Confucius, Beckett, Fyodor, Will & Walt

The couple of old fuel-pump jockeys down the road here at the Servo usually looking bright and lively, up and about. Tonight they were unexpectedly caught in resting pose, one on a pair of stacked plastic chairs against the corner wall, his pal using a red witch's hat as a leaning post. The supervisor must have gone home early. A pair of 1.60cm fly-weights, thin and bald, baby-blue polos with yellow collars and camel cargo knickerbockers to ensure their safety from the cars running in for juice. At their age they're not going to be able to leap out of the way that's for sure. (No joke here. Crossing a side street anywhere on Geylang Road, any one of the dark Lorongs, you get warning toots from behind from the car rearing up for the turn and not wishing to be impeded by a foot-slogger. As a ped. who can't afford the registration for wheels here — about $1500 minimum per annum — you need to respect your betters and take fair warning, Get the fuck outta the way, I'm coming. Women, men, granddads, their own grandma, all of them they'd run over in order not to be impeded. In the dark they don't recognise an ang moh. Think you're an Indian or Bangla boy, especially from behind. If they knew how well you spoke English and thought you were from London, might be a different story. But given the circumstances you can't blame them really. They've worked hard for what they've got. It's very much a look-out for yourself place. You're a visitor.)
The old jockeys have been at their posts at the Esso pumps two or three months, not more. At maybe four dollars per hour — they're unlikely to get more than the illegals doing similar work — it's a nice touch of valeting for those who can afford wheels, registration and $2.10 per litre. The equivalent of the white-gloved car-park attendants even at mid-range hotels like the Carlton on Bras Basah Road. Once the turn into the drive is made immediately the lads are on the move, straight to the customer. Before the driver can get around to the tank the jockey is waiting. Evening sir. Fill 'er up? (Twenty year olds in collars and with car keys receive the honorific here from toothless granddads every hour of the day.) The jockeys wear gloves too come to think of it, a little grimed. In Singapore you don't see cars older than four or five years, taxis and commercial vans aside. Mirror-finish duco you don't want even your girlfriend tainting with her fingerprints. Let alone old codgers like these.
Marching up to Tasvee evenings the men at their stations in their colours stand like birds of augury. Over the distance from the footpath acknowledgement is not possible. Once or twice mornings before their shifts they have been caught at the tables opposite Malay Kampong at the lower end of Geylang Road, recognizable by the uniforms that have lost much of their luminosity without the night lights trained upon them.
Most nights the old Malay fellow who pedals barefoot from Joo Chiat Complex where he lives in the HDB on top comes past the Tasvee tables. There is a hint of Malay in his features leavening the predominant Han Chinese. One never sees the man conversing with a soul down at the base of the tower back there. At the benches he can often be seen near his locked bicycle, drawn by the wind-tunnel effect like the others from their heat-boxes upstairs. Often the man can be seen communing with himself, but not any of his fellows, sociable as are most of them. Provisionally: touched somewhat perhaps. It seems in the nicest possible way, judging by all the pleasant, smiling greetings over the term. Tonight again an earlier sighting at the Haig Road public benches beside the bus-stop. This is a way-station en route to his ultimate destination further up the road, whatever that may be. Even though Haig Road is only a couple of hundred metres from his block, likely the other misfits and vagrants there are most congenial. There too he doesn't speak with anyone. It's enough for him to sit in the midst of an accepting crowd. (You know the feeling yourself well enough.) Received the greeting warmly when it wasn't expected. Shouted back something he thought of ten secs. too late.
Here at Tasvee just now twenty minutes later he crept up unnoticed and managed to get in first. A little hoarse roar and a nice smile. These generous greetings from the elderly are particularly precious — more so one could say than even that from a pretty girl. The chap turns his wheels slowly. Time enough to point his finger over his shoulder back where we had both come from by our independent means. The finger then twirling in reference to his wheel-power. And one more indicator yet at his wrist, suggesting the good time we have made. The latter accompanied by the crumpled mouth and chin and nodding practiced by all the good silent-era comic masters. Well done indeed sir. Each to his own. See you soon back at the ranch.
Dozens and dozens of times the man has glided by there without the full picture emerging. Such has always been the concentration on the communication that the style of the man's pedaling had never been noticed properly until this night. No wonder there was such a leisurely air about him. No wonder he had the air of the floating cloud. For some reason best known to himself, the fellow goes along making only half revolutions of his pedals. Half turn. Return. And the same again. The toes are somehow wrapped around the pedals too. Traction in place of stirrups? Every right to travel howsoever one pleases under one's own steam and by one's own lights. Perhaps he had always had his rear light rigged this way too, unnoticed until now. Some kind of improvised mounting over the back wheel has shortened the space for his seat. If he has any seat at all, it's not much more than a reference point for his bottom, no comfort whatever. The rigging is for the purpose of a carrying cage, a cartage provision. Doesn't seem to have anything inside tonight. The thing must be for the markets around Geylang Serai. Who's going to lug everything in bags hanging off the handlebars for Buddha's or Allah's sake! On the upper corner prong of this rigging a small, white, more or less transparent, plastic supermarket bag has been carefully tied off. In the operation some air has been left inside the bag, perhaps on purpose, producing an odd bulbous effect, as if it might hold emergency liquid. Floating somehow there the glowing red tail-light possibly low on battery. Most of the bike-riders here have neither helmet or any light whatever. Might have been a crack-down lately. This chap now sweet.
