Kate and I were invited to the Chingay Parade and festival and it was our first time ever! We were of course excited and decided to be there early to join in the ra-ra (pre-show audience warm-up) before the show started. Before we go into the details, a little bit about the origin of Chingay…
The Chingay Parade had its roots as a street performance or masquerade started in the 1970s. Today, it has evolved and has become an international festival with audience from all over the world. Touted as the grandest streets and floats parade in Asia, the Chingay Parade boasts of dazzling displays of colours and multi-culturalism that Singapore offers.
The Chingay Parade has been held at the Pit-Building (the actual Pit building for formula one on the F1 calendar) for the past couple of years. It is primarily a street performance where audience are seated on both sides of a street as the performers and displays pass by. The performance would include street performers from all over the world. In addition, organisations in Singapore , both private and public companies or organisations, would also stage performanances that attracts the attention of the crowd. At the pit-building, more than 150,000 spectators can be seated.
As Kate and I begun to get seated at our Category 3 seats (costs about $25 dollars), we noticed 2 of Singapore’s most famous hosts – Gurmit Singh and Quan Yi Feng. It was exciting to see how they warmed up the crowd and entertained us, getting us all psyched up before the first performers arrived.
We were surprised by the first few acts whereby firecrackers (something banned in Singapore except at festivals such as this) and fireworks were used. Stilt walkers and performers from China held huge flags and balanced them superbly as they passed the audience. It was awesome!
The whole parade was filled with dazzling colours and wonderful floats. One of the 2 floats that caught our attention was the USS (Universal Studio Singapore) floats with all the characters such as Kung Fu Panda and the Madagascar Characters. The other float that caught our attention was the HDB (Housing and Development Board of Singapore – Provides public housing for all Singaporeans). This is because the float featured the latest public project that garnered design awards – Pinnacle@Duxton. Here are some of the highlights of the evening…
Of course, to round of the entire parade, what else but FIREWORKS!
Kate and I thoroughly enjoyed ourselves (as you may have heard from the screams of our video) and we were pleasantly surprised by how great and awesome a street performance can be. We formerly typified floats as boring as we see them drive pass during the parade season.
However, having come close to the performance, it actually brings us to see how much work the performers have put in and how much attention to detail have been placed into all the costumes and float designs. Impressive!
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We hope you’ll enjoy the Chingay Parade in Singapore this year!