When I attended a final ULBS course (to tablulate up all the marks) at ancient Hotel City Villa, fomerly known as Asia Hotel right smack in Kampung Batu ( the last Malay Village within a city), I discovered a very strange signage while going to my car in the old, old, old carpark (so old that it reminded me of the hotel in Cambodia...where everything was un refurbished and untouched.......
It read: To Sky Cinema......
This is the sign that disturbed me: Ke Panggung Sky.....on the wall of an abandoned staircase...
Everything looked so dreary and eerie, ....do I dare to check it out??????I FOLLOWED the arrow!!! I am so brave, but, wth, it is 1.30 in the afternoon, no ghosts will spook me right?
It really was a cinema, the Sky Cinema: in its heyday, it must have been frequented by Ah Bengs and Ah Lians......The First Class ticketing counter
The reserved class was for those who pak thor or dated....what they call 'making out' now?
I remembered when we were kids, we always looked at stills of coming shows "NEXT CHANGE"
We queued up to buy tickets at turnstiles like these!!!! I remembered in Batu Pahat, once, I realised that I had never had the experience of queueing up to buy movie tickets. So I went early and was No 1, and the ticket window was still closed. A crowd built up. Then it opened. And it happened. The crowd surged forward. I found myself pinned against the poles, my cheeks flattened on patterned ramps (I was very short). I could have died, trampled and with my last breath squeezed out of my lifeless body. I honestly did not know how I got out. I only know I did not manage to see that show. And that it was my first and last time buying tickets!!! My brother did all the buying for me after that!!!!
Picture, if you will, people milling around here, socialising and waiting for the next show to start, must have been quite a happening place!
Spine-chilling and sssssccccarryyyyyy now! So deserted!....Only the jaga napping on a canvas bed.
This staircase looked absolutely spooky and if it were not in the middle of the day I would have run for my life!!!
Stacks of old movie posters..all in chinese...must have a chinese cinema.."spring", "eastern....story"....Heavenly dreams.......I only know a smattering of Mandarin!!!!
Ironical title......Dreams in Heaven......now everything is but a dream
This marble floor tile must have been quite a novelty in those days...it looks well trodden , now Untrodden...If you are doing a project or thesis on old cinema, or even ghost story or indie, go to this place now, before it is demolished and flattened forever, like all those stand-alone cinema in town. This is appropriately named Sky Cinema, because it was situated on the top floor of a hotel, a good idea once upon a time ........Fast forward to the future: I will post a picture of GSC at Pavillion when I find the pic!!!
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