An unlikely crew of super heroes
With the tagline “Fire Up Your Passion”, this year’s SHINE Youth Festival comprises a month-long extravaganza of activities geared towards getting youths to do their part for society. To contribute, they can pledge to SHINE at the festival itself, do it online, or find ways to “take action and lead ground-up initiatives that would benefit the community” (quoting from Lynette Lee, SHINE Youth Festival Steering Committee member).
Held at Ngee Ann City’s Civic Plaza yesterday, the SHINE festival boasted a series of youth-led social movements such as the ever popular Cosmo Youth Parade, Community Service Marathon’s “Walk for a Cause” featuring an 800 m long cloth dragon, Urban Sports Challenge and the Dell-Intel Youth Concert.
Its interesting to note how the event has grown compared to last year. For the concert, 24 year old twins Janice and Sonia of Jayesslee fame made a special appearance (unfortunately I couldn’t stay long enough to catch them), while a more elaborate mascot parade and greater variety of urban sport games drew youths to the carnival grounds.
Jayesslee covering Maroon 5’s Payphone
Thanks to Edelman and Omy.sg (official media), I had the chance to visit the opening show and practice my event photography skills yet again (remember last year?). Here are some highlights captured with my trusty Panasonic Lumix LX3.
Here’s a sample of the pledges from the youths, some of which are more serious than others.
A life-sized game of Jenga.
Can you spot the ball kicked by the guy in jeans?
I like this game of “sumo wrestling” amongst the young kids. At least it doesn’t injure them.
Two girls slugging it out while “Darth Vader” appears to be pointing his light sabre at somebody.
“Don’t worry about your safety civillians. We’re here to protect you!”
Venom, Spiderman and a superhero/supervillain in blue whose name completely eludes me.
These young boys played a rousing set of drums to kick off the Cosmo Youth Parade.
Distinguished guests preparing to cut the ribbon before the parade.
Do you recognise this elephant? Hint: his name rhymes with charity.
Did this lion “escape” from Universal Studios Singapore?
This guy in dreadlocks isn’t a typical Rastafarian.
More cool youths dressed like video game, anime and movie characters. The force is with them.
An environmentally friendly “dragon” made of recycled drink cans.
I’m guessing that these characters came from the Transformer movies, but I may be wrong.
Ivan Heng and his “queens” from La Cage Aux Folles made a guerrilla appearance and swooned the crowd. I don’t think this was planned by the organisers of SHINE. 🙂
A swirling and tumbling dragon dance performance.
The 800m long cloth dragon taking a breather after its walk.
Daniel Ong and another emcee kicked off the concert segment of the event.
The first item was put up by these four talented young boys singing various pop and hip-hop songs, complete with beatboxing and rapping.
This guy dressed as a manga warrior was probably the best-dressed cosplayer in the parade.
The official launch of SHINE graced by Mr Chan Chun Sing, Acting Minister of Community Development, Youth and Sports.
An energetic dance rowsed the crowd with their athletic and acrobatic moves.
NSF Clarence Liew wowed the crowd with his soulful singing.
At this point, I had to leave so I couldn’t get photos of Jack and Rai and Jayesslee (just use your imagination OK). Before I go, here’s wishing SHINE 2012 Festival every success in its mission of bringing out the best in our youth!