The other younger fellow from down under the Complex at the lower end prefers the foot-slog. This chap has been slogging a mighty long while. It's in his physique. A ferret or whippet. Some part of it possibly lack of nutrition. Way he keeps his eyes peeled in the gutters a fair clue. A long thin birch he has cut for himself helps him along. The man is never without it. In Oz he'd have a dog, a kelpie. Nothing in it of any discernible value. A thin metre long stick such as ethnic mothers back home would pluck from trees in boyhood to beat errant children. Very much the same. This one has had its end bound in gaffer tape. Proven its worth, the chap grown attached. Lost without it. Like a divining rod in this man's hands. One evening directly opposite Tasvee, passing the corner Lorong there without the merest glance to the side where the China-girls stand in the shadows, the man had raised his staff into the air before him, nothing short of a perfect image of the conductor with his wand inside his inner music. Definitely Malay. Doubtless sleeping rough. Never seen with a fag in his mouth. Must be coin he's on the look-out for. Once or twice he's noticed the familiar mat sellah from the other end of Geylang, given a little choked smile and nod, head still mostly bent. Usually like the street-sweeps here, never raises the eyes. Just now the same in passing.
Last night came the first, imperfect sighting of the tee right here at the Tasvee table, sported by a mainlander going back up to his dorm. There had been an inclination to chase the man down in order to get the citation right. Two consecutive impulses came one after the other. Wasn't to be. In the face of all the other billboard tees proclaiming a standpoint, declaring an orientation, over more than eight months, here was the great old sage who bestrided this transplanted civilization, writ large and bold as the day. Yet as fate and ill-luck would seemingly have it, unable to be caught properly, precisely, so as to be sure. A missed opportunity indeed. Then, counter to all likelihood, after all this time reading these lesser, often puerile statements advertised on the streets and malls, buses and cafes, libraries and festive gatherings, the very same Confucius returned in another display less than 24 hours after the first. There was a message in this for certain. One could get superstitious under the influence of such occurrence. Two different men. Had they both been of the same race there might have been some dubiety. Not in this case. This second display arrived after dinner on Changi Road compliments of an Indian man. A clear case of cultural fusion. It was dark, but not that dark. The man passed one way bearing his pronouncement on his chest like a hair-shirt; a few minutes later rounded immediately behind the table. The tees, the first the night before worn by the Chinaman, and now this on the Indian, were of different colour too. Citation however unmistakably the same.
Have No Friends Not
Equal To Yourself
And the ascription, Confucius. (Google has since made clear the line is quite well known, in Asia and beyond.)
From the night before the prompt had teased the mind like no other over this long sojourn. Because the text had not been absolutely verified perhaps, the proposition hadn't rattled as sometimes these suggestions are prone to do. Here now one was asked to grapple more seriously.
Certainly one can sympathize with the old master. Know what he's on about. But isn't this far too hard-arse a position? For one thing, how much agency can be supposed in such and like matters? Quite likely elsewhere in the Analects the philosopher too had other insights arrive counter to this. This could not be the final word on the subject.
Another old wise head, this one from the Montenegrin hills, delivered the understanding at which people of her parts had arrived:
All Men Know All Things, it was held there.
The old ancient teacher would have accepted the truth of that too, and its implications. Lots of equivalent knowledge and insight out there. A trick to know how to balance it all, reconcile like and unlike. Those of the party of Sam, Fyodor, Will and Walt cannot subscribe to such hierarchies. This is a Confucius tailored by corporate business culture, beware you Singaporeans.

[NB. Late Feb. 2012 COE (Cert. Of Entitlement - equivalent to our car Registration back home) increased to $57k per ten year period; ie. $5,700 per annum. for 1600cc.

N.B. 2. Near the end of the collection in Analects a segment which might be taken as some part corrective and refinement to this earlier remark of Confucius's on friendship.
Book 19 Chapter 3.
The different opinions of Tsze-Hsiâ and Tsze-chang on the principles which should regulate our intercourse with others.

The disciples of Tsze-hsiâ asked Tsze-chang about the principles that should characterize mutual intercourse. Tsze-chang asked, "What does Tsze-hsiâ say on the subject?" They replied, "Tsze-hsiâ says: 'Associate with those who can advantage you. Put away from you those who cannot do so.'" Tsze-chang observed, "This is different from what I have learned. The superior man honors the talented and virtuous, and bears with all. He praises the good, and pities the incompetent. Am I possessed of great talents and virtue? -- who is there among men whom I will not bear with? Am I devoid of talents and virtue? -- men will put me away from them. What have we to do with the putting away of others?" Early March 2012]