May 09, 2010

soya sauce chicken

While reading this post I realized that I have not eaten soya sauce chicken for quite a long time already. Usually I eat plain white chicken. I also didn't know there are two Chew Kee Stalls at Upper Cross Street. I only know the one at No. 8 whose lady boss is a Cantonese opera enthusiast.

I also remember seeing one soya sauce chicken stall at the food centre at Chinatown Complex. I decided to eat the chicken at this stall. So I went there one evening. It was quite early and there were only six people queuing at the stall. It is self-service. So I joined the queue and waited for about 10 minutes. During this time, the pint-sized skinny woman assistant helping at the counter looked a bit clumsy.

First, a customer had filled a tiny receptacle with soya sauce and placed it on a tray. Somehow the assistant knocked the tray and spilled the soya sauce onto the tray. Another time she put a bowl of soup quite hard on the counter and some soup splashed onto the counter.

This is the stall : Hong Kong Soya Sauce Chicken Rice & Noodle #02-127 Chinatown Complex


The chicken is tender and tasty but not outstanding. Anyway I am not much of a chicken connoisseur.
Another thing, like many stalls they give you those disposable chopsticks and spoons. The spoon is small and the material is very thin, so it bends easily. It doesn't give you a good feel drinking from it.


I have mentioned this stall in a post somewhere because of its unusual name. The name has nothing to do with what it sells - fish-ball noodles. It is just a few steps away from the soya sauce chicken stall.

May 06, 2010

十二欄杆十二釵 Beauty or Ghost

十二欄杆十二釵 - I know of this title but I have not seen the opera before. I searched a bit and found that there was a movie by this name. The leading stars were Yam Kim Fai and Nam Hong.


Here is the story:

十二欄杆十二釵故事講述石東師是專為朝廷訓練十二女歌舞金釵的專師﹐一日王公府欽差大人到來沉香別苑觀看﹐眼見十二金釵皆為美女﹐於是動起色心﹐圖據為己有。石東師不單不從﹐反被打死﹐但欽差大人也顧忌石東師於朝廷訓練歌姬的兒子石竹亭﹐所以冒石東師寫來家書﹐要兒子速回﹐計劃斬草除根。誰知石竹亭數月前 ﹐身染疾病已死﹐家書來到另一宮廷教習司馬雲風 (任劍輝) 手中﹐雲風覺得事有蹺蹊﹐於是到訪沉香別苑。不料得到石東師的死訊﹐家僕祝桃 (梁醒波) 欲言又止似有隱衷﹐而且是夜在青雲塔見一女鬼憑欄凝望﹐加上碰到 11 女鬼在後園哉歌哉舞﹐覺得事更可疑。後來司馬雲風夜探青雲塔﹐偶遇柳飄翠 (南紅) ﹐才洞悉一切﹐11 金釵已歸順王公欽差﹐唯有飄翠不從﹐於是雲風通知深交陳蓄王 (蕭仲坤) 派兵來救﹐拿捕王府欽差人等﹐沉香別苑從此再次太平﹐12 釵女也可繼續歌舞昇平。

電影拍攝於 1964 年﹐同時由百代唱片出版原聲帶唱片。90 年代﹐EMI曾出版CD﹐2005 年就再次出版復刻版CD。

I also found videos of this opera by Leong Yew On and Ngai Wai Ying at Youtube. The person who uploaded them called it " twelve railings and twelve kanzashi ". Anyone knows what kanzashi is.

Last Sunday I watched an excerpt from this opera at Lee Foundation Theatre. It's English title is Beauty or Ghost which is appropriate if you look at the story. It was performed by Chan Mei Yin and Chan Mei Ling from the Kreta Ayer Community Club Cantonese Opera Group.



十二欄杆十二釵 - 梁耀安, 倪慧英

May 04, 2010

Cantonese opera appreciation night

at Lee Foundation Theatre. Below are the opera excerpts performed that night .....

牡丹亭驚夢 - 黃雯英, 钟慧玲


悲歌慟宋皇 - 洪清芳, 黃兆平


白龍關 - 郭廣麟, 何麗蓮



紅娘 - 李季樺, 麥麗亭



妒雨斷貞魂 - 陳淑樺, 黄安妮


十二欄杆十二釵 - 陳美燕, 陳美玲


May 01, 2010

Classic tunes of Sun Ma Si Zhen

新馬師曾經典名曲欣賞

胡不歸之哭墳, 萬惡滛為首, 啼笑姻緣

April 29, 2010

鳳燭燒殘淚未幹 - 鄧志駒



kid's photo

Found this kid's photo. How does he look like when he grew up? He is the man in the two pictures below. Do you see any likeness?



