and stick-walking boys. They also did the all-time favourite gimmick -- shoot the balloon with a blow-pipe. H9 Sports Mode was able to capture the moment when the balloon burst... impressive!
Ei Sam, kau bah ni, kan?
Sabahan Warriors in their feathers, tree-bark vests and loin-cloths.
I took about 300+ pictures that night, but the winning shot is still this...
