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Crossing the cultural bridge

Ever wanted to see what goes on in a production line?

Well, the interns at the Culture and Education Department got a taste of what it was like, having to pack envelope after envelope of pamphlets and booklets for the World Cultural Village Brief which was held at Republic Poly last Thursday, 9 April.

Factory Line

Wondering where all this hard work goes to?

See what it was like when  Siglap Secondary, St. Joseph Convent and Bukit Panjang High showed us what they learnt about their twinned country.

Singapore meets other countries

Spongebob move over: Here comes Blobby!

Blobby makes an appearance along Orchard Road

View full flickr set here. (51 photos)

Have you met Blobby?

He is SYOGOC’s newest face for the CAN! Festivals. He made his first appearance along Orchard Road on Sat and Sun and he either scared the guts out of the unsuspecting shoppers or became their new best friends.

CAN! Discover, the first of the quarterly CAN! Festivals, will be starting on 18 April at SCAPE and you’ll be seeing much more of Blobby then!

Click here to find out more about CAN!

Find out more about CAN! Discover

Still in Europe!

Judging by deed count, the world is becoming a nicer place to live in.

Numbers of good deeds posted on the Million Deeds Challenge web portal are increasing steadily since its launch, and so are the number of visitors.

Over the past week,

there have been 4164 total deeds posted (that’s almost 3 times the previous week!),

10,301 visits to the page,

and visitors from 69 countries the world over!

The Million Deeds Challenge aims to educate youths on the three Olympic Values of Excellence, Respect, and Friendship, and celebrate the spirit of Olympism,

Like how these girls have learnt in school here.

So, please don’t spam and post silly “deeds” like, “I help my mother beat up my sister” or “I kill my friend”. They’re actually pretty horrible to read.

The Million Deeds challenge is not a chat room either, by the way.

Right now, the virtual Olympic Torch has been through Romania, and is about to cross over to Hungary. There’s still a long way before the torch leaves Europe, so keep those good deeds coming in!

Even schools are getting their students to take part, like this one.

Million Deeds Challenge Highlights

If you spot your face in the video, leave a comment!

CAN! Discover

Coming your way…18 APRIL

Learn anew at Beacon Primary School

Beacon Primary School is TWO this year! It is the first primary school to be part of the FutureSchools@SG programme.

The FutureSchools@SG programme is an initiative by Ministry of Education (MOE) and Infocomm Development Authority (IDA). The objective of the programme is to harness the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Interactive Digital Media (IDM) for learning.

I was at Beacon to find out how the school is making use of ICT and IDM. I wasn’t sure what to expect since I have been away from primary school for donkey a few years. As we entered the class we were greeted with ” Goo…Good..Morning… Mdms and Sirs!” Oh gosh I felt so old. Never mind the age, but the kids love me… or my camera?

Each of us was brought around by a little guide. This is Freda (on the right). 8-year-old Freda’s favourite subject is Mother Tongue and she enjoys using her notebook PC to learn the subject.

YOG TORCH burns in 6 cities

For every Olympic Games, the torch is always a highlight. (pun intended)

Since there’s a first for everything when it comes to the Youth Olympic Games in 2010, the YOG torch will not be doing the same relay routine. It will be traveling to 1 city from each of the  5 continents before touching down in host city,  Singapore.

The Celebration Culminates here

Once the torch reaches the shores of our tropical island, a relay will commence which will end at the Marina Bay Floating Platform. The Games’ cauldron will be lit and tada!… … … (you get the idea)

Read this:

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board (EB), at its meeting in Denver on Thursday night, approved a proposal by the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee (SYOGOC) for the YOG flame to be lit in Greece and travel to one city each in Africa, America, Asia, Europe and Oceania before arriving in Singapore.

Although youths will feature prominently in the torch’s journey to Singapore, adults, including former and active athletes, will also take part in the festivities.

At each city, the YOG flame will be welcomed in a celebration which will not only involve the host city, but also National Olympic Committees (NOCs) from the same continent.

(straitstimes.com)

Meet xxx

Meet xxx. Actually he still hasn’t got a name yet.

Who am I talking about? I was referring to the Asian Youth Games’ mascot! And what other animal to represent our lion city? No prizes for guessing that.

If you want to have a stake in his name, check this out.

Symbolising values of friendship, excellence and respect, the mascot for the June 29 to July 7 Games is still unnamed.

A name-the-mascot contest is being run jointly by The Straits Times and the AYG organising committee (Saygoc). The first contest coupon will appear in Friday’s edition of The Straits Times’ sports section.

Names should be original and not more than five words.

The contest begins on Friday and closes on March 27. Winners will be announced on April 15.

