Long post is long: Featuring Wena Poon, Mark Waid, Lat, Sonny Liew and Amanda T. Of science fiction, comics, children’s books, cabbages and kings.
Day 1 of Singapore Writers Festival… 24th October and Wena Poon sang karaoke in the morning. HAHA, okay not. It was a reading of the Biophilia Omnibus at 11am. Before hitting up the Arts House, I went to Spotlight at Plaza Singapura because they had a grand reopening after their renovation.
Wasn’t aunty enough to arrive there early to be the first 500 people to get the free goodie bags. Nonetheless, I checked out the Halloween section and went ooh since there was something I wanted to buy there… And left because I didn’t want to be late for the reading at the Arts House.
Nerwen, Raven Silvers and I went up the Blue room just in time but it seemed to have started by the time we got there. Well, the intros and such. We were actually… thirty minutes early but were waffling at the first floor because we didn’t know if the upstairs was open yet.
Silly, I know.
It’s cause the security guard or official was by the stairs looking kinda imposing and all. Meeeh. Anywho! We “snuck” in the Blue Room if you call sneaking in as busting into the room and finding chairs to sit then making up our minds that we wanted to be in the front because no one was sitting there. People are always somehow too shy to sit there for some reason.
The reading was cool, it didn’t feel like thirty plus minutes (I recorded it so that’s why I knew how long it was) and left you hanging in a “WHAT HAPPENS THEN?” way since the last sentence of the reading was at a duh duh DUHHH point. It was alright though… BECAUSE THE BOOK WAS SOLD AT THE FESTIVAL. HAHAHAHAHAHA.
If you ever get the chance, go to a Wena Poon reading because it’s so freaking un-boring. There’s book readings I’ve been to that enables me to go into a state of zen while contemplating about life or make me go “What am I doing here? On earth? Why am I here…?” etc etc.
Her readings are pretty interactive in a sense you can imagine it happening since she does accents and stuff like how the characters might say. Which you know, is totally cool since the only other ones who I’ve listened with “interactive” reading were by storytellers/performers/drama people. Here’s a tip for would be read-a-loud readers though, don’t read fast, take your time and good grief, don’t drone on!
Mind you, I’ll have to take my own advice and not freak out for any future readings of my own too anyway.
So, the morning was good since we got to listen to the story and then have our books signed and all.
Next up, Mark Waid’s panel at 1.30pm. Nerwen and Jo (she arrived after her class) instead went to the panel at 1pm for Outside Looking In: Imagining Lives with Miguel Syjuco and Wena Poon. Check their blogs for the “other side” since Raven Silvers and I went to Mark Waid’s.
A banana choco cake for me since I didn’t eat anything until the minor break after/before the talks. Earshot Cafe now has cakes!
Before the Mark Waid panel was Lat’s. Didn’t get to go since it would meant no breaks for us or something and besides, we could get to see him for autographs after the other talk he was going to be at that day.
They fitted monitors in front of the main rooms like the Chamber this time so we could see what was happening inside! Way useful for the volunteers to know if a session was finishing up too.
Considering Raven and I lined up fifteen or so minutes before it started, we were up in the front of the queue. Frankly, some people looked familliarish since it was totally a comic book thing and some of these guys go to the same comic store we go to.
Mark Waid, Terrence Chua (moderator) and Mister Bernard (the owner of G&B comic store) in the far right.
The talk itself was interesting since we got to know how he got into comics and if you really, really wanna somehow write comics and such, it’s always good to go to the events and meet the people or be a fanboy/girl and help out. Eventually, you’ll get connections and stuff to shove your foot in (provided you have talent too). After the talk, the autograph session was on.
As I said before, it’s a reverse balance line thing. If you got up first in the queue to see him up close for the panel, those who are last in line get to sit far away BUT once the session ends, they’re the first ones out the door and are able to be in the front. Thus, Raven and I were in the back.
This was next to us though and we gave narrow eyed looks upon it. Maybe in 2011, we’ll be allowed there or something. That’s sooo our goal for the next SWF. That and to get those funky limited edition cloth bags of the fest. In the meantime, someone passed a piece of paper to us while we were standing around, it was this:
Singapore Comics Wiki
The Wikipedia of Singapore comics: comics.storykitchen.com
Comics Community Singapore
Mailing list for comics-related news, events and discussions: groups.google.com/group/comics-creators-sg
Huh, well I’ll probably sign up later for the google group. Join it if you’re interested too.
And then a time warp occurred and we ended up in another dimension. A dimension of McD’s. Or okay, they had a cut off in the line because he had to go to the next panel with Lat and Sonny Liew, talking about comics and he was running late. It was okay though since it mean we could finally eat lunch and then get back to line up after that talk ended.
We ended up being first in line since we came before the talk finished and some of the people who wanted autographs were also inside listening to it. Hurray, hurray! Mission accomplished.
Lat! I read his stuff and my favourite in his series is Kampong Boy. It’s not that often I get to see him in any of the conventions and any artist things lately! He’s really nice by the way.
And Sonny Liew was next to him. He was being ridiculously cute though. I didn’t bring my Marvel’s Pride and Prejudice (Mr Darcy looks like a beefier Gambit)… or My Faith in Frankie… or pretty much a lot of his stuff that I have. It’s okay though since he appears in the local conventions here so that’s reassuring if I wanted his autograph. He talked a bit of Star Trek with Raven Silvers as he drew a little sketch on her copy of Liquid City and that increased his cute-ability.
Photos were taken (obviously) and things were signed, I said goodbye to the rest since I had to stick around until 6pm since I got invited to the first time writers and illustrators book launch organized by the Singapore Press Holdings.
Amanda’s kinda shy so I didn’t post up a picture of her. She wrote Morris Takes a Chance so if you see that book, buy it! It’s a children’s book about taking a chance to get what you want. Another book there that amused me was titled “Rochee, the friendly cockroach“.
The cockroach was freaking cute so I had to get it and the art was pretty. In fact all the books there at the launch had their own style with rather good stories for children. The author and the artist in the picture above had hand drawn ink on paper styled illustrations about a grandfather clock.
Anywho, luckily I got there rather early and had a seat since there were around 200 or so people made up of the supporters, friends and family of the authors and illustrators. Rather encouraging for these first timers indeed!
And then obligatory food pic because they were nice and had a buffet spread. Fish, prawn Har Kow and some stuffed tofu. And there you go, day 1 of it. Good grief, it’s like I stayed at the Arts House nearly as long as the volunteers there.
