The Hungry Ghost

 At the 15th day of the lunar calendar or in the month of July or August, the Chinese celebrate The Hungry Ghost festival. The festival itself is to pay respect to the deceased like a family member that has passed away or ancestors from many millennial ago that have deceased.
It is a first time for me to see such festival because this kind of religious practices is very uncommon in my country since the Chinese culture only influence a subtle portion of Indonesia's diversity. Yet, i don't see much of the festival since it mostly done during the night since i spend most of my time in class and at night i do my assignments in my room.
The first time i saw that there's a some kind of religious event going on is when i see the number of offerings on the side of the street. The red color of the offerings really caught my attention, sometimes when i was walking along the street and i saw them i stop and give some time to see them. Personally the red color of the offerings, the fruits and foods that's on the table doesn't give them a sense of remorse because they're being offered to the deceased. They give a more joyful feel of sharing, the feel of fortune and blessing that you could share your time to set up the offering and to give what you have to the spirit that's all around you.

We offer foods and many other items with good will in our mind to ask for the spirit's protection and also to create good bond with them, just like when we treat our distant family when they come for a visit. This spirit that surround us during this festival are called pretas. Pretas took form like a ghostly being that appears during this festival. Preta is a spirit that come to our world to seek food and drinks that are being offered by us so they no longer feel hungry or thirsty. 

In this festival there are many believes that swirl around this religious event. As an example to not to go out during the night because u might not be careful and step on the offerings that are placed at the side of the road and disturb the spirit that is eating the offering and then may bring you misfortune. There are many more things that people try to avoid during this month like going abroad or even going swimming, because they may feared that there are spirits that tries to harm them.

 In this festival the entertainment business is also a huge part of the event. There are 2 types of entertainment that are for the spirits and the people in the community also. Wayang and Getai are a part of this event's entertainment. The wayang are a human puppet show that plays drama from ancient stories mostly are being enjoyed by the older citizen. Wayang are more traditional form of entertainment that are being used since ancient time, it is the original entertainment in the festival. As the festival grew with time Getai appears and began to replace wayang. Getai is a live music show that attract more audience because they perform a more modern shows.

In the nutshell The Hungry Ghost festival is very lively and active it has morph to follow the passage of time. The many pieces of the festival such as offerings, the spirits, the superstitions and the entertainment play a big role to give more colors to this festival. Those small pieces make this festival seems like a fun and active and a very vibrant festival to be taking part in.

Building and Watch

Previously on last week

We made a conservation architecture for our selected country which is germany i forgot the building's name but it is originated from Germany and the other historical object that we decided to preserve is the only battleship that can launch torpedo in WW2 is the Bismarck Class battleship herself Bismarck. We have presented our creation and the presentation went off smoothly.

I could guess pretty much the country that the other groups were presenting since they gave out too many hints. Each of the group present a unique design that match the surrounding of the country location like their terrain, weather, job opportunities, tourist spot, etc.

After all of our presentation are done, the lecturer gave out handouts with the layout of a swatch watch like in the above picture. Then she told us to wrote our name on our own paper, after that she took away our paper and randomly distributed each of our class' mates paper so we have a paper with different name. I got Irene's paper and our task is to design a watch for the corresponding person with the name on the  paper.

I asked Irene what kind of watch she liked; she said she liked a simple watch design. I got confused on that because the explanation wasn't clear enough, and then she added that she like Brown the bear from LINE chat app.

I went on searching and find the kind of watch that's suitable for her. A watch that is not too childish and still simple yet elegant enough to wear. I want the metallic bits have rose gold color but sadly i don't have the right color because use my color pencil to give the watch color. I haven't asked what Irene thinks about my design but for me it's still a bit too childish.

Conservation

Previously we were ask to bring satay stick, string, scotch tape, and black trash bag. I have no idea what are we going to do next but as soon as class started the lecturer ask one of our group member to come to her and take a piece of paper and told us to make a building.

After that me and my group brainstormed about what are we going to make and with what material are we going to make it. I myself come up with several ideas like making a dome over the historical item that we're gonna preserve; but as we go along making a dome was too hard for us since we need to make curves. Later on we decided to make some kind of building that we found on the internet and decide that to be our conservation architecture.

Since most of our member are not good with our hands except for one of our member who majors in 3D; that's why we struggle a whole lot into shaping satay sticks into the figures we want. Me and 2 other girls having such a hard time and sometimes our pieces doesnt stick together even though we have put a lot of scotch tape; while the boys seemed to assemble the small pieces of satay sticks easily. Their end result is very clean and neat while ours is very messy and doesnt put up together well.

In the end we manage to finish everything together and we will present our project in the following week.

Architecture Design

Last week we couldn't do the presentation about the snail products because we don't have enough time. On the week 3 class we continued where we left of on week 2 and make a quick presentation about our products.

On this week assignment we were given task to walk around the city and look at many architecture of building. I find many interesting design with different cultural background. My favorite building is the church because i find that the church's design very calming and pleasing to look at especially if the design is very Gothic. I enjoy looking at many ornaments of the church. My other favorite building is the Chinese temple; the red colors of the temple really attract my attention. 
The small ornaments especially the dragon statues on top of the roof make this building seemed very bright and cheerful. A place of worship usually have a calming feeling and very peaceful; but not with this temple. This temple color and ornament gives the place a very bright and active feeling.
At the end of our walk around the city we returned to the class and presented about the architecture that we have seen.