I'll bet you never saw THIS side of Calligraphy!

The Original Story

East Asian Calligraphy, otherwise known as 書法 (shū fǎ) is an ancient art form. It is a tradition originating from China, where it was developed. The tale is told of the praying mantis, a devout insect, who fell into an ink pot. He managed to climb out, but then as he was rushing off to safety, he was stepped on by a man wearing big shoes. The dude who was responsible looked down, and behold! He saw that the squashed mantis, in his death, had assumed the a pose which greatly resembled the word 書. He had an epiphany, realizing that black ink -- or any coloured ink, for that matter -- could be used for writing. (before that, the chinese had been carving on stone, writing on wax, etc. All time consuming process) He pioneered this brush art form and named it after the word that the poor mantis's body had formed in his death throes!

Believe it or not..

The Real Story

Ahh, the fond memories of slogging through calligraphy lessons during our primary school. We were tortured taught how to master using a piece of horse-hair-stuck-on-a-stick to form characters, albeit not as gracefully as our teachers hoped. Here are a few examples of the phrases they would shout out to us as we toiled..

"Hold your brush straight"

"Follow the proper steps to write the words"

"Don't let me catch you using LAN DUO BI (lazy pen)"

"YOU USE YOUR MOUTH TO WRITE AH? STOP TALKING"

"If you spill the ink, you will stay till tomorrow cleaning it up!"

and so on..

Little did they know that their teachings would have a profoud (if not desirable) effect on some of their students, particularly those who attended the 2009 STS fundraising dinner this year. At the said dinner, there were some calligraphy pieces on display, selling for RM500 each. The ex-students couldn't wait but to give their expert opinion on the works of art.

Sam and Dave: Deborah, come join us in our scholarly journey!

Deborah: Do I have to?

S&D: (Already heading towards exhibit #1)

Exhibit #1

Now, I'm not trying to say that I can do better, but.. come on..

This 上 needs to go on a diet or something, coz it's pretty chubby..

And what's with the bump on it's forehead.. hmm.. headbutt??

Ok moving on..

Exhibit #2

Well well, look who came to join the party..

I don't believe it! It's BATMAN!

Hmm, well it kinda looks like a cross between batman and joker.

Exhibit #3

There's nothing much to this one.

Just that if you were there, you would have noticed that the words were not going straight down, but kind of got crooked and veered off from their paths a little.

Exhibit #4

Ok, now i've got to complain. I mean, look at this:

I'm not much of a calligrapher, but then again, it's not much of a mountain.

Exhibit #5

When I saw this, I was like, WOW!!

No kidding, that's one BIG almond right there.

(note, it's as big as my thumb, which, if i'm not mistaken, is really quite big!)

Exhibit #6 (Exhibit of the night)

Now, for the Exhibit of the night~! I promise you, it's gonna be great.

Ladies and Gentlemen, featuring the winner of best calligraphy, I present to you..

Mr.迷姑鲁色 （Microsoft）!!

Look at how neat and straight the words are. There's no doubt about it, we have a clear winner right here. Hehe..

All in all, it was a fun night!

And that's all for this calligraphy special, folks. For those reading this on facebook, you'll need to go to my blog (samvun88.blogspot.com) to see the pictures.

Peace ya'll.