Peregrinations

Ten or eleven Net places visited in the last two days searching out functioning Acrobat software. Nada. $9.99 buys you some kinda usage. But non!... Bugis, three or four of the Myanmar places at Peninsular Plaza, the Indians in Dunlop Street, Haji Lane and Geylang on the return. (Revisiting the kool tourist strip in the old former Arab quarter was a punishing ordeal—Acland & Brunswick Streets rolled into one for Melbournians. Young, affluent shisha smokers at the walk-way tables, knick-knack shops, candy-coloured fixed wheel bicycles as if from a comic strip, clothing boutiques &etc. Such blessed purity among the Malays in Geylang Serai these twenty nine months!) 

Resorted to a friend in an office to prepare the PDF for another submission, the last of 2-3 for the year. (Always reluctant to entrust anyone, no matter how usually reliable, with the responsibility.)

Cup of teh at the half-way mark with a Hari Krishna who had an interesting story to tell. Yanasagaran has traveled five continents using the well-established HK network—living cheap, odd jobs, venturing, hoping to find some way to complete a degree. 

The legally recorded name is the usual assigned approximation given by foreign authorities, in Tamil the Y being closer to the Latinate Ng. Near enough good enough for the official in British Malaya. 

             For Yana thee Australian venture came to an end when the aggressive Chinese at the Immigration gate at Fremantle questioned the regular entries and finally came upon a CV recording illegal work. 

             The Health shop at Golden Landmark—suggested by the shop assistant in the bicycle store in Haji Lane for a possible Net place—produced an interesting sale item in an old steel bucket sitting in the middle of the floor. 

             In a number of cities in Malaysia charcoal merchants traded out of old shop-houses, where the front room was given over to storage of the goods; small-scale production in a couple of places in Ipoh. 

             At Golden Landmark purchasers at the Health shop bought charcoal to absorb humidity in rooms and also radiation from televisions, the woman at the counter informed. 

             Difficult to transport on the bus for a trial.

             After dinner fruit was shared with Captain Rashid and Beechoo at the Labu Labi table. Before Bee arrived the Captain told of his trip out to Tan Tock Seng. 

             For a number of weeks Rashid had avoided appointments because of both the cost of services and also the fares out. Yesterday Rashid wheeled himself both out and back. 

             Roughly four hours each way. On the return he left at 1:44 PM and returned around half seven, tired and sore. A broken bone in his right forefinger didn’t help. 

             One commonly saw wheelchairs on the busy roads here. 

             The Captain reported a little run-in with a bus driver who pulled up beside him near a stop, opened the door of the bus and gave a "scolding". (Common usage hereabout. Cambridge educated Mr. LKY was recorded in a book recently using the same term to describe the reception he received in Geylang Serai at the time of the dismantling of the kampungsin the mid-60s.)

             Rashid showed the water in-take over the return journey. From here—top of the bottle; to here—a carefully measured inch from the bottom. (About 300ml.) 

             Rashid's 89 year old mother had wanted to come out in the morning to deliver cab-fare, but Rashid told her he couldn't wait. Rashid avoids accepting money from his mother. 

             While we sat last night a chap came over to wordlessly slip two folded tenners into Rashid's hand. An old seaman pal. Another old salt awaiting the completion of his new flat has kindly provided a bed for Rashid in the hotel beside L. L., the man and his wife in one room and Rashid sharing another with the teenage son. 

             For a couple of months after the release from hospital Rashid slept in his wheelie under the Labu Labi awning, one red plastic chair for the leg.)

             The Captain was lucky yesterday at the foot of the incline to the hospital. There was little foot traffic there and the gradient daunting. Yesterday a helpful pair of gals pushed the chair all the way to the top. 

             Rashid showed a second water bottle brought out from behind his back.

             — You know what this is for?

             The guess should have been simple.

             Fine for a wee Malay burung, Cap’n. (Bird in Malay; and Chinese equivalent. Strange to English speakers, despite the counterpart of cock.)

             Rashid ignored the lame joke. 

             With a paper—for funnel presumably—all well and good. For a resourceful sailor. 

             Rashid was pleased with himself.

             Currently the Captain was surviving on $340 per month for the three months it will take to process his CPF. Compensation from the accident will take longer. 

             Almost two years ago the accident occurred. Rashid was hospitalized eighteen months; the paperwork now lagging. 

             While we sat a drug-dealer in a bright Arsenal shirt approached the Captain with greetings. The fellow had been dangling the prospect of good dough to be made as a point man. A cripple in a wheelchair was perfect. 

             Rashid continued to resist. 

             As the motor accident occurred on Malaysian territory, compensation when it does arrive will be moderate of course. (Vietnam, from which Rashid had set out on his bike, would have been worse; and Thailand similar.) 

             The CPF will rescue Rashid from his current predicament. $51,000 is expected initially. After six months $4,000 per month until Rashid attains the age of sixty-two, when another lump sum will be released. Finally, should he live that long, the balance at sixty-five. 

             Paternalistic Singapore. Like many similar measures here, useful safeguards.

             The following morning the Captain needed to return to the hospital again. This time Rashid would opt for the bus. The effort and strain out at the hospital trialing prosthetics was enough to make a grown man cry. The doctors and therapists pressed on as they must, badgering and cajoling by turns. 

             The gel applied before the prosthetic was attached lasts how long? the Captain challenged. Not fifteen minutes: forty. Thereafter pain shooting into the shoulder.

             The plan was a return to Indonesia, where Rashid had lived for a number of years. With the money he will receive Rashid would be able to rent a house, hire car and driver.

             Otherwise an escape from the tedium of land-lubbing if a ship-owner could be convinced to take on a Captain with half of one leg and half a foot at the end of the other. Maybe.