My house was the site of pure pandemonium barely half and hour ago. All because one Kelvin Tan (Chen Wei Lian) won a local reality singing competition on Ch U called Project Superstar. There was screaming, jumping, crying (almost... and yes you guessed it, it would be me) and the exchanging of hugs. I think the whole block (and the next block) could hear our screams of joy and jubilation.
Now, gentle reader (YESS...), you may wonder who this Kelvin guy is to get us all so excited. Well, I'll tell you a little about him. Better yet, I'll show you his picture as shown in the official Project Superstar website (thanks Blogger! Love this new photo feature)
Kelvin is no ordinary singer. He was born blind. And yet he posseses a voice so rich with emotion that it would move the hardest heart (ok so I'm exaggerating a bit but hey, who ever said blog entries were supposed to be objective?). In fact, the first time I saw him was not on TV with everyone else. In fact, I had the privilege of seeing him live and up close way back before he even joined the competition. It was many months ago and Jurong East MRT station. I was with Lixin coming down the escalator when I heard someone singing along with the plucking of a guitar. Looking down, I saw a huge crowd of people (this was the evening peak-hour at a major MRT interchange, mind you) just crowded around one guy and his guitar.
Now I don't know about you but I have never ever seen Singaporeans stop for anything other than free gifts (then again, they don't really stop, they actually break into a run and pity whoever is in their path!), not even to help other Singaporeans in distress (more on that in a later post). But this crowd of people were just standing there, completely still and entranced by the busker's voice. Before long, Lixin and myself found ourselves inching closer to hear his voice better and maybe catch a glimpse of the man producing such beautiful sounds.
The man we saw looked nothing like a superstar. He was clad in a t-shirt and bermudas, his hair was not combed. He was clutching his guitar and there was a box in front of him for donations. From the very beginning, I was struck by his simplicity and his earnestness in his singing. Besides, he had an EXCELLENT voice. A tad nasal but man, when he sings, you can just FEEL him emoting. I remember standing there and getting gosebumps. In fact, it may surprise you, gentle reader, but I very nearly cried. That's right.
ANYHOO. We stood there for about 15 minutes (heck, it felt like only 5) and wanted to stay longer but had other pressing commitments. So I walked over to him, and dropped all the money I had in my wallet into the box. He looked up for a while as he sensed my presence (sounds like Darth Vader) and he smiled his famous lopsided grin and said simply and quickly, "Thank you."
And so, gentle readers, this is why I very nearly cried again when they announced the results tonight. Because I was reminded of that time when he was just a busker, and I was just me, and he looked at me and said "Thank you".
Congrats, Kelvin. You deserved to win more than anyone else.
And I'm glad you did.