The Red Chair - published by NWWQ July21

As far as pavement barbers went this one was as good as any; for the Indians it was a twenty minute walk over to Guillemard. The night before there had been a queue and finally the wait was abandoned. A demanding Chinaman in the chair was wanting this, that and the other, making for a brief wait. In the second clan house further along one of the Taoist rituals was taking place, on the throne before the gods and devils a heavily tattooed former baddie-turned-savant rubber-stamping various documents and initialing others. Kids at the corner table helped themselves to soft drinks from the fridge; a couple of take-outs were delivered and the older man at the outdoor table opened four long-neck Carlsbergs, one for each of his pals. During the wait on the fussy Chinaman an unusual song was drifting across from further up the lorong. There were a group of youngsters in lableless clothes outside the last house in the row, with an acoustic guitar and some other kind of instrument. Five or six stood in the choir encouraging, We can, we can....something, something. Can we pray for you sir? the nosey parker in the panama was asked by a chap dealing leaflets. One of the girls of the group stepped forward. No money sir. Do you need a prayer?... Prayers would certainly not be amiss along that strip. There had been no revisiting the scenes in these lorongs the last number of years. Homelessness, beggary, the hunchbacked, deformed and amputees scrounging could be better endured than the trafficking of that quarter. Weekends the lorongs and side lanes along there off Geylang Road collected scores of girls and more in the brothels, young teens predominating. Pimps were regularly prosecuted for underage girls, without any semblance of change on the street. The barber that night had not been recalled—two or three men took shifts on that site—but the chap knew his regular well enough. Aodaliyaah? Aodaliya.... Ya, the great southern land; he had remembered. Understandably the man had been struck by the usage. As usual the working girls continued with very little hang-time. Viets, Cambodians and perhaps Filipinas, one or two trannies among the rest. On this second night there were far more girls and mainly Indian foreign workers customers. Pretty young girls without any need of smiling or enticement. Rapid negotiations, off up the spiral staircase or the old dilapidated house opposite, in and out. Of course whites were rare in the barber’s chair. Six-seven minutes for four dollars. It had been an early finish at the Cyber, well before ten. The street light was fair, but the Mainland construction labourers moonlighting wore bicycle lamps strapped to their foreheads. They used a narrow-blade machine and cut-throat for shaving; a gown was provided for clients. For brushing off a foam shammy was employed like car-washers used; broom for sweeping into the canal in front. Twenty metres down the gospel group continued; across the lorong the young lads followed behind the girls. Three or four girls were always waiting; it was very brisk. The stabbing moment that evening came when one of the young pimps returned to the corner of the canal opposite the lane, close by the chair. It may have been the cruising police car earlier that had sent the lad away. Here he was coming back to his post in a casual swagger. Seeing his approach, a young dark-haired girl suddenly leapt from the red plastic chair like the one the barber had commandeered and assumed her place over at the awning where her friends waited. A bolt of electricity could not have thrown her more violently. For the evening the shop’s awning had been half-raised and the girls slowly circled there showing their legs and curves. Sporting elaborate tattoos along his forearms and sharp red-tinted hair, the pimp took the seat. From the awning the lass bent forward to the young fellow with some witticism. HaHaHa. There was no answering laughter, though the pimp received the gambit well enough. It was OK, there was no need worry, there would be no anger. In the newspaper reports of prosecutions there were mentions of pimps trying out the girls at the outset in order to rate services. Customers enquired seemingly and a serious business needed to take its business seriously.