This short film is about how a clever crow used stone to fill up a bottle of water in order to quench his thirst on a hot day.  Another meaningful cartoon produced by the National Film of Malaysia.  Enjoy.

This is another short film produced by the National Film of Malaysia.  It is called, ‘Hikayat Sang Kancil Dan Buaya’, which means, The Tale of Sang Kancil (the clever mousedeer) And The Crocodiles.

And the tale goes…

On a sunny and peaceful day, a crocodile bathed in the river and ran after the butterfly.  Sang Kancil, the clever mousedeer, stopped by the river and noticed the tasty fruits that were on the trees on the other side of the river.  As she was trying to cross the river, a fish appeared to warn her about the presence of crocodiles and told her to beware.  Sang Kancil thanked the fish for his kind advice and she began to think of a way to cross the river safely.  And finally, she had an idea.

She approached the crocodile.  The crocodile was curious if she was afraid of him because he said crocodiles like to eat mousedeers.  She told him she was instructed by the Rich Man to count the number of crocodiles in the river because he is going to have a big feast (makan).  When the crocodiles heard the word ‘makan’, they all gathered as fast as lightning to let Sang Kancil count them.  However, Sang Kancil said that they have to line up in the river in order for her to make sure that no crocodiles were left behind.

The crocodiles did as told.  After Sang Kancil crossed the river, she told them the truth and the crocodiles went after the first crocodile that she had approached.  The crocodile got away but he said that Sang Kancil was going to get it from him some day.  As for Sang Kancil, luck was not always on her side though.  She was across the river now but all the fruits were eaten by the monkeys.

This short film sends out a few messages.

At the beginning, as the crocodile was enjoying the sun, he accidentally sat on a durian and hurt himself.  Then, he gave a reminder that we must throw rubbish in the bin and not anywhere we like.

And Sang Kancil reminds us about using wisdom to solve problems but she also portraits the consequences if we did not plan each step properly.

Hope that you will enjoy this short film too.

This is my favorite cartoon which was shown on TV more than 20 years ago.  The funniest part is where the monkey eats the chilies, and then he blows fire out of his ears and mouth because the chillies are too hot.

This is what the story is about.

Once in a beautiful and peaceful wood, there lived Sang Kancil, a very clever mousedeer with his best friend, Kura-kura, the tortoise.  One day, as the monkey was swinging happily in the wood, he saw an orchard full of delicious and juicy fruits.  The orchard belonged to Sang Kancil and Kura-kura and they worked hard every day.  All of a sudden, the greediness in the monkey surfaced and he thought of an idea.  He shouted “Tolong! Tolong!”, which means “Help! Help!” and pretended that he has not been eating for four days.  Sang Kancil and Kura-kura sympahtized him and told him that he could eat any fruits that he wanted from their orchard.  The monkey was extremely happy and excited.  He turned and saw a chili tree and said that he wanted to eat them.  However, Sang Kancil and Kura-kura warned him that those type of fruit cannot be eaten.  Despite their warning, the monkey went ahead and grab a whole bunch of chillies and gulped all of them down his throat.  Within seconds, smoke came out of his ears followed by fire from both his mouth and ears because the chillies were too hot!

The message that this story delivers is not to be too greedy and we should always consider good advices from our friends.

This short film is made by Filem Negara Malaysia (National Film of Malaysia) in the Malay language, hope that you will enjoy it.  It might bring up some old memories if you have watched it in the 1980’s.

One of the sentences that touched me the most was, “When parents are 100 years old, they will still worry and care about their children who are already 8o years old.”

While everyone was entertained by the sign language performance, we have learned something valuable in our lives.

Another important message from this stage drama, “we should not wait to be nice to our parents.”  A famous Chinese proverb said that - “The tree want to stop moving but the wind is not still, and a child want to care about the parents but they have gone.”  So, do not wait.

If you are a parent, I am sure you know the feeling when your son or daughter are studying, working or having a life abroad.

One of the most interesting part in the show was, there was a story about a lady who helped her son to take his bag, but her son always rejected her, and the lady was very sad.

Then one day, the son came back and found that his mother was not there anymore.

He screamed… …

He cried over the rocking chair, but everything was too late.  He has lost the chance to show his love to his mother.  How sad…  Do not  let this happen in your life.

Another story told that the parents will feel sad when the children have done something wrong.  I have learned that I should not do something which is not supposed to be done and it will hurt my parents.

If you missed this stage performance, do not miss it next time.  I am sure you will learn or revise many good values in life at the same time enjoy watching the beautiful music, dance and sign language performance.  I hope that they can have the stage drama in other languages as well besides Chinese.

It really touched many people’s hearts.  They ended the stage show with all the performers got up to the stage.  From their brochures, I know that they have about 120 people joined this event as the performers and volunteers.  It was really amazing.

The stage drama was started with the picture of a grateful lamb.  Do you know that the lamb kneel down when it drinks milk from its mother?  Even a lamb knows what filial is, how about us?  Another animal that represent filial is the bird, I have heard some stories saying that the birds will feed their mother when their mother gets old.

This stage drama is all about the value of “filial“.  It is the most important moral value taught by traditional Chinese teaching since thousands of years ago.

The drama began with how the mother suffers when she starts having a baby.  From the slides shown, it presented that “The suffering is merely the beginning.”

If I am not mistaken, this mother and daughter was reading “The Sutra of Filial Piety” (or translated directly from Chinese - The Deep Kindness of Parents & Difficulty in Repaying It).

You can read the English version of The Sutra of Filial Piety here.

There are 10 kindness that we owe our parents.

1.  Kindness of providing protection and care while the child is in the womb.

2.  Kindness of bearing suffering during the birth.

3.  Kindness of forgetting all the pain once the child has been born.

4.  Kindness of eating the bitter herself and saving the sweet for the child.

5.  Kindness of moving the child to a dry place and lying in the wet herself.

6.  Kindness of suckling the child at her breast, nourishing and bringing up the child.

7.  Kindness of washing away the unclean.

8.  Kindness of always thinking of the child when it has traveled far.

9.  Kindness of deep care and devotion.

10.  Kindness of ultimate pity and sympathy.

The member from TzuChi Kuching performed this meaningful drama using beautiful sign language.  They moved their hands all the time following the music and their actions are well synchronized.

Thanks to TzuChi, and I would like to share this great performance with those who missed it, and hopefully TzuChi can organize more stage drama on good values.

To be continued … …

ps:  One thing I like about the events was they did not invite some politicians or government ministers to give speech which is usually boring and time wasting, they started the evening session right away with a meaningful speech from a leader of TzuChi (an author of a book as well) with a meaningful and inspirational speech.