April 25, 2010

fortunate

Sometimes I read blogs belonging to youths. Occasionally they wrote about sumptuous feasts they had with friends at high-class eateries or lavish restaurants. There were photos of the dishes too. Aren't they fortunate? Singaporeans are rich, right?

During their grandparents' time, even eating chicken was rare - usually during festivals. For myself, I didn't eat at expensive restaurants with friends during my schooldays.


Singaporeans are richer now and our youths are fortunate in that they have more money to spend and are given more freedom but I believe they are more stressful than youths in their parents' time. Whether youths of today are better off or happier than those in other generations is hard to say because circumstances are different.

Here is a delicious-looking chicken to brighten up the post.


April 22, 2010

washing machine

Not long ago my washing machine conked out before it could finish the job it was doing. The clothes were not dried yet.

Do you know that wringing water out from the clothes needs a lot a strength, especially if there are more than a dozen pieces. I think housewives in olden days must have very strong hands and arms. They were wringing clothes for years and probably 365 days a year. I suppose they also had to lift water from the well and carry heavy pails of water.


About two decades ago, the washing machine was still not an indispensable item in the house. Some people were still washing clothes using their hands and with the help of a washing board or scrubbing board.


If you have not seen a washing board before, here is a picture of it and a girl showing you how to do the washing.


The picture is the header of this blog - http://moonlightnightsstarryskies.blogspot.com/.
(The blogger has changed the header picture when I visited today 23/04/10)

April 20, 2010

beautiful actresses of yesteryears

While looking for old movie flyers I came across some beautiful/sexy actresses of old Chinese movies (Mandarin, Cantonese and Hokkien). I don't know quite a number of them; neither have I seen their movies before. Nonetheless, from the photos they looked pretty enough. Below are some of them. I can remember the first four - they acted in Cantonese movies.

Lam Fung


Chan Chai Chung


Bai Lu Meng


Yu So Chow


Ting Lan

Chung Ching


Yu Chien


Tu Chuan


Grace Chang


Dianna Chang Chung Wen


Lan Ying Ying


Xia Moon


Han Ying


There are information and more photos at this site:
http://chinesecinemagoldenage.blogspot.com/search/label/actress

April 18, 2010

old movie posters

While looking for pictures of MPs of my constituency, I found some nice old Chinese movie flyers. Here are a few of them:

This movie was showing at the old Jubilee Cinema at North Bridge Road.


The cinemas were Happy (inside the Happy/Gay World Amusement Park), Grand (inside the New World Amusement Park) and ... I don't know the English name of the third cinema or where it was.


This flyer was not from Singapore.


The cinemas were Grand, Oriental (in Chinatown) ... I think the third cinema was called Globe but I don't know where it was.


Grand and Oriental



I don't know the English name of the cinema or its where-about.

April 16, 2010

MP

See the picture below. The man on the right is Professor Simon Tay, a lawyer and a former NCMP. Last week he was a guest in a news bulletin to give his view about the protest violence in Thailand. It struck me that from the side profile he looks like the Thai King.


So I looked for a photo of the Thai King with his side view. I found this - the Thai King in his younger days.


I also searched for photos of MPs for my constituency. I found only two - one past MP and the present MP.


This is the present MP, Mr Matthias Yeo.

April 04, 2010

The last day ...

of the Guangdong Cantonese Opera Troupe's performance in Singapore

The show on the last night was about Wang Zhao Jun, one of the four beauties of ancient China. At first I thought it was the same as the opera 昭君出塞 or 昭君公主. However, it was not the same although in the opera the scriptwriter uses the famous song
昭君出塞 which Mak Yook Ching sang very well. There was another nice song - Zhao Jun playing the pipa and singing a sorrowful song under the moonlit night and this attracted the attention of the emperor.

There was one thing that I find not convincing.

Huhanye, the ruler of the Xiongnu tribe, liked Zhao Jun and accepted her as his wife but Huhanye's brother was unconvinced that a Han girl could be the wife of the tribe's ruler. So he asked Zhao Jun to shoot an arrow with the bow. Zhao Jun did that and he was convinced and accepted her. It looks too simplistic.


But overall I find the show better than I had expected.

Below are some photos taken after the show and during interval. No video.

中国广东粤剧院二团莅新演出最後一晚 : 一曲琵琶动汉皇

Emperor & empress 皇帝, 皇后 - 梁耀安, 岑海雁


princess
公主 - 麦玉清


female make-up room 女化妝室


Palace maid 宮女 - 黃玉玲


Curtain call 謝幕


Group photo 合照

April 02, 2010

華山聖母, 洛水仙子

中国广东粤剧院二团 莅新演出

華山聖母


華山聖母 - 梁淑卿


洛水仙子在新加坡牛车水人民剧场



洛水情 - 麦玉清