Saturday afternoon, I followed my blog friend Vince to watch the bowling and sepak takraw events at Ayer Keroh. When he knew about our evening programme, he expressed the desire to join us. As a result, I had two "bodyguards" with me at Hang Jebat Stadium.
Outside the stadium was packed with vehicles at 7.30pm. Vince went there a bit earlier than us and managed to find a parking place. Ten minutes after we drove past him, we were still turning everywhere to look for an available slot. Thank God a car happened to go off. So we quickly occupied the empty space.
Inside the stadium was also crowded with people.
Nevertheless, it was not too difficult to find three free seats especially after we climbed to the higher floor.
According to the invitation card, the dress code was formal. Vince reminded me that we were going to suffer from heat with the crowd. Finally all the three of us simply put on T-shirts and we realised that most visitors were casually dressed as well.
The Chief Minister of Melaka and Youth and Sports Minister arrived in a vintage vehicle surrounded by trishaws which earlier had had a race among them.
These guests of honour were welcomed by some five thousand kompang players who were seated together. Next, dancers in colourful costumes came into the field covered by white plastic mat.
Being a Malaysian, I am ashamed to admit that I could only identify half of those flags representing the states of Malaysia.
Maybe due to lack of practice, a few of those carrying the alphabet letters took the wrong position and thus failed to display "SELAMAT DATANG KE SUKAN MALAYSIA XIII MELAKA 2010" correctly. Despite the spelling mistake, we Malaysians understood the welcome sentence perfectly.
The contingents led by their respective state mascots and the official mascot of SUKMA XIII marched in.
Only in this kind of situation, a cock could shake hands with a mouse deer or dance with a tiger without fear. I also remembered my close encounter with Tuah during the 10th International Convention of Melaka Twin Cities.
All of us were then entertained by a colourful musical performance, which highlighted Melaka’s rich historical
and cultural heritage.
It was the first time I witnessed such an event. As I had been out from my house since 9.30am and did not have time to get a rest, I fell asleep two times throughout the whole ceremony, once during speeches by the ministers and another time during the dance. However, when torch was being lit and the fireworks were being displayed, I was revived again to keep my eyes wide open for those wonderful moments.
Leaving the parking took us another half an hour. As it was already midnight, VC and I were not going for supper with Vince who had only eaten two small burgers for dinner. Thinking of the poor control of the heavy traffic at the stadium, I still hesitate to attend the closing ceremony tomorrow evening.
1 comment:
I also went to sukma with matthew, luke and daniel on Thursday night. The stadium was beautiful and grand.
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