The launch of the mascot at Velocity on 19 March was a whole lot of fun. From hot babes, to graceful dancers, there was glitz and glamour no less. But when xxx appeared, he upped the cute factor!

Check out the photos.

He found new friends

View full flickr set (36 photos).

Be a millionaire – in terms of your deeds

It’s rare that I get to say the word million. But yesterday, we said it all day long.

That’s because we launched the Million Deeds Challenge yesterday! We were at the Jurong Regional Library Section at the Verging all Teens section (although some of us were not verging teens) and we had a happening time. (did I just use that word?!)

We created some noise in the library

View full flickr set (49 photos).

The ceremony was attended by our GOH, Ms Grace Fu, Senior Minister of State for National Development and Education and MP for Jurong GRC. What a tongue twister. As an emcee, I stumbled over it once. I’m so sorry! (eeks!)

The crowd had fun when students from Holy Innocents’ High School shared about how they practiced the Olympic Values of Excellence, Friendship and Respect  with simple deeds.

The Million Deeds Challenge is really about doing everyday things with a great spirit. Every deed you post on the website brings the virtual Youth Olympic Flame, deed by deed, from Greece to Singapore. You can be a Jetsetter! (a virtual one)

You can also go to Youth.sg to get a walkthrough of the Million Deeds  site.

Was it quiet in the library when we were there? Of course not.

There was hip hop group Will’s invasion, who wowed us with their rapping chops. Seriously, these guys are original and they sound like they can cut albums anytime soon.

TW rappers were also there to show some girl power. These girl rappers won the “I love my library” competition last year organized by NLB. Some lines I remember from their self composed rap? “Cos’ we taking over, one step at a time. Cos’ we’re taking over, one rule at a time.”

You can catch their videos at a later time this week.

Innova JC New Media Academy Camp – Visit to YOG Learning Centre

This morning, the YOG Learning Centre was packed with more than 230 secondary school students from all over Singapore. The YOG Learning Centre is one of the stops for today’s learning journey.

Students came armed with digital SLRs, video cameras, point and shoot cameras. They were eager to record their experience at the YOG Learning Centre, and also to take some great shoots for their new media projects. For a moment they looked like young photographers and journalists, snapping away at every opportunity they had.

View full flickr set (51 photos).

Innova JC New Media Academy Camp- Visit to Learning Centre

Fusion 2009

A few of us attended the opening ceremony of Fusion 2009 – Nanyang Polytechnic, School of Interactive and Digital Media Graduation Show yesterday.

The theme for this year was ‘Superheroes’. The ceremony kicked off with a ‘Supeheroes’ 3D animation and a video documentation which were two of the best works created by the batch of  students.

Although there were no actual Superheroes in the Auditorium last night , every graduate was armed with ‘super passion and skills’. They were all ready to set new heights in the Interactive Digital Media (IDM) industries.

We were wowed by their creative works. You can catch the graduation show at:

Nanyang Polytechnic Auditorium
Fri- Sat 6-7 March 2009
10am – 8pm

CLICK

Do you know you can click your way to the  Asian Youth Games (AYG) this year?

Your gateway to AYG

The Games will be held from 29 June-7 July and people from all over the globe can catch the action live at the Games’ official website.

This first-of-its-kind new media broadcasting nightmare/dream will offer four simultaneous live feeds, video on demand, news, interviews, reviews and information on the participating nations and athletes.

To help them, Singapore Sports Council (SSC) appointed World Sport Group and its partners Perform Group and Content Craft as the official website developer and web broadcaster.

90 events across the nine sports – aquatics, athletics, basketball, beach volleyball, bowling, football, sailing, shooting and table tennis -will feature 45 participating countries.

If you miss your daily dose of streaming, you can also catch a daily, half-hour highlights programme on television.

Those who will be glued to that half-hour slot on TV are 10 countries which do not have the necessary broadband capabilities. This includes North Korea, Bhutan and Mongolia.

First Official Exhibition Venue Partner

Our first Official Exhibition Venue Partner joined the SYOGOC family today.

Changi Exhibition Center (CEC) will be the logistics hub for Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games between April 2010 and March 2011.

It will house all furniture, fixture and equipment required for the Games, including sports competition equipment, audio-visual equipment, Information Technology (IT) and telecommunications systems and accessories, cables and systems as well as kitchen, medical and office equipment and supplies and so on. So many things. Now try to say that whole list from memory and in a single breath.

Traveling there from our office took about 45 minutes. I kind of dozed.

When I opened my eyes, we were greeted with a huge empty area surrounded by beautiful scenery. No, I was sure i was not in heaven.

