Asia Dance Channel

Multicultural Night

2 October 2009

UCTI/ APIIT

By Lim Sue Ying

University College of Technology and Innovation (UCTI) has once again organized its annual Multicultural Night as a platform to blend in all the cultures from different countries. Fascinating performances were choreographed and presented by students from 51 countries including Malaysia, Africa, Indonesia, China, India, Turkey, Mongolia, Korea, Thailand and etc.

It was indeed, as printed on the tagline - A night to be remembered, a night to shine and a night not to be forgotten. This prestigious event was attended by well over one thousand guests, who were mostly there to give support to their friends and family members who participated.

Multi-cultures of the night were presented through art, music, dance, and visibly, the traditional costumes. The guests came dressed in Cheongsam, Saree, Baju Melayu, and all. It was nice looking at all the different traditional outfits worn by the guests - some of the colours were vivid and sharp, and it created a total of collision of hues.

The promising night had a mixture of contemporary and traditional dance performances, besides singing, magic show and fashion show.

Dance elements of the night include Salsa, Classical Indian, Hip hop, Kenyan Dance, Yemen Dance and so forth.

Salsa was one of the most eye-catchy performances of the night; it was presented in pairs by six students. Salsa originally came from the Caribbean with influences from the Argentineans, Italian, Spanish and Cuban. The name “Salsa” is the Spanish word for sauce, thus it connotes a spicy flavor, or “hot”. This sizzling hot performance is sexier than rumba and is more intimate than cha-cha. The students danced with great passionately displaying their mastery for the dance form. And, the driving beat of the music made me want to move along. Great performance!

The Indian dance was presented by dancers with 10 years of dance experience. Bharata Natyam is a classical Indian dance, one of the oldest dance forms in India. The performance started with an opening prayer to the Hindu elephant-headed God, Ganesha - the remover of all obstacles. It was choreographed to classical Hindustani music and the rhythmic quickness matched by the equally fast moving feet. In some parts, we see gentle waits and arms movements. Overall, the whole performance was nimble and lively.

The biggest hit amongst the youngsters was the Hip Hop dance. The performance was simply dazzling. The choreography created a virtual train as the dancing platform. The B-boys performed stunts such as somersaults, head stands and head spins in the “train” when the journey started. The dancing stopped when the train reached its destination, creating the illusion of ‘dancing on the train.’

Traditional performances were featured next. The Dikir Barat was the most distinctive traditional performance that night. It was presented by the lecturers and staffs of UCTI. Dikir Barat is popular art form amongst the Siamese and Kelantanese. It is a musical form and is normally performed in a competitive singing setting. That evening, the performers sang Wau Bulan, a folk song sung to music that fused traditional and contemporary styles.

The night was an eye-opening experience for me. I got to see a lot of different cultures from almost all over the world, especially the fashion show which enriched me with different cultural attires and I was given a chance to witness the natural beauty of people from Mongolia, Philippines, Egypt, Russia, Kazakhstan, Nigeria and others, without having to travel to those countries.

Other unique cultural dances were the Kenyan dance, Yemen dance, Punjabi dance, Medley dance and Ngarojeng, a famous dance in the region of Jakarta.

Besides from cultural dances, I was amazed by performances such as choir singing, instrumental fusion performance, wu-shu demonstration by the emcee Tian Yan, Indie Rock music and a magic show.

Sponsors of the night were Golden Screen Cinema (GSC), Domino’s Pizza, LG, Momoe, Camp5, Parkson, Juice Magazine and AsiaDanceChannel.com.