《2023, a year to remember》

Name: VILAYPHONE VIDALACK
Nationality: Laos
University：Dalian Medical University

Around the end of April, on Saturday, first thing in the morning I checked my message which it was the same routine as everyone else. But this time it was different, I received a message from my lovely teacher, I was wondering why would she text me early on the weekend. Turns out she had a good activity that she would like me to attend which was a short-filming video for Dalian Locomotive & Rolling Stock co.Ltd, (CRRC). As recently there is a China(Kunming)-Lao(Vientiane) route officially opened to service. Therefore, the company were trying to promote this route by creating a short-film and want a Lao student to participate as one of the main actor of the film. The topic of this activity is called ”坐着火车看世界”. After I finished reading I texted her back I will definitely accept their offer. This was a time consuming project, I had to go back to Laos to film, which was an good opportunity for me to go back visit my parents for such a long time of being away from home. Which, I have to asked a leave from the hospital that I assigned to do the intern there and my university was very understandable about this activity.

I didn’t know that filming would be this hard. The camera man have to retake the same scene more than 5 times from different angles and focuses to get the best scene from each take. There were using many locations which are the Second affiliated hospital of Dalian Medical University, Dalian Medical University, their company construction area, Tram line 202, Laos’ Landmarks such as That Luang, Victory Gate(Patuxay), Sisageth Temple. Like I said it was a time consuming project. They have shown how dedicated their hard work through this project and we all had a good time together. I got to know more about Chinese community from them for example, when eating hotpot (火锅) you got to eat the meat first then vegetables later, which was really surprised me. In my community, we eat them all at the same time. On the other hand, I also portrayed my culture through the film and through them to understand deeply about my country history and food culture. When we were in Laos, me and another Chinese actress （艺琳）were got asked to have lunch with the locals while we were walking across them. I politely said no thank you. She was curious and asked me why they asked us to dine with them where we were strangers to them. I told her it was our culture for asking this type of conversation, they didn’t really intend us to go dine with them. It was for politeness and generosity to us. Another thing, I have also learned new knowledge about the train from them. How the head of the train were build, the different color to determine the new to old train, how the company instruct the number for each train and types of the train.

This project was about one month of preparation and filming. At first I thought to myself not to accepted this activity because I do not have a good acting skill. I have not once thought of doing acting through my entire life. Likewise, Even though you think you are uncapable of something, If you decided to just do it, you are already at half way to the victory. Through this, I have gained good companies, new connections and new skills. I would never forget about this opportunity that my university and the CRRC company had gave it to me. Like once wise men said ”If a window of opportunity appears, do not pull down the shade”. Finally, I would like to attached the short film link here just to indicate the dedication of this project.