Because, there it was, all 40,000 sqm fully air-conditioned indoor exhibition halls and another additional 100,000 sqm of open outdoor area. (No I didn’t measure it. It was on the brochure.)

Anyway, wow. This place was seriously amazing. Never did I see so much open space before. Well, it does make sense cos this place did play host to world’s premier events like Singapore Airshow 2008, Formula Drift Singapore, BMW 1 Series Driving Experience etc.

Check out the photos:

Shots of the day

Art Design Media students get Creative

Reported live from NTU

By YOG correspondent Vivien Wee:

ADM student presents his creation

Imagine crafting the sequence of events for the Opening Ceremony of the Singapore Youth Olympic Games (SYOG).

That is what the students from NTU’s School of Art, Design and Media (ADM) have to face in their Special Topics course, where the special topic this year is SYOG 2010.

The best part? Students don’t just sit in class and talk about SYOG, they actually talk to the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee (SYOGOC) to make their ideas happen, in reality, at the Games in 2010.

Students from the Olympics Character Design Class presented a mass variety of cute – grotesque – edgy – fanciful mascot ideas. (check out the photos!)

Work of Art.....design and media

Two teams from the Trick Film Lab Class screened short video trailers boasting their work with special effects – one video saw the use of depth perception tricks (ala LOTR hobbit style) so the people were the size of a basketball!

Finally, student groups under the Design Experiences class proposed their ideas of what would happen at the SYOG Opening Ceremony.

Architecture models were built, fantastic animated walk-through videos of the Youth Olympic Village grounds were shown and feedback given.

We need the clicks of your finger…

From the CAN team:

Following the success of the recent CAN! (Create. Action. Now!) event that reportedly saw some 10,000 youths creating action for the Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games (YOG) on the grounds of SMU on 10 January, the CAN! Team is looking forward to bringing youths more exciting events that will hype up the spirit of celebration for the upcoming YOG.

To help us fine-tune the programming aspects of our event, we seek your help in completing a short survey for us. Survey respondents will be kept anonymous, while the results will be used as a major source of feedback for the recent CAN! event, as well as other upcoming activities to celebrate the YOG.

CLICK HERE TO DO THE SURVEY!

Once again, thank you all for joining us at CAN!. We hope you enjoyed yourself as much as we did putting the event together for you. CAN! promises to bring you more updates on youth happenings for Singapore 2010!

Final installment of local artistes video

They support Singapore 2010. They performed at our Logo Launch CAN Party last month.

Check these up and coming talented music groups who will take over our country in years to come: MILUBING, Giants must Fall and Plain Sunset!

Get creative & spread the Singapore 2010 cheer : Join Innova JC’s New Media Academy

Innova Junior College, together with the Media Development Authority (MDA) and the Singapore Youth Olympic Games Organising Committee (SYOGOC) will like to invite all secondary schools to take part in sCene 3 2009. This year’s sCene3 supports the Media Fiesta as well as Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games.

In the first component of the event- New Media Academy, secondary school students will be able to select from a range of training packages, catering to the following disciplines of New Media Arts:

Digital Filmmaking

Digital Broadcasting and Music design

Website & Graphics Design, Animation

Digital Photography

The second component – National New Media Challenge, is a chance to showcase your creativity through creating media-rich websites.

This is a great opportunity to gain skills that will stand you in good stead in an evolving new media environment, and a once-in-a-lifetime chance to participate and contribute to the first Youth Olympic Games.

Are you ready for the challenge? Check out www.scene3.nma.sg to register now!

2014 Youth Olympic Games

The first Youth Olympic Games is not even here yet and guess what, people have been dying to bid for the 2nd Games already!

HOT off IOC press:

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) today announced that six National Olympic Committees (NOCs) have submitted applications to host the 2nd Summer Youth Olympic Games in 2014. They are, in alphabetical order: China, Indonesia, Mexico, Morocco, Poland and Turkey.

A number of NOCs requested additional time to designate the city they wish to put forward as Candidate City.

The IOC has extended the deadline for these NOCs to submit the name of their cities to 1 April 2009. As of today, Jakarta 2014 (Indonesia), Nanjing 2014 (China) and Poznan 2014 (Poland) have already been confirmed.

For one, the names sound exciting and unique! Poznan…wow… reminds me of the James Bond ad where the guy says, “Mr Poznan?” If anyone knows what I’m talking about…yay!

If not, here’s a link for you to find out more about the bid.

Oh I found the video. Enjoy Mr Poznan/Bosnan!

Jack & Rai

Jack and Rai. Double duo. Local Batman and Robin. They have been making the airwaves and building a base of loyal fans.

We catch them after they perform at the CAN Party.They also tell us what sport and getup they’d prefer…if they were forced to play sports 😉