Artsy Fartsy-World Music Festival Penang Island

So, Thursday was May Day and most parts of the world had the day off to celebrate the 8 hour work day. Of course, this is a little too close to communism for the good old red, white and blue, so I decided to celebrate my own way by taking a little time off and having my first art lesson with my little Bohemian Artists at Central Market in Kuala Lumpur.Here is a pic of my first lesson on how to draw on eye. My teacher is an incredible pastelist; I felt like karate kid. He made me draw 100 circles and shade them while he chain smoked cherry hand rolled cigarettes and watched and told me I needed to "become one with the graphite and the paper". Apparently I was lucky to have him as a teacher because he was just coming out of a vow of silence for 5 years.

Then this weekend I took off to the island of Penang for the World Music Festival which was a great experience. Penang is an early 16th century port where traders from Portugal coming from Goa used to come. It became a place for all traders following the Spice Trails to come together and I guess a perfect place for pirate raids. So, it is a historic town opening to the straits of Malacca in Northern Malaysia. I finally found my beer and then decided that its too hot to drink beer because I had a headache all day.

The festival was a wonderful time (http://www.penangworldmusicfestival.com/). Great production, great performers. I met some fun musicians from Kenya (Lake Victoria) called KENGE KENGE and spent time with them. Their performance was amazing and the music incredible. Overall the festival was great.

On Sunday, I headed to the butterfly garden. I forgot how amazing it is to feel the gentle touch of a butterfly on your skin. That was amazing combining my 2 favorite things: butterflies and orchids. Then I went and pampered myself at the beach. Sang show tunes with some gay manicurist from Singapore...all in all a good trip.

For more photos you can go to http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=406924&l=2d2d6&id=508474203