Oddity Central |
- Finland’s Shouting Men’s Choir Will Make Your Ears Bleed
- Artist Recreates the World’s Most Famous Cities from Cardboard Boxes
- Conquer Your Fears in China’s Snake Village
| Finland’s Shouting Men’s Choir Will Make Your Ears Bleed Posted: 26 Feb 2013 04:24 AM PST Shouting is what some men do best. And when a group of such men get together, you can hardly expect to hear something musical. But that's what makes the Shouting Men's Choir in Oulu, northern Finland, so special. The men shout, and it becomes music. The choir consists of 30 men who generally dress in black suits for their performances. Most locals consider the choir to be a product of long nights in a town with little to do, the north-Finnish sense of humor that borders on the absurd, and of course, a steady supply of vodka. Mika Ronkainen, a local filmmaker, made a documentary film with the choir and its founder as the subject, called Mieskuoro Huutajat. That translates to Screaming Men. It was the first Finnish film to be accepted at the Sundance Festival, and also the first to get international distribution. I saw a short clip from the film on YouTube, in which Petri Sirvio, the founder and director of the Shouting Men's choir says that the best part of the group's performance is the element of surprise. "I trained them quite well," he says rather unabashedly. Their act is indeed surprising. When you look at all the 'men in black' standing in formation with somber expressions, you would expect them to break into something musical. But they open their mouths to release a quick shout, almost like a bark. It does cause a bit of a shock, no matter how prepared you think you are for it. Sirvio conducts the whole time, but somehow the experience isn't very orchestra-like. The Shouting Men's choir makes about 5 to 8 tours a year and want to someday get invited to perform at the White House. The group has been in existence for more than 20 years now. Some of the members are actually professional musicians, while others are just passionate about shouting. They perform a variety of pieces ranging from their own versions of national anthems to children's nursery rhymes, and one of their singles called Our Northern Native Land was a top-10 hit. Each performance is a heady mix of both discipline and abandon. Interestingly, shouting isn't much a part of Finnish tradition. Mika, who was in the choir for about 4 years himself, is very soft-spoken. He says, "I think there is more of a tradition of being quiet in Finland." According to Sirvio, "Here, physical presence is sufficient for sociability and you can speak if you have something to say." So he says that the shouting isn't an alternative to singing, but to saying nothing at all. He came up with the idea way back when he was a part of band and choir, and used to mix music for a local punk band called Sound of Oulu. "It was just an idea, very simple and easy," he says. "The concept was exactly as now; the musical part came later, but the look was there from the start." Six months later Sirvio advertised in the newspaper asking for men 'who wanted to scream' to come forward. 20 guys responded, and since then 170 men have been part of the choir. Only 4 of the original members are part of the current group.
Sirvio says that the Shouting Men's Choir is no different from a football team. The men are bonded in masculinity, wear the same uniform, and pursue the same program. So the choir in a way is a parody on male bonding activities like hunting, sport, or forming secret societies. This element of parody is, in fact, crucial to the choir. While its members come from diverse backgrounds and professions, it is more about anarchy than it is about democracy.
It's unusual, yes, but in order to truly appreciate the Shouting Men's choir, you've got to have an 'ear' for this kind of stuff, I guess. Finland’s Shouting Men’s Choir Will Make Your Ears Bleed was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
| Artist Recreates the World’s Most Famous Cities from Cardboard Boxes Posted: 26 Feb 2013 04:02 AM PST Using only corrugated cardboard boxes and glue, renowned English artist Chris Gilmour has managed to recreate some of the world’s most famous cityscapes in stunning detail. We first featured Chris Gilmour’s amazing cardboard sculptures back in 2009, but his latest project, titled “You can build anything when you put your mind to it“, is probably the most impressive one yet. The talented artist used common packaging boxes and glue to build models of some of the most iconic landmarks in the world, and did it all in record time. They say Rome wasn’t built in a day, but Gilmour managed to make a 40-foot-wide replica of London in just two days. Featuring the river Thames at the center, the fragile work of art also includes an intricate replica of Big Ben, a functional model of Tower Bridge and a rotating cardboard Big Eye. Part of an advertising campaign for the Bankers Box brand, the project also included incredibly detailed cardboard replicas of Paris and Berlin. "Creating the iconic landmarks from each city was a real challenge,” Gilmour said. "This is the largest project of its kind that I've undertaken. Thankfully the boxes were really easy to work with and build. The biggest challenge was placing the iconic sculptures in the correct place in each city to successfully convey the depth and size of the entire build.” But the artist says the amazing result of his hard work proves you can actually build anything if you put your mind to it. Make sure to check out the timelapse video of putting together cardboard-box London, at the bottom of the page.
Source: Daily Express Artist Recreates the World’s Most Famous Cities from Cardboard Boxes was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
| Conquer Your Fears in China’s Snake Village Posted: 26 Feb 2013 03:22 AM PST Nestled in the heart of a vast farmland in East China’s Zhejiang province, the small village of Zisiqiao has a pretty common look, but it hides a scary secret. The aptly names “snake village” is home to thousands of the most feared snaked species on Earth. Snakes are a vital ingredient in Chinese medicine, and are also widely used to make soup and wine believed to increase a person’s immunity. As the number one snake village in China, Zisiqiao breeds and sells over 3 million snakes per year, to satisfy the ever-increasing demand. The 160 snake-breeding families living here now boast an annual income of several thousands yuan, and in this Year of the Snake, a significant profit increase is expected. The once poor village of Zisiqiao is now the envy of similar rural communities, with some of the larger snake farms making tens of thousands of dollars from this lucrative business. Obviously, it’s not the easiest job in the world, and most breeders admit they have been bitten several time, even by deadly snakes, but the rewards are definitely worth the risk. Photo: Eugene Hoshiko/Oriental IC It might be known as China’s Snake village today, but until nearly three decades ago,Zisiqiao was just an ordinary rural settlement, where people had to make due with an average income of 100 yuan ($16). 62-year-old Yang Hongchang, nicknamed the Snake King, is credited for the community’s new found fortune. Forty years ago he worked as a farmer, as the only member of his poor family able to slave all day in the fields. Unfortunately, at one point he caught a spondylitis disease that caused excruciating pain in his waist. Despite the constant agony, he continued to work until he couldn’t even sleep from the pain. A doctor suggested he drink medicinal wine made from the red-banded snake, and since he could afford to buy the snake from the market, Yang decided to catch the slithering reptiles himself, in the mountains near the village. Miraculously, the snake wine actually cured his condition, but the snake catching experience got him thinking about the sustainability of Chinese medicine. Photo: Eugene Hoshiko/Oriental IC “I was thinking how we could sustain the industry if we continued catching wild snakes and put them in danger of extinction,” Hongchang said. So in 1985, he borrowed 10,000 yuan and started an unprecedented snake breeding experiment right in his backyard. It proved unsuccessful at first, but he kept trying, and in 1987, he managed to incubate about 30,000 snake eggs and sell the baby snakes for 80,000 yuan. It was a huge sum back then, and as the news spread in Zisiqiao, other families became inspired to invest in this dangerous but lucrative business. It was the beginning of a new age for the small Chinese village.
Originally, snake breeding was done just by putting males and females together, but after doing meticulous research, the residents of Zisiqiao have learned how to select the best females, provide them with an appropriate diet, and even how to incubate the eggs to increase survival rates. After the snakes are dried, they are usually shipped to medicine factories in China, but many products from Zisiqiao are exported to countries like Japan, United States or Germany. Conquer Your Fears in China’s Snake Village was originally posted at OddityCentral.com  |
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