Sichuan Opera: The Striking Face Change Technique - Bian Lian

Never in my mind or in any of my traveling plans that I have intention to watch a Chinese Opera before. Probably this opera thingy didn't interest me that much.

However, if you know me, my travel principle is to go or to do anything that I have never done before at least once. If I like it, I might do it again. If I don't, I probably won't be back.

This travel principle is actually the one thing that makes me wanna go anywhere and try a lot of different things that are different from my daily life. And it turns out that nothing was ever that disappointing. It turns out that in everything I see or to everywhere I go, there are always some things to learn, new perspectives to gain, and many people to learn from. This is the main reason why I love traveling.

Early this September, I had the chance to visit China. As this was my first time, it got me really excited and I began to research about the places and the things to do in the cities that I was gonna visit. I spent a lot of hours googling and google mapping and making a list of things to do like any other avid travelers do.

One of the things that were in my itinerary provided by the tour operator was to watch the Sichuan Opera "Face Change" or commonly known in Chinese language as Bian Lian in Chengdu City, the Capital of Sichuan Province of China.

Coming here, I didn't have any high expectation at all. So my plan was to watch a little bit of it to get a sense of what's going on in the show and only to experience a little bite of Sichuanese or Chinese cultures and then leave somewhere in the middle of the show.

The theatre was actually crowded and I observed that it was almost full house. Probably it's full of tourists like us and I believe many local tours bring foreigners to this show since this show provides English translation for its audiences.

When I arrived at my seat, the show was already started a couple minutes before. As the show went on, I saw a lot of dancing and opera singing in Chinese ways and also a lot of beautiful vibrant colors so typical of Chinese culture. I never thought I would enjoy the show that much. It was actually really cool and uhm, different, from my world. Here I got to taste what Chinese culture is all about. The beautiful girls dancing, the weird characters making jokes, and the intricate storytelling of Chinese history, these were just things I eventually love to see and observe.

The one and half hour show didn't bore me, completely different from my expectation. And my plan to leave in the middle of the show, I ended up didn't do it. I sat there watching and observing the performing arts full through. And thank God I could capture most parts of the show through my digital camera in pictures and videos that you can watch above and for me to rewatch again sometime in the future.

In conclusion, you might have many expectations about the things you haven't done before and the places you haven't been before, good or bad. However, one thing that I learn here is that when you have a bad expectation, expect that bad expectation to fail. Have a good attitude about it. You don't know what you haven't done before. Just face it and sit through it, then you will definitely learn something......

"Money is something that can come and go. But experience and knowledge are the two assets in life that nobody can take away from you, ever....."

Note: please enjoy the videos above..... I hope you like Sichuanese Opera "Face Change" as much as I do. :)