“Resilience” is certainly word which resonates strongly in the history of 20th century Singapore. It is also a word that has become a buzzword recently.
The works of the students who have chosen this theme are moving and touching in how the young of this nation have found strength or inspiration within themselves and the people around them to retain a positive outlook throughout these challenging times.
Some of the works are a tribute to their family member who are frontline workers, some are tribute to those in industries who ensure that economic activities can continue, some are a tribute to simple acts of kindness and consistency in routine amidst the fast changing times and some are just a reminder of how oneself should keep strong and healthy during these times.
Resilience Gallery
This Resilience Gallery features two rooms: six pieces of manga and six pieces of caricature in the first and nine pieces of doodles in the the other. The artworks capture the different ideas of resilience. These pieces were created by over 80 students from 18 schools.
Hip Hop Dance : Freedom
Hip-Hop Dance Crew from Bukit Merah Secondary School
Music: Mashup of ‘Bored in the House’ by Curtis Roach and Tyga, ‘The Box’ by Roddy Ricch, and ‘Simple Funky’ by Rizky Ayuba
About Hip-Hop Dance Crew: Irfan, Pravin, and Zabiir
With the Circuit Breaker in place, students found themselves unable to meet up with friends to socialise and to have fun. As an inevitable result of being forced to stay at home, boredom set in for these boys. Hence, this group of students were thankful for the opportunity to participate in this programme which provided some interactive reprieve from their stay home routine. They shared that this experience provided them with a platform to learn and share TikTok dance movements, and express the freedom they felt in a creative manner.
Zabiir shared that he found it fun and interesting as he got to understand his friends better through the learning the dance which involved teamwork and hard work. Likewise, Pravin was glad to have enjoyed the process of learning something new and useful while spending quality time with his friends.
Last but not least, Irfan chipped in that he too was happy to learn a new dance movement and, like his group mates, recounted great memories with their dynamic teacher, Ridhwan.
K-pop Dance :
Thumbs Up
The Cool Cheetahs from Ahmad Ibrahim Primary School
Music: Thumbs Up by MOMOLAND
About The Cool Cheetahs from Ahmad Ibrahim Primary School: Michael, Priscilla, Yi Qi, and Xin Ning
“Your worth is not measured in LIKES or FOLLOWERS. Never let others determine who you are! — Celebration of self-love!” This dance group consists of 4 members and they call themself The Cool Cheetahs as that represents resilience! They want to be strong and cool like Cheetahs to overcome insecurity in life and to be confident to be who they are.
Hip Hop Dance :
High Hopes
RSC (YCK) Hip-Hop Dance Crew from Yio Chu Kang Primary and Guangyang Secondary School
Music: High Hopes by Panic! At The Disco
About RSC (YCK) Hip-Hop Dance Crew: Anson, Chandru, Erna, Jabez, Jayden, Kyson, Lateshaa, Mazlan, Pin Yan, Qisya, Shao Qing, and Talan (Yio Chu Kang Primary School) & Cher Boon, Ganesh, Kumar, Syolihin, and Turvijan (Guangyang Secondary School)
Says Chandru: “I think that being resilient means that you do not give up when times get tough! … I find this experience very interesting and fun as I get to learn how to dance!” Says Anson: “Resilience means to believe in what you do and to keep doing it even when its hard, I found that the class was quite challenging as I had never learnt dance before” These students at Raffles Student Care (YCK) were very pleased to participate in the #Engage2.0 programme. Across the four weeks, they looked forward to the Hip Hip dance lessons led by Afiqah and they thoroughly enjoyed the dance. Through the dance lessons, these students were able to unleash their creativity and learn more about the culture of Hip Hop. They also mentioned that the dance steps were very easy to understand and catch up to. Although their journey with Afiqah has come to an end, the students expressed joy in having found a new interest in dance.
Vocals : Fight Song
The Fi8ghters from Juying Secondary School
Music: Fight Song by Rachel Platten
About The Fi8ghters: Daniyal, Fang Feng, Htet Hlaing, Issac, Ming Yang, Wan, and Ze Hao
“We chose this song to sing along to because it encourages us to fight and stay strong especially during this CB period. Hence, in the end we decided – why not we encourage fellow Singaporeans instead of only ourselves? This is my fight song, take back my life song. This part of the song reminds us of the lives we led before CB began. Masks back then weren’t a need, we could come out whenever and wherever we wanted to and there was no need to scan any identifications before entering malls. So, we want to motivate fellow Singaporeans to stay strong and fight to have our lives back to before.“
K-pop Dance : Not Today
789 United
Music: Not Today by BTS
About 789 United: Asfadil, Cyrus, Daanish, Jacquez, Jerusha, Laarushan, Surfina, and Zhen Xuan
Under the theme of Resilience, the team relates to words like “diligence”, “honest” and “harmony”. They are dancing to a Kpop song by BTS called Not Today, which sings about how despite challenges we may face, we will survive and we will fight. In this video, it emulates elements from the Kpop music video of Not Today, depicting strength found in self, in the group and in helping others. Dancing to the energy of the music with their movements, 789 United hopes to share their strength through dance despite the current COVID-19 situation! This team of 8 from Marsiling Primary School came together in the start of May and decided on the team name “789 United” — “789” as inspired by the names of Kpop groups, while “United” to represent their unity as a team. The students have been helping each other to keep up with the choreography while working towards the video, piecing together different movements and sharing some of their own too!