Teacher! Teacher!

Event Details

This event took place at Arcan, 106/2 Điện Biên Phủ, Phường 17, Bình Thạnh, Ho Chi Minh City, from 7 PM on 16 September 2018 until 5 AM on 17 September 2018, with the original location retained for archive accuracy even though the venue has since closed. Teacher! Teacher! brought a Sunday charity fundraiser to Arcan with a BBQ, raffle, pool party and ten hours of underground electronic music in support of Little Rose Warm Shelter.

The event approached fundraising with the deliberately playful attitude associated with several independent Saigon parties of the period. Instead of presenting a formal charity evening, Teacher! Teacher! turned Arcan into a badly behaved classroom where costumes, DJs, dancing, food and beer all contributed to the fundraiser.

Teachers had become an important part of Ho Chi Minh City’s expatriate community, and the event built its concept around classroom humour and a red-and-pink dress code. Guests familiar with Wild Wild Country would have understood the visual reference immediately, while everyone else was simply encouraged to arrive dressed for the occasion.

Anyone ignoring the suggested uniform could expect some friendly peer pressure to buy a red ILACN T-shirt for charity. The idea was not to create an exclusive dress policy but to use the theme as another way of raising money and getting the crowd involved.

Arcan became the classroom for the night, and the organisers issued their own set of rules for the pupils. Speak easily, dance freely and drink responsibly were the basic instructions, although drinking beer also had a direct connection with the fundraising effort.

Tê Tê donated all beer sales from the event to Little Rose Warm Shelter, turning each keg consumed into another contribution towards the charity. The original party description treated every emptied keg as another star earned by the students, keeping the school theme running through the fundraising itself.

The event took place in a residential area, so the organisers also reminded guests to respect the people living around Arcan. Participants leaving the club temporarily or heading outside were asked to keep noise to a minimum and remember that the surrounding neighbourhood was not part of the party.

The classroom rules became stricter later in the evening, with pupils warned not to arrive late after 10:45 PM. Anyone leaving for the toilet was also encouraged to return quickly and quietly, another humorous piece of school discipline that carried a serious request to reduce disturbance outside the venue.

Musically, the programme moved from Dub and Disco into House, Deep House and finally Techno as the event developed from evening BBQ into overnight rave. Krysalize, Abstraack, Talal, Goosebumps, Valy Mo and Yariuss each handled a different stage of the ten-hour programme.

Krysalize opened the event from 7 PM until 9 PM with a Dub selection while the earlier pool-party and BBQ atmosphere was still in place. Starting with slower and more spacious bass music allowed the evening to develop gradually rather than immediately pushing the room into full club intensity.

Abstraack followed from 9 PM until 11 PM with Disco and House. That two-hour section moved the event closer towards the dancefloor while retaining the warmer and more accessible character appropriate to the earlier part of the fundraiser.

Talal took over from 11 PM until 1 AM with Deep House. His slot marked the transition from the evening programme into the later club section, with the party becoming progressively deeper as Sunday moved into Monday morning.

Goosebumps then played back-to-back from 1 AM until 3 AM, moving the music from House towards Techno. Their combined set covered the central late-night period when the classroom concept had fully transformed into an underground rave.

Valy Mo and Yariuss closed the event together from 3 AM until 5 AM with Techno. The back-to-back format gave the final two hours a harder direction and carried the remaining pupils through to the end of class.

French producer Valy Mo was already familiar to audiences around Arcan through appearances at other independent electronic music events in Ho Chi Minh City. His work around this period moved between House, bass-driven club music and stronger electronic productions, making him suitable for the harder final section of the fundraiser.

Yaroslav Kuchin, known as Yariuss, had also become connected with Arcan and the wider local underground scene after returning to DJing following a lengthy break. His approach to House and Techno gave the closing back-to-back set another perspective while maintaining the late-night direction established by the programme.

The complete running order therefore allowed the music to increase in intensity across the night rather than placing similar DJs together from beginning to end. Dub introduced the evening, Disco and House developed the dancefloor, Deep House took the event beyond midnight, and House-to-Techno selections carried it into the final hours.

Tickets were initially priced at 100,000 VND and were distributed through several locations around Ho Chi Minh City. These included Union Jack’s at 130 Tôn Thất Đạm in District 1, TNR at 57 Đỗ Quang Đẩu in District 1 and Au Lac Do Brazil at 238 Pasteur in District 3.

The Opposite Bar at 35 Tống Hữu Định in Thảo Điền also sold tickets, while ILACN and ILA human-resources representatives provided another route for people connected with the teaching community. Door admission was later announced at 150,000 VND from 11:30 PM, encouraging supporters to obtain their charity tickets in advance.

The use of several ticket outlets reflected the community-led nature of the fundraiser and helped connect different parts of Ho Chi Minh City with the event. Rather than depending solely on online sales, the organisers used bars, restaurants and education networks already familiar to many of the people expected to attend.

The BBQ, raffle and pool-party elements also meant that Teacher! Teacher! was designed to work before the main overnight club programme began. Guests could arrive early, socialise and contribute to the charity before the musical direction became progressively heavier later in the evening.

Little Rose Warm Shelter was the central beneficiary throughout the event, with ticket activity, charity merchandise and Tê Tê beer sales all helping direct money towards the cause. The fundraiser used the existing social network around teachers, DJs, venues and independent nightlife to turn an ordinary Sunday gathering into a larger community event.

The emphasis on red and pink clothing, school rules and badly behaved pupils gave the fundraiser a recognisable identity without obscuring its charitable purpose. Humour helped bring people through the door, while the ticket sales, beer donations and other activities gave participation a practical fundraising outcome.

Arcan’s involvement also placed the event within a venue that was already hosting alternative electronic music and themed parties in Ho Chi Minh City. The long running time allowed the building to move from an early social setting into a late-night club environment without requiring the fundraiser to change locations.

Events such as Teacher! Teacher! form part of the wider history now documented through Scientific Sound Asia, alongside its events, radio station, DJ agency and music news sections. The archive preserves a period when independent venues, DJs, teachers, local businesses and community organisations regularly crossed paths through Ho Chi Minh City nightlife.

Although Arcan has since closed, retaining the address, running order, ticket outlets and charity information gives the event a proper historical record. Teacher! Teacher! brought Krysalize, Abstraack, Talal, Goosebumps, Valy Mo and Yariuss together for a fundraiser that moved from Sunday evening Dub and Disco to an early-morning Techno finish.

The night demonstrated that a charity event did not need to abandon the humour, music or unconventional character of Saigon’s underground scene to support a serious cause. With a classroom full of unruly pupils, donated beer sales, costumes, food and ten hours of music, Teacher! Teacher! turned a long Sunday at Arcan into a fundraiser for Little Rose Warm Shelter.